Experience Co currently runs a mix of skydiving, marine tours and treetop experiences across Australia and New Zealand but the past half year has been tough. Fewer international arrivals, rising living costs for local customers and severe weather disruptions have all combined to slow sales. The company has already reshaped its portfolio once, offloading a remote luxury accommodation arm to focus more tightly on core adventure and reef tourism experiences.
In the six months to 31 December the company generated an unaudited underlying EBITDA of about $2.5 million, down from roughly $3.7 million for the comparable period a year earlier, while net debt climbed from around $10.9 million in June to $13.3 million. Management now flags its Australian skydiving arm as failing to cover its cost of capital, which is pushing it into a formal review of operating sites and structure. By contrast, the New Zealand skydiving division, a nine vessel marine fleet with a reef pontoon in Far North Queensland and the Treetops adventure division are described as the strongest contributors, helped by new products such as whale watching trips and island day tours.
The wider outlook seems mixed. Marine and New Zealand operations appear to offer a clearer growth path and the group is already considering more marine opportunities beyond Cairns and Port Douglas. However, delayed international tourism recovery, the sensitivity of key markets such as Japan and the United States to global conflict, lease issues at some treetop sites and recent industrial action affecting skydiving all suggest that earnings recovery may take longer than hoped. A potential sale or reshaping of the Australian skydiving unit could free up capital and reduce risk but it also underlines how uneven the tourism rebound appears to be across different experiences and locations.
