Capital Brewing among Canberra Airport retailers whose plans are uncertain

The bar - due to open on September 3 - is one of several airport retailers which will be impacted if plans to close the next two Saturdays are ongoing.

Canberra Airport announced this week both Saturday and Tuesday trading could cease as a reduction in passenger numbers bites further into its bottom line.

Its owners are calling on the federal government to devise a national aviation recovery plan, to prevent further job losses.

Capital Brewing managing director Laurence Kain said while operators were doing everything they could, any changes to flight schedules were not good.

"It's just very uncertain at the moment with all of the border closures," Mr Kain said.

"If there's not a lot of flights there's not a lot of people coming through to buy beer."

Pre-pandemic, a bar operated at the international terminal alongside retailers Lotte Duty Free, News@CBR, Bakers Cut, Noodles XO and City Hill Coffee.

City Hill was the only outlet to remain open from the time the passenger terminal first closed its doors in mid-April, due to a lack of scheduled flights from all the airlines.

News@CBR has since reopened and a new convenience store opened at the airport in the last month.

Capital Brewing had built a full-tap room at the airport to allow travellers to sip any of the beers available at its Fyshwick brewery, as well as its specialty beers.

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Mr Kain said they'd decide on how its opening would be affected when more was known regarding flights.

"If the airport needs to close for two days to make sure they survive then it's probably a good move," he said.

"They're a commercial entity as well who are no doubt hurting from this."

Canberra Airport head of aviation Michael Thomson said in a statement this week they couldn't keep functioning while aviation travel was down to around 1 per cent of pre-COVID-19 passenger numbers.

"We are calling on all governments within Australian to develop a national aviation recovery plan - a plan that adheres to health authority advice and one that allows people to travel based on a risk assessment and passengers meeting prerequisites for travel," Mr Thomson said.