Local businesses say they've planned ahead
| • | Docks on West Coast shut down indefinitely |
By Kelly Yamanouchi
Advertiser Staff Writer
Many Hawai'i businesses said yesterday that although the latest West Coast port shutdown is troubling and it's unclear how long it will last, they have long been preparing for such a situation and so far are not expecting to see any shortages of supplies.
The latest shutdown means at least several additional days of delay in arrivals of supplies — putting what had been regularly scheduled back as much as a week — but businesses said yesterday that they believe the reserves they've built up can last for that long.
They declined to say, however, just exactly how long supplies could last.
Ross Anderson, general manager of Duke's Restaurant in Waikiki, said the restaurant started discussing contingency plans two weeks ago and made arrangements to fly in supplies.
The latest news of indefinite port closures calls for more contingency plans, Anderson said. The restaurant already gets all of its fish and much of its produce from local suppliers, "but there is still a significant amount that does come from the West Coast."
"We're so dependent on the West Coast for incoming goods," Anderson said. "Everybody's going to have to fly things in. It'll be a cargo-jet bonanza."
The items most difficult to keep in stock when dock shipments from the West Coast are disrupted are toilet paper, paper towels and some produce, Anderson said. Lettuce in particular may be difficult to procure. "There's a local supplier for that, but that's going to dry up real fast when everybody starts to hit it," he said.
Although air cargo is an option for businesses, it costs significantly more and could lead to some businesses' raising prices in the event of a lengthy dock disruption.
"We would try and hold our prices but it would definitely affect retailers' bottom line," Anderson said.
Hawaiian Airlines said it had full loads of cargo out of Los Angeles yesterday, but had cargo space available on about half of its other flights from the West Coast. Aloha Airlines said it was too early to tell whether the airline would have cargo space available.
Todai assistant manager Ryan Nomura said the restaurant has anticipated the port shutdowns, "so we should be OK." The restaurant depends on a combination of local and Mainland supplies.
Hotel operators have also been stocking up. Starwood Hotels & Resorts in Hawai'i ordered an extra month's worth of some supplies, said spokesman David Uchiyama. The hotels also order local produce and meat from the Big Island.
Outrigger Hotels & Resorts spokesman Jim Austin said some of the hotels' suppliers have been keeping nearly double their normal stock of important paper goods. Relatively less hotel supplies are needed, too, because the hotels' busy season during the summer has ended.
"We feel pretty good about just the short term because a strike has been talked about and anticipated but you can't be prepared for a long-term strike or work stoppage. At some point we would run out of inventory," Austin said. "For long-term contingencies we would have to find out what type of rationing or program that we put in place."
However, hotel guests should see no impact yet from the labor dispute, he said.
Retailers typically have about six weeks of excess inventory, and there was little evidence yesterday of any shortages around the Islands.
At the Longs Drug store in Kailua, rice was selling quickly yesterday, according to a store manager, but there was no concern over potential shortages. The store was operating normally, ordering its typical supply of goods.
Food distributor Fleming Foods has said it has built up its supplies of rice, toilet paper and canned goods to last a few weeks. Fleming supplies retailers such as supermarkets. And distributor Y. Hata & Co., which supplies restaurants, hotels, hospitals and other nonretail food service outlets, also has said it has built up a "safety stock" to handle a disruption of a few days.
