French hotels and other accommodation facilities, except for campsites, experienced a 12.6 per cent increase in overnight stays recorded in the first three months of 2023 compared to the same period last year. In addition, the presence of British tourists has been more prominent in French accommodation spots during this period.
According to the National Institute for Statistics (INSEE), hotel occupancy was also relatively higher than in 2022, with almost seven million more overnight stays recorded. In addition, domestic tourists spent some 2.1 million nights, representing a 7.7 per cent increase, while international tourists spent some 4.8 million nights at French accommodation spots – 55.8 per cent more than in the first quarter of 2022, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports.
Rich hotels benefited from these rates as the number of overnight stays rose by 31.4 per cent while unclassified hotels experienced decreases – occupancy dropped by 2.7 per cent, with the rise being particularly sharp in resident tourists.
Hotel occupancy was 37.4 per cent higher in Île-de-France compared to the first quarter of 2022, representing four million additional overnight stays. In provincial urban areas, the number of nights spent was up by 15.1 per cent, accounting for 1.9 million more overnight stays.
As the occupancy rates vary between zones, coastline hotels and ski mountain hotels recorded more minor increases – 6.1 and 3.4 per cent, respectively. The increase in non-resident overnight stays was partially compensated by the decrease in resident occupancy.
“Business attendance increased sharply in Q1 2023 (+17.3 per cent, representing 3.1 million additional overnight stays) compared to the same period of the last year, which was highly impacted by the sanitary crisis. Despite this rise, business attendance share kept decreasing slowly, going from 48.8 per cent in Q1 2022 to 48 per cent in Q1 2023,” INSEE explains.
The same source reveals that the number of overnight stays spent by Brits was up by 102.5 per cent. Nights spent were up by 41.7 per cent for German tourists and 9.7 per cent more for Dutch tourists, while Americans spent 62.3 per cent more nights in French hotels during the first three months of the year.
Non-resident customers’ occupancy in hotels rose by 55.8 per cent, while attendance of domestic tourists was slower as it rose by 7.7 per cent during the same period.
The number of people staying in holiday and other short-stay accommodation was up by 1.6 per cent for the metropolitan area of France, while tourist residences experienced a 0.8 per cent decrease.