Positive Outlook from 2011 Business Confidence Monitor

VisitEngland’s 2011 Business Confidence Monitor recently revealed that 2010 was a good year for the tourism industry in Britain with 36% of businesses experiencing an increase in visitor numbers compared to 2009 and another 36% experiencing the same amount of visitors as in 2009.

All accommodation sectors had a relatively good year, according to the Business Confidence Monitor and 31% of operators expressed they were ‘very satisfied’ with the performance of their business in 2010 and 50% were ‘fairly satisfied’.

This was mainly due to domestic leisure visitors but also stable numbers of overseas and business visitors as well as repeat visitors.

Despite advance bookings for spring and Easter being slightly down on average, the remainder of 2011 shows fairly healthy bookings levels in view of the growing trend of last-minute bookings.

The Business Confidence Monitor shows that 26% of operators are ‘very confident’ for spring and Easter and 30% are ‘very confident’ for the rest of the year. Over half of operators are ‘fairly confident’ for both spring and Easter (56%) and the rest of the year (55%).