Financially it’s been difficult,” UK hotel and leisure businesses reveal their lockdown struggles

“Financially it’s been difficult. As we’d only been open a year we weren’t entitled to the self employment income support scheme from the Government. We also weren’t granted the small business rates relief grant as beach huts were exempt. This meant £0 income while lockdown happened.”

British attitudes to summer holidaying have come full circle from the post war years when families took take their annual break in places like Cornwall, Camber Sands and Bournemouth. Over the past decade, holidays in Britain, which were once dubbed as poor, sunless comparisons to European beach holidays have risen in popularity again…

Offering a leisure experience without the complication of overseas travel and security checks, the ease of staycations at any time of year holds appeal for couples, singles and families alike. Spokespeople in the UK tourism sector expected that staycations or “domestic tourism” would further grow in Britain as a result of Brexit.

Statistics from early 2020 gives us further insight into the growing profitability of the UK staycation sector, where 70% of Britons were planning to book one this year which would have boosted the UK economy by £27bn.The figures also showed that consumers expected to take a staycation at least twice in 2020, signifying a rise in the total number of predicted staycations compared to 2019.

But then the coronavirus pandemic hit the UK’s resident hospitality and leisure businesses, including holiday let businesses, small family owned hotels and B&Bs, all of which were forced to shut down in late March, just before their busiest months of the year.

Three months later, and as lockdown laws are gradually easing, the UK’s hospitality and leisure sectors are getting ready to open for business again. But will there be a domestic holiday boom as many European holiday spots remain shut to British tourists? Or will there be a bust as a rising number of furloughed and jobless consumers tighten their belts and forgo a holiday completely?