Report 28/07/2020

Milan: stability in hotel trends, driven by seasonality factors.

In Milan, the Hotel Activity Index (HAI) confirms the trend of previous weeks, and hotels’ decisions to offer rooms online are stable, mainly driven by seasonality factors. We highlight a clear drop in the AB14_days curve (rooms offered for mid-August week, the core of summer holidays in Italy) but, overall, the gap between summer and autumn is visible, with the share of hotels offering rooms in summer being around 50% and 60%, while the share in autumn is over 80%. The sharp increase in AB56_days and the slow but constant increase in AB140_days show that the business is expected to be back to normality in the autumn season, the peak season for Milan as a business destination. The worst period seems to be over, although HAI shows that there are still 15 percentage points missing with respect to the pre-Covid19 situation.

Venezia: improving trends, but far away from the “sold-out”.

All HAI curves are growing or are stationary even this week, and the index ranges between 68% and 76%. The dynamics of the share of hotels offering rooms online at different advance bookings (from today to December) shows a gradual return of hotels management to normality. Hotels expect a growing demand, although they know that the“sold-out” condition, typical of Venice in summer, is very far away this year, as one hotel out of five still does not publish rooms online for 2020 dates. The great uncertainty on the timing and on the conditions of reopening to international tourism is the main driver of this situation.