Mallorca's tourism has long offered a battleground of argument between hard realities and apparent fictions. The former, unfortunately, are mostly based on anecdotal evidence. This non-scientific approach confronts the latter's data gathering and report generation. Consider if you will: tourist spending statistics; airport arrival statistics; hotel occupancy statistics. Combine these factual bases and a form of meta-research gives succour to the headlines of bonanza, boom and record. The anecdotes, though, can and do suggest alternative realities.
It has been like this for years but the discrepancies are heightened at times when there are the supposed bonanzas, as at present: ones served on the plates of terrorism and competitor destination insecurities. Take the degree of disbelief regarding warnings of overbooking, which itself is inherent to hotel occupancy stats. There always is overbooking. It's the nature of the beast for the hotel sector. Statistical methodologies are at play here as well. They determine the degree by which hotels can anticipate reservations not being fulfilled. This degree is filled with overbooking in the hope of securing 100% rates of occupancy and is supported by arrangements entered into by hotels to ensure guest transfer to other accommodation. The problem arises if the stats fall down, which may indeed be the case this summer.
The disbelief arises as a consequence of the anecdotal evidence, the sharing of opinion from the touristic coal face which argues that the stats are all to cock: factual fictions, or should it be fictitious facts? Because this is not empirical evidence and only oral, it cannot be substantiated, but its existence breeds suspicion of the data-based "facts". By its very nature, though, it is discriminatory. One resort's anecdotes are not reflected by those of other resorts. Even within resorts where there are differing anecdotes. Some bars in Magalluf reporting a worse-than-ever season is evidence of Magalluf, or a part of it. Such evidence cannot be extrapolated and be used as a conclusion for the entire island. As some never tire in insisting, Mallorca is not Magalluf.
Nevertheless, there is some factual support (if one cares to believe it). Last summer it was said that bars in Magalluf had taken hits of up to 40% lower turnover, the consequence of the drive to root out "drunken tourism" (as well as the influence of all-inclusives). If that was really the case, then why should this summer be any different? By contrast, there is the evidence of boom times this summer for Palma's restaurants: turnover up by 15% and even 20% in the centre. The conclusion one draws is that the 15% applies to Playa de Palma. There will doubtless be those who disagree.
Because there are discrepancies between anecdotal facts and the apparent fictions, the process of dissonance (reconciling competing positions) errs on the side of the fictitious and therefore disbelief. It is easy to satisfy individual prejudices that will always prefer not to accept official claims, those made by the statistics purveyors, government, hoteliers and other employers. Not, it has to be said, that these prejudices are necessarily wrong; simply that they lack substantial and hard evidence.
There are other apparent fictions which have to be contended with. These are the qualitative as opposed to purely quantitative statements. For Mallorca they embrace the evidence of transformations, as with Magalluf, the upgrading of hotels and so the quest for and implementation of greater quality among the island's hotel stock (and indeed other accommodation). They can also refer to levels of service, to improved standards of cuisine, to a broader offer of complementary facilities.
Market research opinion surveys can never hope to provide a complete picture, but the statisticians with their degrees or error and so on can offer indicators to back up claims of leaps in Mallorca's quality (or not). So it is with the latest annual survey of tourist satisfaction by Gadeso. One doesn't of course know where the tourists surveyed were staying or certain demographic information about these tourists, but if the survey is to be accepted at face value, the claims regarding transformations and improved quality are only that: claims, unsupported by the tools of market research.
Gadeso discovers, inter alia, a slip in the level of satisfaction with accommodation. This is a marginal decline, but it is a decline nevertheless at a time when accommodation is meant to be acquiring greater quality. "Specialised offers" of cuisine and retailing have fallen further than in previous years: both are "deficient". Even beach services have slipped. In fact there is very little which shows greater satisfaction: health care and public safety are notable in that they have.
Where lies the truth with Mallorca's tourism? Impossible to say. What is certain is that we'll go through all this again next year, and Gadeso may well report a greater blip on the price-quality ratio for hotel satisfaction. Why? Satisfaction or otherwise with the tourist tax.
Showing posts with label Statistics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Statistics. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 27, 2016
Friday, April 17, 2015
Spending Nothing On Advertising
Which public sector tourism promotion agencies do you suppose featured in the top thirty spenders on advertising in Spain in 2014? Do you think the Balearics Tourism Agency might be one of them? Palma 365 perhaps? Or maybe even one of the island councils or town halls. The answer is of course that none of them feature. There is not one single public body in Mallorca or the Balearics which makes this top thirty, defined as having spent 500,000 euros or more on television, radio, press, internet, direct mail and mobile advertising.
This list is headed, by some considerable distance, by Viajes El Corte Inglés (32.4 million euros). Other travel agencies and tour operators get a look in, but of the public sector agencies, the highest ranking was Andalusia's (eighth with a spend of 2.2 million euros). Behind it came Mexico (tenth), New York (twelfth), Andorra (thirteenth), Galicia (fifteenth) with the Canaries, Castile-La Mancha, Malta, Madrid, Extremadura, Valencia and Portugal all listed.
It is no surprise that the Balearics tourism ministry's agency doesn't appear on the list as it doesn't spend anything on advertising; its promotional spend (such as it is) is dedicated almost exclusively to travel fairs. Yet somehow, even another low-spending regional agency, Valencia's, manages to part with half a million euros in seeking to attract national tourists.
