Cape May’s Summer: Bargain Hunters, Less Restaurant Customers

CAPE MAY — Visitors to the Nation’s Oldest Seaside Resort came for shorter stays, ate less often in restaurants, and hunted for bargains on rooms and rental homes.
Larry Muentz, owner of the Alexander’s Inn and Restaurant and Successful Seasons, a Web marketing firm for innkeepers, called the summer “strange, both very busy and very slow.”
He credits bad weather in June and a weak national economy coalescing to produce “some odd results.”
“I think people’s vacation habits have changed. They ate out less frequently in high-end restaurants and more frequently in more casual restaurants,” said Muentz.
He said on some weeks his Sunday brunch was sold out, but with no discernable change in patterns. On other Sundays it was very slow.
Muentz said he thought customers for inns this summer were price conscious and price shopping. June and August was very good last year but both were “softer” this year, he said.
Both years he cut mid-week room rates but it worked better last year, said Muentz. He said he did not see many Europeans here this year.
He cited the loss of motel rooms in the city to condominium conversions with kitchens. That, he felt, has cut down on meals eaten in Cape May restaurants since condo guests tend to cook and not dine out. In the past few years, the city lost three top end restaurants, he said: The Pelican Club, Daniels and The Island House that went more to more casual dining.
Muentz gave the summer season a grade of “C.”
Cape May City Manager Bruce MacLeod told the Herald a review of economic barometers available to the city, such as parking meter, occupancy room tax, and beach tag revenues were indicative of a difficult economy.
Parking meter revenue through the end of August was down $21,000 or 2.7 percent compared to 2008.
The occupancy room tax, which cycles on a two-month lag time, clearly reflects a weak month of June, he said. Monies received in August represent fees collected for the month of June.
The June 2009 revenue was $20,000 less compared to June 2008, said MacLeod.
However, the city is hoping room tax revenues for the actual months of July and August will match-up with 2008, he said.
Beach tag sales grossed a higher dollar amount of $1,763,545 in 2009 versus $1,668,945 in 2008, which is up $94,600 over 2008. This was primarily due to a $1 increase in the price of the daily and three-day tags for 2009, said MacLeod.
A preliminary review of the different types of tags found that less daily tags were sold while there was a slight increase in the number of three-day, weekly, and seasonal tags sold. Another indicator is the volume of water consumed, which was recorded as 8 million gallons below levels consumed in 2008 through the first six-months of 2009.
MacLeod said Cape May offered a number of free events as incentives to draw visitors including 33 concerts in Rotary Park, six concerts on the Washington Street Mall and partnered with Chamber of Commerce of Greater Cape May Towne Crier group to present the highly successful Movies on the Beach series throughout the summer as free entertainment.
Dick Adelizzi, owner of Five Mile Trolley, which provides trolley and shuttle service to Cape May, the Wildwoods, Stone Harbor, Avalon and Ocean City, said business was good. A free trolley operated in the Wildwoods sponsored by the downtown business district, he said
“Every town had ridership up from last year,” said Adelizzi.
He said the tour bus business started very slow in the spring but fall reservations look better than last year. He gives the summer season a grade “B.”
“We had a very good summer,” said Mark Allen of Canyon Club Marina.
He said attendance for fishing tournaments was very good. The Mid Atlantic $500,000 Tournament normally gets about 140 boats and 137 boats entered this year.
Charter boat business was down about 40 percent. Allen gave the season a “B.”
He said the marina pre-purchased fuel when it was cheaper during winter to guarantee it would not rise above a certain price.
Cape May-Lewes Ferry vehicle and passenger traffic in June decreased 15.8 percent and 17.2 percent respectively when compared to June 2008. Year-to-date vehicle traffic decreased 9 percent and passenger traffic decreased 10.5 percent when compared to the same period in 2008.
When compared to the average of the last three years, year-to-date vehicle traffic decreased 13.6 percent and passenger traffic was down 12.9 percent. The Delaware River and Bay Authority (DRBA) attributed the drop to a high number of rainy days and significantly cooler temperatures in June.
In response, ferry operations reduced the June operating schedule by 60 crossings, operating a total of 530 passenger crossings compared to 590 in June 2008. The average number of vehicles and passengers per crossing in June was 59 and 170 respectively, compared to 62 and 185 in June 2008.
When compared to the average of the last three years, year-to-date food and beverage sales decreased 14.3 percent and retail revenues decreased 22.2 percent.
David Craig, an owner of Lucky Bones and the Washington Inn restaurants, said he thought the season “started off slow but in August it really bounced back.”
“I think people are really watching what they are spending, but for the most part, I think people are trying to get value out of quality products,” he said. “I think Cape May did well.”
Craig gave the summer a grade “B.”
Margo Harvey, communications coordinator for Mid-Atlantic Center for the Arts said the organization found the season overall “pretty disappointing.” MAC provides trolley tours and operates the Emlen Physick Estate, Cape May Lighthouse and Fire Control Tower 23. By July 1, MAC saw a decrease of 4.8 percent from 2008 despite the opening of the World War II era lookout tower for tours.
Harvey gives the summer season a grade “D.”
Dolores Lanzalotti, broker/owner of Jersey Cape Realty in Cape May gave the summer fairly high marks in both home rentals and sales but overall graded the season as “C.”
She said most customers were looking for discounts on rentals. Lanzalotti said customers were calling and saying “Can you offer the owner $200 less a week?”
“We informed the owners that had to do that or they would end up with empty weeks,” she said.
Lanzalotti said this past summer season was better than 2008. She said there were a number of last minute bookings for rentals.
Goldie Adams, owner of Atlas Motor Inn, said business was slow until the second week of July.
“Through half of July and most of August we were full,” she said. “We did notice there were shorter stays and more people in each room, it seems like families are trying to combine the cost of the room.”
Adams said guests were refusing to go to the beach because of the cost of beach tags.
“They would either go before 10 o’clock or after five, so our pool area was extremely busy this summer,” she said.
A lot of guests were using the hotel’s barbecue grilles by the pool to cook meals said Adams. Adams said a lot of guests returned to the hotel because it offers free breakfasts from its restaurant menu at Bloody Mary’s.
She rated this season better than last year’s for the hotel but “worse” for the restaurant and gave the summer a grade “C.”
Larry Hirsch, an owner of Montreal Inn, said he anticipated that the summer would be challenging and prepared himself as far as marketing to minimize the effect of the economic downturn.
“It was a challenging summer,” he said. “We expected worse.”
Visitors were very careful how they spent their money with shorter stays often reduced from the typical five to 10 days to a three-day weekend or three or fours during the week. He said there were plenty of price shoppers aware they could negotiate rates.
Hirsch said he believed the 2008 summer season was better than this year. He said Canadian visitors arrived in healthy numbers.
Hirsh gave the summer season a “C plus, B minus.”
“The Jersey shore needs to better market what it has,” he said. “Cape May can’t go it alone, the state has to take a better grasp of what’s going on.”
Hirsch said he believed there were fewer visitors in town due to the availability of parking spaces on Beach Avenue.