The Hawke’s Bay Magpies have the Ranfurly Shield!
And the All Blacks are in town!
It’s a great time to be a rugby fan in Hawkes Bay! đ
Hawke’s Bay – Rugby Country!
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Tag Archives: Tourism
Less Money, More Mana!
HOW MUCH??!!
Hawkeâs Bay Today has really been pushing support for the All Blacks versus Argentina game to be held at McLean Park on 6 September and who can blame them â There are still around two thousand tickets to sell and this will be only the second ever time the All Blacks have played in Napier. The other time was against Samoa in 1996.
The last time the All Blacks played in Napier all those years ago I went along to watch them practice (I watched the game at home on television). I asked a rather ragged-looking Andrew Merthens how he was going. His reply burned itself into my memory: âI feel like my guts are about to come flying out my arsehole!â Charming! Heâs still one of my favourite All Blacks of all time, although some of that may just have to do with the fact his name is âAndrewâ (for the record, I never cared much for similarly named All Blacks Dalton or Hayden).
The only rugby game I have seen in person involving the silver fern was the New Zealand Maori vs England at McLean Park in 2010.
I remember it was a freezing-cold June night on the way to the park, but the several thousand fans inside, the atmosphere was superbly warm and friendly.
What attracted my wife and I to attend wasnât actually the game itself. We went along because there was going to be a 200-strong NgÄti Kahungunu haka performed before the game. It. Was. AWESOME!
Not content to just watch, a number of the fans on the embankment where we were joined in. The sound was amazing. You could feel the Mana in the air – It was very moving. Then the NZ Maori team performed their traditional pre-game haka. It was the first time I had ever been present for such a spectacle. Once again it was very moving, shiver up the spine experience â a true war cry.
I canât remember much about the actual game, other than the New Zealand side ran rings around the English (as we knew they would), after both teams wasted a quarter of the game kicking and chasing. But the two haka at the start of the game alone were worth far in excess of the $30 ticket price.
I would love to go to next monthâs match. But the main thing stopping me, and I dare say many others, is the ticket price: $70 for an uncovered stand ticket and upwards of $110 for a semi-covered seat. That price is for both adults and children.
Yup, your three year old son or daughter experiencing their first All Blacks game in person will cost the same as your ticket. Thatâs pretty rough.
There had been childrenâs tickets available for around $50, but it appears they have sold out. Meaning a Mum, Dad and two kids, who would have paid around $240 (thatâs a weekâs rent or groceries, give or take), could now have to fork out between $280 and $440.
To invert the lyrics of the Jessie J song, âItâs all about the money, money, moneyâŚ.â
And that sucks.
Now, the hefty price-tag isnât the fault of McLean Park, or the Hawkeâs Bay Rugby Union, or even the local paper. Itâs the NZRFU who set the prices.
It feels like a very long time ago that pulling on the black jersey with the silver fern used to be a mainly amateur endeavour. You played for pride and for country. But somewhere along the way money got involved. Lots and lots of money.
Gone are the days where you could watch the All Blacks play England or Australia at Athletic Park in Wellington (Iâm showing my age there) on free-to-air TVNZ on a Sunday afternoon before tea time and the six oâclock news. Television rights were the first to go â sold off to Sky TV at a minimum cost to you, the viewer, of $50 per month. Next the New Zealand-made âCanterburyâ All Blacks jersey lost its contract as German clothing giant Adidas got clothing rights. It was all down-hill and mark-up from there as more and more sponsorship deals were signed.
These days the (AIG, Adidas, Powerade, Ford, Steinlager, Air New Zealand, Sky TV, Rexona, Sanitarium, etc., etc., etc.) All Blacks are far more a business and brand than a sporting team.
And itâs not just us â professionalism has overtaken the wide world of sport â astonishingly high ticket prices and a new replica uniform plastered with sponsors to buy (you’d think you’d get a discount for all the free advertising you’re doing for them by wearing it) every season to show you are a âtrue supporterâ is sadly the way things are all over the globe. It just goes on and on and on, as prices go up and up and up.
But what makes it worse in New Zealand is how we appear to have sold out so big, so relatively cheaply, so easily, so often.
Just look at the All Blacks’ and NZ Cricket’s (“Black Caps” was a 90s branding idea and I still honestly cringe thinking of the term) playing kits.