But then, perhaps there is no need for such spend. With national tourists returning to Mallorca, thanks mainly to improved economic circumstances, then why bother? And this seems to be the prevailing attitude. Is it an appropriate attitude, or does Mallorca, conspicuous by its absence from advertising in established media, suffer in the long run? If it were conspicuous by its presence in less established media (social networks), then perhaps one might understand the attitude, but it doesn't engage in social media promotion either.
National demand in the first quarter was up by 10%, according to statistics, and these statistics, with which we are regularly bombarded, are to become the responsibility of the National Statistics Institute (INE). Currently, surveys of tourist spend and arrivals are actually the responsibility of Turespaña, the national tourism agency, and the intention to make this change was announced three years ago when the tourism secretary of state, Mallorca's Isabel Borrego, intimated that they might become more meaningful. The chances are that it will just mean that there are more of them.
This list is headed, by some considerable distance, by Viajes El Corte Inglés (32.4 million euros). Other travel agencies and tour operators get a look in, but of the public sector agencies, the highest ranking was Andalusia's (eighth with a spend of 2.2 million euros). Behind it came Mexico (tenth), New York (twelfth), Andorra (thirteenth), Galicia (fifteenth) with the Canaries, Castile-La Mancha, Malta, Madrid, Extremadura, Valencia and Portugal all listed.
It is no surprise that the Balearics tourism ministry's agency doesn't appear on the list as it doesn't spend anything on advertising; its promotional spend (such as it is) is dedicated almost exclusively to travel fairs. Yet somehow, even another low-spending regional agency, Valencia's, manages to part with half a million euros in seeking to attract national tourists.
But then, perhaps there is no need for such spend. With national tourists returning to Mallorca, thanks mainly to improved economic circumstances, then why bother? And this seems to be the prevailing attitude. Is it an appropriate attitude, or does Mallorca, conspicuous by its absence from advertising in established media, suffer in the long run? If it were conspicuous by its presence in less established media (social networks), then perhaps one might understand the attitude, but it doesn't engage in social media promotion either.
National demand in the first quarter was up by 10%, according to statistics, and these statistics, with which we are regularly bombarded, are to become the responsibility of the National Statistics Institute (INE). Currently, surveys of tourist spend and arrivals are actually the responsibility of Turespaña, the national tourism agency, and the intention to make this change was announced three years ago when the tourism secretary of state, Mallorca's Isabel Borrego, intimated that they might become more meaningful. The chances are that it will just mean that there are more of them.
Thursday, March 05, 2015
The Moneyball Of Tourism
There is an interesting debate going on in the world of sport at present. It is one being had principally in cricket and concerns the England team more than others. It has to do with the compilation of statistical information in guiding and setting tactics. The team is told that a certain score should guarantee victory. Bowlers are told to pitch a ball in a certain place with a certain style, as this will lead to a wicket being taken rather than other deliveries.
The England cricket team, a generally joyless and robotic formation, is currently enduring a period of massive underachievement and of resounding defeats. Blame for this is being levelled at all sorts of targets, with the use of statistical information and the reliance placed on it by coaches at the top of the list. Yet, there was a time, not so long ago, when stats had helped England to overachieve. The data collection was thus seen as having given England a competitive advantage over other sides. Now, and possibly for a variety of reasons - changes to fielding regulations, for instance - big data appears to be a hindrance; it is causing England to play in a restricted fashion and, more often than not, to lose and to lose heavily.
A root of this sporting obsession with statistics is "Moneyball", the book that was developed from the use of so-called sabermetrics analysis in baseball. But it is only one root. For many years, the English Football Association employed Charles Hughes as its director of coaching. His statistical analysis bred the "long ball", but Hughes insisted that the science of his analysis was beyond dispute.
The analysis that cricket has at its disposal gives evidence that is irrefutable. Every single delivery is analysed. A total picture of how runs are scored, how wickets are taken is formed. But cricket's analysis, the son of Moneyball, cannot be compared with baseball. There are vastly more variables in cricket than in baseball. The wicket and its condition (not a factor in baseball) is just one of them. Nevertheless, the science is sound. It has to be because of the completeness of the data. But then this was what Charles Hughes claimed, and Charles Hughes was wrong. In the pursuit of statistical perfection, the intangible was lost: the soul of the game, the moments of inspiration and genius, the tolerance of the individual.
Statistical completeness is thus nothing if it is not complemented by the beautiful recklessness of flair and the unorthodox. England's cricket team lacks a brutal creator, a De Villiers or Gayle, or a fearsome destroyer, a Johnson or Malinga. Indeed, it positively discriminates against the non-conformist, as Moneyball appears to insist that it does.
But what happens when the statistics are not complete yet are still held up as a type of Moneyball justification? Some of Mallorca's tourism statistics are complete. Airport arrivals can be calculated accurately, but what do they tell us? Who are these travellers? Where are they going? Why are they here? It is completeness without discrimination. Data without information. As annual scores edge up, they are cause for numerical celebration but no more. The tourism spend statistics, on the other hand, are not complete. They are extrapolations from samples, the validity of which the statisticians will defend. They may have some accuracy within an acceptable range of deviation, but if they are determined by wrong questions being put, by wrong things being measured, by an almost infinite variance on account of the who-where-why tourist mix, how can they be construed as showing the reality? They can't, and even the national secretary-of-state for tourism has accepted as much.
