Slow recovery of tourism in Basel thanks to Swiss guests

In 2021, Basel's hotels recorded 784,607 overnight stays. This was almost 44 percent more than in the previous year, which, however, will probably go down in history as a catastrophic year not only for tourism in Basel. The room occupancy rate of the 66 hotels (+3) of 35 percent on average was still at a low level. "The worst is behind us," said Daniel Egloff, director of Basel Tourism, at a media conference on Thursday. But one is still far from normality, he added. With an increase in overnight stays of almost 43.7 percent, Basel did better than the reference cities of Zurich, Bern, St. Gallen, Lausanne and Geneva, which recorded an average increase of 21.4 percent. On a more positive note, Egloff mentioned that there was a striking increase of nearly 44 percent among guests from Switzerland. They accounted for more than half of all overnight stays and even set records in the months of August to October. Unsurprisingly, the value of overnight stays by guests from America and Asia barely recovered, while guests from European countries are slowly making their way back to Basel.

Upswing in leisure tourism

The fact that hotel occupancy was markedly higher on weekends than on weekdays was taken by Egloff as a sign that the recovery was mainly due to leisure tourism. Business, trade fair and congress tourism is still struggling at the moment. And in this area, the medium-term prospects are still uncertain: In the business sector, the newly intensified use of digital communication tools will probably have a lasting impact on travel activity. In the area of exhibition tourism, those responsible also do not expect a one hundred percent recovery against the backdrop of the crisis-ridden exhibition operator MCH Group. Basel Tourism will, however, actively promote growth in congress tourism. On the basis of these targets, Basel Tourism expects a moderate increase in overnight stays of 10 to 20 percent for the current year 2022. He said it is encouraging that Basel will be able to come up with a large number of top events in view of the good prospects in connection with the Covid 19 pandemic: Mention was made of the postponed Swissbau trade fair, the Basel Tattoo military music festival, the Swiss Indoors and also Art Basel, which had already provided the daily top figure for room occupancy last year. In addition to the Swiss Federal Wrestling and Alpine Festival in nearby Pratteln BL, exhibitions by Basel's museums were also counted among the top events. With the Mondrian show at the Fondation Beyeler and El Greco/Picasso at the Kunstmuseum Basel, two blockbuster exhibitions were on the annual program. (SDA)