Fewer American and British visitors to the Netherlands

Last year, 29.1 million guests stayed in Dutch overnight accommodations, as against 30.3 million in 2007. In the latter half of 2008, the number of hotel guests dropped considerably. In relative terms, there was a remarkable decline in the number of American and British guests.

Guests in Dutch overnight accommodations

Number of foreign guests drops dramatically

The number of guests staying in Dutch overnight accommodations dropped by nearly 4 percent in 2008 relative to 2007. The number of Dutch visitors declined by 1.4 percent, the number of visitors from abroad by  8.2 percent.

Foreign guests, overnight accommodations, several countries

Fewer American and British visitors

In recent years, most visitors in Dutch accommodations came from Germany, Great Britain, Belgium and America. These countries accounted for more than 25, 15, 10 and 10 percent of foreign guests respectively.
In 2008, fewer visitors from the United States and Great Britain visited the Netherlands. Their numbers declined by 16 and 14 percent respectively. The amount of German visitors dropped by 6 percent, but the number of Belgian guests increased marginally by nearly 1 percent.

Guests, overnight accommodations, by type of accommodation

Fewer hotel guests

The number of hotel guests dropped by more than 700 thousand (3.8 percent) in 2008 compared to the previous year. The decline over the first six months was just under 2 percent, as against over 5.5 percent in the latter half of 2008. The number of hotel guests in 2008 was still higher than in 2006, but the number of people staying on Dutch camping sites has not been so low since 2000. Last year, the number of people staying on camping sites in the Netherlands was more than 400 thousand (11 percent) down on 2007. The number of guests staying in holiday cottages and group accommodations hardly changed compared to 2007.