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Coronavirus Puts Athens’ Hospitality Market on Hold
Posted On 24 Feb 2021
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Tag: Athens, Athens hotels, Athens-Attica & Argosaronic Hotel Association, Attica, Attica hotels, c311c, Coronavirus, coronavirus Greece, coronavirus pandemic, COVID19, COVID19Gr, COVID19Greece, COVID_19, Evgenios Vasilikos, Evgenios Vasilikos. Labrini Karanasiou-Zoulovits, Greece, Greece tourism, Greek news, Greek tourism, l70l, l75l, post-Covid-19, Tourism, tourism and travel, tourism and travel Greece, travel
Photo source: Athens – Attica & Argosaronic Hotel Association
The ongoing coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic, the travel restrictions imposed worldwide and low demand have put Athens’ hospitality market on hold.
“There are no bookings [for Athens] at the moment. Nothing is certain for the next months, since we don’t have any prepaid bookings, while a flexible cancellation policy in place,” Athens – Attica & Argosaronic Hotel Association Secretary General Evgenios Vasilikos said during a press conference on Tuesday.
According to Vassilikos, very few hotels are open in the Attica region at the moment, with 90 percent of visitors being domestic travelers that visit Athens mostly for medical reasons.
Data presented by GBR Consulting show that in January 2021, only 55 percent of Attica’s hotels were operating with occupancy rates reaching 11 percent and RevPAR (revenue per available room) at 8 euros against 42 euros in January 2020 – prior to the coronavirus outbreak in Europe.
Meanwhile, in 2020, the pandemic led to a revenue loss of 700 million euros for Attica’s hotels, with occupancy rates reaching only 19.7 percent based on the Total Room Inventory (TRI) methodology (TRI = paid rooms occupied / total number of rooms in a market).
“Making predictions for 2021 would be an absolute risk, as circumstances change and estimations are rather ominous. We would be a happy if we could ‘save’ the second semester of 2021, however all indications point to the opposite,” Vasilikos added.
Athens keeps guests satisfied
Photo source: Region of Attica
Although the ongoing uncertainty is puzzling the association’s executives, President Lambrini Karanasiou-Zoulovits believes that Athens’ strong brand and high satisfaction rates can contribute to the recovery of its tourism market.
“Athens has a strong brand name and offers a prime tourism product,” she said during the online event.
During the press conference, GBR’s “16th Survey on Guest Satisfaction and Hotel Performance in Attica 2020” was presented.
Conducted between August and September, the survey showed that the overall satisfaction score of Athens increased from 8.1/10 percent in 2019 to 8.2/10 percent last year.
