The number of newly-released Kiwi holidaymakers flocking to New Zealand’s 280 holiday parks in January this year hit the 1.7 million mark in January, the figure shy of the 1.8 million recorded in 2021 but equalling the 1.7 million figure reached in pre-COVID January 2020.
Thanking them for their patronage, Holiday Parks New Zealand (HPNZ) chief executive, Fergus Brown said the domestic visitors had helped keep hundreds of people working and many parks survive.
Echoing his contemporaries across the country’s accommodation and hospitality sector, Mr Brown said he was looking forward to the borders being reopened as soon as possible.
“One good January is not enough to support a business through the other 11 months,” he said.
“They (the parks) still desperately need international travellers who would traditionally visit through February-April, after New Zealanders have gone back to work and school”, he said, citing January 2019 figures which show of the 1.7 million guest nights recorded, 412,000 were international visitors.
Areas that did well in January were those close to major population bases and those that have loyal repeat visitors.
These included Coromandel, Bay of Plenty, Taupō, Hanmer Springs and Nelson Tasman.
“However, some regions such as the West Coast, Queenstown, Fiordland and Kaikōura continued to be severely impacted by the lack of international visitors,” Mr Brown said.
Pre COVID, holiday parks’ guest nights comprised 65 percent domestic and 35 percent international visitors, with many of the international visitors coming from Europe and Australia.
In the year ended 31 December 2021 holiday parks hosted 7.7 million guest nights nearly all of which were domestic guests.