Lisa Lumsden sits at the front desk at Niagara-on-the-Lake's Royal Park Hotel, fiddling with her pen and looking a bit bored. A couple of guests enter the lobby, and she pounces to help them -- they bring a welcome change of pace to a town that has been all too tranquil these days.
"Our boss is really freaking out, he's saying the people just aren't coming," says Lumsden, who then cites four cancellations related to fears of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in the last week-and-a-half. A newspaper ad offers the hotel's $150 rooms for the discounted price of $99.
"Last week a woman said she was considering coming with her grandkids, but now she's unsure because of SARS," Lumsden says. "People are saying they just don't want to get sick."
The streets in this town, famous for its Shaw Festival, are still quiet in the late morning. Hotels and bed-and-breakfasts are able to accommodate last-minute bookings, and an unusual number of empty seats in the three festival theatres leave scarcely a queue for the women's washroom during intermission. Urgent warnings from foreign media about SARS have been wrestling for tourists' attention with the timeless scripts of George Bernard Shaw -- and in many cases, fear has won.
"School groups and seniors' groups aren't coming from the States like they have in the past," says Janice Thomson, executive director of Niagara-on-the-Lake's Chamber of Commerce. "And those that do are prefacing their booking arrangements by asking how far we are from Toronto."
Around three million tourists visit Niagara-on-the-Lake each year to attend the Shaw Festival, shop, tour nearby vineyards, and stroll the town's flower-lined streets. Close to half are Americans, who normally arrange their trips well in advance.
But this year many have decided to rethink their travel plans. Bus tours fell by half in May, Thomson says. The chamber's accommodation-booking service, which represents all the hotels and more than 230 B & Bs in the area, has seen a 20-per-cent drop in reservations. And several conferences planned for spring and summer have been rescheduled for late fall. Last Sunday afternoon, the flagship Festival Theatre was only two-thirds full. "Some days you're playing to a full house, and the next you're playing to half of that," says house manager Muriel Triano.
When the first outbreak of SARS hit nearby Toronto, and the news pages, advance ticket sales at the box office -- which usually attributes about 40 per cent of business to Americans -- dropped by between 10 and 15 per cent, says festival spokeswoman Odette Yazbeck. And the trend has continued through round two of SARS.
"People from the U.S. aren't coming like they used to," says Corrie Vriens, who has been an usher at Shaw for the last 18 years. "I spoke to a lady from Rochester [N.Y.]who was supposed to come up here with three of her friends, but none of the others came because of SARS," she says.
Audrey Zeifert and Julie Rumsey are chatting behind the counter of Greaves Jams and Marmalades, one of the more popular shops in the heart of Niagara-on-the-Lake's tourist strip. The clanging of cash registers should be competing with their voices, but today the shop is quiet. "We still get a lot of people, but there's been a big decline in Asian tourists," Zeifert says. "They usually come via Toronto, and they're probably afraid to do that now."
Then Rumsey recalls her recent conversation with a couple from Rochester. "They said they were surprised that anyone was here at all. The way the headlines are reading over there, it's like all of Canada has SARS."
A few doors down is the Dansk Factory Outlet, whose discounted dinnerware has long been popular with bargain hunters from south of the border. The store's manager, Sylvia Dibenedetto, says sales have dropped 25 to 30 per cent. "At the end of last month, it looked promising. But now with this new SARS outbreak, who knows?" she says. "People visiting from the States watch the news and see people walking around with masks on," she says. "When they come here and see no one wearing them, they realize the media has really played it up, and most sort of laugh SARS off."
But for local businesses, who must make the bulk of their money between Easter and Labour Day, even a short-lived plunge in business is far from laughable. What's more, says Jack Lane, who sells clothing, knickknacks and his patented "world's greatest pant hanger" in a shop called Cute that he has owned for six years, SARS is only one of several factors that have bruised tourism this season. Among the others: a reticence among Americans to cross the border ever since the invasion of Iraq; a rising Canadian dollar; and this spring's cold, wet weather.
Still, misinformation about SARS has been a huge part of the problem, and the theatres, shopkeepers and hospitality workers have struggled to ensure that potential visitors get their facts straight. "Working in the box office, we get a lot of calls about SARS," says Karen Boyer. "They ask, 'How is it there? Is it something we should worry about? Have there been any reported cases in Niagara-on-the-Lake?'
"U.S. tourists don't realize just how far we actually are from Toronto," she adds.
The same story rings true at the Stratford Festival, which is even farther from Toronto, and which attributes 37 per cent of its box office to American visitors. According to media-relations manager Kelley Teahen, the World Health Organization's April travel advisory for Toronto led to a slump in ticket sales that briefly rebounded to normal levels before falling again when word of the second outbreak hit the headlines.
Although she wouldn't attach a figure to the slump in ticket sales, she did note that the drop is not directly perceptible in the theatres yet: "Tickets for the current shows were bought as early as December. It's the sales -- not the attendance -- that's down now."
"With every media blitz there's been a fallout," says Beth Read, who owns Breaking Bread, a B & B, with her husband Dave. She says that last year 80 to 90 per cent of their guests were Americans; this year it's more like 10 per cent.
Some businesses are weathering the SARS storm better than others, in both Niagara-on-the-Lake and Stratford. Well-established businesses that have built a clientele base of repeat visitors have benefited from their guests' familiarity with the area, and with their hosts. Landmark operations such Niagara-on-the-Lakes's Prince of Wales Hotel and Stratford's Birmingham Manor Bed-and-Breakfast are still booked for the months ahead. "When there is a drop-off, the newer businesses are the first to feel it," says Anthony Vivona, vice-president of the Stratford and Area Bed-and-Breakfast Association and owner of Birmingham Manor.
And amid all the hype remains a core of dedicated visitors whose love of quaint towns and theatre trumps any hearsay about SARS. "I'm not worried about it at all," says Ann Pettee, who has travelled from Ohio to the Stratford Festival with her husband, Chuck, every summer for the past 16 years.
They will stay at the Festival Inn, see three plays, and splurge in the restaurants and shops. And Chuck will still play in an annual golf tournament with his friends from Toronto. "It would take a whole lot more than SARS," says his wife, "to keep us out of Canada."