
After two quarters of steady hotel activity for France’s hotel industry, marked by 6% and 7.5% growth in the performance indicator for the RevPAR, the summer began under the best auspices.
The disastrous atmospheric conditions somewhat tempered this optimism, but did not quell it. In the midst of an excellent month of June, the month of July was also a record month in terms of hotel activity. Until the big mid-July departure weekend, major cities benefited from the double strength of a French economy that was still at work and the arrival of foreign tourists. The shift of Ramadan to the entire month of August caused families from the Middle East to anticipate their traditional holiday in the Parisian capital to the month of July. The effect of this is particularly evident in the upscale 4 and 5 star segment, which benefited from a clientele with strong buying power that generated a strong increase in average daily rate. It is interesting to observe that all hotel categories, without exception, progressed with respect to a month of July 2010 that was already marked by a significant renewal of activity.Bad weather at the beginning of the summer left shoreline regions in the North of France more penalized than their southern counterparts where tourists were comforted by hope for improvement. Globally, major cities did fairly well within a context of bad weather as they have more urban, cultural and commercial leisure activities available. The region of Languedoc-Roussillon drew the interest of tourists this summer. Last July, Paris, Marseille, Nice/Cannes, Strasbourg and Lyon posted respective growth in their RevPAR by 11.6%, 9.2%, 8.6%, 8.6% and 6.6%. The first indications already show that this summer’s activity is already more spread out over the months than in previous years, extending beyond the traditional period of July 15 – August 15. The high level of activity in certain shoreline regions and the generally better weather at the end of the summer caused vacationers who are not bound by school holidays to postpone their departure. The European Society of Cardiology (ESC) Congress in Paris at the end of August and several major professional exhibitions offer some encouragement for hotel activity levels in the fall.
