Peninsula businesses counted

Peninsula Chamber of Commerce has identified 1308 businesses operating on the Peninsula.

The Chamber has compiled a database of 1538 businesses in the 2256 and 2257 postcode areas, which extends as far as Bensville and Killcare.

The database is thought to be the first extensive list compiled for the Peninsula.

Woy Woy has the highest number of businesses with 549.

Umina has 474, Ettalong 235, Pearl Beach and Patonga together have 26 and The Bays have 24.

"These figures highlight the large number of home-based businesses on the Peninsula," said Chamber secretary Mr Mark Snell.

With about 600 commercial premises on the Peninsula, as many as half the businesses were home-based, he said.

Many of these were tradesmen.

Mr Snell estimated that as many as one in 20 homes on the Peninsula hosted a business.

The listings in the database fell into 450 business categories and included some non-commercial listings, such as churches, council services and community organisations.

The largest category was building contractors with 61 businesses.

The next largest was medical practitioners with 38.

Plumbers and gasfitters came next with 32, followed by electrical contractors with 31.

The rest of the top 10 was real estate agents 30, hairdressers 28, mechanics 22, take-away food shops 22, accountants 19 and painters and decorators 18.

The next 10 most highly ranked categories were boat and yacht services, landscapers, restaurants, child-care centres, churches, food and general stores, organisations, air-conditioning services, chemists and massage therapists.

The figures confirmed the importance of the building, health and leisure industries to the local economy, said Mr Snell.

He said the database was made possible through the Work for the Dole program.

The Chamber used the services of Work for the Dole participant Juliet Williams to put more than 2000 business telephone listings onto computer.

These were then filtered to remove multiple listings and aggregated to produce the statistics.

"We are very appreciative of Juliet's work for us and are pleased to see that she has now secured a job for herself in Sydney," said Mr Snell.

The Chamber planned to use the database as a business directory on the Peninsula's community web site, www.thePeninsulaR.net, as well as a research tool.

October 19