Grimmest downturn yet seen

An impromptu meeting of business owners from Karratha and surrounds was called last week by concerned proprietors operating in what they're calling the grimmest downturn ever faced.

More than 50 business representatives, from builders to mobile hairdressers, packed the Jamaica Blue Coffee Shop in Karratha Shopping Centre for the first meeting of the North West Network.

There were speeches from the Small Business Centre and Regional Development Australia Pilbara chairwoman Fiona White-Hartig.

The air of the meeting was tense and thick with vented frustrations of locals doing it tough.

Some said they had to move out of commercial properties into mobile or home-based businesses to cut costs.

In the City of Karratha, the number of home-based or mobile businesses includes nine hairdressers, 20 food providers, and 16 beauty therapists. Pilbara Site Pics owner Margaret Bertling has been in the region on and off since 1987 and combined with Oztopia manager Harley Spencer to organise the networking event.

She said seeing so many friends not doing well in the business sector was the tipping point.

"I couldn't work out why in a town that's supposed to be in growth mode, we had businesses that were falling over," she said.

Mr Spencer said the event was about getting local businesses to work together.

To achieve this aim, the network has set up a referral system to get business owners interacting with each other at a personal level and referring businesses to their friends and family.

Embroidery Excellence owner Len Vertigan said the Karratha and Districts Chamber of Commerce and Industry was good for larger businesses, but it was good to have something for smaller businesses.

Crawford Realty commercial sales and leasing consultant Michael Jeffs has been in Karratha for two weeks and attended the meeting.

He said the situation in town was a bit worse than he had prepared for.

"(It's) softer than I thought it would be," he said.

"Certain areas are suffering (more) than others, and the industrial area is suffering (more) than retail."

Mr Jeffs said the building industry was in a tough place, as were the retailers whose businesses focused on furnishing and filling new houses.

He said while filling the retail section of the under-construction The Quarter project had gone well, at the same time he had started on three receiverships since arriving in town.

Member for Pilbara Brendon Grylls said it was a challenging environment for businesses that had grown a lot in recent years and needed to scale back.

"At this time we need as many locals shopping local and buying local," he said.

"That includes Government procurements and the like and seeing more of the Government work going to the local workforce rather than fly-in, fly-out."

Mr Grylls said there were positive stories coming from the city, and cited the opening of a new restaurant at Pelago, but he didn't disagree there were retailers under pressure.

While residential rents have continued to decrease in the Pilbara, Mr Grylls said there were no prizes for not adjusting rents to market conditions for commercial properties.