Hotels hold strong following Westminster attack
London hotels maintained their performance in spite of the terrorist attack in Westminster on 22 March, according to data company STR.
During the days following the incident, the market recorded significant year-over-year growth in both occupancy and average daily rate (ADR), largely in line with typical March performance patterns.
The lack of performance disruption in London differed from the situations around other recent attacks, for example Nice in July 2016 and Berlin in December 2016. Within four days of the 14 July Bastille Day attack, Nice's daily occupancy dropped from 94.6% to 72.8%. A drop in actual occupancy levels was seen in the three days after the 19 December attack on a Christmas market in Berlin, but this is typical during the lead up to Christmas.
STR reported last year that it has historically taken a market's hotels approximately three months without a subsequent attack to begin performance recovery.
Thomas Emanuel, STR's director of business development, said: "We're seeing now that the way a hotel market reacts to an attack really does depend on the severity. Of course, any time innocent lives are lost or people are injured, it's tragic. But this most recent attack in London and even the December attack in Berlin have not had much of an impact on hotel performance.
"When there is a larger number of casualties, as was the case in Nice, Brussels and Paris over the past two years, it takes a longer duration without additional incidents for tourism confidence to grow. This is also what we've noticed in Istanbul, as it remains to be seen when the market will be deemed a safe destination again."
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