How Mudgee Travel and Cruise has weathered the COVID storm

Glenn Box has been involved with Mudgee Travel and Cruise for nearly three decades. In that time he's seen his fair share of world-altering events and the business has weathered them all. But ever since the world shut down amid the COVID pandemic, the struggle has never been greater.

"It (COVID) is as disruptive as September 11. Nobody saw that coming and it was an instant shutdown on on air travel. From that moment on, it was 'let's scramble and do what we had to do to get people home' and logistically work with that, but, the startup happened so quick after September 11," Glenn said.

"You didn't have a lot of time to sit around and have no income happening. You also didn't have to give back the income that you had earned in the six to 12 months prior to that."

Giving back that income is one of the harshest realities faced by Glenn and his team, processing a steady stream of refunds for people whose travel plans were put on hold or cancelled which also means losing commission on those sales.

The business has relied on Government initiatives like JobKeeper and Glenn said he has even dug into his personal savings to keep the company afloat. "If you can imagine a retail store that is continually just waiting for the courier to drop off the goods," Glenn said.

"We've continually just drawn our line in the sand and our goal to go along with how it's evolved. Originally we said we would stay in the fight until the 30th of June, 2020 and trade for four or five months with no income. Then we went to September 30 and said we'll do it 'till then. Then we went through to December 31. So it's just grabbing at hope every quarter."

Glenn admits it can't last forever and knows the clock is ticking. He acknowledged the support he has received from the community and hopes that are more people are vaccinated things will trend upwards again.

"May and June of this year were the best months that we'd had since the start of COVID when booking domestic travel, and we almost got to the point where we're going to cover costs... The wheels have fallen off the bus again so it's been hard, but let me also say that we're really appreciative of the support that we've gotten," Glenn said.

"I think when [things ease], it's gonna be pretty powerful. People will be ready to go and I would like to think that they would be looking for a bit of a hand holding sort of relationship with someone to ensure they've got everything lined up with regard to their vaccination certificates - that they're going to need.

"We wouldn't have liked to do it anywhere else other than Mudgee that's for sure."

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