Spain’s Tourism Sector: Demand and Challenges
Tourism in Spain: Evolution and Characteristics
Since the 1960s, Spain has experienced significant growth in its tourism sector, becoming a major global destination. This growth is characterized by:
- Mass tourism with a focus on medium-low purchasing power.
- Accommodation primarily in apartments and hotels.
- High dependence on tour operators.
- Popularity of beach destinations.
Features of Tourist Supply and Demand
The tourism product is integrated and sold through various channels:
- Institutions promoting international tourism, such as the FITUR fair.
- Offices in various countries.
- Travel agencies providing services to tourists.
Facilities cater to accommodation, recreation, and maintenance needs.
Accommodation Offer
The hotel sector is very extensive, reaching a million beds. Ownership is quite fragmented, although since 1990, hotel chains have been expanding, especially in the Balearic Islands, through takeovers and franchises. Non-hotel establishments represent more than 10 million beds.
Support Services
This is based on restaurants and complementary services, primarily in cafes and bars. The most visited restaurants are those with two forks, reflecting the average tourist profile.
Leisure Activities
These include sports facilities, recreational parks, water parks, and riding clubs.
Challenges in the Spanish Tourism Sector
Several challenges impact the sector:
- Increased prices without a corresponding improvement in quality.
- Rigidity and poor adaptation to new demand requirements.
- Seasonality.
- Competition from other European Mediterranean countries and North Africa.
- The growing appeal of Eastern European countries.
- Dependence on international tour operators.
To address these issues, efforts are underway to enhance the quality of tourism infrastructure, modernize facilities, and promote environmental sustainability.
International Tourism Demand
International demand has grown since the late 1950s, except for brief periods of crisis. Since Spain joined the EU in 1986, the number of tourists has significantly increased, reaching 76.3 million visitors in 1999. Most tourists come from Western and Northern Europe, especially Germany, the UK, France, Benelux, Italy, and Portugal. Americans are a much smaller segment. Foreign tourism is mostly during the summer, primarily directed to sun and beach areas in the Balearic and Canary Islands, followed by Catalonia, Andalusia, and the Valencian Community. These tourists primarily use hotel accommodations.
Domestic Tourism Demand
Domestic demand has been increasing since the 1960s, as the standard of living for Spaniards has grown. It originates from more industrialized areas (Madrid, Catalonia), is better distributed throughout the year, and is less polarized. Preferred destinations include Andalusia, Catalonia, the Valencian Community, and Castile and León. In the summer, domestic tourists tend to favor hotel services.
The Problem of Excessive Seasonality
Excessive seasonality is one of the main problems of Spanish tourism. Peak demand coincides with summer vacation, except for ski resorts, where the high season is winter, and the Canary Islands, where seasonality is less pronounced. The high season is driven by foreign tourists, with 80% taking their holidays between June and September. National tourism focuses on holidays in August, but its seasonality in hotels is less because, although there is more hotel use in summer, there has been a large increase in weekend tourism, which accounts for almost half of the overnight stays in hotels throughout the year.
The concentration of demand in a few months causes:
- Increased seasonal use of infrastructure.
- Saturation.
- Loss of quality.
- Environmental problems.
- Low utilization and amortization of invested capital for the rest of the year.
To alleviate this problem, new forms of tourism are being encouraged, such as senior citizen tourism, sports tourism (nautical and golf-related), rural tourism, ecotourism, and conference/convention tourism.