The merchants of the old town of Marbella predict a good tourist season, and after the results of Holy Week it is expected a summer with an outstanding influx of publicmainly from the national and European markets.
The president of the Platform of merchants and hoteliers of Marbella, Nahuel Klappenbach, has shown “very optimistic” about forecasts ahead of the summer, especially after the “good Easter” and the movement that is seen during these days, that “they are being good”.
“This year I think what would be a normal summer is going to come together with a summer of 2 years of people who were afraid to go out, and who perhaps no longer have it in a large percentage, and with a kind of security when booking a flight or a hotel”, he assessed.
In this way, he has indicated that “it’s going to be a really explosive summer and if the previous one was good but short, this one is going to be good but long. So, I have very good prospects for both commerce and the hotel industry, indistinctly, because when there are people, there is something for everything”, he pointed out.
Regarding the profile of the visitor, it has affected the presence of national tourism, since “since the pandemic we have all gotten used to traveling closer and of course there will be no problem with all the tourists we already had coming back this summer.” In relation to the international visitor, he has remarked that “we are already seeing Americans who had not seen each other for a while and all the countries of Europe are traveling here.”
“It is seeing a very varied public, perhaps fewer English, which was a huge market in Marbella, but we are seeing more people from other countries than before”, pointed out Klappenbach, who has valued that when the visitors from the United Kingdom “really finish coming back, which will surely be this summer, it will be a very good summer”. To this has been added the visitors from America, France, Eastern European countries or the Netherlands who “have become accustomed” to visiting the Costa del Sol.
For her part, the president of the Association of Merchants and Professionals of the Old Town of Marbella (ACOPROCAMAR), Carola Herrero, has declared that “The feelings of the merchants are very good” in the face of summer, highlighting that “you see people at all hours” in the historic center of the city, and has even stated that the habits of tourists are changing and “now you first visit the old town and then go to the beach”.
“The old town begins to be like the first point of visit ahead of Puerto Banús or almost the beach, so we believe that the summer is going to be very good if nothing happens again”, has valued the representative of the group, who has attributed this change in trend to the fact that “the pandemic has changed everyone’s habitsand just as ours have changed, those of the visitors have changed”.
Herrero has also pointed to security during the pandemic that has occurred in the environment, where “people have returned to enjoy our terraces or the shops are very accessible”, for which he has pointed out that Covid-19 “has made us improve our infrastructures and people have appreciated it because it is now seen that the old town is practically full throughout the day”.
Regarding the origin of the tourist who can come to Marbella in summer, he highlighted that “the national is doing very well and throughout the pandemic it has replaced the international, but we believe that the European to come because he has nowhere to go”.
“I think this summer we will have overbooking and there is going to be almost a problem of excess people in Marbella and I don’t know how we are going to deal with it”, remarked Herrero, who pointed out that the proximity to the war conflict in Ukraine of destinations such as Turkey or Greece will drive the European market to plan their vacations in places like “Italy, France and Spain”.
Thus, he stated that “Spain is the country furthest from the war that there is in Europe and we also have very good security and health”, which is why he stressed that “in these circumstances the Costa del Sol is almost a place-tourist refugeapart from the quality.