Parade means business

Newport Beach florist Janet Peloquin found herself having to turn away business this week after being inundated with last-minute requests for boat parade arrangements.

Thousands flock to the harbor’s edge every year for the annual Newport Beach Christmas Boat Parade, which has been called Newport’s scaled-down version of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, and this year local businesses expect the same as they prepared Tuesday for the next five days of holiday celebration.

All those celebrations and customers equal dollars for the city and businesses like Peloquin’s Bloom Where You Are Planted floral designing company.

“It increases business significantly,” especially for the parties on the weekends, Peloquin said.

Peloquin and her one other designer will work late through Saturday, when they’ll have to send out about 25 large arrangements mostly to bay-front homes.

About a decade ago, a study was done to evaluate the effect the boat parade has on Newport Beach’s economy, Newport Beach Chamber of Commerce President Richard Luehrs said.

“We found the impact the parade had on the local economy got up to the multimillions of dollars…. Once it got into the tens of millions of dollars, we stopped adding this up and just said it’s huge,” Luehrs said.

The most obvious benefactors, of course, are bay-front restaurants that open reservations up for the five-day parade months in advance.

“These five days of the boat parade are probably some of the busiest days of the year, but we prepare for it as much as we can,” said Dave Salisbury, owner of Newport Landing and Harborside restaurants on the Balboa Peninsula.

It’s thin pickings for someone looking for a last-minute reservation, as tables at both his restaurants, along with others, are just about full.

The Balboa Bay Club is a huge draw for parade watchers, and the club’s director of sales and marketing, George Lysak, said he expects a couple thousand customers will take advantage of its several restaurants and its picnic-style event outside.

But there are less-obvious businesses that do well during the five-day parade. Fuel docks, caterers, florists — like Peloquin — grocery stores, coffee shops and boat charters also see business jump, Luehrs said.

“You can look into bay-front windows of these homes or see out on the patio literally hundreds of people … lined up on the rails,” Luehrs said. “They’ve all got something in their hands, whether it’s a plate of meatballs or a cocktail — somebody had to buy that cocktail or that meatball, and they had to prepare it, had to buy the goods from someplace.”

Although one day Wednesday through Friday may not be the biggest days in terms of money coming in, the parade’s five consecutive days are often the busiest for business owners, including the Balboa Bay Club, Newport Landing and Harborside, which used to be the Balboa Pavilion.

It also reflects a boost in tourism dollars as people from all over Southern California come to check out the parade.

“The parade brings people from all over the county down to the water for the night, and not just in terms of Newport Beach locals,” Newport Beach Conference and Visitors Bureau spokeswoman Jessica Roswell said. “It’s an Orange County event and a Southern California tradition.”

And the tradition extends from the waterway to the roadways. The only negative business effect of the boat parade is the traffic and the workload.

Every year at this time, Newport and Balboa boulevards, Pacific Coast Highway and other areas that lead to the water are usually bumper-to-bumper, which makes for long lines for shoppers.

To address this concern, along with the lack of parking, some businesses try to accommodate late-comers.

Salisbury’s restaurants do only one sitting each night of the parade so people who have to fight the traffic to get to the peninsula aren’t rushed during their meal.

In 2002, amid uproarious complaints from some residents and businesses, the boat parade’s path was cut short and the event was shortened from seven days to five days. When the change was looming, businesses were concerned it would hurt their bottom lines. Luehrs said residents who live along channels cut from the parade’s path tell him their property values plummeted, although he never sought to confirm that.

Fortunately, local businesses have fared well with the cut and now say they’re even happy about the change.

“People just crammed all their orders into the five days,” said Peloquin, who has owned her Dover Street business for eight years. “I didn’t really notice — in fact I was kind of grateful.”

Business at Newport Landing also wasn’t affected by the shortened schedule.

“We were concerned, but seven nights for us as workers — we were all pretty tired after seven days of parade onslaught,” Salisbury said. “It seemed like we did the same amount of sales in five as we did for seven…. Usually the Monday and Tuesday of the parade were the slowest, so it didn’t hurt us too bad.”

Even though most restaurants will be packed for the event, there’s always a chance you’ll be seated at the last minute. Salisbury said there are even a “smattering of tables” open at his restaurants, but they’re few and far between.