The statistics are a defence shield that obscures the painful orthodoxy of thinking, tactics and strategy. There were more "tourists", i.e. airport arrivals, in January. Hooray, the winter message is getting across. No it is not, and it won't while the flair of promotion as exhibited by others, e.g. Croatia, is inhibited and an automaton Moneyball preference for defining tourism through numerical software is valued over the human ware of original thought and a passion for innovation. The winter message, such as it is, is shackled by an orthodoxy of product offer which apes that of so many competitors, but it is compensated for by the array of summer statistics which dispassionately speak of incremental growth and of percentage increases.
Neither sport nor tourism can be calculated solely in statistical terms. They are human activities with all the emotion, difference, imperfection that these imply. But they are also activities in which the previously-thought impossible can take hold. England's cricket team is realising this, as it struggles to compete with the unconstrained joyousness of so many opponents not inhibited by a Moneyball straightjacket. There is a message for tourism. Think the impossible, rather than think only of the statistic.
The England cricket team, a generally joyless and robotic formation, is currently enduring a period of massive underachievement and of resounding defeats. Blame for this is being levelled at all sorts of targets, with the use of statistical information and the reliance placed on it by coaches at the top of the list. Yet, there was a time, not so long ago, when stats had helped England to overachieve. The data collection was thus seen as having given England a competitive advantage over other sides. Now, and possibly for a variety of reasons - changes to fielding regulations, for instance - big data appears to be a hindrance; it is causing England to play in a restricted fashion and, more often than not, to lose and to lose heavily.
A root of this sporting obsession with statistics is "Moneyball", the book that was developed from the use of so-called sabermetrics analysis in baseball. But it is only one root. For many years, the English Football Association employed Charles Hughes as its director of coaching. His statistical analysis bred the "long ball", but Hughes insisted that the science of his analysis was beyond dispute.
The analysis that cricket has at its disposal gives evidence that is irrefutable. Every single delivery is analysed. A total picture of how runs are scored, how wickets are taken is formed. But cricket's analysis, the son of Moneyball, cannot be compared with baseball. There are vastly more variables in cricket than in baseball. The wicket and its condition (not a factor in baseball) is just one of them. Nevertheless, the science is sound. It has to be because of the completeness of the data. But then this was what Charles Hughes claimed, and Charles Hughes was wrong. In the pursuit of statistical perfection, the intangible was lost: the soul of the game, the moments of inspiration and genius, the tolerance of the individual.
Statistical completeness is thus nothing if it is not complemented by the beautiful recklessness of flair and the unorthodox. England's cricket team lacks a brutal creator, a De Villiers or Gayle, or a fearsome destroyer, a Johnson or Malinga. Indeed, it positively discriminates against the non-conformist, as Moneyball appears to insist that it does.
But what happens when the statistics are not complete yet are still held up as a type of Moneyball justification? Some of Mallorca's tourism statistics are complete. Airport arrivals can be calculated accurately, but what do they tell us? Who are these travellers? Where are they going? Why are they here? It is completeness without discrimination. Data without information. As annual scores edge up, they are cause for numerical celebration but no more. The tourism spend statistics, on the other hand, are not complete. They are extrapolations from samples, the validity of which the statisticians will defend. They may have some accuracy within an acceptable range of deviation, but if they are determined by wrong questions being put, by wrong things being measured, by an almost infinite variance on account of the who-where-why tourist mix, how can they be construed as showing the reality? They can't, and even the national secretary-of-state for tourism has accepted as much.
The statistics are a defence shield that obscures the painful orthodoxy of thinking, tactics and strategy. There were more "tourists", i.e. airport arrivals, in January. Hooray, the winter message is getting across. No it is not, and it won't while the flair of promotion as exhibited by others, e.g. Croatia, is inhibited and an automaton Moneyball preference for defining tourism through numerical software is valued over the human ware of original thought and a passion for innovation. The winter message, such as it is, is shackled by an orthodoxy of product offer which apes that of so many competitors, but it is compensated for by the array of summer statistics which dispassionately speak of incremental growth and of percentage increases.
Neither sport nor tourism can be calculated solely in statistical terms. They are human activities with all the emotion, difference, imperfection that these imply. But they are also activities in which the previously-thought impossible can take hold. England's cricket team is realising this, as it struggles to compete with the unconstrained joyousness of so many opponents not inhibited by a Moneyball straightjacket. There is a message for tourism. Think the impossible, rather than think only of the statistic.
Friday, August 29, 2014
Tourism Stats Are Not Cricket Stats
Cricket is a sport which gives the impression that it only exists in order to generate statistics. The numbers are a sport within a sport and their gatherers become names in their own right alongside pundits and players. They are numbers, though, which cannot be misinterpreted. When Jimmy Anderson and Joe Root put on 198 for the tenth wicket against India, it was a world record and there was absolutely no dispute. In a sense, they aren't statistics. They are simple maths. One plus one equals two, it always has done and it always will do. Statistics aren't so simple. If they were, there wouldn't be huge armies of statisticians engaged in their gathering and huge arguments over their validity.
Tourism statisticians can give the impression that, like cricket, tourism only exists because of its statistical evidence. It is evidence, however robust the methodologies are said to be, which often fails to convince because of the apparent discrepancies between numbers and the evidence of the eye or the ear. For all this, an avalanche of statistics over the past few days, taken at their most general level, would appear to tell a story that is beyond dispute. There is something a bit odd going on.
