62 percent decline in hotel overnight stays in Basel
Basel's hotels recorded a 61.7 percent decline in overnight stays in 2020, the year of the coronavirus pandemic. More than a third of the hotels suspended operations entirely during the spring lockdown.
Last year, 297,671 guests booked 545,906 overnight stays in Basel hotels. This corresponds to a decrease of 61.7 percent or 877,580 overnight stays compared to the previous year, as can be seen from the tourism statistics published by the Statistical Office on Wednesday and statements from an online media conference held by Basel Tourism.
A sharp decline of 70.4 percent was recorded above all among guests from abroad, while the number of guests from Germany fell less sharply by 44.6 percent.
In 2020, 66 hotels were open for at least one day. However, over a third of them closed their doors during the lockdown phase in spring. This had an impact on the average total number of hotel rooms on offer: This fell by 11.2 percent to 3969.
Basel Tourism with 5 million less turnover
The coronavirus crisis is hitting city tourism particularly hard, said Carlo Conti, President of Basel Tourism, at the online media conference. The loss of revenue last year was enormous. For example, Basel Tourism only generated revenue of CHF 7 million instead of the budgeted CHF 12 million due to a lack of guest tax revenue or the fact that city tours did not take place.
However, short-time working for all employees and the release of reserves meant that Basel Tourism had survived the past year relatively well, said Director Daniel Egloff.
Egloff assumes that tourism in Basel will slowly pick up again this summer/autumn. "At the same time, we unfortunately expect digitalization to take hold in corporate communications and leave a lasting mark on business tourism in Basel." Tourism will not have fully recovered from the coronavirus pandemic until 2025/2026, said Egloff.
Dramatic situation for hotels and restaurants
According to Raphael Wyniger, President of the Basel Hoteliers' Association, the loss of revenue at hotels due to the coronavirus pandemic is "dramatic". Hotel room prices are also under pressure, as many beds are available. The drop in revenue per available room is over 75 percent.
"The coming months will be tough and the hotel industry is facing enormous challenges, especially as business tourism, which is important for Basel, will still not take place," said Wyniger.
Alexandre Kaden, board member of the Basel Innkeepers' Association, also painted a gloomy picture. According to his estimates, the 1000 or so hospitality businesses in Basel are currently losing 10 million francs a month in turnover. The hospitality industry is struggling to survive and many businesses are in debt, said Kaden. "Unfortunately, normalization is still a long way off and the time after the lockdown will be a challenge for many businesses."
According to Director Daniel Egloff, Basel Tourism wants to expand its "experience marketing" and focus more on leisure tourism by 2024. The association is also hoping for more state contributions from the canton of Basel-Stadt, as income from guest taxes has declined, said Egloff. Basel Tourism currently receives contributions of CHF 1.9 million per year from the canton. (SDA)
