High expectations for tourist season after successful St Patrick’s weekend - Fáilte Ireland
The Galway City St Patricks Day Parade attracted thousands to the city centre on Sunday. Photo:-Mike Shaughnessy
By Martina Nee
There are high expectations for the tourist season this year after hotels in Galway city reported a strong occupancy rate during the St Patrick’s weekend, that is according to Fáilte Ireland.
Client services manager with the national tourism promotion group, Eva Dearie, described the mood of the city’s hotels as being very positive following a successful bank holiday weekend - many hotels reported a 100 per cent occupancy for Saturday and Sunday. Ms Dearie added that current signs are indicating that events such as those planned for The Gathering will bring a welcome boost.
“This St Patrick’s day bounce bodes well for our expectations for The Gathering this year and hopefully will be the start of a positive pattern this season. The performance of hotels in the city really confirms that events do drive business in Galway,” said Ms Dearie.
Fáilte Ireland revealed this week that most of the key hotels in the city centre were full with many expected to be still significantly busy up until March 22 and optimistic levels of business for the upcoming Easter break. Hotels in particular noticed a significant increase in overseas visitor traffic as well as domestic Irish vistors to the city. Some of the local hotels also hosted a good amount of North American business with some hotels observing particularly strong levels of US visitors, and good numbers from mainland European markets such as France and Germany. It is understood that there was, across all hotels, a good strong mix of domestic, northern, and UK visitors also.
Ms Dearie concluded: “Our hotels are still managing the trick of providing good value with impressive quality and it is no wonder that so many of them fared well in terms of bednights over the weekend. The level of overseas business in the area over the last few days is very encouraging. It is imperative now that everybody with a stake in tourism keeps their eye on the prize and helps to drive this type of performance throughout the year.”
