Cafe Society: Good-natured business has legs

A high-flier says his walking company is on the right track with a bold vision for new projects.

The Tasmanian Walking Company’s Rob Sherrard. Picture: NIKKI DAVIS-JONES

WHEN Virgin Australia co-founders Rob Sherrard and Brett Godfrey bought the Tasmanian Walking Company five years ago, the plan was to lavish some tender loving care on the nature tourism business then let it do its own thing.

After turning a $10 million seed investment into a billion-dollar aviation business, it would surely be a doddle for the high-fliers to lead an established walking company out of a post-GFC lag — and a bit of a feelgood mission, too, as they emerged from a high-polluting industry.

Soon after the pair bought the company in late 2013, though, the incoming Hodgman Liberal Government announced it was opening the state’s Wilderness World Heritage Area to more tourism developments.

The ramble became a scramble. And it hasn’t stopped.

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Buoyed by Three Capes Track success, the Government is on the hunt for the next iconic bushwalk, which it will back to a tune of $20 million.

Back in 2014, Rob and Brett realised they couldn’t let rival operators just walk in, so the entrepreneurs started pitching, too.

“We thought, hang on, we’d better have a look at this, because at the end of the day it’s a business,” says Rob, when we meet at The Glass House on Hobart’s Brooke Street Pier, where he berths his 27m yacht, the Pacific Huntress. The Tasmanian Walking Company runs four of the 12 Great Walks of Australia, and is best known for its upmarket guided multi-day walks at Cradle Mountain and Bay of Fires.

Through the expressions of interest process it has doubled its approved volume for the Overland Track experience; launched a bespoke Three Capes Track experience running alongside Parks and Wildlife Service’s hike and huts operation; and awaits submission outcomes for new multi-day walks at Frenchmans Cap in the West Coast and the Walls of Jerusalem in the highlands.

The latter pitch reflects a nascent shift in progressive nature tourism to incorporate private and reserved land, keeping infrastructure in protected areas to a minimum.

Having grown up in Northern Ireland and spent time rambling in Europe, Rob says he is open to discovering natural beauty anywhere.

“Great nature walks in Tasmania don’t need to be wholly in Wilderness World Heritage areas or National Parks. [Walls of Jerusalem] is a sacred area, I know, but we are trying to work out how we could do that. You would still walk into the Walls, but we are looking to stay outside the park.”

He asks why I’m smiling. It’s because he has just sketched a model similar to one former Greens Leader Bob Brown described in the first Cafe Society column.

Where Bob, on that occasion, spoke of regional towns providing a comfortable base for several day expeditions, Rob is committed to progressive journeys with a different camp each night. (That’s a vision, in turn, outlined in a strong iconic-walks submission by the Bob Brown Foundation for a 10-day tented camp walk in the Tarkine).

“People like that sense of journey,” says Rob.

“Would you really be wanting to go back to the same place every night in a bus?”

He hears the call for greater dispersal into regional towns to alleviate pressure on Hobart and key nature hotspots, but Rob says towns need more to offer Tourism Tasmania’s target markets.

“Friends of mine coming down and driving out [of Hobart] find they run out of quality very quickly,” he says.

“There’s lots of small businesses coming in, and there are some popular destinations, but I’d like to see more medium-sized ventures developing.”

He’s a fan of Pumphouse Point retreat at Lake St Clair, its lodge converted from an old Hydro facility.

He says its World Heritage zone site is neither here nor there to him; it’s the quality, scale and resounding success that interest him. Ditto for Barnbougle golf resort in the North East.

“I don’t know how we attract investors to do [more of] that,” he says.

“Brett and I have already put up our fair share. There are beautiful villages and towns that miss out.”

He says he “has reservations about turning Tasmania into a mass-tourism destination”.

Is that even on the cards? “Well, maybe. Is it or isn’t it? I don’t want us to become like the Gold Coast of the 1980s with an influx of people.”

He seems unperturbed by the scrutiny of environmental groups fiercely critical of the Government’s changes affecting the World Heritage Area, paying tribute to protesters’ enduring vigilance instead.

“I think environmental groups here have done a great job,” he says. “They won’t let anyone get away with anything here.”

Not without a fight, anyway. And who wants that when you can just take a hike instead?