Hotel rates hold value in slump

Queenstown hotel room prices have weathered the global plunge in room rates caused by the worldwide recession, industry experts said.

Figures released by Hotels.com on Tuesday show the average price of hotel rooms dropped by 14 per cent globally from 2008 to 2009, making them equal with the price of a room in 2003.

New Zealand Hotel Council independent chairwoman Jennie Langley yesterday said the Hotels.com report came from broad data that did not differentiate between types of hotels and markets, and Queenstown had coped well in the face of such statistics.

"New, unfinalised figures show that the average rate per room sold in Queenstown from 2008 to 2009 dropped by about 3 per cent compared with a New Zealand-wide average of about 5.5 per cent," she said.

The Hotels.com report shows the global price plunge for hotel rooms started to slow towards the end of 2009.

But New Zealand Hotel Council Queenstown regional chairman John McIlwain yesterday said the resort's hotel room prices had started to recover sooner because of factors including a strong Tourism New Zealand campaign, a good snowfall, an exchange rate favourable to Australian visitors and exposure gained for the Queenstown Winter Festival by Destination Queenstown.

Occupancy figures had shown a decline in the number of United States and United Kingdom visitors during 2009, but Australian visitors became a mainstay of the local tourist economy, Mr McIlwain said.

"The Australian market has been huge, and we have not suffered as much as other destinations because of that."

Queenstown's early recovery signs looked hopeful for a continued climb in hotel room prices, but had not escaped the effects of the worldwide recession, he said.

"Queenstown was under the same pressure as any other destination around the world in the previous 12 months, but it is pleasing to see prices rebounding as we move into 2010."

A Hotels.com report released in March last year showed Queenstown hotel room prices dropped 35 per cent in the last quarter of 2008 compared with the same period in 2007.

The decline was reported as the third-highest in the world, behind Mumbai, which had been hit by a terrorist attack in November 2008, and financially ravaged Reykjavik in Iceland.

- © Fairfax NZ News

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