Posted on: Friday, February 22, 2002

Business picks up at DFS Hawai'i

By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer

DFS Hawai'i said yesterday that its business has begun a slight recovery and that the company is not planning reductions in employee work schedules as it reported to the state on Wednesday.

Sales are still down 35 to 45 percent, but that is an improvement from the roughly 50 percent decline the retailer experienced following the attacks through January, said Sharon Weiner, the company's group vice president for business development, public and government relations.

Visitor arrivals from Japan are increasing, Weiner said, although she noted that the company is not seeing parallel increases in sales to Japanese tourists, who account for most of DFS Hawai'i's business.

"There are more arrivals coming back from Japan, but they are not high-spending visitors," she said. "They are coming on more inexpensive packages. They are more budget-conscious."

DFS Hawai'i initiated cutbacks in employees' work hours, equivalent to about 300 full-time jobs, last year after the Sept. 11 attacks, Weiner said, and the travel retailer's filing with the Department of Labor & Industrial Relations two days ago was a retroactive notice informing the state of employee work hour reductions already completed.

The hourly reductions were in addition to about 90 job cuts to the company's 1,300-member work force.

Weiner said the company expects to restore hours for employees when business improves more, but she was reluctant to project when that might be.

No further cuts are planned, she added.

Reach Andrew Gomes at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8065.