Random The Luxury Hotel Boom - Expansion in a bad financial market!

In June of this year, I wrote the following post in “Travel Suggestions for a Weak Dollar,” here on Extravigator.com:

We were in France and Portugal last month and, while we were there, I had the opportunity to talk to some of the senior executives at two of the five-star hotels we stayed at, Le Meurice and the Lapa Palace, as well as to the captain of the luxury barge we traveled on in the Burgundy area. The general feeling I got from these conversations was that their business was suffering somewhat because of the strength of the euro against the U.S. dollar. This resulted in a significant (but not catastrophic) reduction in the amount of American tourists visiting Europe so far this year. However, almost everybody agreed that the decline in business has not been so bad because, in general, people tend to schedule their European vacations approximately a year in advance and, once they've bought their airline tickets (or used their frequent flyer miles) and made their hotel reservations, they normally won't cancel their vacations outright.

However, there was also general agreement that NEXT YEAR could be much, much worse for them, since, going forward, Americans are now acutely aware of how expensive travelling to Europe will be, because of the weak dollar, and are considering other destinations for their next vacations. As a result, I believe that it's fair to assume that there will be some very attractive discount rates and packages offered by leading hotels and resorts throughout Europe that will be geared towards attracting leisure travelers to Europe, despite the strong euro. Some of these offers might be so attractive that travelling to Europe next year might not be so expensive after all!”

Since then, the dollar has gotten much stronger. But the global economy has entered one of, if not the, worst financial crises we have ever experienced. So, even though the situation is now completely different, the effect may still be the same and even more widespread. While, when the dollar was weak, travelers were becoming increasingly reluctant to plan vacations in Europe and other countries where the dollar had lost a good deal of its value, now, because of the global financial crisis, those same travelers may be reluctant to travel ANYWHERE internationally. The fact that many new luxury hotels and resorts will be coming on-line at just the wrong time will just amplify this problem. So, it would not be surprising to see SOME VERY ATTRACTIVE DISCOUNT RATES AND PACKAGES BEING OFFERED NEXT YEAR, BY LEADING HOTELS AND RESORTS ALL AROUND THE WORLD, THAT WILL BE GEARED TOWARDS ATTRACTING LEISURE TRAVELERS.