Scottish hotels continued to have higher occupancy and rooms yield (the industry measure of revenue) during July compared to the rest of the UK, according to the latest report by accountant and business adviser, PKF.
Date:
Fri, 23 Sep 2011
Source:
PKF
PKF:
Website
The firm’s monthly survey found that year-on-year occupancy levels in Scotland rose by 2.6% to 82.8% during July; were up 3.5% to 80.2% in regional UK; up 3.6% to 79.8% in England; and up 3.8% to 81.2% in Wales.
Rooms yield during the month rose 0.2% to £61.41 in Scotland; was up 2.6% to £49.68 in regional UK; up 3.3% to £47.98 in England; and reduced 5.1% to £42.26 in Wales.
Occupancy fell by 1.0% in Aberdeen but rose by 2.2% in Edinburgh and by 2.5% in Glasgow. Rooms yield increased by 5.8% in Glasgow, was up 4.3% in Aberdeen, and rose by 2.7% in Edinburgh.
Alastair Rae, a partner in the real estate and hospitality sector at PKF, said: "This year continues to be positive for the Scottish hotel sector.
"Whilst an average occupancy of 82.8% is very good it is the rooms yield which is more telling. To have such a high occupancy level coupled with rooms yield which is almost £12 per room per night higher than the average for the UK is a sign that the sector in Scotland is doing something right.
"Indeed, it would be true to say that the Scottish market is something of a hospitality hotspot compared to the rest of the UK outside London.
"The challenge for hoteliers is to provide the right product for their market and back this up with strong customer service. If either of these factors isn’t right the business suffers and for those hotels with significant debt levels it can affect the stability of the business."
Rae added: "Aberdeen has also performed well given that occupancy fell slightly by 1.0% yet rooms yield rose by 4.3%. This indicates a robust market which can take higher charges despite a slight drop in demand.
"The performance of Glasgow‘s hotels has also improved during July, reflecting improved conference demand.
"The city marketing board has indicated that a lot of their conference business for the year has been skewed toward the latter part of the year and the expectation is that the coming months will result in an improved performance for the hospitality sector on the back of business based visitors."
Edinburgh, however, remains the jewel in the hospitality crown with occupancy and rooms yield only beaten across the UK by other tourist hotspots such as Bath, Cambridge and Oxford.
Said Rae: "It is clear that the volume of leisure visitors for the year has been very high and early indications are that this pattern continued for the rest of the summer.
"The trend for the year to date has been very positive and Scotland’s hoteliers can congratulate themselves for maintaining such high levels of occupancy and rooms yield despite the continuing uncertainties which the wider economy is presenting.
"I would expect the remainder of the summer to produce equally good figures for Scotland with the only proviso that the economy remains volatile and there is increasing concern among many that the economy is simply bumping along the ground and that real growth remains both elusive and some way off.
"It is vital, therefore, that hoteliers push rates upwards whilst the going is good in the expectation that this may not always be the case."
PKF’s hotel trends surveys have been published since the early 1970s and feature a broad range of hotels in the 3-4 star categories.
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