Smoke And Mirrors: Why friendliness is spurious

Alcúdia friendly, so it was said on 16 June. It's not the only resort in Mallorca that is friendly and not the only resort where tourists can expect excellent hospitality. "The Diario", as it did when interviewing tourists in Alcúdia, following tour operators' arguments that greater friendliness needed to be shown to visitors, has gone on another walkabout - to different places across the island. Again the impetus was what tour operators were saying about service and that all-important friendliness, or the lack of them. And what they have again discovered is a situation quite removed from what the tour operators have been alleging.

While one has to get into perspective a few sources being cited in a couple of articles, the paper's findings - including the fact that tourists come back year after year - does make one wonder quite what has been behind the tour operators' suggestions as to a lack of friendliness or poor service. Maybe, just maybe, they're using them as a smoke-screen.

There was an interesting letter in "The Bulletin" yesterday. The points it raised were well-made, and it came from someone who was behind a movement in Calvia to correct the problems faced by bars and others. Among the points was the fact that tour operators are saying that were bars and restaurants to stay open - in winter - and support hotels that get their prices right, then they would arrange packages. Yet they also say that Mallorca needs more all-inclusive, as the market wants it.

Forget the winter tourism element, the point about all-inclusive says it all. Bars and restaurants staying open while all-inclusive gets cranked up are mutually exclusive. The tour operators' line of thinking is thoroughly illogical - and they surely know it to be so. Which is why they may be raising that smoke-screen of friendliness and service; it's a red herring.

It is the tour operators that have caused the problems with Mallorca's tourism, just as - for the most part - they also brought about the success. True though it may be that bars and restaurants had it easy, thanks to the benevolence of hotels and yes the tour operators, but as the letter-writer points out these bars and restaurants were needed, encouraged. Not now they aren't. Saying that bars and restaurants should stay open, while simultaneously taking away their business because of a growth in all-inclusive is a fatuous and idiotic argument.


England's humiliation
It was embarrassing. It was quieter than Slovenia. Of course it was. And now the bars will be lamenting the defeat. No great troupes of Rooneys and Gerrards. No great sales of foamy. Sadly I feel I may have been prescient when I said on 17 June that "England will prove to be rubbish, and Germany will win it."


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.