Firstly, we learned that in July and for Spain as a whole, there had been a record number of foreign tourists - 8.3 million, up by 6% over 2013. Yet, the number of hotel overnight stays fell; in the Balearics, the decline was in the order of 4.7%. How could this be, especially as the Balearics had, for the first time ever, exceeded two million foreign tourists during July? There are two explanations. One is that holidays are shorter. The other is that tourists choose to stay in alternative accommodation. For the whole of Spain, overnight stays in rented accommodation, in visitors' own properties or in those of families or friends were up by over 14%.
We then learned that, despite this record number of July visitors, spending by tourists in the Balearics fell by over 5%. This was largely attributable to what is being described as a "collapse" in the German market. Its spend alone was apparently down by a whopping 14%. There could of course be an explanation for this - stay-at-home Germans watching the World Cup. The overall Spanish tourism market suffered a fall in German spend, but it wasn't at the level supposedly recorded in the Balearics; 6% versus 14%. Moreover, while total Balearics spend was down, spend was up more or less everywhere else (Catalonia, Andalusia, Canaries). The one exception was Valencia.
One can reach for certain other explanations for this decline in the Balearics. All-inclusives would be one. But this would be too simplistic. All-inclusives are not confined to the Balearics by any stretch of the imagination. Nor are illegal or legal holiday rentals confined to the Balearics. These spending statistics, as I have sought to explain on many an occasion, are not an exact science. Nevertheless, they do give an indication. Are we to conclude, therefore, that despite the efforts of the Balearics to push the islands in the direction of attracting a higher-net-worth tourist, the opposite is in fact happening? The numbers will create a great debate and a scratching of heads. If only the statistics were as clear as those in cricket.
Tourism statisticians can give the impression that, like cricket, tourism only exists because of its statistical evidence. It is evidence, however robust the methodologies are said to be, which often fails to convince because of the apparent discrepancies between numbers and the evidence of the eye or the ear. For all this, an avalanche of statistics over the past few days, taken at their most general level, would appear to tell a story that is beyond dispute. There is something a bit odd going on.
Firstly, we learned that in July and for Spain as a whole, there had been a record number of foreign tourists - 8.3 million, up by 6% over 2013. Yet, the number of hotel overnight stays fell; in the Balearics, the decline was in the order of 4.7%. How could this be, especially as the Balearics had, for the first time ever, exceeded two million foreign tourists during July? There are two explanations. One is that holidays are shorter. The other is that tourists choose to stay in alternative accommodation. For the whole of Spain, overnight stays in rented accommodation, in visitors' own properties or in those of families or friends were up by over 14%.
We then learned that, despite this record number of July visitors, spending by tourists in the Balearics fell by over 5%. This was largely attributable to what is being described as a "collapse" in the German market. Its spend alone was apparently down by a whopping 14%. There could of course be an explanation for this - stay-at-home Germans watching the World Cup. The overall Spanish tourism market suffered a fall in German spend, but it wasn't at the level supposedly recorded in the Balearics; 6% versus 14%. Moreover, while total Balearics spend was down, spend was up more or less everywhere else (Catalonia, Andalusia, Canaries). The one exception was Valencia.
One can reach for certain other explanations for this decline in the Balearics. All-inclusives would be one. But this would be too simplistic. All-inclusives are not confined to the Balearics by any stretch of the imagination. Nor are illegal or legal holiday rentals confined to the Balearics. These spending statistics, as I have sought to explain on many an occasion, are not an exact science. Nevertheless, they do give an indication. Are we to conclude, therefore, that despite the efforts of the Balearics to push the islands in the direction of attracting a higher-net-worth tourist, the opposite is in fact happening? The numbers will create a great debate and a scratching of heads. If only the statistics were as clear as those in cricket.
Monday, July 15, 2013
The Damned Lies About All-Inclusives
I know that we should all by now realise that tourism statistics and figures that are thrown out to the media provide no more meaningful a purpose than for the media to be able to fill some space, but bear with me if you will. I know these stats are basically pointless, but their pointlessness doesn't stop them being looked at and questions being asked as to whether they are not just pointless but also wrong and perhaps deliberately wrong.
Last week we were fed a diet of all-inclusive statistics, ones to be regurgitated by the media, reported and otherwise ignored except by some indignant commentators to websites who choose not to query the statistics but to sound off about crap food and drink, low-quality tourists and indulge in the normal sounding-off which accompanies anything AI.
These figures revealed that all-inclusive represents 15% of hotel overnight stays, this 15% being equivalent to more than eight million overnight stays. They also revealed that there are 165 hotels offering AI. So far, so utterly uninteresting. However, my discrepancy antennae were alerted to the 15% percentage. More than eight million overnight stays out of a total of 42,524,369 do not equate to 15%. They are some four percentage points higher. So, this was the first thing that was wrong. Then there was the 42 million figure.
The Balearics tourism ministry very kindly publishes spreadsheets on its website which give all manner of information about the number of hotels that are open in any given month, about the number of hotel places and about the number of overnight stays. The 42 million was not 42 million. It was 37,408,218. More than eight million, as a percentage, is not 15%, not 19% but around 21.5%.
