Benidorm, at the gates of summer: one in three hotels is still closed due to the lack of British tourists
Impact of Covid on tourism
Updated Wednesday,
23
June
2021
–
01:51
The employer warns that losses for establishments range from 50,000 to 150,000 euros for each month of closure
When in 2020 Benidorm entered July with more than half of its hotels closed after months of confinement, no one could presage that, one year later, the effects of the an pandemic would be noticed. But the reality is that one of the main Spanish tourist capitals continues today with almost a third of its hotel plant closed. And the reason is none other than the absence of British tourists.
The city of Alicante is one of the most suffering tourism parn from the United Kingdom by the imposition by your Government of strong restrictions on its citizens traveling to areas considered to be at risk. And Spain is in the eyes of the UK. Although now the Executive of Boris Johnson has left the door open to British immunized with the vaccine can travel freely and without quarantines to return to his country, Benidorm is still waiting to receive the tourist of this country, which represents nothing more and nothing less than 40% of its market.
Of ah that, according to the data of the hotel association of the Valencian Community Hosbec, 33% of your hotels keep the blind down. There are establishments that work exclusively with British tourism and therefore remain without activity, because for them it does not make sense to open, confirms to EL MUNDO the president of the employers, Toni Mayor. This means that, at the gates of summer, a tourist city like Benidorm only has 62% of its hotel beds operational (about 23,000), since the occupancy barely exceeds 50% in these last weeks: Demand remains stagnant and supply increases little by little, since this week there have been new hotel openings.
Also by early July the forecast is that recover the activity hotels as the Grand Luxor, Marina or Palm Beach. However, according to Hosbec data, nine out of ten rooms are occupied in Benidorm by Spanish tourists. This is already an anomaly, because if the city is characterized by something it is because half of its tourism is directly foreign. The restrictions on mobility due to the coronavirus have drowned an economy focused on tourism and, especially, on the British. This explains that, if in Benidorm the open hotels represent 67%, in areas such as the Costa Blanca or Valencia they exceed 80% for these dates.
Lost
Tourism has been one of the economic sectors hardest hit by the health crisis. In the case of closed hotels, the Valencian employers ‘ association calculates that losses amount to between 50,000 and 150,000 euros per month of closure depending on the type of establishment. The concern about the delay in the British de-escalation is maximum in the hotel industry because, without the British tourist, there can hardly be recovery of Valencian tourism. When in the year of the pandemic the arrival of British tourists cay a 79% compared to 2019, the Valencian Community stopped entering 537 million, that is, 78% of the total expenditure.
Now, and after a blank winter by the autonomous perimeter closures, the point and apart is marked by the activation of the Covid passport in the European Union, stresses Major. From now on, we will see how demand evolves, because so far we did not expect more occupation than we are having. In the face of the high summer season, depend directly on the opening of borders. In the words of the president of Hosbec, we are conditioned by the decisions of the European political authorities… and British.
The behavior of reservation for the next few weeks, therefore, it is still unknown today. In the hope that British tourism can be reactivated, at least the national one is trusted. Mayor confirms that it is working quite well, even better than expected, already reaching an occupation of 80% on the Valencian coast on weekends.
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