Record numbers in Victoria Street during the festival carnival. Photo: Mary Anne Gill
Cambridge Chamber of Commerce says 50,000 people through the central business district last week proves the economic benefit events bring to the district.
Numbers hit an all-time high on March 26 when the Autumn Festival’s Main Street Carnival and Art Market and the New Zealand secondary schools rowing champs’ Maadi Parade were held.
More than 4400 people were counted on the chamber’s pedestrian counter walking past Unichem Pharmacy in Victoria Street, nearly 400 per cent up on the same day last year.
The increase went right through the week with numbers up from 17 per cent on Saturday to 45 per cent on Tuesday March 28.
“Our township certainly came alive,” said Chamber of Commerce chief executive Kelly Bouzaid.
Kelly Bouzaid
The town was “hectic”.
“We have long known the value of economic contribution that events bring to Waipā and recent events have been demonstrative of this, providing a welcome boost to our retail and hospitality business.”
Autumn Festival chair Alana Mackay said numbers for their events were up on previous years with the most popular being the sold-out Youth Waikato Orchestra concert in the Town Hall on Sunday.
The three musical events at Te Awa’s Woolshed Village Centre – Big Band Bonanza, Thursday Night Blues and Paint it Jazz – all proved the merit of teaming up with the retirement village, she said.
Conservative estimates are that at least 7200 people attended festival activities.
Alana Mackay
Bouzaid said she would be talking to Waipā District Council about the lack of economic information coming out of the council.
“We’re looking for some datasets to allow us to do better forecasting,” she said.
Through a spokesperson, the council said it had not determined whether or not to seek an official report on economic activity from recent events.
Council has done so in the past, more recently in 2016.
Infometrics publish a Waipā quarterly economic report.
The last one in December showed the district’s gross domestic product grew 2.5 per cent – below the country’s 2.8 per cent.
Consumer spending drove the local economy while tourism activity was up 25.8 per cent, well ahead of the country’s 18.9 per cent.
