By Abbey Cannan
The local community can now enjoy a river ride as much as our tourists with Noosa Ferry & Cruise Company recently launching a Locals Frequent Traveller Pass.
Noosa Ferry & Cruise Company Proprietor David Stielow said the pass offered a 50 per cent discount to valued locals when they purchased 10 tickets in one purchase.
After 20 years of operating a marine business in the Whitsundays on Hamilton Island, David knows a thing or two about looking after his local customers.
“I had quite a substantial marine business up there that took people to the Great Barrier Reef and around the islands, and so being in the marine industry is my life,“ he said.
“There’s never been a real process put in place to look after the locals here, and I wanted to bring the same methods that worked in the Whitsundays to Noosa.“
David said the local community was the nuts and bolts of supporting the business.
“I just wanted to give back to the community as best as I could so that they could enjoy the Noosa River as much as the tourists,“ he said.
The company was successfully run by Don McBride for the past 20 years and David has been continuing on with that legacy for over a year.
“I bought the business from the original founder of the business and he’s a local legend,“ David said.
“I met Don a number of years ago and we just became good friends over the years.
“The ferry is an iconic business for Noosa and it’s synonymous with the shire.“
David said the first year of taking over the business had been eventful.
“Pre-Covid was wonderful and we refined the brand and continued on with what Don did,“ he said.
“Covid shut us down for nearly two months and during that shut down period, we painted boats, and we did a lot of maintenance.
“Now post-Covid we have increased the number of services that we traditionally did, so we’re now doing double the number of services up and down the river.
“Part of the reason for doing that is we have to be cautious about the capacity of people on the boats and safety is our priority.“
For more information on the Locals Frequent Traveller Pass visit www.noosaferry.com or call 07 5449 8442.
