July business was limited for many Ely area outfitters, leading to what some have called their worst mid-summer numbers in decades.
Dan Waters of Canadian Waters and Drew Brockett with Piragis’s outfitting department weighed in on trip cancellations at their respective businesses — as well as the outlook for rebound throughout the rest of the summer.
Canadian Waters lost 50% of its typical July revenue last month, Waters said. Following the BWCAW closures in mid-July, the business did not send their first group into the wilderness until Tuesday, August 4.
“Numbers are way down. It wasn’t even close to last year, or any other year, so it was devastating from that standpoint,” Brockett said about business at Piragis. “But we’re rocking now.”
Piragis recently began sending out trips again, and Brockett said the opening of entry points along the Fernberg Corridor has been a major help for the outfitter.
In the very tail end of July, Piragis outfitting staff were able to save a few trips by sending them south to BWCAW entry points at Isabella Lake and Island River. Brockett heard positive feedback from the groups’ experiences.
Dan Waters said it is not always possible to re-route trips and give them the experience they wished for, especially outside the wilderness.
The outfitter previously sent one group to Voyageurs National Park and one to Birch Lake, both of which returned two to three days early after the locations failed to match their hopes.
“When I asked them how they liked it, they said, boy, that’s really big water. It’s not for canoeing. It’s for big boats,” Waters said.
Waters said it is difficult to convince groups who had their hearts set on the Boundary Waters to shift to alternate locations.
“That’s like trying to talk somebody who had their mind set on a big fancy Cadillac car talking them into a little tiny Ford pickup,” Waters said. “You don’t talk people into changing like that.”
Dan Waters said rebound has been limited at Canadian Waters, even with the reopening of a number of Boundary Waters entry points for overnight and day use.
Canadian Waters clients have still been cancelling permits for not only August, but September as well. Brockett said Piragis has also continuously seen August cancellations.
“There’s an awful lot of people who cancel their reservations all the way into September because of the publicity and they didn’t want to go into an area that had been burned over,” Dan Waters said.
Some of the outfitter’s most popular entry points, namely Moose River, Mudro and Fall Lake, still remain closed, while other entrances like Little Indian Sioux and Stuart Rivers will remain closed through September.
“Even though there’s been a lot of talk about opening things up and it’s going to be better, I think there will still be a number of losses that will carry through the rest of December,” Waters said.
Waters said he has not seen an outfitting season to match this one’s losses in his 63 years at Canadian Waters.
Though the Boundary Waters completely closed for a period in 2021 due to the Greenwood Fire and a partial closure in 2011 from Pagami Creek, Brockett said this year’s season is unique.
“This one is very interesting. It is hurting a lot of other entry points that we love to send people to,” Brockett said.
Piragis reduced their regular outfitting hours to adapt to reduced demand, limiting operations to 8 a.m. - 6 p.m. rather than their standard 6 a.m. - 8 p.m. summer schedule. The retail store also saw reductions to their open hours.
“Nobody was cut,” Brockett said. “But we went barebones here from the standpoint of staffing the outfitting department.”
Expanded hours will return to Piragis on Monday, August 10.
“We’re ready to have people come up and take canoe trips from the outfitting department,” Brockett said. “We’re ready to go.”
