Queenstown tourism manager retires after 37-year career

Real Journeys commercial director Tony McQuilkin in front of the Earnslaw. Photo / Philip Chandler

Thursday marked the retirement of Tony McQuilkin, who was not only Queenstown's longest-serving tourism manager but also one of its most influential.

McQuilkin has held management roles his entire 37-year career with Real Journeys, the ODT reports.

He started out in 1980 as area manager in charge of TSS Earnslaw, a Fiordlander boat, and a tug.

He has weathered floods and tourism downturns but leaves with his company, in which he has a small shareholding, in better shape than ever.

As he says, he and Real Journeys - formerly Fiordland Travel - have grown together.

Appropriately, last week he was awarded life membership of the Tourism Export Council (TEC).

That is on top of the Sir Jack Newman Award in 2014 - New Zealand tourism's most prestigious individual award.

Presenting last week's honour, former TEC chairman Martin Horgan called him tourism's own "Speight's Southern Man".

"Over four decades, tourism in New Zealand and Real Journeys in particular have benefited from Tony's no-bull..., honest and incredibly loyal and hard-working approach to business," Horgan said.

"Tony has been constantly innovative over that time, full of ideas to grow and with the drive and energy to make them happen."

McQuilkin is credited with ideas such as RJs' glass-roofed, bullet-design Milford coaches, overnight Fiordland cruises and developing Queenstown's Walter Peak product, but stresses everything is a team effort.

A major contribution was identifying the Chinese tourism market early on.

After his first job, he took on roles such as head of sales and international markets director before more latterly becoming commercial director.

Real Journeys takes tourists through Doubtful Sound in 2013. Photo / Supplied

"We always had an attitude that we'd get out and promote our excursions and our experiences all around the world, and that proved to be really successful.

"Even if you were in the back streets of some godforsaken place in southern China, and there was just a wall of black bicycles, you'd be out there with a Chinese brochure saying, 'This is what you can do'."

He recalled lugging 15kg boxes of brochures around the world in the pre-internet age.

He noted that after the Global Financial Crisis in the late 2000s, numbers from tourism markets such as the UK, Europe and the US almost halved.

The saviour of New Zealand, and indeed Queenstown, was the burgeoning Chinese market, and today it's hugely significant.

If there is one RJs product McQuilkin is synonymous with, it is Earnslaw, a major refit of which he spearheaded in 1982.

The good thing about that steamship is it's such a good vessel. When you see her cruising on the lake, she is the guts and the bones of Queenstown.

A highlight was escorting dignitaries, including the Queen and Prince Philip who took a Frankton Arm cruise in 1990.

"I was walking backwards and I nearly knocked the Queen over, which was a bit unfortunate.

"I had quite a good yarn with old Prince Philip just on the wing of the bridge."

McQuilkin, who is 63, said it was time to move on.

"I've got heaps of expeditions. I've got a number of personal/business opportunities and development things which I can choose to do."

He intended continuing his chairmanship of the Queenstown Trails Trust and had a desire to see maybe 150km more tracks and trails put in place.