This year, travelling — still — makes us happier

2023 has got off to a booming start. After a year end marked by the recovery of the Group after two years of hard work and perseverance, we can now look towards the future with the confidence and optimism needed to go on offering the very best hotel experience. Now, more than ever, it is worth recalling the thoughts of the writer and mathematician Marilyn vos Savant, who said that only by developing our strengths can we achieve success.

The outlook for the hotel sector this year is promising. Travel has regained its place as a key priority in people’s minds. This is confirmed by Barceló Hotel Group’s latest survey, conducted over social networks, in which 80% of respondents placed travel at the top of their list of leisure priorities for the coming months. Travel, particularly to destinations with more hours of sunshine and pleasant climates, has become one of life’s essentials for many people — and it has been scientifically proved that climate and hours of sunshine affect both our physical and mental health.?

That explains why, although it is still early to make predictions, we are optimistic about the coming months, largely due to advance sales and healthy demand, both in the domestic market and in our main international markets.

The company’s plans for expansion this year reflect our commitment to continued growth within Spain, where we have just opened Canfranc Estación, a Royal Hideaway Hotel, a five-star GL establishment located in the historic Canfranc railway station, in Huesca. And over the next few months, we will be opening new hotels in Benidorm, Granada, Pamplona, Lanzarote and Gran Canaria. We are also planning to expand internationally, with new hotels in Portugal, Slovenia, Poland and Turkey, and venturing into what are, for us, new territories in Sri Lanka, Cape Verde and the Maldives.

This expansion plan is closely linked to our aim to spearhead an increasingly more regenerative type of tourism, and to this end we have implemented a series of measures designed to maximise the positive impact by the sector on society, by being ethically responsible and economically sustainable. Our initiatives range from installing technology to boost energy efficiency to designing buildings that work in harmony with their environment, and include the adoption of more efficient systems for using water and electricity, and investing in the local identity of our destinations. These initiatives have enabled us to achieve the position of third most responsible Spanish company in the Merco Responsabilidad ESG Espa?a 2022 rankings in the ‘Hospitality and Tourism’ category, and seventy-fifth position in the general ranking of the most responsible companies of 2022.

All this demonstrates our commitment to a more sustainable and responsible tourism, by encouraging local talent and working with partners to promote the economic, social and cultural development of every destination where we have a presence.?

Finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel after the worst period in the history of our industry does not, however, absolve us of the responsibility to proceed with caution and diligence; we need to remain alert to factors such as geopolitical uncertainty, rising energy costs and the economic conditions prevailing in our source markets. In the light of all this, we will continue working over the coming months to create a better, more sustainable and conscious kind of tourism, and to make ever more meaningful our main motto: “travel makes us happy”.