RESTAURANT owners in Mallorca are sounding the alarm for the island’s hospitality industry after reporting ‘the worst start to September anyone can remember’.
September is traditionally one of the strongest months for Mallorca’s restaurants and bars, attracting clientele who avoid the busy summer peak and are generally considered to have greater spending power.
But concerns are mounting within the hospitality sector that extra spending capacity is failing to translate into increased takings after a below-part final two weeks of August was followed up by an underwhelming start to September.
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“The last two weeks of August were bad – worse than last year,” said Juan Miguel Ferrer, president of Restauracion Mallorca CAEB employers’ association.
“We expected to recover but it hasn’t happened. What is really worrying us now is the start of September. In the restaurant sector, we cannot remember a first week this bad.”
Ferrer believes high-earner tourists who typically visit the island in early autumn are still paying a visit – but appear increasingly reluctant to dig deep into their pockets and spend big in local outlets.
He said: “We are seeing a visitor with good purchasing power who is choosing September to avoid the crowds – but this year that spending capacity is not translating into restaurant spending as we expected.
“The issue is less about how many people are arriving in Mallorca than about their capacity and disposition to spend once they are here.”
The organisation has been warning about the issue for some time, with Ferrer calling for a clearer distinction between the number of tourists visiting the Balearic Islands and the profitability those visitors generate for local businesses.
“We urgently need to distinguish between tourist footfall and business profitability,” he argued, warning that a busy island does not necessarily mean a lucrative one for local business owners.
The warning echoes concerns already emerging elsewhere in the Balearics.
In Ibiza, popular tourist areas including Figueretes experienced a sharp drop in visitors during August, with locals and businesses left questioning where the crowds had gone.
Some blamed the extreme heat, while others pointed to soaring prices and a changing visitor profile, pushing away the family tourism that had traditionally filled the area.
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