Owner of top Darwin restaurant Pee Wee’s at the Point reveals extent of staffing crisis at his business

The owner of one of Darwin’s top restaurants has revealed he has turned away thousands of customers this dry season due to a staff shortage preventing his business from opening to capacity, with staff numbers down 30 per cent on a typical dry season.

AWARD-WINNING restaurant owner Simon Matthews says it has been a very long time since Darwin has had such a bumper tourist season.

However, the silver lining of having the full house sign out night after night is bitter sweet.

Mr Matthews, who owns Pee Wee’s at the Point, says he has had to refuse thousands of bookings because he cannot get the staff to enable him to increase the numbers of tables his popular restaurant can cope with.

“We are 30 per cent down on our normal dry season staffing numbers and demand is higher than it has ever been in the 20 years that I have been here,” he said.

“We could employ another 10 to 15 people, 40 hours a week, but there is just no one out there.

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“We are knocking back three times as much business as we are doing.

“And that is only because we do not have the staffing numbers to be able to cope and do the job properly.”

Mr Matthews refers to it as the perfect storm.

“We have never seen so many people wanting to make a booking,” he said.

“National visitors to Darwin is full-on at the moment and it is only going to increase.

“We are literally knocking back business hand over fist at the moment.

“We are not prepared to sacrifice our quality of service to try to squeeze more in.

“It would do more damage than good.

Pee Wee’s at the Point co-owners Simon Matthews and Lily Matthews. Picture: Justin Kennedy

“We always try to maintain the same level of service. We have a full kitchen, but we have not been able to get the number of front of house staff we need.”

Mr Matthews is a supporter of looking to overseas locations to bring in hospitality staff.

Hospitality NT has floated the idea of bringing in hospitality staff from our near neighbours to help solve the hospitality industry staffing crisis.

“I think as long as you do that safely and all quarantine guidelines are met I think that anybody you can bring in is a bonus for us now,” he said.