Hoping for a post-COVID boom, Minnesota resorts face severe labor shortage

This was going to be the big comeback summer for Minnesota's tourism business.

Freed from the limits placed on them last year during the COVID-19 pandemic, the state's resorts, hotels and camps were poised to welcome a flood of visitors eager to get out and enjoy themselves.

Well, the visitors are there. But the workers aren't.

From the North Shore to the limestone bluffs of the Mississippi River, the state's tourism destinations are struggling to staff up. Many are operating with half their normal complement of workers while dealing with an explosion in demand for their services.

Job boards are full of postings for resort workers, many offering as much as $17-$18 an hour. But it hasn't moved the needle.

"After last year, we were hopeful that things would get back to normal," said Sue Dutcher, manager of the St. Croix River Resort in Hinckley. Instead, she said, "we're being run ragged."

The four properties in Dutcher's group would normally employ about 50 people — from cooks to groundskeepers to shuttle drivers — to handle summer guests. But right now, staff numbers are about 50% of normal levels despite months of help-wanted ads and Dutcher's willingness to "pay whatever it takes to get somebody in here."

Dutcher has had to cut back on services, including shuttles that take canoers to and from the river.

In Detroit Lakes, Joanne Anderson faces a similar challenge at the Forest Hills Resort. Anderson manages Izzo's, the resort's bar and restaurant, and right now she's running it with eight workers instead of the usual 20.

The restaurant, which normally stays open until 11 p.m., now closes after supper. The entire resort, which usually has about 80 workers during the summer months, has fewer than half that number.

"It's a sad situation," Anderson said. "Being we got through the COVID, we were pretty excited for this year to be a boom. But it's not a boom.

"The faucet wants to run, but we can't turn it on full blast. It's trickling."

The worker shortage has been brewing for more than a year, said Ben Wogsland, a spokesman for Hospitality Minnesota, the trade association for the state's hotels, restaurants, resorts and campgrounds.

The industry is down about 50,000 workers from its normal summer level of 280,000-290,000. Many of them found other jobs during the first COVID shutdown in March and April last year, and others left when a second hospitality shutdown was ordered later in the year. Some also may be choosing to draw expanded unemployment benefits rather than work, a sore point with many resort managers.

"People are trying to bring back their staff, and they find they had to get another job," Wogsland said. With 90% of the state's leisure operators planning summer hires, the labor market is "very tight, very tight," he added.

"Unfortunately, it's kind of this perfect storm that has created this situation over the last 18 months," Wogsland said. "We're hearing from people who have had to turn guests away, cut hours for restaurants.

"So many of these folks accumulated debt over the last year. Now that they're allowed to get back to 100% capacity, it's frustrating not to be able to operate at full speed to dig out from that financial hole."

In the past, many resorts and campgrounds have brought in foreign workers for the summer on temporary work visas. But COVID is still affecting those workers, with the United States not allowing some countries to send workers here, while other countries are barring their citizens from traveling to America.

The YMCA of Minnesota, the state's largest operator of summer camps, is seeing record enrollments this year. The group's day camps are "fully staffed and operating at record levels," with more than 18,000 children enrolled, according to Niki Geisler, vice president of camping.

But the Y is short on camp counselors for its children's overnight camps and kitchen staff for its family camps.

The Y typically hires 50 to 100 international workers as camp counselors, but they have none this year. Though they've made some counselor hires locally, they've had to cut back on enrollment at the overnight camps. While they've enrolled about 6,000 children in their overnight and wilderness camps, that's down by 10 to 15% from before the pandemic.

"It's unprecedented times," said Merrick Dresnin, human resources director for Cote Family Destinations, which operates three resorts including the Grand View Lodge in Nisswa.

In past years, Dresnin has hired as many as 100 international workers for the summer, and was hoping to get 30 this year. He got none.

Dresnin is "actively looking" for 60 to 80 more employees to fill out a full complement of 800. Meanwhile, the existing staff is being pushed harder than usual.

"It's tough on the troops that we have here," he said. "So our job is to try and keep them motivated and enthusiastic, and try and find relief."

Dresnin said the company is offering bonuses to selected workers and has made pay adjustments for some positions. They've also brought on interns from hospitality programs at colleges.

"On a daily basis, we're strategizing how to recruit aggressively and how to retain those people we're blessed enough to have," he said.

Some operators have been fortunate enough to escape the labor shortage. The Trail Center Lodge on the Gunflint Trail is "100% staffed," according to owner Sarah Hamilton. With the lodge open year-round, she's put together a veteran staff of about 15 who have been with her for years, and she adds about five summer workers.

This year, Hamilton launched a program called One Spirit Employment that brings young adults from the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota to work at businesses on the North Shore.

Six young people have come this year, including one who works at Hamilton's lodge, and she hopes to expand that number in the coming years.

Other businesses in the area aren't as fortunate, she said. Many of the restaurants in Grand Marais are closing one or two days a week, as well as trimming their menu offerings and cutting their hours.

The irony, Hamilton said, is that customer traffic is skyrocketing.

"We're doing August numbers in the beginning of July," she said. "People want out. They're traveling.

"It's a conundrum, for sure."

john.reinan@startribune.com 612-673-7402