In Part Four of our Deep Dive Series into how the national ‘hospitality crisis’ has impacted the Island, News OnTheWight spoke to Will Myles, the Managing Director of Visit Isle of Wight Ltd.
Part of our objective with this series is to speak to all areas of the industry to get their thoughts and opinions of how the situation came about, how things currently are and hopefully, we can find out what can be done to change it.
Deep dive series
Will, in effect, is the head of the Trade Body for the hospitality industry here. We covered a range of areas during our discussion, including:
- Task Force being formed
- The research being carried out
- Making most of the new visitors – by getting it right now
- Skill gaps – and filling them
- Advice for local businesses
- Free training available
- Political involvement
- Helping customers be more understanding
Visit Isle of Wight
If you haven’t heard of Visit Isle of Wight before, they’re a not-for-profit company, dedicated to showcasing the Isle of Wight to the UK mainland and overseas audiences. They’re what is known as a Destination Management Organisation (DMO), aka a tourist board for the Island.
An Island Task Force
This morning (Wednesday) saw the first meeting of a new Island-based Task Force that Will Myles has been pulling together.
Those taking part in the Task Force will include businesses from the tourism and hospitality industry, recruitment agencies, educators from the Isle of Wight College (who will look at the skills required to deal with the issue), as well as Isle of Wight council officers and others with a vested interest of how the issue can be addressed.
Will explained,
“We could go out and pull together some sort of marketing campaign to stay ‘come back into hospitality it’s great’, but if these things are already being done by businesses, which they are, then we need to look at a different way to try and approach the problem.”
Root cause of the problem
Over the last week or so, Will Myles has been involved in national discussions, sharing the Island’s perspective of the nationwide ‘hospitality crisis’. During a call with Visit England, he said the same story was coming from every DMO across the country.
Getting straight to what the root cause of the problem is, Will told News OnTheWight,
“It’s almost as if it’s some sort of perfect storm, and this perfect storm is that mixture of Covid and Brexit. The two of them together have created it.”
Myles: It’s our chance to shine, if we mess it up, it could have wider impact
He went on to say,
“We need to think differently about how we deal with this problem in the short term.
“We get about 2.4 million tourists on the Island, this is our chance within staycation 2021 for people to see what we have, and yes, they may go on a foreign holiday next year, but they may also have their short break and additional breaks on the Isle of Wight next year.
“So it’s our chance to shine, if we mess it up then it could have wider impact on the economy of the Island.”
Surveying businesses
On Friday last week Visit Isle of Wight sent out a research request to hospitality businesses asking what they need and what they want.
Will Myles explained that by Monday morning they’d already received 100 responses,
“So people are engaging with us, helping us make this decision.”
Are any businesses immune from the problem?
In an attempt to understand whether there are any hospitality businesses who have not been hit by the staffing crisis, News OnTheWight asked if the head of Visit Isle of Wight was aware of any businesses that weren’t having issues and what what might be doing differently?
“I think it’s totally widespread across everything.”
Changing perspectives
Will said it’s all about making sure hospitality is a “more desirable occupation” to be in. He went on to say,
“This is not just a right here and right now issue, we still have to look forward at a medium and long term strategy for this.
“It’s all about skills gaps, it’s about making hospitality not just the low paid, low skilled, long hours that people perceive it to be, but it’s about ensuring that people come into hospitality.”
He added,
“If people come to the Island for staycation this summer who have not been here before and go away having had poor or reduced service, then we lose out.
“Equally, you’ve got to think of the businesses that need to survive and need to go forward with it.”
Advice for local businesses
Seeking possible solutions to help businesses, News OnTheWight asked what advice Will had for Island businesses.
“You’ve got to look at what you can deliver and deliver it well.
“If you have a 50 item menu, reduce it to your best selling dishes and most impactful options that you can do well.”
Free customer care training
Will Myles also explained that he has managed to secure some free spaces on a customer care course that are running through Tourism South East. He said,
“Don’t just throw young people in at the deep end, I’ve got some free spaces that people can put their staff on to customer care courses and Isle of Wight College are also looking at how they can do that as well”
Political pressure from Government
He explained that support was being sought at a Government level. He told News OnTheWight,
“I have been busy and challenged Visit Britain and Visit Britain to push forward to look at this from a national perspective to form a national Task Force.”
Isle of Wight MP, Bob Seely, has also been helping get Visit Isle of Wight into the Department for Culture, Media and Sports (DCMS) to speak with either Nigel Huddleston or Oliver Dowden to get them to ‘politically encourage’ Visit England and Visit Britain to take that on board and deal with it.
Will said,
“Bob is actually doing that and in addition he’s put in for a slot at a DCMS surgery, and if he’s not successful in getting a slot there to talk about this very subject, he going to raise it directly with the tourism minister.”
Myles: We should all be in this together
News OnTheWight raised the issue of customers being demanding and not sympathetic to the issues being faced by hospitality providers.
Will Myles agreed, adding,
“That’s across the whole of hospitality, that’s catering, pubs, restaurants, tourist attractions, hotels, guest houses, the whole thing.
“People are telling me that customers are very demanding, they are coming at it almost as those they have a right to be demanding, because ‘we are coming to your premises and going to spending our money with you’.
“And you know what, they don’t, because we should all be in this together.”
More to come
News OnTheWight is seeking to tell this story from all angles.
Look out for the next part in our Hospitality Deep Dive series.
