Irish hotel business bounces back to over 80% of pre-Covid levels

Business at Irish hotels is more than 80 per cent of pre-Covid levels, putting the Republic in Europe’s top three, an industry gathering will hear this week.

The Republic, the UK and Poland are the only European countries whose hotels have reached 80 per cent or more of pre-pandemic occupancy, says hospitality industry number cruncher STR.

Over the 28 days to April 11th, Irish hotels had 81.3 per cent of room lettings enjoyed in 2019, before Covid travel curbs sent tourism and business travel into freefall two years ago.

According to STR, this ranked the Republic at number three in Europe, behind the UK, which had 87 per cent of 2019 levels, and Poland, which was at 84.5 per cent.

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The figures show that Polish occupancy fell from a peak of 94 per cent hit in February when refugees from Ukraine fled from the Russian invasion to their western neighbour.

STR, part of Nasdaq-listed Costar, will outline the latest figures at the International Hospitality Investment Forum, which kicks off in Berlin, Germany, on Tuesday.

Major markets

Robin Rossmann, STR's managing director, said his company believes that hotels in most major markets should recover to between 90 per cent and 100 per cent of 2019 levels by the middle of this month.

“Europe’s occupancy recovery has accelerated in recent months to 70 per cent of pre-pandemic comparables,” he noted.

“In general, leisure-dependent markets have been furthest ahead in the timeline, but there are encouraging signs of life returning to gateway cities that are far more reliant on corporate demand.”

Figures from March showed that Irish hotels were showing the highest forward booking rates in Europe for April, with spikes of more than 70 per cent.

Hoteliers here also benefitted from travellers arriving for St Patrick's Day and Six Nations rugby games.