A Season Of Extremes

This is the piece that has appeared in the latest "Talk Of The North", the one about the season that was.


So that was the season. It may be a little premature to be looking back with October not yet past, but to all intents and purposes the season has gone, some places counting their losses and shutting up shop early. That was the season that was. A season of extremes. Over four months of almost unbroken sunshine peaked with a 15-year temperature high (in Sa Pobla) of a touch over 42 degrees in July. And then the weather duly and predictably collapsed in mid-September, making the month the wettest in the last 30 years. The abrupt and grey end to summer only added to a sense of despondency as late-season bookings took a tumble along with the thermometer.

There were the extremes as experienced in the pocket, of health - swine flu - and on the streets and in the bars of Palmanova and Palma. Bombs. Despite the paranoia that made a few imagine that every shopping bag carried Semtex or a black ball with a wire sticking out of it, ETA's actions were seen for what they were: desperate and isolated. This also despite an outrageous claim by the travel editor of "The Sun" (the travel editor, mind) that the bombs could mark the end of tourism in Spain and that tourists would avoid Mallorca. I trust she's been reallocated to something less contentious or less intellectually challenging - like making the tea. The German tabloid press was not to be outdone. "Bild" claimed that Mallorca was some sort of hot spot for swine flu. The numbers who succumbed to the virus on the island remained low.

The price story, though, was the recurring theme of the season. Mallorca is so expensive. For some reason, Puerto Pollensa seemed to get it in the price neck more than anywhere else. Emotion and hyperbole intervened in an unseemly scramble to prove that one anecdote of high prices was better than another. The most crass was the example of paracetamol costing five euros. Chances are that it was being sold in a supermarket, and there was at least one supermarket in Playa de Muro doing just that - at a fiver a pop. The real story was that the supermarket had no right to be selling it. Amidst all the complaints as to costly this and costly that, the most legitimate complaint concerned hire cars. But even here, the charges were not universally high, while the fact that some agencies may indeed have been demanding what were excessive amounts should have come as no great surprise. In April, it had been announced that there would be a shortage of vehicles and that the lack of credit had limited agencies' abilities to renew their fleets. Moreover, the credit squeeze for hire cars was experienced in other countries.

Yet all of this led to the inevitable "the authorities must do something" and the gross exaggerations of the "demise" of tourism based on little more than one person's say-so and experience of a plate of steak and chips costing more than that person had bargained for. Emotiveness was no more apparent than in the default use of "beautiful" - as in our "beautiful island/resort" (delete as applicable) being "ruined" or "going to the dogs" (literally in the case of the ongoing doggy-doo tedium) because of high prices.

There was evidence also of a more extreme position being adopted by the hotels and tour operators in advancing the offer of all-inclusive places. Alcúdia's Bellevue was but one example. From zero five years ago to over 50% now - and growing in all likelihood. Just wait for next year when the hotels take on the bars in the World Cup war. A hotel room or lounge may lack the communal experience or atmosphere of a bar, but the hotels will be looking to try and ensure that watching Wayne Rooney getting himself sent off is done within their walls. TUI, meanwhile, was launching its first specifically all-inclusive brochures, in readiness for 2010.

And as the season's sun sets, so attention will shift to the lack of winter tourism. Amidst all the navel-gazing and angst caused by lower tourism spend and a fall of up to 20% in the British market (in some instances), those authorities - the ones who must always do something - were saying that the summer tourism model was working fine and that attention had to be paid to the off-season. They were wrong. More than anything, recession and the pound's slide have highlighted the extent that the summer model is subject to capricious economics and also to the tourist's priority in terms of cost. And if the summer model was so right, then why undertake exercises such as the Mallorca events held in Manchester in May or lavish a significant wedge on Rafa Nadal so that he'll unbutton his shirt and hang around on a yacht? If the summer model isn't working, then you can forget the rest. And how can it be said to be working if 50% or more places are all-inclusive and if the wider economy suffers as a consequence of these places whilst also being caught in the vice of recession and a basket-case pound? Only in terms of announcing numbers of tourists overall and in particular the numbers passing through Palma airport can it be said to be working. And in the case of the airport, the greater the numbers the better as the regional government seeks to get its hands on running it once the numbers reach the required level. One then also has the absurdity of the consistent attempts to undermine the private, holiday-let sector, one that offers the potential of high-value tourism which the authorities, apparently, crave.

Those authorities who must do something consistently miss the point. Nadal fronts up promotion for a corporate Balearics, yet it is the individual islands that are the "brands". No-one goes on holiday to the Balearics. At a time when spending on internet advertising in Britain has overtaken that on television, it is here - the internet - where the real battle is being fought. And it is one involving increasingly canny tourists on the hunt for a bargain. The real promotion for the island and the resorts is coming from the likes of Travel Republic and Alpharooms. Those authorities who must do something should accept the lesson of 2009, not the extremes of weather, not the flu, not the bombs, but - I'm sorry to have to say - all that price stuff. It's easy to be dismissive of those anecdotes, but in the same way as the tourist seeks his bargain so he takes note of an allegedly price-inflated pizza. They would do worse than to offer everyone a bribe, sorry, price incentive. Here, have a fiver and come to Mallorca. So long as you don't spend it on paracetamol.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Shangri-Las, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FxSM88H-G4.

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