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Tourism
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the HIE hotel, declares: “We always thought there were 30 rooms every night in every hotel in Gibraltar, including the Caleta, that would relocate when the Holiday Inn Express opened; our assessment was right, because there was a lack of a limited service hotel, and it’s obviously price driven.”
40% more hotel rooms
However, a significant 40% rise from the circa 650 present Gibraltar hotel rooms is expected in the period to 2021, the result of fresh investments.
IHG is establishing a second brand - a 120- bedroom Indigo boutique hotel – in Gibraltar, “which we recognize is becoming an increasingly popular destination for both business and leisure travellers”, under a franchise arrangement with UK hotel developer Roquebrook, which is converting an office building near the centre for completion at end-2020.
Lester Hotels, through its City Homes Hospitality business, has planning approval for a 180 room aparthotel also close to the airport and will be a two-year build.
Last year’s overall Gibraltar hotel occupancy was at an all-time high – 71% of availability. Sunborn is expecting it to be less in 2018, “but with rates going up by double figure percentile”, reports Niemi. “Unfortunately, that is not going to be sustainable, because of the increasing [hotel] capacity.
“If someone is investing into a hotel business here, they must have had a feasibility study, but there is none that supports more
capacity at the current air visitor level. If you disregard Monarch’s collapse and say it didn’t happen and add 5% growth every year in overnight arrivals, we still wouldn’t make it,” Niemi insists.
Before Sunborn opened in early 2014 “Gibraltar hotels experienced 50-60% occupancy – it was even below 50% in 2000 – and each was battling for clients”, he asserts. “Sunborn was a catalyst for a lot of upgrading and investment in the hotel sector, which has benefited everybody, because everyone is getting a better rate, there’s been consolidation in the hotel market and, simultaneously, we have been lucky enough to see the overall market and Gibraltar’s GDP growing.”
Niemi adds: “The biggest thing we battle when we go around the world selling this yacht hotel is that we first have to tell people where Gibraltar is! It’s not about the hotel, it’s a lot about the destination.” Like other major hotels locally, Sunborn attracts 50:50 business and
leisure travellers. “We don’t rely on anyone else to bring us business. When we opened in this jurisdiction, we weren’t expecting to steal everyone else’s business, as there simply was no luxury market in Gibraltar - but there is now.”
Ostuni emphasises: “The overall growth in the hotel offer is disproportionate to growth in the market. It would be unrealistic to say that HIE has grown the market by 120 rooms in so little time! Eventually in 1–11⁄2 years’ time, I am sure the brand will create some awareness of the destination and there will be an element of growth because of that.”
Charles Danino, 6 years general manager of
the iconic 94-bed Rock Hotel, submits: “Room rates are rising – I don’t see too much price cutting generally, but the differentiation between hotels is marked.” Although the UK remains predominant, “we have been attracting business from new markets – Spain and Portugal – and cross border custom,” he says.
2017 government hotel and air arrival statistics indicate up to a third of 278,000 airport arrivals stayed overnight in Gibraltar hotels for an average of 3.2 nights. Yet the airport terminal arrivals and public areas at present feature little information to attract more visitors, particularly from those crossing the border into Spain.
Minister Licudi concedes: “We may be missing an opportunity; there is no analysis more generally of how many of those going straight to Spain have ever been into Gibraltar. Maybe that is something we should be looking at.”
Mind the transport gap
With near 10m day visitors arriving from Spain per annum, industry leaders believe up to 3m are “genuine” tourists open to more than Gibraltar’s Duty Free alcohol, cigarettes and jewellery shopping. “We want to convert those visitors into tourists: we have things to show, but we lack the tourist infrastructure to show it off”, maintains George Gaggero, chief executive of M H Bland, whose 1966-built Cable Car to the top of The Rock carries 400,000 of the 1m+ annual visitors to the Nature Reserve there.
At end-October, he was seeking planning approval for a £20m+ upgrade to the top attraction Swiss cable car and increase capacity 31⁄2 fold – to reach 1,150 people per hour – but challengingly, that will mean its closure for 18 months from autumn next year!
Gaggero is also promoting a plan to introduce electric rubber wheeled, hop-on, hop- off “trains” in a circuit to link all of the Upper Rock sites and another circuit from the frontier for ground level attractions - “from the entry points into Gibraltar to feed the tourist sites; to join the dots”. As a joint public-private venture it would involve all Gibraltar’s tourist sector – tour coaches, taxis, buses, site operators and government. “It would enable tourists to go around all of the sights in Gibraltar with minimal impact on the environment,” Gaggero enthuses.
His Calypso fleet of 36 coaches ferry 15,000 people a year on Rock Tours, principally for passengers from cruise ships - 250 were expected in 2018, a 6% rise, and eleven calling for the first time. In 2017, only around 41% of the 578,000 passengers and crew went ashore, in part because there were high numbers of repeat
The Windsor Suspension Bridge, part of the thrill seekers walking trail
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14 Gibraltar International
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