There was then something about these figures in last week's report that didn't suggest a discrepancy but rather bafflement. The figures were for 2010. If so, why were they being reported now? Oh, because, so we were led to believe, this was the last time that the tourism ministry did a survey. Really? And what survey was this exactly?
Among the spreadsheets on the website, there are those for different types of establishment. What these do not show is the exact type of board arrangements that hotels offer, but the ministry has this information. Or it is supposed to have it, as hotels are supposed to register board offers with the ministry.
But even supposing that, for some reason, the ministry doesn't have this information, why has it taken three years for it to make available information about all-inclusive places? And, moreover, why has it taken three years to issue information that disputes that which it makes public on its website, namely the total number of overnight stays? An answer to the first of these questions is that it hasn't taken three years.
The 15% figure that was reported last week wasn't in fact new news. On 23 March 2010, I wrote an article in which I quoted the figure. It had come from the hoteliers federation. Another article I wrote in 2010 (6 May) referred to the 165 hotels. Information from? The hoteliers federation.
So, I am totally baffled as to why these statistics were issued last week. Baffled as to why there has not been a more recent "survey" of all-inclusives by the tourism ministry and baffled as to why there is a discrepancy in the statistics, as revealed by the ministry's website figures which, were there not the discrepancy, would show a higher percentage of all-inclusive in 2010.
What might we conclude from all of this? Might this conclusion be that there is a wish to suppress information about the true level of all-inclusives? But there again, what is the true level? What was interesting about the reporting of these figures last week was mention of the fact that not only would the level of all-inclusive have increased since 2010 (which it undoubtedly has) but that it was nigh on impossible to get a true figure because of the common practice by hotels of offering upgrades to guests with other board arrangements when they arrive. This was hardly a revelation. It's a practice that has been happening for years.
We don't know what the true level is. We will probably never know. And yet, there have been political demands for there to be true and accurate information. Concerned by reports of a 15% decline in restaurant turnover, these demands were made. When was this? July 2008. Who made them? The Partido Popular. Who now runs the tourism ministry ...?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Last week we were fed a diet of all-inclusive statistics, ones to be regurgitated by the media, reported and otherwise ignored except by some indignant commentators to websites who choose not to query the statistics but to sound off about crap food and drink, low-quality tourists and indulge in the normal sounding-off which accompanies anything AI.
These figures revealed that all-inclusive represents 15% of hotel overnight stays, this 15% being equivalent to more than eight million overnight stays. They also revealed that there are 165 hotels offering AI. So far, so utterly uninteresting. However, my discrepancy antennae were alerted to the 15% percentage. More than eight million overnight stays out of a total of 42,524,369 do not equate to 15%. They are some four percentage points higher. So, this was the first thing that was wrong. Then there was the 42 million figure.
The Balearics tourism ministry very kindly publishes spreadsheets on its website which give all manner of information about the number of hotels that are open in any given month, about the number of hotel places and about the number of overnight stays. The 42 million was not 42 million. It was 37,408,218. More than eight million, as a percentage, is not 15%, not 19% but around 21.5%.
There was then something about these figures in last week's report that didn't suggest a discrepancy but rather bafflement. The figures were for 2010. If so, why were they being reported now? Oh, because, so we were led to believe, this was the last time that the tourism ministry did a survey. Really? And what survey was this exactly?
Among the spreadsheets on the website, there are those for different types of establishment. What these do not show is the exact type of board arrangements that hotels offer, but the ministry has this information. Or it is supposed to have it, as hotels are supposed to register board offers with the ministry.
But even supposing that, for some reason, the ministry doesn't have this information, why has it taken three years for it to make available information about all-inclusive places? And, moreover, why has it taken three years to issue information that disputes that which it makes public on its website, namely the total number of overnight stays? An answer to the first of these questions is that it hasn't taken three years.
The 15% figure that was reported last week wasn't in fact new news. On 23 March 2010, I wrote an article in which I quoted the figure. It had come from the hoteliers federation. Another article I wrote in 2010 (6 May) referred to the 165 hotels. Information from? The hoteliers federation.
So, I am totally baffled as to why these statistics were issued last week. Baffled as to why there has not been a more recent "survey" of all-inclusives by the tourism ministry and baffled as to why there is a discrepancy in the statistics, as revealed by the ministry's website figures which, were there not the discrepancy, would show a higher percentage of all-inclusive in 2010.
What might we conclude from all of this? Might this conclusion be that there is a wish to suppress information about the true level of all-inclusives? But there again, what is the true level? What was interesting about the reporting of these figures last week was mention of the fact that not only would the level of all-inclusive have increased since 2010 (which it undoubtedly has) but that it was nigh on impossible to get a true figure because of the common practice by hotels of offering upgrades to guests with other board arrangements when they arrive. This was hardly a revelation. It's a practice that has been happening for years.
We don't know what the true level is. We will probably never know. And yet, there have been political demands for there to be true and accurate information. Concerned by reports of a 15% decline in restaurant turnover, these demands were made. When was this? July 2008. Who made them? The Partido Popular. Who now runs the tourism ministry ...?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
You Pays Your Money: Tourism prospects
You pays your money, you takes your choice. Or you pays rather less of your money than previously and you takes less of a choice. Or you pays less of your money, you takes a similar choice but you takes one that involves you paying less. Whatever.
