Greece’s Reputation Hits Bookings

Each country’s views on the crisis in Greece directly affects the tourist flow to the country, according to recent figures of research company GfK’s Tourism Panel.

According to data, bookings of package tours to Greece from Germany until the end of February 2010 showed a fall of 4.3 percent while an increase was noticed for Turkey by 11.7 percent and Egypt by 13.7 percent.

Greece’s share of tourism bookings for summer 2010 for the Mediterranean region saw a drop of 0.4 percent compared with 2009. Meanwhile, bookings to Turkey have increased by 2.9 percent and to Egypt by 1.1 percent.

GfK noted that this year is the first year that there is a significant delay in booking summer package tours from the German side.

On the other hand, reservations from France for travel packages to Greece showed a 10 percent increase.

Greece continues to be the sixth destination in order of preference for French tourists after the United States, France (domestic tourism), Tunisia, Italy and Spain.