A good year
“Yes, 2024 was a good year. We’re very satisfied. As an industry here in the Balearics we managed to meet demand, comply with the needs of the tour operators while also overcoming the challenges thrown up by an ever-changing industry with more dynamic sales models which range from the traditional package holiday to direct online marketing and bookings. We’ve shown that we as travel agents and receiving incoming tour agents can adapt to an industry which is becoming increasingly flexible with regard to how it operates and the changing travel habits of tourists. The classic 7-night packages are still extremely popular but in the era of low cost airlines with more and more people designing their own trips and holidays while also travelling more often, we’ve had to adapt and we’ve shown we can.
“However, the market is changing, not only with regard to travel habits but also the competition. Here in the Balearics, Spain as a whole, the public administrations need to be aware of that and they can’t continue to look at tourism as a cash cow while constantly throwing up new hurdles for the industry and travellers to overcome. To start with, here in the Balearics, we get the impression that while we live off tourism, we don’t seem to like tourists, especially when it comes to the public administrations. Despite tourism being vital for the local economy, very little serious thought and investment is being put into improving and diversifying the industry.
Quality standards
“We can’t continue putting up prices if we’re going to continue offering the same thing. Have we built a Disneyland or a pyramid? No. We can’t charge people more for the same as what they experienced the year before, or worse in some cases as quality standards in some parts of the service sector have fallen,” he said. “I know the hotel federation refuses to acknowledge it, but demand for all-inclusive holidays is continuing to rise and it will this year with many of our key European markets either slipping into recession or facing economic problems. For example, many of our Spanish clients heading to the Caribbean or Mexico are nearly all going on all-inclusive packages, so it’s not a holiday model alien to Spain, it’s extremely popular, so we can’t ignore its popularity.
“If the demand is there then surely we need to meet it otherwise people will simply go elsewhere and the options, the competition, are probably going to be stronger than ever over the coming years. Many of the leading tour operators in the UK and across Europe have invested and committed heavily to north African Mediterranean destinations this year from Morocco to Tunisia and Egypt, not to mention other European locations, the United States and emerging long-haul destinations.
Who is going to pay?
“So the Balearics and Spain have got to watch the pricing. Tourist taxes look set to rise while new ones are introduced. At the end of this year, my members are going to have to pay a tax to send transfer coaches to the airport, 45 euros per coach, that’s going to hit them hard and these costs have to be covered. Will they be passed on to the tourists? We’ll have to work it out. Then there’s the cost of bio-fuels and rising airport taxes for the airlines, who is going to pay for that?
“And then we have all the new paperwork, especially for visitors from third party countries like the United Kingdom, the country’s largest and most important market. We have the new visitor registration scheme which we are desperately fighting to have scrapped or at least modified to exclude the UK. Officially this has been introduced to tighten security but what kind of image is it putting out there?
“With the emphasis being so much on increasing safety and security it could spark some people in the UK to start questioning whether Spain is safe. Do we have a security issue? It’s a negative message and another hurdle for visitors. What we’ve suggested is to remove tourists who have booked a traditional package holiday with a tour operator from the scheme so it will only be applicable to those who have made their own arrangements - if not ditched completely.
Paperwork-free destinations
“Then we have the EU Entry/Exit System (EES) looming, another hurdle which paperwork-free destinations will benefit from, and the ETIAS travel system for non-EU visitors which is going to cost €7. During Covid, Turkey, for example, required visitors to fill in forms so the authorities could try and control the situation but as soon as the pandemic ended they quickly realised visitors didn’t like all the extra hassle and scrapped it all, made the borders more open and other designations have followed suit. We, here in Spain, are just making it more complicated and more costly and that is not going to help in the mid to long term.“It’s highly unusual that after a record 2024, we will have a slump this year, but we, and the pubic administrations in particular, need to be thinking and planning ahead.
“The tourist industry is changing and they need to factor in problems down the road such as over-saturation of European airspace, climate change, competition, dynamic pricing and changing travel habits. And they need to change their mindset. When I travel to a country which may be having issues with mass tourism or other political challenges, I don’t consider myself part of the problem.
“I’m on holiday. I’ve invested in that destination, I’m spending money there, I’m helping the local economy, it’s up to the politicians to sort out their domestic problems, not me and I shouldn’t be blamed for them either,” Pedro stressed before adding that he hopes there are no repeat anti-mass tourism protests this year.
“I like to think that the majority of people realise that the problem is more of a social and political one which needs to be resolved in-house,” he said. But will it? We, as an industry, the travel agents here in the Balearics, are at the top of our game, we’re doing our very best and it works, but we’re not getting much help. Palma wants to limit the size of guided tours to just 20 people. Well, to start with, we’ve had a severe shortage of professional registered tour guides for the best part of the last 16 years.
"Then, and I’m pushing for this, there’s no easy parking for coaches on excursions to Palma Cathedral, the island’s most popular landmark. We have to use a public bus stop with room for just two coaches dropping off and picking up; problems like this need to be solved. Tourists are paying for excursions and they, quite rightly, expect a professional service and value for money, but we at Aviba or as an industry as a whole can’t act alone,” he said.
“In the same vein the local authorities need to be talking to the airlines if they want to seriously get a grip on illegal holiday lets. If we have the same or fewer registered beds in the Balearics, how come the airlines, in particular the low-cost operators, are offering more flights and seats to the islands. Where is everyone staying? Illegal lets,” he stressed. And of course low-cost airlines meet the demands of those visitors who can’t afford a seven-night package, a long-stay holiday or prefer a short break in the Balearics.
Year of reflection
“Travellers are now able to work within their budgets more than ever before and we are seeing more visitors spending fewer nights in the Balearics. For the most part this is due to price, while people are travelling much more frequently and will do so even more in the future. Traditionally, people would go on one holiday a year, not any more and I think it was the British who changed all that. They’ve always been big travellers, especially to Spain and it didn’t take long for the rest of Europe to follow suit. Today we are jumping on and off planes all the time. All of this has to be taken into account, studied and accommodated by public administrations. On the back of last year, 2025 needs to be a year of reflection,” he said.
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