Hotels in city recover from Martial Law, say

HOTEL gross sales in Davao City have increased by 25 to 100 percent from August to December 2017 after experiencing 10 to 25 percent decrease a few months after the declaration of Martial Law in Mindanao, said Prime Philippines.

City Tourism Operations Office (CTOO) head Generose Tecson, during an earlier interview, said the tourist arrivals in the city was affected by the Martial Law declaration by 19 percent to only 123,343 in June 2017 from 152,678 during the same period of 2016. She also said about P20 million in tourism receipts was lost during the first three days of Martial Law declaration.

However, last Tuesday, during the Mindanao Business Briefing at Seda Abreeza Hotel, Prime Philippines shared their study that showed three 4-star hotels in Davao City experienced 10 percent to 100 percent increase in gross sales for August to December 2017. Four 3-star and 2-star hotels’ gross sales also increased by 10 to 25 percent during the same duration.

“In just the start of August 2017, roughly three months after the declaration of Martial Law, sales had already gone back and in fact two of the four-star hotels recorded with them is more bullish than ever. So clearly as of December 31, 2017, sales had fully recovered after the declaration of Martial Law,” said Prime Philippines founder and managing director Jet Yu.

This is also supported by CTOO’s data which showed a 10 percent increase in the city’s tourist arrivals during the third quarter of 2017 to 511,228 from only 464,985 third quarter of 2016.

In previous interview Tecson, attributes this increase to the successful

celebration of Kadayawan Festival in August which continued to attract more tourist to come to Davao City even until the end of the year. JPA