What's Inside:

Urging Targeted Relief

Roundtable on Re-Opening Hospitality

Challenges Facing Seasonal Businesses

Hospitality Minnesota is leading a coalition of hospitality organizations, including the Minnesota Licensed Beverage Association, the Community of Minnesota Resorts and the Minnesota Craft Brewers Guild, to bring attention to the peril our industry faces and urge federal, state and local officials to work together to take action providing targeted relief. A   press release  sent to media outlets around the state this morning tells of the anticipated economic devastation if relief does not come soon.

Early coverage included FOX9, Associated Press/WCCO and the Mpls/St. Paul Business Journal. We expect additional television, print and radio coverage as the evening progresses, given CEO Liz Rammer’s numerous interviews throughout the day.

Today, DEED Commissioner Grove asked Hospitality Minnesota to lead the next step of the Hospitality Roundtable he has formed to gain agreement on re-opening guidance. We are asking that the process be sped up to gain the swift approval needed to get some or all of our hospitality businesses open on May 18. This follows our earlier work to share best practices and protocols with the Governor demonstrating our industry’s good work to ensure safe employee and customer interactions. Hospitality Minnesota is well-represented on the roundtable, including Pete Mihajlov (Parasole Restaurant Holdings), Abbey Pieper and Ben Thuringer (Madden’s Resort), Brent Frederick (Jester Concepts), Phil Trusty, (Crow Wing Lake Campground) and Stephanie Laitala-Rupp (Commonwealth Properties). 

MPR ran a  story  this morning on challenges facing seasonal businesses like resorts and campgrounds, featuring member East Silent Lake Resort and comments from Hospitality Minnesota stating:

“With these seasonal businesses, they really typically make almost all of their revenue during about 100 days during the summer … there’s not really a way to make up that revenue in the fall … [i]t’s important that we get this right, [that] we do it safely, but we  start to allow these tourism businesses to expand operations  in the very near future.”

At this afternoon’s Roundtable, Board Member Phil Trusty effectively re-iterated our position that campgrounds are ready to open safely now. We will continue to advocate for this, as well as with the DNR for houseboats to operate safely.

Our Member Updates are generally sent to members only. In the interest of public health and the health of our industry, we encourage you to share this update widely. Additional resources can be found on our  website  and through our social media posts on   Facebook , LinkedIn  and  Twitter .