What has pride of place? The silver fern – New Zealand’s sporting symbol?
NO!
Some giant international corporation’s logo has taken bigger, bolder pride of place on the AB’s playing strip than New Zealand’s silver fern.
AIG, American International Group, an international insurance company are far more central, larger and clearer on the All Blacks’ uniforms, and ANZ, the Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Limited (sure, we are in the title, but recent financial events have proven the company is well and truly driven from Australia) on New Zealand Cricket’s men’s international playing strips.
By comparison look at the American NBA/NFL/MLB/NHL leagues – The most “professional”, most monied sports in the world.
Millions and MILLIONS on dollars are spent on individual players, never mind entire teams, with individual sponsorships and endorsements paying HUGE money – LeBron James has a deal with Nike worth $1Billion – that’s insane!
Yet for each of those leagues and their (b/)millionaire players: The playing strip is a scared bit of advertising-free space!
The team logo takes pride of place, and the clothes’ manufacturer’s logo is small and modest in the same place it is on regular clothes.
That’s it.
You won’t see Coke, or Fox News in the middle of the playing jersey for the LA Lakers, the New York Yankees, New England Patriots, or the Detroit Red Wings. and these teams, like the All Blacks and New Zealand Cricket team, are some of the most admired and watched teams in the world.
Wouldnât it be magnificent if the maximum number of Hawkeâs Bay people possible could attend their first All Blacks game and get that chill down their spine and feeling of pride when the All Blacks launch into âKa Mateâ or âKapa O Pangoâ?
After all, the All Blacks are supposed to be more about Mana than money, right?
So I Was Right All Along??!!
“Where are we going, Wilbur?”
So itâs finally over. âBerties Busesâ are no more. Sold off for a paltry $1,250,000 less than the whole sorry saga cost Napier ratepayers.
But, as the MTG saga showed, there will never be any accountability, responsibility or blame taken within Napier City Council, will there? No-one has ever done anything wrong at NCC – “It’s because we have got one or two extremely vocal critics who are stirring the thing up” says Mayor Dalton.
Well, Bill, I’ll happily take credit for being one of those critics – Because you know what? I was right!
I said the buses were a silly idea back in 2011 when they were dreamed up. Their construction, delivery and resulting repairs were a farce in 2012 and in the (2013-14) year they were in operation, virtually no-one used them! – “The poor drivers must be beside themselves – because no-one else is!”
And yet, just as Mayor Daltonâs predecessor pointed the finger of blame for problems with her museum at those capable enough of seeing and reacting to problems much quicker than she and her council could, Mr Dalton blames the critics?
Am I happy the buses are gone? No! Because they were such an elongated, obvious waste of money from the outset â they should never have been allowed to go ahead!
Rather than once again pandering to fly/cruise-by-night tourists, imagine what $1.3 â $2 million could have done for developing projects and initiatives for Napierâs youth, who get blatantly ignored, or community development, or even encouraging economic development in the city!
These are projects and people that call Napier home ALL YEAR ROUND â Not just in cruise season, not just during the holidays, EVERY SINGLE DAY OF THE YEAR â Napier projects and funds for Napier people!
Rather than trying to develop Napier into a city embracing the future and evolving into a new technological and business powerhouse, the council long ago shackled itself to the past by clinging to historically-based tourism as the cityâs saviour and in doing so indentured its economy and people into tourist servitude.
I’ll keep critiquing gaping faults like the Deco Buses because I love my city! I want to see it succeed. I don’t want to see it waste its time, money, people and resources on follies like these buses.
Napier deserves better!
Managing Accountability at MTG
The question is often asked âWhat planet do politicians live on?â In the case of Hawkeâs Bayâs local body politicians the answer must be âPlanet Teflonâ â as nothing ever seems to stick, especially accountability.
From storage space shortages, to wildly inaccurate consultantsâ reports on projected visitor motions (pun intended); things did not get off to a good start for Napierâs revamped cultural and historical hub – “MTG”, or “Museum, Theatre, Gallery”.
Now, after another council-commissioned consultantâs report – The “McDermott Miller Report” has been released into just what went wrong, where, how badly and how it could be fixed.
