The Host Marriott Airport Restaurant at Lihu’e Airport has been “impacted positively” by tighter security measures brought on in response to the September 11 terrorist attacks, the restaurant manager said. People are arriving at the airport earlier to catch flights,
The Host Marriott Airport Restaurant at Lihu’e Airport has been “impacted positively” by tighter security measures brought on in response to the September 11 terrorist attacks, the restaurant manager said.
People are arriving at the airport earlier to catch flights, spending more time in the airport, hence spending more time and money eating and drinking before boarding planes, said Lynn Hiranaka, manager of the Host Marriott restaurant and bar.
Which is why the Lihu’e Airport bar and restaurant hasn’t requested special rent relief granted to 14 other airport concessionaires in the state, including Host International’s restaurant operations at Honolulu International Airport, a sister company of the Lihu’e Airport restaurant.
The Lihu’e restaurant pays rent (to the state Department of Transportation Airports Division) based on a percentage of its sales; other concession operators in the state pay a flat monthly rate, Hiranaka explained.
Host International and 13 other vendors requested and have been granted a percentage-based rent through special powers given to Gov. Ben Cayetano by the state Legislature after the terrorist events of September 11.
Sales have slumped at the Lihu’e Airport restaurant since September 11, and have been hurt by cuts in scheduled service by both Aloha Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines, said Hiranaka. United Airlines’ twice-a-day West Coast nonstop flights provide the restaurant its base of customers, she explained.
“We’d really take a hit without United,” she said.
Tiare Enterprises, the lei-seller inside the Lihu’e Airport security checkpoint (through which only ticketed passengers can pass under the new security measures), is the only Lihu’e concessionaire to apply for and be granted the rent relief.
Four additional applications received before the December 31 deadline are under review by the state DOT, said Kim Murakawa, spokeswoman for Cayetano.
Tiare at Lihu’e must make special provisions to provide leis for the local market. Its employees must come out of the shop sell leis at curbside.
Empowered through laws enacted in the October special session of the state Legislature, Cayetano declared an economic emergency and created the Airport Concession Relief Program.
Through that program, airport vendors who applied for and were granted the relief are able to calculate rent payments on percentages of sales, rather than pay base monthly rents, retroactively to September 11.
The concession relief will last through the end of April, but may be extended on a month-to-month basis beyond that date. It’s expected to save vendors around $18 million, with nearly $16 million of that benefiting Duty Free Shops (DFS Hawai’i, Inc.) at Honolulu International Airport.
Peter Fithian, whose wife Roberta Fithian is president of Tiare, said the Lihu’e Airport Tiare Enterprises location is the only one of his wife’s shops at state airports located inside the security checkpoint. Shops at the other airports are accessible to the public because they are outside the security checkpoints.
As a result, the Lihu’e Airport location has suffered slumping sales, said Peter Fithian, chairman of an airport concessionaires’ committee.
Across Mokulele Loop at Lihu’e Airport, Ampco System Parking, the parking concession, also has not requested rent relief. Ampco pays the the rent percentage of fees it collects.
Some airport concession contracts at Lihu’e Airport are coming up for renewal soon, but Peter Fithian feels that because of uncertain economic times, the state is in no hurry to negotiate or renegotiate contracts at this point.
Staff Writer Paul C. Curtis can be reached at mailto:pcurtis@pulitzer.net or 245-3681 (ext. 224).
