Cruise season results mixed
Photo/Jackie Farwell
The Dry Dock Restaurant and Tavern on Commercial Street
The sight of towering cruise ships, with their white, bulging bodies and sleek lines of windows, was common at Portland's waterfront this summer. A record number of cruise ships - 48 this season compared to 31 last year - deposited more than 70,000 tourists into the downtown.
Yet despite all the ships and their passengers, some Old Port merchants say they didn't notice an increase in sales. The shredded economy and lousy weather certainly did not help. At the same time, other stores and restaurants say they had a good season, creating the impression that certain Portland venues may have benefitted more from the cruise industry than others. And while the city waits to see how retail sales reflect this season's cruise impact, it's already gearing up for a bigger season in 2010, when more than 70 cruise ships are scheduled to dock here.
"Sales were on par with last year," Edgecomb Potters Gallery manager Steven Anderson says. The pottery store is located on upper Exchange Street, and Anderson says passengers did not seem to wander far from the ships, especially on this past summer's many cold, sodden days.
Cheryl Howe, the manager of Paper Patch on Exchange Street, says she also didn't observe many cruise ship tourists in her shop. "It didn't help us that much," she admits. "We did see more traffic and we did sell more postcards, but dollar-wise not that much."
Kate Smith, at the luxury clothing store Black Parrot on Middle Street, says she didn't see one tourist from a cruise ship. "They are great for the local economy but they are not spending their money on luxury goods," she points out.
"People-wise, it was actually kind of slow," says Leigh Mizner of the Fore Street gift store and apparel shop, Cool As a Moose, adding that she didn't have any kind of numbers to compare summertime sales with past years.
Yet, depending on whom you talk to, some stores did reap the benefits from cruise ships. Stuart Gersen at Longfellow Books says he noticed many foreigners from the ships browsing his Monument Square store, although he couldn't "possibly sort of carve out what percentage [of sales] came from cruise ship passengers."
"They bought a lot of books, and they would buy information about Maine," Gersen says. "They're a well-read group." But he adds that his sales were likely improved by the closing of his Old Port competitor, Books Etc., late last spring.
It's possible that restaurant owners saw more regular business from cruise ship passengers. The city in 2008 commissioned an economic-impact report from the University of Maine that determined cruise ship tourists generate between $5.8 million and $8 million for the Portland area economy, mostly by buying food, beverages and apparel.
Pat Finnigan, assistant city manager, says that cruise ship passengers often set out with the goal of tasting local seafood. "The day the Queen Victoria came in, on her maiden trip, that was the first one we used the green bags with," Finnigan says, referring to the free lime-green recyclable bags the city gave out to ship passengers to welcome them ashore. "And you walked into restaurants and saw those green bags everywhere."
Manager Heather Chouinard at Dry Dock Restaurant and Tavern on Commercial Street says ship tourists often stopped in for a small meal, like a cup of chowder and a beer. "It definitely helped," she says.
And Tess Van Horn, who worked at the Morning in Paris cafe on Exchange Street this summer, says every new boat would bring in a wave of customers. "I don't know numbers but it definitely contributed a lot to business," she says.
Finnigan says the city won't collect any sales numbers this year but will likely commission another economic study in a couple of years. The city itself, though, earned $557,485 from berthing fees, taxes, fresh water sales to the ships and other charges.
And next year, Portland will earn even more. City officials say 71 ships are scheduled to berth here in 2010, promising to bring more than 80,000 people to town. In the past five years, Portland has actively recruited the cruise industry, investing $25,000 to market the city to cruise ship lines.
Now that it has lured more ships to Portland, the city is trying to deepen and diversify the impact of the cruise ship industry here. It has, for example, convinced American Cruise Lines, which has smaller boats, to use the port as home base for its tours. This could entice the passengers who fly into Portland to extend their stay in Maine before and after the cruise.
The city would also like to reach out to local farmers, fishermen, and nonprofit and museum directors to engage them in the cruise ship industry, Finnigan says. For example, farmers or lobstermen could sell their vegetables or daily catch to ship kitchens, she points out.
"You have one little window when the cruise ship comes into port. How do you maximize that?" Finnigan asks, referring to the 12 or fewer hours a ship typically remains at port. "We're trying to make sure everyone benefits from cruise ship industry."
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