Much though no one much believes tourism spend statistics, and they have good reason not to, given the way in which the data for the statistics are gathered and to what they relate, you can't accuse the statisticians of seeking to cook the books and wishing to issue feelgood stats regardless of realities, though some people have in the past been inclined to accuse them of just this, when these tourism spend statistics have revealed a scenario that appeared to bear little relation to what was in fact happening on the street or on the terrace.
Tourism spend in the Balearics was down by 8.6% in April (compared with April 2011). Oh woe. However, demonstrating that comparing one month per year with the same month in a previous year can be like comparing chalk with cheese, in April last year the spend rocketed by comparison with 2010. Why? There was no ash cloud last April and the Arab spring had fully sprung. For the first four months of this year, or so says the Egatur survey (which is the one that deals with these tourism spend stats), spend is actually up on last year. Oh joy.
I think I have in the past promised to never quote these spend statistics ever again, given that they only partially deal with what is spent on the ground by tourists (a goodly proportion relates to costs of packages etc.). I am only breaking my promise and doing so now as a means of highlighting what is a confused picture of expectations for this summer. We have already been variously told that 2012 would be a "record" year, outstripping last year's record, then we were told that it might not be a record year because the Brits were all planning on taking a staycation, then we were told ... . Sorry, I have rather lost track of what we have been told.
A survey which came out last week, that by the Mallorcan research organisation Gadeso, suggested that this summer would be pretty much the same as last year and that there was in fact a rise in business optimism. Then the hoteliers went and spoiled things by issuing their own findings in hinting that occupancy figures weren't as strong as had been anticipated.
What does seem to be the case, insofar as one can draw anything like firm conclusions, is that the domestic Spanish market is dragging things down and so is the Brit market. Prospects for the summer suggest that the volume of domestic tourists coming to the Balearics will be down by 20%, while the Brits will show a decline of just over 5%, this coming on top of an appreciable fall in the first four months of 2012.
Neither is particularly surprising, the domestic market especially. Yet countering this gloomy outlook, there are - as ever - the good old Germans to keep things bobbing along reasonably well, but far more spectacularly there are the Russians and the Scandinavians who are both knocking in increases of 30% more tourists. The Italians are also looking good, as are the Dutch and the Swiss, while events elsewhere may yet lead to the usual last-minute rush; there is overbooking in Turkey and Tunisia, while there are continuing worries about unrest in Egypt and now also in Greece.
If you put all the other markets together, they do tend to compensate for losses elsewhere, though whether they are sufficient to fully compensate is another matter. The Spanish and British markets are two of the top three tourism markets by some fair old distance. Russian tourism up by 30% sounds good, but it is an increase from a comparatively low base, and while this 30% may well come laden with gold (most of it around their wrists or necks), it tends to end up in better quality all-inclusives. This accommodation will, because of the way in which the tourism spend stats are made up, help to probably show an increase in spend, but this is one reason why these statistics paint a false picture.
So, will 2012 be a better year than 2011, about the same or slightly down? Well, don't ask me, because I don't know. And nor does anyone else. It could be one thing, it could be another. You pays your money.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Much though no one much believes tourism spend statistics, and they have good reason not to, given the way in which the data for the statistics are gathered and to what they relate, you can't accuse the statisticians of seeking to cook the books and wishing to issue feelgood stats regardless of realities, though some people have in the past been inclined to accuse them of just this, when these tourism spend statistics have revealed a scenario that appeared to bear little relation to what was in fact happening on the street or on the terrace.
Tourism spend in the Balearics was down by 8.6% in April (compared with April 2011). Oh woe. However, demonstrating that comparing one month per year with the same month in a previous year can be like comparing chalk with cheese, in April last year the spend rocketed by comparison with 2010. Why? There was no ash cloud last April and the Arab spring had fully sprung. For the first four months of this year, or so says the Egatur survey (which is the one that deals with these tourism spend stats), spend is actually up on last year. Oh joy.
I think I have in the past promised to never quote these spend statistics ever again, given that they only partially deal with what is spent on the ground by tourists (a goodly proportion relates to costs of packages etc.). I am only breaking my promise and doing so now as a means of highlighting what is a confused picture of expectations for this summer. We have already been variously told that 2012 would be a "record" year, outstripping last year's record, then we were told that it might not be a record year because the Brits were all planning on taking a staycation, then we were told ... . Sorry, I have rather lost track of what we have been told.
A survey which came out last week, that by the Mallorcan research organisation Gadeso, suggested that this summer would be pretty much the same as last year and that there was in fact a rise in business optimism. Then the hoteliers went and spoiled things by issuing their own findings in hinting that occupancy figures weren't as strong as had been anticipated.
What does seem to be the case, insofar as one can draw anything like firm conclusions, is that the domestic Spanish market is dragging things down and so is the Brit market. Prospects for the summer suggest that the volume of domestic tourists coming to the Balearics will be down by 20%, while the Brits will show a decline of just over 5%, this coming on top of an appreciable fall in the first four months of 2012.
Neither is particularly surprising, the domestic market especially. Yet countering this gloomy outlook, there are - as ever - the good old Germans to keep things bobbing along reasonably well, but far more spectacularly there are the Russians and the Scandinavians who are both knocking in increases of 30% more tourists. The Italians are also looking good, as are the Dutch and the Swiss, while events elsewhere may yet lead to the usual last-minute rush; there is overbooking in Turkey and Tunisia, while there are continuing worries about unrest in Egypt and now also in Greece.
