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Business Briefs Guy Quenneville Wednesday, November 19, 2008 Previous columns 
Get ready With Halloween now behind us, Yellowknife businesses have wasted no time breaking out the Christmas Muzak and holiday products. Which can only mean one thing: it's time to start planning your shopping and, more importantly, your shipping. Given the high volume of Christmas presents that make their way out of the territory via mail, people are advised to ship early. "Two weeks before Christmas is the absolute maximum" people should wait, said Randy Thompson, Atco Frontec's UPS/Purolator supervisor. Impressive numbers The Wildcat Cafe was a busy place this year, according to rough figures recently divulged by Pierre Lepage, who ran the popular Old Town restaurant for the last two years. This summer, the cafe ran for 101 days. According to numbers recorded in a logbook by Wildcat staff, a total of 15,000 ate there this summer. "Out of 15,000, 70 per cent were local and 30 per cent were visitors," said Lepage. "Out of that 30 per cent, half of them were business travellers and half were tourists." Also, of that 30 per cent, one third of them were English-speaking, added Lepage. Good news for one-day fishers Greg Robertson of Bluefish Services had good news for fishing guides in the area at the NWT Tourism Conference held in Yellowknife last week. "The federal government has finally approved the one-day fishing licence. The bad news is it's probably not going to be ready for another year and a half," he said. "This is amazing because I think we first approached the federal government about this 10 years ago. "The price will be set by the GNWT, hopefully in the $5 range," he added. This will open up a lot more fishermen for day trips and Japanese visitors who like to ice fish." Hotel blues Asked at the tourism conference what Yellowknife hotels have done to cope with the current economic climate, Jenni Bruce, manager of Chateau Nova, said "Some of them have lowered their rates. Some of them have not. "As for my hotel, we've just partnered more closely with the outfitters and with industry to come up with appealing packages. "I think overall the hotels decided to ride out or lower their rates."
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