Coronavirus Hits the Hotel Industry Hard

Berlin, Germany, March 19, 2020 --(PR.com)-- Since 1 March 2020, hotel occupancy in Germany has decreased by more than 36% compared to the previous year: This is shown by the analyses of the market research companies STR and Fairmas. They show that in addition to air transport, logistics, trade fair organizers, tourism service providers, cultural institutions and domestic industry, the hotel industry in particular is struggling with dramatic declines in sales.

Throughout Germany, room revenues of hotels are shrinking by more than 42%. So far, the city of Cologne has been hit the hardest - compared to March 2019, more than 2/3 of revenues have been lost due to postponements of trade fairs and cancelled business trips. The minus in Frankfurt is similarly high. In the banking city, the drop in sales is currently -62%. These drastic losses in the current month have a particularly precarious effect on the overall economic situation of the city’s hotel industry. A March without Easter holidays has an above-average share in the annual financial balance of city hotels due to the high proportion of trade fairs and congresses. To date, while business, group and event travel have been mainly affected, private travel is now also showing a massive decline.

"We assume that the bottom has not been reached yet. In the first few days of March, the hotels still had comparatively good levels of advanced bookings. Due to event cancellations and travel warnings, the booking situation is worsening with each passing day and even greater declines are to be expected," states Niels Schroeder, Managing Director of Fairmas GmbH.

Internationally, the corona crisis is leading to major distortions for the hotel industry. STR currently sees massive slumps for the entire European hotel market. Demand in many countries has already been falling since February. The situation has been worsening since March and occupancy rates fell last week, in some cases to single-digit figures. Italian cities such as Rome are particularly affected with a current occupancy rate of 6%, whereas London is still the most stable with an occupancy rate of around 47%.

"The effects of the corona crisis are having an enormous impact on the entire European hotel market. Currently, city destinations and winter travel destinations are mainly affected. An extension of the current situation over time would lead to further aggravation of the situation in the typical holiday regions," says Robin Rossmann, Managing Director of STR.

The surveys conducted by STR and Fairmas are based on long term, mainly automated daily data transmission from the hotel systems. The figures collected by the cooperation partners thus reflect the real business development of over 1,700 hotels in Germany and 13,000 hotels in Europe.

STR is a leading global provider of performance benchmarking and market analysis for the hotel industry. As a partner of more than 68,000 hotels worldwide, the data covers more than 9.1 million hotel rooms. This provides operators, investors, consultants and associations with up-to-date information on demand and supply trends in the global hotel markets. In October 2019, STR became part of the American CoStar Group, Inc., a leading data and platform service provider for all commercial real estate uses. Further information can be found on the websites str.com and costargroup.com.

Fairmas GmbH, based in Berlin, develops software solutions with a focus on financial planning and management reporting especially for the hotel industry. Currently, more than 11,000 users in more than 4,000 hotels worldwide work with the company's software solutions. The company, founded more than 15 years ago, has thus established itself as a strong partner for the hotel industry. A team of 43 experienced hotel and IT specialists is responsible for the constant permanent new and further development and enhancement of software products specially tailored to the hotel industry.