Nearly half the tourists who come to New Hampshire visit the Lakes Region. And they spend millions of dollars while they’re here.
But some businesses in the area are bracing for the high gas prices to hit their bottom line this year, especially companies whose profits depend on boats.
NHPR correspondent Shannon Mullen has more.
MULLEN: The Mount Washington cris-crosses Lake Winnipesaukee three times a day, from May through October.
Resting in her slip at Wiers Beach, the 136 year old ship brings another era back to life – a time when her male passengers wore topcoats and the women carried parasols…
A time when fuel for the 230 foot ship cost a fraction of what it does today.
Her Captain, Jim Morash, says the Mount holds 9-thousand gallons of diesel.
MORASH: We’re going to run about 70 thousand gallons worth of fuel, that’s assuming we have a good season. I can tell you as little ago as 2000 I think we were paying 50 cents a gallon, and now we’ll be paying close to 4 dollars.
MULLEN: This season Morash raised rates a bit on dinner cruises, but he says that’s because the food costs more...
...and he won’t have to pass his fuel costs on to customers, if enough of them show up.
MORASH: It is our hope that people who are staying closer to home this year for the summertime, visiting maybe some of the diamonds in their own backyard, hopefully they’ll consider us a jewel worth revisiting or visiting for the first time.
MULLEN: Some smaller charter businesses in the region have raised rates.
For the first time, the four year old company “Experience Squam” in Holderness, is adding a fuel surcharge of about 20 dollars per hour.
And one of few small private charter cruise companies on Lake Winnipisaukee, Latitude 43, raised rates 15 percent this year.
Despite the changes, both companies say reservations are on par with last year or up slightly.
But at Mountain View Yacht Club in Gilford, there are a lot of empty boat slips, where there’ve been waiting lists in recent years.
The club has almost 300 private slips and Manager Phil Arel says as many as 20 percent of them are for sale or for rent.
AREL: What we’re from a lot of our members is that the economy is real bad, they’re all weighing what they cut out of their lives and in most cases it’s the toys or the pleasure, and obviously most boats are pleasure craft
DUPRE: I believe the gas prices are going to make it one of the toughest years for us in our industry.
MULLEN: Paul Dupre owns Glendale Marine in Gilford.
He’s been selling, renting and storing power boats on Lake Winnipesaukee for 26 years.
And much of his business comes from his storage and launch service – getting boats out of the racks and ready to ride when their owners are in town.
DUPRE: Many of our customers come from MA, CT, RI. People just don’t feel they’re going to be driving up every weekend and spending that kind of money on gas. We’re finding more people calling, saying just store my boat for another year b/c we’re not going to use it this year.
MULLEN: Others want out altogether.
Mike Audesse lives in Manchester, and has an island house on Winnipesaukee.
He’s been trying to sell his Baja speedboat for weeks, below value, and no one’s calling.
AUDESSE: It’s a 28 footer and the average cost is about 400 dollars now to fill the tank. In the past I’ve done a lot of powerboating. We’d go out on the lake to go out to dinner… and I’m not going to do that anymore just because of the cost of gas.
MULLEN: Some marinas in the Region report new boats are selling, mostly high-end models.
At Thurston’s Marine in Laconia, Don Thurston says sales are up 30 percent over last year.
But his company faces the same economic hardships as other small businesses, and he says he’s tired of all the high gas price hype.
THURSTON: We have to work a little harder to sell more, and selling more this year is going to be a job, but I’m not as down and doomy and gloomy as we get on the 6 o’clock news: America’s bleeding every time we go to the gas pump...
MULLEN: Thurston says he believes paying more for gas in tight times will eventually force people to change their ways.
Former power-boater Mike Audesse agrees.
He’s teaching his kids to sail this summer.
And he still has a small outboard boat his family uses to get back and forth to their island…
AUDESSE: Uses very little gas. But I think in the future I’ll be moving towards an electric boat, or I’ll be rowing across.
For NHPR News, I’m Shannon Mullen.
