Business survey checks in on COVID recovery

Noosa businesses are being called on to help gain a better understanding of the shire’s COVID-19 recovery.

 Noosa Council has launched Phase two of its Business Roundtable Resilience Survey – a follow-up to the one done in June this year.

 Mayor Clare Stewart said the latest Pulse survey is vital to helping plan the shire’s ongoing economic recovery.

“The information will help us to better advocate to Government for more business support initiatives and track how the pandemic has changed local businesses’ needs,” she said.

"The results will guide where we need to focus and identify exactly what businesses need so we can develop appropriate initiatives to help them bounce back,” Cr Stewart said.

The first survey, supported by the Business Roundtable, revealed that while 80 per cent of Noosa businesses managed to remain open during the most restrictive period of COVID-19, about half experienced a fall in revenue of nearly 60 per cent.

“The easing of restrictions have certainly been a catalyst to a stronger economic outlook.”

“But this will be a long, challenging recovery for everyone,” she said.

Economic Development Manager Anthony Dow encouraged local operators to provide feedback.

“We appreciate things are still difficult, but we need the data to track how the continuing impacts have hit local business,” he said.

“There were over 680 responses from the last survey, so it would be fantastic if we could generate a similar response,” Mr Dow said.

The survey is open until November 1 and can be found here https://survey.zohopublic.com/zs/upCNkb