I have read the report and it makes pretty good, common sense. Perhaps its only down-fall is that it cost Napier rate-payers the equivalent of New Zealand’s average annual wage to tell them what a Napier ratepayer on the average wage could have told them after a visit or two to MTG.
After a flurry of publicity and changes in the last couple weeks, I now understand that Napier City Council announced they will not be blaming, firing, or holding anyone accountable for MTGâs much-publicised failings.
REALLY??
NO-ONE???
In fact, the council appears to have taken a âmove along – nothing to see here!â (Inferences like that will NOT help visitor numbers, by the way) approach. Napier City Councilâs new CEO Wayne Jack even said he was âtiring of the barrage of criticism” being levelled at MTG.
My advice to Wayne in helping avoid such situations is simple:
HOLD SOMEONE ACCOUNTABLE!
Not to be outdone, former Napier mayor, Hawke’s Bay Museum Trust chairwoman, acting trust general manager and MTG project champion, Barbara Arnott has already identified who is to blame â saying she âbelieved the whole MTG issue had been blown out of proportion by some people who had expressed their feelings and opinions without “thinking it through”.â in the local newspaper.
Of course, how silly of us – itâs all the rate-paying public and fact-quoting mediaâs fault! What an absolute load of imperious rubbish!
I was saddened not to hear or see any rebuttal from Hawke’s Bay Today Editor, Andrew Austin, supporting his reporters or readers / online commenters on such a ludicrous statement to what is a very public issue.
In the real world, when things this big go this wrong, people lose their jobs. MTG is currently going through a round of staff redundancies as a result of their current review. If MTGâs marketing department had indeed ignored a large portion of the community as potential visitors because of their socio-economic status, as McDermott Miller claims then, yes, heads certainly need to roll â A regionâs culture and history is made up from everyoneâs input, so no-one should be exempted from being able to view and appreciate it. But you canât help but feel that deeper problems, well out of the control of staff, have not been accurately accounted for.
How are Mrs Arnott and former NCC CEO and MTG project manager Neil Taylor, despite their deep involvement in MTGâs development, apparently completely free from criticism or accountability?
Current Mayor, Bill Dalton says he “did his apprenticeship” under Arnott and the majority of the current council is unchanged from the one led by Arnott for so many years, so there is doubtlessly still a sense (or burden) of loyalty there.
But there appears to be far less love between current council CEO Wayne Jack and his predecessor – Jack having to tidy up a number of messes left over from the previous regime in his first months in office. In fact the way in which Jack does a number of things is a complete reversal to Taylor’s modus operandi, so it would not have been too surprising to have seen Taylor being “Thrown under the Art Deco Bus (another of his projects)”, But no – no accountability there either
Come to think of it, any and all past and current Napier city councillors involved in committees for and voting on MTGâs errant planning and enactment have somehow escaped any and all responsibility or accountability for some very expensive mistakes that are very embarrassing to Napier.
How is that fair?
All this MTG publicity couldnât come at a worse time for the âFriends of MTGâ programme, as they are in the middle or their annual membership renewal programme.
My wife and I are âFriends of MTGâ and have been for a number of years – so any “conflicts of interest” claims that those mentioned above have completely avoided will doubtlessly now be levelled at me…. đ
I and a number of my fellow âMTG Friendsâ think for all its faults MTG does indeed have a lot of unfulfilled potential â itâs still a bit of a âblank canvasâ if you will. But we also want to see those responsible for some major errors held accountable for their actions.
What do other âMTG Friendsâ think?
I would expect this yearâs membership numbers depend on it.
Napier, its history, present, and future, its art and culture deserves better.
Horsepower Needed in Hoofing Berties Buses
I see Napier City Council have decided to divorce their trouble-plagued, ill-conceived Art Deco Buses and sell them after barely a year in service.
They plan to stop the service in May and sell the buses to try and recover some ratepayer money.
I think NCC may have already missed a great opportunity to get the people of Napier a good price for “Bertie and Barb’s Busted Buses” by not hocking them off even earlier than May.
With Hastingsâ annual equine event attracting so much publicity, attention and so much money from a very affluent sector of society, surely the last couple of weeks would have been the best time and place to sell vehicles with massive price-tags that are so used to having only a few occupants:
“Where are we going, Wilbur?”
