After Gov. Phil Scott announced travel restrictions Tuesday to combat rising rates of Covid-19, prospective guests from other states called and canceled their reservations — another blow for lodging properties, already the hardest-hit sector by a pandemic that started in March.
The lodging industry is asking the state to do a better job of presenting information about the required quarantine, one of the directives in Scott’s announcement Tuesday.
“Nobody is saying you can’t come to Vermont, even now,” said Tim Piper of Warren, president of the Vermont Inn and Bed and Breakfast Association. “But that’s the perception.”
The restrictions that Scott announced Tuesday include a required 14-day quarantine for every person entering Vermont, or returning to Vermont, on nonessential travel. The quarantine can be cut in half, to seven days, if the person tests negative for Covid-19 — though it often takes a few days to get the results.
Vermont’s hospitality sector has been slammed by the pandemic because business restrictions lasted the longest for companies that bring people together to dine or stay overnight.
Many of the state’s hospitality business leaders have banded together into a new alliance called the Vermont Lodging Coalition Project which has retained the Downs Rachlin Martin law firm to help steer some remaining federal Covid-19 emergency grant money toward the sector.
Vermont this week broke its single-day case count with 72 new infections, a number not seen since April. Scott has directed the State Emergency Operations Center to prepare for a coming surge, including the redeployment of field hospital sites in case hospitals are filled to capacity with Covid patients.
Sheri Baraw Smith, who co-owns the Stoweflake Inn and Spa in Stowe, said Nov. 11 that she received cancellations soon after news organizations published reports Tuesday about the governor’s new directive.
“I get that the counts are going up, but that being said, we’re trying to make it through the next season,” said Baraw Smith, who has 116 rooms and also manages 30 vacation condos, many of them occupied now by their out-of-state owners. “The message really came out as the state shutting down, in my opinion. The news wasn’t clear that Vermont is still welcoming.”
To get that message through, Baraw Smith had a three-hour meeting with marketing staff Tuesday to think of ways to let guests know they can still visit as long as they quarantine.
“What kind of positive message can we get out there?” she said. “We’re saying we know there are challenges around it, but it’s worth coming here, and you can do it safely. You just need to quarantine.”
The spread of Covid-19 that Vermont is experiencing right now is part of a worldwide surge, and rates are also going up in the state’s immediate neighbors.
Brian Maggiotto, general manager at the Inn at Manchester, said Vermont’s restrictions put the inn at a competitive disadvantage regionally. And he said the talk of compliance checks makes it sound as though infection spikes are occurring at Vermont businesses, when they are not.
“That’s a PR problem for us,” Maggiotto said Nov. 11. “What is the Vermont messaging? What is the story we are telling these travelers? What we are going to see as a result of the press conference yesterday, unfortunately, is a lack of confidence in the lodging sector specific to health and safety.”
He added that he lost five reservations on Tuesday, all for dates in November.
“We’re starting to hear more feedback from guests, which is the perception from the amplified messaging that maybe it’s not the best time to come to Vermont,” he said.
The competitive disadvantage created by Vermont’s quarantine has already affected Stoweflake, said Baraw Smith.
“The core market thinks Vermont is not as welcoming, that we’re more closed than other states,” she said. “One of my repeat guests ended up at a lodge in New Hampshire because they could go there without quarantining. She called me to apologize.”
