Thistle becomes another foot-and-mouth casualty

Thistle Hotels has joined the growing ranks of companies blaming foot-and-mouth for a downturn in business. At its annual general meeting today, chairman David Newbigging said Thistle had traded "very satisfactorily" in the first 12 weeks of 2001, with a turnover growth of 11.9% compared with the same period last year and a rise in revenue per available room (revpar) of 13.2%. Revpar in London, where Thistle has 22 of its 56 hotels, grew by 13.2% as a result of higher achieved room rates offsetting lower occupancy. Outside London, revpar growth was 14.3%, with increases in both rates and occupancy. But in the eight weeks from the beginning of April onwards the company recorded a significant drop in turnover. Newbigging said: "We have been hit by two external factors which have adversely affected our business…the slowdown in the US economy and foot-and-mouth disease in the UK." As a result, turnover growth in these eight weeks dropped to 1.8% and revpar growth dropped to 2.1%. This means an overall turnover growth for the first 20 weeks of the year of 7.5%, and a revpar rise of 8.2%. Newbigging also warned that things were not likely to improve significantly for some time. "Looking ahead, the slowdown in the US economy and foot-and-mouth disease in the UK are likely to continue to have an adverse effect for the remainder of the year on both business travel and inbound tourism," he said.