If you put all the other markets together, they do tend to compensate for losses elsewhere, though whether they are sufficient to fully compensate is another matter. The Spanish and British markets are two of the top three tourism markets by some fair old distance. Russian tourism up by 30% sounds good, but it is an increase from a comparatively low base, and while this 30% may well come laden with gold (most of it around their wrists or necks), it tends to end up in better quality all-inclusives. This accommodation will, because of the way in which the tourism spend stats are made up, help to probably show an increase in spend, but this is one reason why these statistics paint a false picture.
So, will 2012 be a better year than 2011, about the same or slightly down? Well, don't ask me, because I don't know. And nor does anyone else. It could be one thing, it could be another. You pays your money.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Thursday, May 03, 2012
Technical Note Re Spam Referral Sites
For anyone operating a blog through Blogger, Wordpress or other server, there is an issue with spam referral sites. Basically, these are blank web pages which hook onto a blog or particular posts on a blog for whatever reason. One effect is that the stats for visits to a blog, such as this one, can be distorted. The page views for this blog are updated daily and overwhelmingly are real views, but the spam referral sites can constitute about 1% at any given time. Because specific posts are hooked onto, the facility to see "Popular Posts" has been taken down from this blog, as it is misleading.
If you have a blog yourself and you see referrals from sites, usually with a www3 or www4 prefix, ignore them and do not click on them. They are harmless but might not be if clicked on. They are annoying and that's all.
If you have a blog yourself and you see referrals from sites, usually with a www3 or www4 prefix, ignore them and do not click on them. They are harmless but might not be if clicked on. They are annoying and that's all.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Número Uno: Can Picafort and occupancy stats
"And at number one in August, it's Can Picafort!"
The charts for August hotel occupancy in Spain have been topped by Santa Margalida. Can Picafort, in other words. How on earth has this happened?
Back in the middle of August, the Mallorcan hotel federation was indicating that, unlike some resorts which had enjoyed decent Julys, Can Picafort had been on the opposite scale. Rather than number one, it had bombed. What a difference a month makes, especially to a resort often seen as the poor relation within the trinity of conurbation it forms together with Puerto Alcúdia and Playa de Muro.
The Spanish national statistics office is the one that has elevated Can Pic to the lofty heights of suddenly being the country's most successful resort. Does the town get a plaque or something? The town hall should put up a new sign. "Welcome to Can Picafort, number one in Spain", with August 2010 in small type. 50,630 foreigners and 3,981 Spaniards can't be wrong. 97.67% occupancy. God, how they love all this junk. And for many it is junk because they don't believe it. Maybe the chaps at the stats office just stick a pin in a map and then roll some dice to see what numbers they can come up with.
To explain Can Picafort's ascendancy may have to do with factors like discounts, Germans and the position of the planets. I had wondered if having a fiesta during August, and one with some hugely entertaining duck tossing, might have been a further factor, but under four thousand Spaniards suggests otherwise; foreign tourists are not normally attracted by fiestas per se. Nope, quite why it's number one is a mystery to me, and will also be to many in a resort who are prone to wearing the long face of "cree-sis" and to letting anyone unfortunate enough to be in earshot to know about it. They will also let you know about the devil's work of the all-inclusive.
Getting to grips with quite how prevalent all-inclusive is in Can Picafort is difficult. Look at certain hotels' websites and you will find no mention of it, but go off to an agency's site and you will. There are hotels in the resort which everyone knows to be all-inclusive and which don't mind telling the world that they are, but there are others which are a bit coy. Of the approximately 50 hotels (depending on your definition) in the resort, it's not unreasonable to assume that at least a third of them offer AI; the number is probably higher.
August's celebratory occupancy figures for Mallorca as a whole, partly attributed to the rain-soaked British who fortuitously found an under-used credit card stashed in the pocket of a hastily retrieved winter overcoat, disguise the real truth - what's being spent. Despite the positive figures on spend, issued generally rather than per resort, the all-inclusive/spend relationship has been proven. The research at Palma university says it all: an average daily spend by an AI guest that is under half of that of a guest staying B&B. There are plenty who would probably disagree with this, putting it at more like a quarter, if that.
To compensate for this 50% lower spend, you need an awful lot higher than average spend by all the other tourists. With the greatest respect to Can Picafort, it has a reputation for tourism which, how can one put it, is not at the wallet-bulging end of the market. And this is not me saying this; it's a view often expressed by business owners. Nigh on full occupancy for the peak month of August doesn't mean a great deal when you place it in the context of the nature of the market.
The statistics which get pumped out may be questioned by many. I'm less inclined to; they aren't always positive. But more fundamentally, the regularity of their production and the prominence granted to them can create an illusion, or indeed a delusion. They may be correct, but they enable politicians and others to boast of "records" and of tourist seasons being "good" ones (and this one has been, according to Spain's minister for tourism) and thus fail to appreciate how tourism is working - less at the macro level but more at the micro levels of the individual resorts.
Well done though, Can Picafort, you could do with a break, but you will also know that having a number one can be deceiving. Milli Vanilli, anyone?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Thursday, May 06, 2010
True And Fair? The number of all-inclusives
A restaurant owner in Playa de Muro said to me the other day that he had read that 65% of hotels in Mallorca were now all-inclusive. Give it another three years, and that number will be 100%, so he reckoned.
