Online bookings, more beds can boost hotels

A National Bank report has shown that if Greek hotels increase their online booking penetration from 11 to 25 percent, combined with the creation of new beds, they would manage to attract an additional 2.1 million tourists and 1.8 billion euros in revenues per year in the medium term.

The survey covered small and medium-sized hotel enterprises. It found that the increase in demand from 2008 to 2014 was not uniform, as only half of this sector posted an increase in sales volume.

The main force behind growth, the authors of the report found, has been mass tourism, as the vast majority of hotels relying on foreign tour operators (79 percent) increased their sales by about 30 percent more than the rest.