London back on top as most profitable city

London made it back to the top of the UK hotel industry in 2006, with a 16.8% rise in revenue per available room (revpar).

Results from the Deloitte HotelBenchmark survey show a third year of growth for the capital city, bringing revpar to £96.

Strong weekday demand gave Aberdeen the fastest growing hotel market, with growth of 15.1%. Belfast followed with growth of 13.9%.

Outside of London, Edinburgh reached the highest revpar, commanding rates of £67.

Marvin Rust, hospitality managing partner for Deloitte, said: “In 2006 has been a great year for the London hotel market after the challenges of 2005.

“The capital appears to have learnt valuable lessons from the past and is also reaping the rewards of more sophisticated revenue management.”

The results highlighted Nottingham as the poorest performing city, recording a 5.2% drop in revpar.
 
Hotel performance in Yorkshire also fell, with a decline in revpar in the county’s cities of Sheffield, Leeds and York.

For the latest facts and figures visit CatererSearch’s Trends and Data section >>

Hotel Benchmark >>

Revpar drops by nearly 5% in London >>

UK tourist spend hits almost £4b >>

London hotels beat performance of European rivals during November >>

By Alex Blakelock

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