Welcome to #GigatownNapier!
Welcome to #GigatownNapier!
For those who are unaware, âGigatownâ is a competition being run by Chorus over the next year or so.
The winning city / town of will receive:
âThe fastest internet in the Southern hemisphere – Chorus will make a special one gigabit per second (1Gbps) wholesale service available in the winning Gigatown at a special price and a Gigatown development fund – a $200,000 fund provided by Chorus and Alcatel Lucentâs Connect will support entrepreneurs and innovators taking new services over Gigabit fibre to market for Gigatown.â
Iâm all for Napier becoming the first city in the southern hemisphere to have gigabit internet speeds. I can see just how much of a benefit our city and region could gain from such a digital asset. At the very least it is a way to engage, employ and empower Hawkeâs Bayâs technologically-savvy youth and maybe even keep some of them from leaving the region in droves as they currently do.
At the most, it can put us at the forefront of the digital world and create massive financial, employment and social gains for our region. Thatâs why Iâve become a â#GigatownNapier ambassador.â
HOW the competition is currently structured leaves me more than a little cold, though.
The first stage of the competition is all about getting as many people to âhashtagâ (â#Gigatown(insert location here)â) your townâs Gigatown handle on as many forms of media as inhumanely possible.
This can, of course, backfire with lots of people getting tired of seeing or using the Gigatown hashtag very quickly â social media is, after all, a very fast moving, trend setting (and following), constantly changing and fickle.
It all seems a little âSpam-likeâ to me (although there are rules and guidelines to help avoid this).
Currently leading the â#Hashtag Sectionâ is Wanaka â where a simple ham sandwich from a lake-front cafe can set you back a whopping $10 (this was what sticks in my mind from the last time I was there), with almost 70,000 points. Oamaru, the âSteampunkâ capital of New Zealand second (Iâm pretty sure Steampunk technology isnât internet compatible, though) is second, 37,000 points behind.
Napier is 14th
There are, apparently, conversion factors to be taken into consideration here â towns with smaller populations (like Wanaka and Oamaru, for example) appear to get more points per capita / hashtag, than bigger population centres. But this will start to even out as the competition proceeds, so weâre told.
Under this basis, letâs all just hope the likes of Otira donât get too involved, or theyâll smoke the lot of us!
All the hashtag noise has also been a bit of a distraction from recent problems Chorus has been having with the government and the Commerce Commission over âunbundlingâ and the rolling out of New Zealandâs Ultra-Fast Broadband (âUFBâ) network.
It has been interesting to note, too, that while the promise of gigabit internet speeds has been raising a lot of interest, the usage and uptake of âthe next big tech thingâ – Ultra-Fast Broadband in New Zealand has been a pretty slow. Despite the government and providers strongly promoting the use of UFB and installing the infrastructure for it around large portions of metropolitan New Zealand over the past few years, it has been gaining momentum only recently.
Rather than making the most noise, Iâm all for the winning town being the one with the most substance.
Napier deserves an opportunity like this.
We have the port, airport and roads facilitating the transit of goods â export being our biggest earner and the servile tourism industry being a big portion of the regionâs economy, but a poor earner for those involved.
Inject gigabit internet technology into Hawkeâs Bay and I think we could foreseeably overtake at least one of those sectors. In doing so we would also massively increase the number of skilled workers, increase the wages, in doing so local boost consumer spending and launch the regionâs economy into the stratosphere.
Regardless of what happens in the competition, whether Napier becomes #GigatownNapier or not, I still think this is a great opportunity for Napier and Hawkeâs Bay.
I went along to the first that Napier âGigatown Education Seminarâ hosted by Ryan Jennings and I was impressed by the passion and drive I saw and heard from everyone at the event to see this sort of thing happen for Napier.
For too long Napier has been chained to the past. Over recent years I have felt we are just out of reach of that one thing that will get Hawkeâs Bay out of its current economic doldrums. This is a great opportunity to thrust ourselves through the present and into the future.
Be it with Gigabit internet speeds, or with Ultra-Fast Broadband, this is a great step in the right direction and an opportunity that cannot be wasted!
A Month of Fun-Days!
Looks a bit quiet, eh?
#GigatownNapier needs some giddy-up!
