Despite big drops in Gold Coast theme park attendances, hotelier Mantra Group has boosted net profits by 26 per cent for the six months to December 31, after adding another four local and international hotels to its burgeoning portfolio.
Theme park operator Village Roadshow yesterday reported 100,000 fewer visits to its Sea World, Warner Bros Movie World and Wet‘n’Wild parks on the Gold Coast, a drop of 8.4 per cent, or 100,000 visitors for the half-year, blaming the decrease on the tragedy at Dreamworld last year.
Mantra chief executive Bob East has consistently said the Dreamworld tragedy, where four guests were killed, would not affect Gold Coast hotel occupancies.
Twenty-three of Mantra’s 127 hotels in Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia and Hawaii are on the Gold Coast and are operated as Mantra, Peppers and Breakfree brands.
“The accommodation sector on the Gold Coast performed similarly to last year, ever so slightly up on the previous period over December and January,” Mr East said.
“There are other influencing factors, (but) I do believe (the Dreamworld tragedy) did have an impact on some discretional leisure spend, however an increase in international visitors and more group visitors associated with the movie industry has helped the market perform overall.’’
Mantra produced an underlying net profit after tax of $31.8 million, up $4.2m on the previous first half and it will pay a fully franked interim dividend of 5c per share on March 22.
Mantra is continuing to expand overseas.
“We are looking predominantly in Asia and we have an office in Singapore, we are interested in Thailand, Singapore and Indonesia in Asia and we are still looking for deals in the United States,” Mr East said.
“We are working on the mainland, predominantly in California, and in Hawaii.”
However, Mr East said he did not think he would target another American leisure hub.
“I was looking at Florida but we don’t think it is right for us because there is an awful lot of new builds.”
Mr East said the improvement in the first half was also driven by the acquisition of four new resorts and hotel properties and the continued growth in domestic and international tourism.
Mr East said he was thrilled with the performance of the Hawaiian properties bought during the year, particularly the 1176-room Mantra-branded Ala Moana in Honolulu which he said had contributed $27.2m in revenue since joining the group in July last year.
Mantra Resorts produced revenue of $163m, up 30 per cent on the previous corresponding period. Mantra’s growth was also helped by improved occupancy and higher room rates.
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