It's crunch time for businesses along the coast who are praying for a boost in visitors after a year of Delta debt.

Between August and October, Hauraki and Coromandel experienced one of the largest decreases in visitor spend across the country with a near $26 million loss after being shut off from Auckland and Hamilton.

The lack of visitors led to hospitality and tourism businesses running reserves dry – with some even forking out for loans to keep them a float.

Now with the borders open and Aucklanders let loose, the CEO of one of Coromandel's biggest tourism venues says this summer is make or break for the sector.

'I've been involved in tourism on and off for a long time and nothing has been quite like this,” says Driving Creek CEO Neil Oppatt, who has been in the sector for around 40 years.

'Prior to Covid, the worst thing Coromandel had to deal with was slips on the road. A single slip would see a $100,000 plus loss in income,” he says. 'Covid made that $100,000 seem insignificant.”

Driving Creek, which owns Driving Creek Railway tours, Coromandel Zipline Tours and Driving Creek Pottery, saw a 15 per cent decline from a lack of Auckland and Waikato visitors added onto its 45 per cent income loss from a lack of international visitors.

On top of that, Oppatt said the company's 'more mature market” outside the lockdown areas also weren't spending.

This meant the business had no choice but to eat up its reserves and get out loans, he says.

'We were coming into summer already carrying winter losses – which is common for Coromandel businesses – expecting we would make it up, but so far we haven't.

'We've lost hundreds of thousands of dollars of income, that historically we would have received. In 2020, we made half of what we had made in 2019 and 2021 was half of what we had 2020.”

The company was lucky it didn't have to let any staff go thanks to a government grant, but that money is 'coming to an end,” Oppatt says.

'Things have picked up, but we're yet to see at what extent.

'If we can do what we did in the first year of Covid, we will survive, but if it's below that it's going to be difficult.”

Destination Coromandel general manager Hadley Dryden said Driving Creek's case is not unlike what other businesses, including small businesses, are also experiencing.

While after Christmas from Boxing Day to Waitangi Day is the district's busiest period, August is usually when things start to pick up, he said.

'This summer is crunch time for the district,” Dryden says. 'It's more important than ever that businesses get money in the bank to get them through the quiet seasons.”

In 2020, Covid-19 led to a $50m drop in visitor spend in the Coromandel for March and April, taking the district's total spend to the lowest it had been in two years.

This came after the Coromandel tourism industry had grown by $200m in the last decade.

So far the district isn't experiencing a bounce back quite like it did last year, but he said it was still early days.

While this year's lockdown wasn't as dire due to the district moving into level two relatively early, the coast is still feeling the pressure, Hadley says.

It's likely the shoulder seasons will become more important than ever, he says.

Destination Coromandel's Where Kiwis Holiday campaign will commence early in 2022 with the aim of increasing travel through March and into Easter.

'Right now it's all nose on the grindstone, but I'm hopeful businesses will have money in the bank to keep them going through winter.”

-Stuff/Sharnae Hope.