Olympics key to the region’s lack of foreign visitors
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HOTELIERS in Wick have reported a significant drop in visitors to the east of the county this season.
Many claim bus tour operators, which previously travelled to the county from across the UK and Europe, have struggled to attract passengers, blaming the economic recession.
This has resulted in them cancelling rooms, which they had booked as part of contracts with hotels, costing businesses thousands of pounds this holiday season.
Many hoteliers are describing this summer as the worst in decades and claim they are only making a profit due to developments in the business and energy industry.
Andrew Mackay, manager of the Norseman Hotel in Wick and the Castletown Hotel, said both establishments have seen a drop in guests.
“This has been a tough season for both our hotels but especially in Wick,” he said.
“We’re finding that the bus tour businesses, which we have relied on in the past, are suffering a lot during the recession as we have had a lot of cancellations for rooms due to them running low on passengers.
“It is more of a problem with the European and American operators than the British ones – American tourists no longer seem to be flying over here and are tending to vacation at home.
“If foreigners are flying to the UK this year, they are heading to London for the Olympic Games as the event is definitely having a negative impact for hotels in the Highlands.
“Australian tourists is the one area of the market where we have not seen a drop, but there are fewer Europeans, especially from Italy and Spain, due to the state of their economies.”
Queen’s Hotel owner Peter Sutherland blamed the euro crisis for the drop in visitors but said Caithness does not market itself well enough as a tourist destination.
“It has been very slow this year and I think that the lack of money in the economy has been the main factor,” he said.
“The crisis with the euro has a lot to do with how the tourism industry is suffering at the moment and we have definitely seen a drop in the amount of people coming over from the continent.
“But the British crowd is not doing that well either, the majority of tourists do tend to be pensioners – it is not an area younger people tend to visit.”
He added: “To have a hotel in Caithness that makes a profit you can’t rely on tourists.
“We have a lot of workmen that stay at our hotel that work at the airport or within the renewable energy sector.
“Caithness doesn’t publicise itself nearly well enough as most people just see the county as a road to Scrabster to get to Orkney.”
Helen Hill, owner of the Nethercliffe Hotel in Wick, said her business has coped well this season but admits that as it only has six rooms, it is not a true reflection on the industry in the far north.
She is aware the demand for rooms has decreased compared to previous years.
“We have seen a steady flow of customers coming to our hotel this year and we have been fully booked for the last few months,” she said.
“However, we only have six rooms within our hotel so we may not be experiencing the recession as bad as larger hotels would.
“There has been a number of Europeans who have stayed in our hotel as well as tourists from Australia and Japan.
“One major difference that we have noticed from previous years is that we are not having to turn away people or phone around other hotels to see if there are rooms available because we are fully booked like we have done in the past.”
