Expensive hotels top occupancy rate ranking
Five-star hotels in Austria achieved the highest occupancy rates in the past holiday periods both in summer and winter, new figures show.Statistik Austria announced today (Weds) that 49.3 per cent of beds in the most expensive hotel category were booked in the 2009/2010 winter season, while 52.1 per cent were occupied in the summer months of 2010. The agency said these figures mean five-star resorts did better than private guesthouses and hotels in all other categories.The institute also found that 64,400 hotels did business last summer, while only 59,500 hotels were open in the past winter season. The overall occupancy rate in summer 2010 was 36.3 per cent and 38.4 per cent the previous winter.The most hotel beds were counted in the Alpine province of Tyrol where 23,800 businesses offer 350,000 beds. Salzburg comes second with 11,700 hotels and 206,800 beds.Austrian hotels contain an overall 1.09 million hotel beds, according to Statistik Austria. Hotels in Vienna have the highest average number of beds with 119, while the smallest resorts are found in the western province of Vorarlberg with an average capacity of 13 beds.Austria is one of the most popular winter sport holiday destinations in the world. The domestic tourism sector contributes between 15 and 18 per cent to the countrys annual gross domestic product (GDP).Hotels and private guesthouses across Austria registered 124.82 million overnight stays throughout 2010, around 0.4 per cent more than in the previous year. Vienna did best among the countrys nine provinces last year as far as year on year performance improvements are regarded. Hotels in the city recorded 10.86 million overnight stays, up by 10.3 per cent year on year.Verkehrsbüro Group, Austrias leading travel company, meanwhile said Austria was the most popular destination among its customers last year. The firm explained that more ten per cent of all trips booked at its 125 Ruefa travel offices were domestic holidays. After Austria the next most favoured destination was Spain which came second ahead of Italy.