Crisis mood on Lake Garda: Hoteliers meets hard!

Crisis mood on Lake Garda: Hoteliers meets hard!

Gardasee, Italien - The mood on Lake Garda is anything but rosy at the moment. Numerous restaurants and hotels report sales declines of up to 20 percent, a clear sign of the challenging location in the tourism sector. The hoped -for influx of tourists is missing, and everything indicates that the region has to deal with a significant decline in visitors. The absence of German and Italian holidaymakers is particularly sad, which leads to empty tables in the restaurants and hardly filled hotel rooms. Fr.a> reports that Fabio Pasqualini, the chairman of the trade association Confcommercio Bardolino, of a change in the tourism landscape speaks.

A change of visitors is noticeable: more and more Northern Europeans are opting for a stay, while the loyal regular guests from Germany and Italy stay away. The main reason for this development is exorbitant price increases that mean for a family of four that they almost have to pay for a pizza almost twice. A look at the journey also shows that the construction sites on the Brennerpass are now extending the travel time from Bavaria from five to seven hours - an additional obstacle for vacationers. giessener-zeiger.de indicates that these factors also affect the output behavior of the Northern European. They spend less money in restaurants and shops and often prefer campsites.

The loss of nightlife culture

The consequences of the changed visitor structure are also visible in the evening. After 10:30 p.m., there is a yawning emptiness on Lake Garda - a clear indication of the declining attractiveness of nightlife in the region. Where the streets used to be fulfilled, the evenings are now often dreary and unreasonable, which also increases the concerns of the business owners. fr.de and dein-italien.de calls this development alarming, since the arrival of German tourists at least remain stable, which can be attributed to the higher income of these guests.

The price increases in August, which affect campsites with +12.9%, hotels with +4% and other accommodations with +7.2%, do not contribute to calming the situation. The demand for state monitoring in the tourism sector becomes louder in order to counteract the threatening collapse of the tourist infrastructure. The questions that are pressing for the region: Can falling prices recover the lost guests? And how long can the gastronomy survive under these conditions?