Inner-city Napier sadly lacks activity and public events. There is a citywide sale in the slowest, coldest time of the retail year, one day of the year when youâre supposed to be randomly kind to one-another (just one?) and a prolonged picnic on Napierâs Marine Parade, which draws people to the CBDâs periphery, away from the retailers and taking custom away from its own cafes.
Cumulatively it amounts to just over a dozen days of activities, covering less than 5{3919f50c199a8627c147b24d329ff0de8aa05e3a462fa3330e11cd9ea56ed948} of the year.
The CBD marketing association ladies will claim that it costs a lot (of council / retailer funding) to run their organizations and provide the same handful of events each year. But youâve got to admit, the regionâs central city businesses donât appear to be getting much bang for their buck and our CBD needs both bang and buck urgently!
I get sick of cost being an excuse for inactivity. What about passion, creativity and imagination? Just use Youtube as an example. A couple of people with an idea and a camera can create something for nothing that millions of people around the world can view, enjoy or be inspired by.
Last year I took to Twitter with some ideas for getting action back into Napier’s CBD. We need preferably free (or very cheap) events that both enliven Napierâs city centre and encourage more spending. I tried to think outside the square as much as possible and involve local organizations, schools, groups etc. or develop ideas that involve partnerships with local or national companies giving them event naming rights in return for their logistical or financial input and the subsequent advertising.
The companies I mention below are mentioned merely a guideline â they are ones that I follow or vice versa on Twitter. As is the order of events â I started from a Monday and went from there.
Week 1: Your Brand Here!
#1: More FM Monday: Live broadcasts, sausage sizzles, fun & games with the local radio station!
#2: Hawkeâs Bay Today Tuesday: Special feature section on Central Napier: History, Then and Now pictorials, stories etc. in the paper with perhaps a pull-out coupon selection for CDB businesses combined with displays throughout town, public interactivity with editors, reporters etc.!
#3: Whittakerâs Wide & Walk to Work Wednesday: Leave the car at home, ride or walk to work and get rewarded with CHOCOLATE!
#4: TV Thursday: New Zealand TV networks love doing live crosses, so the networks can broadcast their breakfast shows from Napier! Imagine TV Oneâs Breakfast broadcast from cafĂŠs and shops throughout Emerson Street, or TV3âs Firstline being presented from the balcony of âThe Domeâ with the sun rising over Hawke Bay and Marine Parade behind it!
#5: Thank Grabaseat it’s Friday: Air NZ (who, let’s face it haven’t been the most generous to Hawke’s Bay in terms of flight prices) discounts their airfares to our region; Napier puts on a city-wide party to celebrate, attract and welcome the visitors!
#6: Suzuki Swift Saturday: BMW is launching its latest X5 in Napier next week, which is pretty awesome. So why not other marques? The Suzuki Swift has become the small car of choice in NZ for quick, stylie, around-town commuting. So why not launch their next generation car in a stylie city centre like Napier?
#7: Subway Soundshell Sessions: Free / gold coin donation to see live music at the Soundshell!
Week 2: Community Involvement!
#8: Musical Monday: Buskers & school bands / orchestras play throughout Napier’s CBD! I have had a concept in my head for some time of a combined Napier high schools orchestra / band / choir / variety show at the Municipal Theatre that this could tie in with.
#9: It Takes Two to Tango Tuesday: Cafes & shops open onto the street to music & dancing lessons / demonstrations!
#10: Awareness Wednesday: Napierâs community groups, clubs, etc. stage an outdoor expo along the paved areas of Emerson and Market Street. Raising awareness of what can be done in and for this beautiful city!
#11: Theatrical Thursday: Schools and local theatre groups take to the streets to perform!
#12: Fashion Friday: Napier’s clothing stores host a combined fashion parade and use Emerson Street as the catwalk! EIT fashion / theatre / media students can assist in the production, aiding their studies!
#13: School’s Out Saturday: Activities specials & events for the young ones throughout town!
#14: Sport Hawkeâs Bay Sundays: Plenty of green grass along Marine Parade and empty spaces not being used, so letâs use it for interactive sport demonstrations!
Multi-Media Week
#15: Make Some News Monday: Hawkeâs Bay Today, the Dominion Post etc. open up to Napier people for them to submit their CBD stories & pics. (Also gives any thin editions a bit more bulk!)
