Hoteliers should ask for big increases from tour operators for 2023

Hoteliers should move optimistically and seek "to get big increases from tour operators for 2023" stresses the president of Greek hoteliers association SETE Mr. Giannis Retsos, in order for Greek hotels to survive and face the increased energy costs and inflation.

The honorary president of SETE, Mr. Andreas Andreadis, also defended this position, noting on twitter that "I agree with @ YARetsos. The demand for Greece 2022/23 will be very high. Colleagues will make a big mistake if they are afraid to increase prices by 8% -10% for 23 for tour operators in order to give pay raises to employees & to cover inflation ".

Inflation and price hikes are for Mr. Retsos the elements that will largely determine the course of tourism this year. The war in Ukraine may have frozen the bookings for a while, but it did not result in cancellations. Also, if the conflict stops in April, then there will be an explosion in demand, he said yesterday in a press conference where he presented his estimates for the course of Greek tourism.

The target

In fact, he added that the goal of the industry to approach the tourism revenues of 18.2 billion euros in 2019 has not been lost for this year.

As concerns markets, he characterized the British and the Scandinavian as more dynamic, while we expect a lot from the American market, which, however, is greatly influenced by the wars. For the German market he said as for the Polish it is more restrained.

Inflation and rising prices will have a greater impact than the war, he added, adding that rising energy prices and the primary sector are forming a strange mix, the real effects of which we will see in 2023. As Mr. Retsos explained, European tourists have saved more money in the last two years due to pandemic...