Braddon cafe Gather unsure what demand will be on the Queen's memorial public holiday

The announcement of the public holiday with less than two weeks notice has stirred up a number of issues for businesses, the most pressing of which has been whether to open their doors at all on Thursday.

"For small business owners the decision to open or not is going to be far more difficult, they'll need to pay penalty rates for their staff," Canberra Business Chamber chief executive Graham Catt said.

Operators have been balancing up the risks of opening with the potential revenue proffered by a potentially busy day.

Wet weather or an exodus of Canberrans headed to holiday destinations could eat into those profit margins though, leaving business owners hesitant to roster staff on at double their usual pay.

"This one is a bit of a gamble, it's not common to have a Thursday public holiday rather than a Monday," Will Fisher, the co-owner of Braddon's Gather cafe said.

"Is everybody going to leave on the Thursday and then come back on Sunday? I don't really know what it looks like yet, but we're expecting it to be reasonably busy."

Mr Fisher has made the call to keep his venues - which include the cafe, a restaurant in the Belconnen Labour Club and Blackbird bar - open.

He's already seen an uptick in demand alongside the arrival of spring and the Floriade festival.

"It's hard to predict how busy things are going to be at the moment, with spring coming and the weather pretty inconsistent.

"If it's really busy, we will have a successful day and make a bit of profit and everything will run smoothly.

"If it's quiet, then we'll just have to manage down, send people home and try and control our losses," he said.

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The potential that staff may take Thursday and Friday off at short notice is also on business owners' minds, but Mr Fisher said he was confident he could rely on his employees.

"I feel like we've got a better relationship with the majority of our staff base, so we can count on all of them showing up."

Canberra Region Tourism Leaders Forum chair David Marshall said while the public holiday could see a boost in visitors to Canberra, it was always difficult for businesses to make arrangements in such a short time-frame.

"Because the tourism industry have had quite a few challenges, financially, it's always a bit of a slap when you find something is imposed on you very quickly without a great deal of notice.

"The good news is that [hotel] occupancy rates for the school holiday period are looking very strong in Canberra, and we also have the highest visitations of visiting friends and relatives."

Mr Fisher isn't phased, he said.

"We're used to getting late functions, late catering orders, late 50-person tables, all these sorts of things.

"So a late public holiday is nothing all that new to us."

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