#16: Twitter Tuesday: Encourage the public to utilise the CBDâs free Wifi coverage by sending Tweets, pictures & video broadcasting Napier to the Twitterverse! Get #Napier trending internationally on Twitter!
#17: Wifi Wednesday: Encourage the cityâs people and businesses out onto the streets with the CBDâs free Wifi network!
#18: Youtube Thursday: Expose the world-wide interweb to virtual guided tours of Napier peopleâs favourite places and things? Create some interest and make people want to visit and check them out for themselves!
#19: Facebook Friday: Encourage the public to utilise the CBDâs free Wifi coverage by sending pictures & video broadcasting Napier onto Facebook! Get #Napier trending internationally!
#20: Snapshot Saturday: Post pics of central Napier onto sites such as Flickr, Instagram and Pintrest. Prizes for the most âlikedâ or creative photos!
#21: Open-air Cinema Sunday: The Soundshell doubles as an outdoor cinema for the evening!
Commercial Week
#22: Makeover Monday: Central Napierâs proliferation of womenâs clothing stores, hairdressers, beauty therapists and masseuses take the fore to make Napier people look and feel wonderful!
#23: Tax-free Tuesday: A city-wide 15{3919f50c199a8627c147b24d329ff0de8aa05e3a462fa3330e11cd9ea56ed948} off Sale!
#24: Midweek Market Wednesday: Napierâs Farmersâ Market comes to town a few days early in the evening, while Inner-city shops have stalls outside during the day.
#25: Themed Thursday: City-wide storefront displays and promotions based around an event or a local / visiting national sporting team etc. Public votes on best display, specials on anything black and white (for a Magpies theme)!
#26: Alfresco Feast Friday: For an evening Emerson Street becomes Napierâs biggest outdoor restaurant, as the CBDâs eateries put on an outdoor serving to put the âGreat Long Lunchâ to shame!
#27: Special Someone Saturday: Treat your special someone to breakfast, shopping & more! Spend $20 or more in a store city-wide to be in the draw to win a night at The Dome / County Hotel etc.!
#28: Slow, Summery Sunday: Take a stroll through town, have a shop, have some lunch at a cafĂŠ and then wander up to the parade for a leisurely walk, or relaxed concert at the Soundshell!
âIf All Else Failsâ Week
#29: Music Video Monday: Why has Napier never featured in a music video? Letâs make one!
If No bands are forthcoming, then it could become âManufactured Pop Mondayâ, evolving into a reality TV series featuring a search for local talent. How could NZ on Air refuse to fund it?
#30: Tug of War Tuesday: With so much rhetoric and spin over the amalgamation debate, letâs settle it the old fashioned way â a NCC vs. HDC / HBRC / WDC / CHBC / A Better Hawkeâs Bay tug of war down Emerson Street. Winner takes all (or status quo)!
#31: âWipe-outâ Wednesday: Create a fun, crazy obstacle course in Emerson Street and invite people, individuals, companies and schools to take it on!
There are my ideas. What do you think?
⢠A month FULL of activities?
⢠31 weeks with one event per week?
⢠Or can central Napier stay alive with the weak pulse and mere 5{3919f50c199a8627c147b24d329ff0de8aa05e3a462fa3330e11cd9ea56ed948} activity it currently exhibits.
Incidentally, the earliest chance of doing all the events, in order, would be September or December 2014, whose 31 days start on a Monday.
But why wait? I love my city and want to see it busy and prosperous.
Letâs get these ideas into fruition NOW!
Mission the Mark Again
If it was a joke, it would start with âHey, Mission Concert, the nineties called!â And thatâs how we got this yearâs âbigâ, âsurpriseâ acts.
Each member of the âUK Invasion Partyâ (they’ve already had to do an emergency rebranding – see below), comprising of Ronan Keating, Melanie C of the Spice Girls, Billy Ocean, Leo Sayer and Sharon Corr of the Corrs will perform for around 20 minutes at Mission Concert in February next year.
It all sounds pretty luke-warm to me:
Ronan Keating is ok, but his recent gigs on ârealityâ singing shows have diluted his credibility for me.
