Viennese hotels slash prices
Hotels in Vienna have introduced a drastic price reduction, a survey has found.
International hotel price comparison platform Trivago (www.trivago.co.uk/hotelprices) found that a standard double room in the Austrian capital currently cost 118 Euros, down from 140 Euros last month.
The website’s research reveals that prices for rooms in hotels in Graz, the second-largest Austrian city, decreased as well from 114 to 103 Euros. Rooms in Salzburg edged up in price from 126 Euros in June to 133 Euros, while hotels and guesthouses in Linz, Upper Austria, charge 95 Euros per night on average at the moment (June: 101 Euros). Prices for one night in hotels in Innsbruck, Tyrol, slightly declined from 119 Euros last month to 117 Euros.
Trivago – which constantly checks the prices for standard double rooms in Europe’s largest cities and most important vacation destinations – previously revealed considerable price hikes by hotels in Vienna. One night in a hotel in the city cost 142 Euros in May, up sharply from just 99 Euros in February. With 10.86 million, hotels in the capital registered more overnight stays than ever before last year.
Research has shown that an increasing number of tourists opt for short trips. Hotel bosses have reacted to this development by offering special long weekend package deals for couples and families.
Congress tourism has become of increasing importance to Vienna too. The International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA) announced in May that 154 international summits took place in the Austrian capital in 2010. This figure helped the city to top the association’s annual ranking ahead of Barcelona, Spain, where 148 congresses were held last year. Paris, the capital of France, reached third place (147).
Petra Stolba, the president of the Austrian Tourism Marketing Agency (ÖW), recently warned that the current summer season could turn out to be a “difficult” one for the country’s hotels and restaurants. The businesswoman stressed many Germans who previously went to Austria were expected to go on holiday in their homeland this year. Stolba refused to give a precise prediction, claiming that many holidaymakers book at short notice depending on the weather.