Depending on which of the multitude of sources you believe, our average year round hotel occupancy is quoted at around 67 percent.
Recently a senior industry spokesperson stated that we have a total of ‘6,000 hotel rooms and 3,000 villa rooms’.
This does not of course include the explosion of alternative lodging choices which has ‘appeared’ over the last decade. Until these Airbnb type offerings are fully identified, systematically listed and licensed, we can only speculate on just what percentage of our total arrivals choose to stay at these previously non traditional accommodations.
So, let’s just focus on those 9,000 villa and hotel rooms for the moment.
At 67 per cent average annual occupancy that would equate to having every one of those rooms full for 244 nights of the year. If a typical average stay is 7 nights with two persons per room, that’s a total of 627,428 people, but that does not seem to tally with published arrival figures.
This is perhaps an area which needs a great deal more investigation and clarification or our combined efforts in marketing the destination could be based on misconceptions.
Conversely, that would also mean that the ‘9,000 rooms’ were empty for 120 nights of the year, which based on the same assumptions, mean that we actually have an unfilled capacity of another 308,571 visitors or guests per year. I use the word ‘guests’ deliberately, as I personally feel there is a great deal more opportunity for domestic staycations.
The question then begs, how do we creatively fill all those empty rooms both to the financial benefit of the individual properties and to the country at large with the collection of increased taxation?
There are many existing promotions to encourage special events including sports, culinary and other potential areas of mass interest.
Could a singles month be a possibility?
Most of us fully understand the reason for single supplements and the economic reasons they are applied. But an empty room has no value, as it’s impossible to fill it twice on another night.
There are several specialist single travel tour operators who already have a captive customer base that we could work with and I am sure our partner airlines would welcome the possibility of filling more seats, even if it’s one at a time. When for instance, was the last operator FAM (familiarization) trip specifically aimed at these tour companies?
When I GOOGLED ‘single travel to Barbados’ I was surprised just how little information was available, so perhaps this is an area that our tourism policymakers could highlight and exploit.
It would of course be foolish to speculate substantial funds on any targeted
marketing plan without first embarking on research to identify the very best way of engaging this niche group, which some estimate could be as high as one in four of all travellers from our major visitor sources.
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Barbados is not cheap you have chosen the market you want. Wealthy which usually means older people with houses paid and extra spending money. Young people head to places where it is more economical unless Barbados has a shift from quality to quantity singles are a non starter. And oh yeah old people are not fun
David I am going to a five star brand new hotel in the dominican for a week in a few weeks 4 1/2 hrs there and back direct 1700 dollars. My son and 11 others just came back from a resort there it was so large you take carts to get around, said it most so much fun a lot of young people they paid 1400. Thats hotel,flights,meals. sports, gym etc…..kind of going on a cruise on land. If that is the market that is being suggested by singles it will be a tough sell.
You can value for money in DR, the downside is infrastructure does not compare outside the resort areas.
@Blogmaster
Is the link correct? Clicked on your comment and Lawson’s and ended up here instead of at Loveridge post
Ignore. It is correct.
true David but like a cruise one week on a resort is do able that is what sandals wants once your there you have no need of leaving.but at a much higher price But on a more serious note there are two things barbadians can do to increase tourism STOP shooting and killing people, or take your newspapers off the net and hide the stories of killing people. I prefer option one.
theo…..ignore……. way ahead of you
@Lawson
don’t forget your Loperamide. For whatever reason the DR, always gets me going, or maybe its the green rum LOL
Or the girls and casinos?
el presidente beer