Group tours provide a valuable room service

buoyant demand from group tours helped hoteliers in Yorkshire achieve year-on-year growth in two key measures last month, according to the latest industry survey.

Operators saw an increase in average room rate and revenue per available room in July, largely due to the group tours market offsetting underperformance in the corporate and conference sectors.

But a lack of revenue growth coupled with the scourge of rising costs resulted in falling profitability for hoteliers, said TRI Hospitality Consulting.

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Ancillary spend was also down, year on year. And room occupancy rates were lower in Yorkshire than the national average. Jonathan Langston, managing director of the advisory firm, said: “While the overall picture for hotels in the provinces is not encouraging, pockets of positivity still remain.

“That said, with inflation levels currently at 5 per cent and utility costs widely reported to be set for increases of up to 25 per cent, growth in profitability levels for provincial hoteliers is going to become even more of a challenge.”

Nationally, year-on-year profitability levels declined by 3.7 per cent.

Hotels in the North East saw large declines in profitability, while counterparts in the North West were able to increase profitability per room.