By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

A jewellery retailer is “preparing to pull the plug” on his 25-year presence in the Port Lucaya Marketplace, after Memories’ pull-out became the latest in a series of “devastating” blows for businesses in the area.

David Fingland, proprietor of The Jewellery Box, told Tribune Business he will close his doors for the final time on April 1, once his existing lease expires, due to Freeport’s depressed economic environment.

Besides the loss of 1,500 hotel rooms between Memories and the Grand Lucayan, Mr Fingland said Port Lucaya and its tenants had also suffered a 50 per cent slash in cruise passenger traffic over the past two-three years.

He blamed this on the decision by Grand Lucayan’s owner, Hutchison Whampoa, to close off free beach access to the public, which had resulted in the cruise ships directing passengers towards Grand Bahama’s various adventure tour operators and away from the Marketplace.

Disclosing that Port Lucaya tenants were “dropping like flies” due to the absence of customers and business, Mr Fingland said the Marketplace would have been “really, really dead” without the Bahamas Celebration cruise ship.

While thankful that the vessel has resumed sailing to Grand Bahama, he added that the Grand Lucayan’s closure meant that Celebration’s ‘overnighting’ passengers had been billeted further away from Port Lucaya - a development that had reduced ‘walk in’ sales and volumes.

Revealing that it was too late for his retail outlet, Mr Fingland told Tribune Business: “It’s got to the point where I’ve looked at the whole economic climate, and my lease is up on March 31.

“I’ve decided to close my doors on April 1, after 25 years in business. Memories pull-out is going to hurt all the merchants in Port Lucaya. It’s going to be devastating, especially given that this is winter season, and nothing is happening.

“This year, with the hotels closed after Hurricane Matthew, you can forget it now. You can forget it. There’s no light at the end of the tunnel.”

Mr Fingland said the closure would affect The Jewellery Box’s three employees, all of whom have been with the business for 20-plus years, but it was simply not viable to continue.

Revealing that Port Lucaya’s problems had started two to three years before Memories’ withdrawal, Mr Fingland said: “Hutchison barred tourists walking through their property to the beach.

“They stopped that, and charged people $30 if they wanted to come and use the facility. That prompted a big reduction in beach tourists.”

He explained that the cruise lines reacted to by directing their passengers to the three excursion providers - Pirate’s Cove, Adventure Tours and Grand Bahama Nature Tours - and away from the Port Lucaya area.

“When the ships come to port, 700, 800, 900 passengers go straight to the beach, whereas they used to come here,” Mr Fingland said. “We’re not getting that traffic flow.”

He described the reduction in cruise passenger volumes to the Port Lucaya Marketplace as “huge”, and in the vicinity of 50 per cent.

Mr Fingland said two cruise ships, Royal Caribbean’s Grandeur of the Seas with a capacity of 3,800 passengers, and Liberty of the Seas with a maximum 2,800 complement, were both docked in Freeport yesterday.

“There can’t be more than 100 people shuffling around this place,” he added, “and we’ve had one sale for the day of $350. Here we’ve got to do $10,000 a week to keep afloat, which is the reality. We used to do it; it was fantastic.”

Mr Fingland said that despite his business being promoted on-ship to cruise passengers, Freeport was being marketed by the lines as an adventure tour/beach excursion - as opposed to retail - destination.

He added that Carnival’s on-board lecturers were not permitted to even mention there was a beach at Grand Lucayan, further impeding the flow of customer traffic to the Marketplace.

Mr Fingland then revealed that the pre-selling of tours to cruise passengers before they arrive in Freeport, and their subsequent immediate transport to these destinations, had also cut sales for his del Sol/Cariloha retail outlet at Freeport Harbour.

“Last year and the year before, it was not happening, and the tourists were milling around the port,” he told Tribune Business. “Now, our sales have dropped 25-30 per cent because of this.

“We’re trying to negotiate with Adventure Tours to put a kiosk and booth on the beach to try and get that revenue we’ve lost at the harbour.”

Mr Fingland credited the Bahamas Celebration with ensuring Port Lucaya Marketplace’s survival, as passengers staying overnight at the Grand Lucayan generated “a lot of good business” for its retail and restaurant tenants.

“Everybody would tell you that they make more money off that boat than the Carnival and Royal Caribbean boats that come in,” he added. But now, with just 200 rooms at the Grand Lucayan open, Bahamas Celebration passengers were instead staying at Club Fortuna, meaning Port Lucaya was now losing that business.

Mr Fingland’s assessment of trading conditions was backed by Christopher Paine, a retail tenant in the Grand Lucayan, who said sales were “shockingly down”.

“I would imagine people are down by 50, 60, 70 per cent over previous years,” Mr Paine told Tribune Business.

“It’s really, really poor. The restaurants only seem to have business at the weekend, when some of the locals come out, but during the week it’s very quiet. In retail, you have this competition with people on the cruise ships being taken to the beach.”

Mr Fingland said his Nassau-based Breitling, Del Sol and Little Switzerland outlets gave him “plenty to keep me going, but up here you can forget it”.

“I’ve been robbing Peter to pay Paul for the last two years, taking Nassau’s profits to keep this afloat,” he told Tribune Business.

“I used to go to the jewellery shows in Miami and Las Vegas, but for the last two years I haven’t bought any merchandise. I could see what was coming with the business and the tonnes of stock I already had.

“It’s a struggle. There’s no traffic, no one to sell to, and the hotel customers were the ones that spent the money.”

Mr Fingland added that in a “normal environment” he might have been able to sell The Jewellery Box as a going concern, but its location in Freeport - and a general absence of financing - meant buyers were few and far between.

“The merchants here are stuck,” he told Tribune Business. “You could normally move this merchandise before you close, but it would take a year-and-a-half to sell the stock we have - all $700,000 to $800,000.

“When you’re only making a couple of thousand of dollars a day, it’s virtually impossible. It’s bodies and traffic. If 100 people come through your door, you sell to 10 per cent of them. If five people come through your door, you won’t sell anything. It’s volume.”