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2020-05-06 20:33:30
Over the past few years, Greece has achieved spectacular success in terms of building its image as a country extremely attractive to tourists. Each upcoming season was assessed through the prism of increases and subsequent records of the number of visitors. And although this year's vacation was predicted by the tourism industry as a period of stabilization, and perhaps even slight declines, no one expected this season to be so hard for Greece. Many hotel and guest house owners estimate that this year's revenue drops associated with the coronavirus pandemic will range from 50 to as much as 75% over previous years.
The future is being looked upon with great concern. Nobody even mentions closing this year's season with any profit. The determination to minimize losses is so great that some hotel and guest house owners estimate that their facilities will remain closed to tourists this year. A simple economic estimate showed in their case that this is the best way to survive the difficult period. According to the most pessimistic estimates, this situation can affect up to half of all facilities in Greece. Let's testify how an exceptional situation we are dealing with, that the owners, as part of cutting costs (including their own lives), will live in their closed hotels and boarding houses during the crisis.
Although it is planned to restore all-year-round hotels at the beginning of June, and seasonal accommodation at the beginning of July, these dates are not seen as a possible start of the residual season. Most hoteliers believe that both this month and July are completely lost to them. Such a negative assessment of the future results from several aspects. One of the most important is that most reservations for this one have been canceled and the number of new ones is small. What's more, due to closed cross-border traffic and canceled international flights, there is little evidence that the situation has changed yet. Carriers who currently do not have any specific solutions for safe transport in the context of the coronavirus transporting people make their contribution.
Unfortunately, these are not the only aspects affecting the fact that hotel owners are currently under extremely high pressure. European travel agencies, which are also currently in a very difficult situation, are negotiating this and next year's rates very aggressively. Most tour operators demand extremely attractive prices for tourist packages offered by Greek hotels as part of broadly understood all inclusive stays. However, as Greek hoteliers point out, they cannot afford such far-reaching reductions. An additional issue that the local industry points out is the fear of bankruptcy of tour operators after guests leave Greek hotels. This would mean that no one would pay for tourists' stay in the event of insolvency of travel agents.
Healthcare protocols that hotels must meet to receive their guests are another costly challenge. Additional spaces, the need for disinfection and other sanitary requirements are an additional financial burden. Another problem is how to provide meals, because we can certainly forget about Swedish tables. Instead of this form of serving meals, hotels could deliver, for example, meals directly to the rooms. However, in this case the hotel would have to increase employment, which is unprofitable in this situation. Hotels with external gardens may be able to serve dishes there on a similar basis as were developed for restaurants, but owners of all-year hotels pay attention to the fact that some of them do not have such spaces.
In addition to organizational difficulties, hotel owners are also concerned about the health of their employees and their families. As the president of the hotels in Rethymno said, "In no way do we put business above human life, especially the health of the staff who will come to work, for their families and the whole of Greek society." Another issue that Mr Manolis Tsakalakis raised is the compensation that customers can demand in the event of a coronavirus infection on site. It is also doubtful that hotels could insure themselves against such an eventuality.
It cannot be expected that domestic tourism will at least partly compensate for the shortcomings of foreign guests. Here, too, the industry has no illusions and estimates that Greeks spending their holidays in their country will provide a maximum 3% occupancy rate of hotels. Greece simply has too few citizens who will also save money in the current crisis.
What, then, can be expected in such difficulties? President Tsakalakis predicts that only some hotels will be opened. Where reservations are not enough to make it profitable to open a hotel, guests under Greek law will be able to be transferred to another hotel of the same or a higher standard in the same area.
The above-mentioned problems are most severely affected by larger hotels, whose operation requires the provision of numerous staff. Smaller units, and thus cheaper to operate, seem to be much more flexible. In recent days, some owners of attractive holiday villas have begun to offer large discounts. This looks obviously very tempting, but there is also the other side of the coin. At the moment, they do not have procedures in the event of an outbreak in their facilities. Another aspect here is the fear of a price war and some kind of degradation of the "product", which could negatively affect the future.
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Bardzo przykro, że tak się stało. Myślę, że na przyszły rok będzie super. Musi być.
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