âSporty Spiceâ was, at least, one of the Spice Girls who could actually sing (lord help our ears if theyâd snared Victoria Beckham!)
Sharon Corr was the violinist, back-up singer and 1/3rd of the ž sensationally attractive (sorry Brother Corr) siblings that made up âThe Corrsâ.
Billy Ocean got out of my ears, into his car and drove off into the sunset years ago.
And I had to Google âLeo Sayerâ before I could even recognise any of his songs.
As is the way with this age of technology, I immediately jumped online to gauge reaction to the announcement
The Hawkeâs Bay Today websiteâs announcement was a bit drab and âregurgitated press release-ishâ, but the comments section was, as always, good for a laugh.
I get very amused by comments vilifying or âknockingâ the âknockers.â Everyone is entitled to their opinion. So what is wrong with someone voicing their displeasure at what they consider is another sub-standard Mission line-up?
Hawkeâs Bay Today has done a better job of getting wider opinions this year.
Finding a terribly amateur mistake (organisers failed to recognise that Keating and Corr are from the Republic of Ireland and Ocean was born in the Caribbean – not the “United Kingdom” and a very quick way to get into a fight apparently) in Mission Concert organisersâ marketing (or proof-reading / sub-editing) restored a bit of my faith in balanced journalism too.
Getting the basics wrong this year isnât a Mission Concert first, after a series of wine bottles were printed up for Eric Claptonâs (a recovering alcoholic) show six years ago.
A truer litmus test is the reactions from a wider audience â tourists who come from out of town for Napierâs events, the likes of these Stuff.co.nz commenters.
Online reactions did bring up a very good point.
When Dame Kiri Te Kanawa performed at the inaugural Mission Concert in 1993, it was new, special and spectacular. It set a standard that many other wineries and venues followed.
Now virtually every winery and its dog stages âMission-esqueâ concerts and events each year. Many smaller, newer vineyards, parks and venues attract much more up-to-date acts than the Mission has over its 20 year history. Meanwhile Mission acts seem, with a few exceptions, to be getting older and less recognised.
After a spate of less than impressive acts in recent years, Napierâs Mission Concert was becoming more unflatteringly recognised for its drinking and related less-than-world-class attendee behaviour. They could have released DVDs of the concerts under the brand âBaby-Boomers Gone Wildâ or the like, but I donât think sales would have been too flash.
After starting with a hiss and a roar (or rather, a Soprano and some very high notes) two decades ago it feels like the quality of Mission Concerts has dawdled off a bit. Organisers have either lost interest, or lost the plot as to what our gorgeous venue and city deserves.
We are constantly told what a modern and vibrant city Napier is and how âworld classâ the Mission Concert is supposed to be. But for the same price as a Mission Concert ticket, you can see the likes of Beyonce, Taylor Swift or U2. All massive draw-cards, so why waste your time or money on anything less?
Surely if the Mission Concert is such a âWorld classâ event, it deserves world class acts â as in the biggest artists RIGHT NOW, rather than largely forgotten acts from decades ago.
The Mission, Napier and its visitors deserve far better than what they are currently getting.
Delightful, Delicious Diwali!
Diwali , or the âFestival of Lightsâ is an Indian festival celebrating the triumph of good over evil, light over darkness. Hawkeâs Bayâs Indian community has been celebrating it at Napierâs Sound Shell for several years now.
Itâs a free event and has a great, friendly, family atmosphere that easily attracts hundreds and hundreds of people – young and old of all ethnicities each year. Itâs the sort of event that Napier has been so sadly missing out on in recent years.
Thereâs dancing, great music (so good, youâll probably recognize riffs and beats that most main-stream rap musicians have flogged and hoped no-one (aside from maybe one billion Indians) would notice) and FOOD!
Lots and lots of delicious samosas, satays and curries are served from a number of stalls. This year Napierâs Indigo Restaurant, had the consistently longest queue.
It took about half an hour to reach the business-end of dinner, but when you got there it was certainly worth it – $10 for a traditional Indian meal in such a great open-air environment with free entertainment! Try and beat that, âGreat Long Lunchâ!
I happened to see Napierâs Inner City Marketing Manager at the event. I certainly hope she was taking notes, because NICM could learn a heck of a lot from a great family festival like this. Napier needs and deserves a lot more like it!
