In the summer of 2020, Mainebiz talked to hospitality leaders about the early impact of the pandemic on their businesses. We checked back to see how this summer season went.
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Last year, when Mainebiz talked to hoteliers in Maine’s midcoast and Downeast regions for our “Hotel business check-ins” cover story, the picture was mixed for 2020’s curtailed season.
Here’s what we learned about 2021 from two owners as they prepared to wind down for the year.
Managers pitch in at understaffed resort
In a typical year, Sebasco Harbor Resort in Phippsburg employs up to 150 or 160 people at peak season. Accommodations at the 450-acre midcoast vacation village range from hotel rooms and cottages to a newly renovated 10-room lighthouse.
While there would have been enough work this year for 170 to 180 people, Sebasco Harbor had to make do with 135 because of a staffing shortage, according to Bob Smith, the resort’s majority owner and self-proclaimed chief lighthouse keeper for nearly 25 years.
“Everybody had to work a little more than they would have liked, with not as many days off and not as much personal time,” Smith says. “But everybody stepped up, and we’re proud of how everybody made the effort and kept a great attitude.”
Those who took on extra duties include managers who washed dishes until late and even Smith and his wife, a former nurse.
“I’ve made more beds this year than I have in my entire career, and that’s OK,” he says. “My wife worked as an ICU nurse for 40 years at Maine Med and she didn’t expect to work in the laundry, or in housekeeping or in the pro shop, but it was all hands on deck … You can’t ask your employees to work 70 hours a week and you work only 50, that doesn’t fly.”
Smith says that housekeeping and dishwashing were two of the toughest areas to staff, particularly without the 20 seasonal workers from eastern Europe he would hire in a typical year. This year there was only one from eastern Europe, and Smith managed to hire a few people for housekeeping from Puerto Rico.
Forced by understaffing to keep its fine-dining restaurant closed and only its casual-dining pub and patio open, the resort added options like food trucks, luncheon cruises in collaboration with Harpswell’s Dolphin Marina & Restaurant and outdoor grills for guests to use.
“We did a lot of creative things to make sure there were options,” Smith says.
Reflecting on a season that began in May and was due to wrap up on Oct. 17, Smith describes rainy July as a “mess,” but both August and September as “great.”
“We could have done more revenue, we could have sold more rooms and certainly gotten a lot more food and beverage revenue if we had enough staff,” he says.
For 2022, he expects another busy year with many return guests.
“As long as we’re able to get a little bit more help on the seasonal workforce side, we’ll be fine,” he says.
Wedding boom drives strong bookings
2021 has been a banner year for weddings at Aragosta at Goose Cove, a Deer Isle waterfront hotel with a fine-dining restaurant. Up to 44 guests can be accommodated on 22 mossy coastal acres in 10 private cabins and four suites.
Glad for the business from eight summer weddings, with five of those postponed from last year, owner Devin Finigan says it was also a lot to take on, entailing lots of extra duties for staff.
“It rained so much this summer, every wedding had a tent,” she says while on a break from prepping onions in the restaurant kitchen. “We also had to have a whole separate catering staff and used our deck and restaurant crew to move chairs and tables. It gets exhausting.”
It got more exhausting after college students there for the summer left, reducing the wait staff from 14 to six by late September — with two fall weddings still ahead.
Finigan, a Vermont native who is also the restaurant’s executive chef, told Mainebiz the hotel has been fully booked since early July with visitors from places including California and Canada.
At the restaurant, reservations are now required, though a small number of tables are held for guests staying there who may not have booked a table. There’s also a new gift shop on the property peddling food and drink items to go, as well as prepared food guests can order online from champagne and cheese to a lobster picnic.
“We’re going to keep moving forward with some of the things we introduced because of COVID, which is exciting,” Finigan says. “It’s taken a long time to get to where we are.”
Her off-season plan: a culinary trip to Europe with her two daughters, and then to build two more cabins on her property to expand guest capacity next year to 48.