How to save seaside businesses from being washed away by pandemic: Andrew Vine

That is the stark verdict of several independents who I’ve been in touch with.

Glorious weather over Easter would normally have seen Yorkshire’s seaside towns packed with visitors, and the traditional beginning of the peak months for the tourist industry off to a flying start.

But not this year, with the country in lockdown. No bookings at the hotels and guest houses, no shops open and currently no end in sight to the restrictions to slow the spread of coronavirus.

And as one guest house owner in Whitby put it to me, no future if this continues over the next couple of months.

For him, this has come at the worst possible time. He spent a lot over the winter on upgrading his property, and hoped for a good summer to cover the cost.

That doesn’t look likely as things stand. Fellow business owners in Scarborough and Bridlington are similarly pessimistic. Government packages of aid designed to get the country through this crisis are, of course, welcome, but there’s real fear that they won’t be enough.

These aren’t big operations with staff who can be furloughed, or able to take out loans that could land them with unsustainable levels of debt if the visitors aren’t back for months, but family businesses often operated by couples who make only a modest living as it is. The peak months from Easter to September sustain them for the rest of the year. Even in normal times, if the weather is poor and tourist numbers down, it can be touch and go whether they make ends meet.

But there’s been nothing like this to contend with before, and it’s causing a depth of anxiety that at least one of the people I talked to worries will take a toll on his health.

All of us for whom Yorkshire’s coastline occupies a special place in our hearts ought to be deeply worried about what lies ahead. When this all ends, or at least subsides sufficiently to let everyday life start moving once more, the wheels of industry and commerce in and around our cities will start turning again.

Bigger companies with substantial resources behind them will have taken a hit, but they’ll get through.

It isn’t the same for the coast. Behind the carefree atmosphere so beloved of the visitors who throng the promenades and beaches there already lies a story of economic problems and deprivation.

In summer, our seaside towns might look as if they are thriving, but a lot of businesses there are barely getting by, and the damage inflicted by the lockdown could prove too much for many.

The coast’s economy is a mosaic of small independent businesses, whether they be guest houses, cafes or shops and it’s fragile. Incomes are uncertain, and there is often not a lot of money in the bank to tide them over hard times. And besides the concern about how long the lockdown will last, eating away at the weeks and months on which their livelihoods depend, business owners tell me they worry what will happen when it is over.

Will visitors whose own household budgets have come under pressure because of wage cuts when employers shut down have any spare money to spend on enjoying themselves? However much they’d like to, are they going to be able to afford a few days’ accommodation and meals out? Or are their visits going to be day trips with the intention of spending as little as possible?

One way of addressing these fears is for all of us in Yorkshire who cherish our seaside towns and villages to do our bit for them when they reopen. By taking whatever holidays we can afford this year at the coast instead of abroad, we could be the difference between survival and going bust for a legion of people who have worked hard for what they have and worry that it is slipping away through no fault of their own.

The same applies to day trippers.

Spend what you can, not just for your own enjoyment but for the sake of places which could potentially suffer serious long-term harm. But something else needs to happen too.

There has long been a compelling case for coastal communities to receive additional Government investment to address underlying economic weakness. Some help has been given, but it’s not enough.

Now there needs to be a new programme of aid that takes into account the nature of so many seaside businesses – small family concerns for which measures aimed at large employers simply aren’t appropriate. 
They are the very fabric of Yorkshire’s seaside resorts, and cannot be allowed to become victims of this appalling pandemic.

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James Mitchinson

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