Price Does Not Equal Luxury
“See Naples and die.” Pompeii tourist brochure circa 79AD
âSee Napier and Spit*â Mark Twain, Napierâs Masonic Hotel 1895
Napierâs tourism industry has been struggling for some years now.
Some blame too much focus on cruise ships for the decline. Others blame Napier City Council for not doing enough to Marine Parade, or the uncooperative relationship that exists between Hawkeâs Bayâs many councils. HB Inc. / Venture HB / HB Tourism (if youâre new to the region theyâre all the same organisation with mainly the same staff, just under different names after years of reorganisation or failure) have also faced their share of criticism. As has Air New Zealand (have you tried finding a cheap flight to or from Hawkeâs Bay – one of New Zealandâs busiest regional airports?).
I feel most of these criticisms have their merits. But I have seen a theme run through a lot of Hawkeâs Bay tourism schemes and advertising in recent years that may be doing even more damage: Luxury.
When times are tough and money is sparse (as it is currently), what is the first thing you usually give up? The âluxuriesâ! So why is that such a feature of so many HB tourism ventures recently? Sure they are attractive to a select few for their exclusivity (âponce-pulling-powerâ?), but as a result they also cater to only a very small portion of the market for only a small amount of time.
From an accommodation perspective, take the likes of the Kidnappers resort (scarily expensive to mere mortals like myself), or closer to home The Dome in central Napier (don’t even get me started on how our Art Deco-mad rulers let them build a modern addition atop one of Napier’s most iconic buildings…). Both make a point of being exclusive and luxurious. But, at even their cheapest winter rates, how many people will ever get to know precisely how luxurious they are? They also appear geared towards just individuals or couples too. The typical middle-income-earning Kiwi family holidaymakers, surely Hawke’s Bay’s biggest and most lucrative domestic market, donât get much of a look-in. But I guess thatâs the whole point, right? Itâs a case of the money versus the many.
Case in point: Kidnappers hosted an event with international celebrity chef, Heston Blumenthal, a few years ago. For the price of a ticket to this event (a night or twoâs accommodation and accompanying meals) you could have flown to England, dined at Hestonâs original restaurant, The Fat Duck, spent a few more days seeing the sights and still had change for duty free on the return to New Zealand! Somehow the event still sold out. Iâm guessing not many locals bought tickets.
I wonder how long these types of venture usually last (I think at least one of the two examples I mentioned above has changed owners at some stage)? If one nightâs accommodation is that pricey, and guest nights must be pretty slim as a result, imagine what their running costs must be.
I make this point about longevity, because two of Napierâs most popular and longest standing holiday accommodation providers, Kennedy Park Camp Grounds and the iconic central Napier Criterion Backpackers hostel are not only some of the cityâs oldest establishments (Kennedy Park celebrated a whopping 75 years of operation recently and âThe Criâ was built after the 1931 Earthquake, ironically, as a luxury hotel), but also some of the cheapest!
Accommodation providers are stuck between a rock and a hard place, though. The less people staying with them, the more they have to charge to make ends meet. But the more they charge, the fewer customers are inclined to spend the night. Itâs a vicious cycle.
One of the cosiest hotel beds I have ever slept in was at the Jucy Hotel / Hostel, just 200 meters from Queen Street in Auckland. The rooms were quiet, bright and modern. They had great new facilities, a flat screen TV, a modern stylish bathroom and cost just over $100 including a carpark for the night. Where else could you find value for money like that in New Zealandâs biggest city, or even Napier for that matter?
The popularity and longevity of Kennedy Park and the Cri Backpackers and my experience at Jucy prove that money canât always buy you a good nightâs place to rest.
A high price does not equal luxury!
Rather than go for the âvanity factorâ and charging accordingly, ultimately scaring potential clients off, I think Napier Hoteliers / Moteliers need to go back to the basics. Provide a comfortable, family-orientated place to stay at an attractive price. The reduction in individual price will pay off in spades, as more guests stay for longer.
With the summer tourist season fast approaching, I wonder how many operators will try it?
*The âSpitâ Mr Twain refers to is now the area we call âWestshoreâ. Pre-1931 earthquake, it was a long, thin spit of land at the entrance to the then harbour, now Ahuriri fishing port.
