Gold Coast restaurateurs feeling pinch from penalty rates despite packing in the festive diners

Sky-high staff penalty rates are putting a dampener on an otherwise cracker of a festive trading ­period for restaurateurs on one of Australia’s most popular tourist strips.

Londoner Connie Buckley working at Shuck restaurant at Main Beach, Gold Coast. Picture: Glen Norris

Sky-high staff penalty rates are putting a dampener on an otherwise cracker of a festive trading ­period for restaurateurs on one of Australia’s most popular tourist strips.

Despite recording some of their best trading days since the end of the Covid period, up to 40 per cent of eateries in the Tedder Avenue precinct at Main Beach on the Gold Coast did not deem it worthwhile to open over the Christmas-Boxing Day period due to penalty loading that would have forced them to pay even junior staff up to $72 an hour.

John Caz, owner of the popular Domanis restaurant, said despite having a packed restaurant on Boxing Day, he would have barely broke even.

“You have five people out the front and five out the back, that’s $500 an hour,” Mr Caz said. “But hospitality is hospitality and we are there to serve the customer.”

Mr Caz said he was all “booked out for New Year’s Eve and I didn’t even have to advertise”.

At nearby Shuck Restaurant, British working tourist Connie Buckley is one of the beneficiaries of penalty rates but said the beach and sun were equal attractions.

Shuck owner Scott Budgen said many more restaurants would open over the holidays if penalty rates were not so exorbitant.

“I was chock-a-block on ­Boxing Day and a lot of people would like to trade through but the penalty rates are too much,” Mr Budgen said.

Hot Shott cafe is enjoying bumper crowds. Picture: Glen Norris

The owner of one small eatery on Tedder Avenue said she closed before 6pm on Christmas Eve when the penalty rates kicked in and only reopened on Friday.

Many other smaller traders did the same even though they were guaranteed lots of customers if they did open.

Mr Caz said people also were restricting their spending due to cost-of-living pressures. “We are noticing that instead of that $100 bottle of wine they are going with the $30 variety,” he said.

However, other traders said that despite the cost-of-living crisis, some people were still spending up big on meals and accommodation.

Alex Marko, manager of Xenia at Main Beach, said it was looking like the best Christmas period for the Greek restaurant since Covid despite overall belt tightening.

“People will spend if it is quality,” he said. “I don’t want to jinx things but it’s looking good.”

Hot Shott cafe owner Phil Stefanovic said his eatery was consistently busy the whole year but at the moment he was “super busy”.

“It is hard to say if this will be our best year since Covid but things have become consistently better every year,” he said.

Mr Stefanovic said as well as a strong local customer base, many southerners from NSW and Victoria were loyal to the cafe.

“Some of them own units in nearby streets so whenever there is a public holiday in Victoria we are busy,” he said.

Xenia manager Alex Marko. Picture: Glen Norris

Bee Puaungjunda, the owner of Thai Eatery at Main Beach, said that while things were looking up for the new year it had been a relatively quiet Christmas period.

“Last year was better,” she said.

Experience Gold Coast head of visitor economy and corporate relations Rachel Hancock said the tourist city had enjoyed a great start to the Christmas/new year period with stunning weather attracting strong crowds, particularly from the drive markets of Brisbane and northern NSW.

Ms Hancock said overall hotel occupancy for New Year’s Day was sitting above 80 per cent slightly up on the same time last year, while the forward bookings for January remained strong, sitting around 5 per cent above the same period last year.

“We are expecting that trend to continue – particularly around the Australia Day public holiday and Lunar New Year,” she said.

“After the devastating storms and flooding that hit the Gold Coast this time last year, this is much-welcomed relief for our tourism sector.

“The opening of new precincts and attractions at our theme parks – the Wizard of Oz at Movie World, and Rivertown at Dreamworld – has also been a huge drawcard and a testament to the invest­ment Gold Coast attractions and hotels continue to make in driving the city’s visitor economy.”

She added that the region’s shopping centres such as Pacific Fair and Harbourtown both attracted bumper crowds as the Boxing Day sales kicked off, and the retail market was likely to remain strong across the weekend.

Originally published as Gold Coast restaurateurs feeling pinch from penalty rates despite packing in the festive diners