Always believe what you read. What can you believe? If the trend towards all-inclusives was this strong, it would already have been clear two years or so ago. This particular restaurant opened two years ago, some time into the season, following months of expensive work on converting one premises and re-modelling another. Why do it if the trend was already observable and if it was likely to be as great as it is now being claimed? Why do it, if all you do is moan about what the hotels are up to?
I am afraid you do have to wonder as to some business decisions, given the changes in market conditions. You do also have to wonder as to what people are prepared to believe and as to what they should make of the figures which get bandied around by various bodies. Take a piece from yesterday's "Ultima Hora". Reporting statistics from the tourism ministry, this says that the total number of hotels in Mallorca which offer all-inclusive only - the "exclusive" all-inclusive - is 48, representing a mere 3% of the total number of establishments. The figure is highly misleading, as it takes no account of size of hotel. More relevant is the total number of places in these 48 hotels - a bit under 23,000. Which sounds a lot, and may indeed be a lot, but there is no figure given as to the total number of places in all hotels.
Even allowing for this 3% to be correct, there is another confusion, and this has to do with the so-called "partial" all-inclusive, i.e. hotels which offer all-inclusive as an option in addition to other forms of accommodation. The hotel federation in Mallorca says that 165 establishments have this offer. Not that this gets us very far.
We are regularly subjected to these statistics, but never do we get a true and fair picture. You do have to wonder if "they" would rather "we" didn't get it. Or perhaps an accurate picture is not available. Can the ministry or the federation be sure about all those "upgrades" that take place when a holidaymaker is checking in at reception?
But it is only when and if a complete list of hotels and the precise number of all-inclusive places is published, and by resort, that we will ever really understand the extent of all-inclusive. And it is this which is lacking. The 3% figure, for example, is irrelevant as it takes no account of local conditions - by resort. As I have mentioned before, Puerto Pollensa cannot compare with Puerto Alcúdia, Can Picafort and Playa de Muro when it comes to all-inclusive offers, as they barely exist in Puerto Pollensa.
Until such information is made available and is truly transparent, which it is not at present, restaurant owners (and others) will continue to believe what they read, even if it is not accurate. And they will continue to bemoan their luck. But they should also take a look at themselves and at their decisions. In Playa de Muro, which does have a number of all-inclusive places, the bad-luck stories all centre on these places, except in the case of some businesses, such as Boulevard and its Dakotas. They have opened a second Dakota in the resort, and the boss has told me that all-inclusives have not affected them. And if this is true, then you do have to further wonder as to factors like marketing and trying that little bit harder, especially at a time of changed market conditions. Whither, therefore, one might ask, the traditional restaurant?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Always believe what you read. What can you believe? If the trend towards all-inclusives was this strong, it would already have been clear two years or so ago. This particular restaurant opened two years ago, some time into the season, following months of expensive work on converting one premises and re-modelling another. Why do it if the trend was already observable and if it was likely to be as great as it is now being claimed? Why do it, if all you do is moan about what the hotels are up to?
I am afraid you do have to wonder as to some business decisions, given the changes in market conditions. You do also have to wonder as to what people are prepared to believe and as to what they should make of the figures which get bandied around by various bodies. Take a piece from yesterday's "Ultima Hora". Reporting statistics from the tourism ministry, this says that the total number of hotels in Mallorca which offer all-inclusive only - the "exclusive" all-inclusive - is 48, representing a mere 3% of the total number of establishments. The figure is highly misleading, as it takes no account of size of hotel. More relevant is the total number of places in these 48 hotels - a bit under 23,000. Which sounds a lot, and may indeed be a lot, but there is no figure given as to the total number of places in all hotels.
Even allowing for this 3% to be correct, there is another confusion, and this has to do with the so-called "partial" all-inclusive, i.e. hotels which offer all-inclusive as an option in addition to other forms of accommodation. The hotel federation in Mallorca says that 165 establishments have this offer. Not that this gets us very far.
We are regularly subjected to these statistics, but never do we get a true and fair picture. You do have to wonder if "they" would rather "we" didn't get it. Or perhaps an accurate picture is not available. Can the ministry or the federation be sure about all those "upgrades" that take place when a holidaymaker is checking in at reception?
But it is only when and if a complete list of hotels and the precise number of all-inclusive places is published, and by resort, that we will ever really understand the extent of all-inclusive. And it is this which is lacking. The 3% figure, for example, is irrelevant as it takes no account of local conditions - by resort. As I have mentioned before, Puerto Pollensa cannot compare with Puerto Alcúdia, Can Picafort and Playa de Muro when it comes to all-inclusive offers, as they barely exist in Puerto Pollensa.
Until such information is made available and is truly transparent, which it is not at present, restaurant owners (and others) will continue to believe what they read, even if it is not accurate. And they will continue to bemoan their luck. But they should also take a look at themselves and at their decisions. In Playa de Muro, which does have a number of all-inclusive places, the bad-luck stories all centre on these places, except in the case of some businesses, such as Boulevard and its Dakotas. They have opened a second Dakota in the resort, and the boss has told me that all-inclusives have not affected them. And if this is true, then you do have to further wonder as to factors like marketing and trying that little bit harder, especially at a time of changed market conditions. Whither, therefore, one might ask, the traditional restaurant?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
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