The Canary Islands will receive 60% of the revenue left by British tourism this winter in Spain. This was announced today by the Minister of Tourism and Employment of the Government of the Canary Islands, Jéssica de León, within the framework of the World Travel Market (WTM), the most important tourism fair in the world.
“We must break the myth that travelers from the United Kingdom do not economically benefit the islands, as their average daily expenditure is 7% above the average of markets, with 128.6 euros compared to 120.2 euros for the rest”, explained the minister, who added that “it also exceeds the expenditure of the German market by 12 percent”.
In the specific case of Lanzarote, British spending is almost half of the total spending of all travelers who visit the islands, although the Scandinavians and the Dutch are the ones who spend the most per person on the island of Lanzarote.
The archipelago continues to be the favorite Spanish destination of the British market, with a share in 2023 of 31% in tourists and 35% in revenue, a figure that increases considerably in winter, when the Canary Islands receive more than half of the tourists from the United Kingdom who arrive in Spain.
“The British market has always been our first issuing market. Almost half of the traveling population has come to the islands at some point in their lives, with which they maintain a strong emotional bond since they have been visiting them for many years. In fact, tourism in our land began with the British and we still have many British references”, argued the minister.
This close relationship has not cooled with Brexit: of the British who come to the islands every year, more than 80 percent have already done so before and 25 percent have repeated more than 10 times, that is, more than one and a half million British. In addition to this, 50 percent of tourists from the United Kingdom who chose the Canary Islands for their holidays last year were very clear about their destination and did not even consider another when preparing their trip.
A trend that continues throughout 2024, when the growth of this market is being generalized in all the islands except La Palma, which has not yet been able to recover the connectivity lost after Covid and the volcano. “We are convinced that this situation will be reversed with the reopening of the entire island to tourism, which will surely soon convince the airlines of the interest in flying to Isla Bonita”, explained the minister.
With the 11% growth in air capacity scheduled from the United Kingdom for this winter, everything indicates that the year could be closed with around 6.3 million British tourists and a turnover of 8,200 million euros, up to 23% more than last year.