General Industry

Consumer Spending In Irish Hospitality Sector Up 9%

By Dave Simpson
Consumer Spending In Irish Hospitality Sector Up 9%

Visa Ireland's Irish Consumer Spending Index has revealed that hotels, restaurants and bars have posted the fastest increase in consumer spending in the past 12 months, experiencing year-on-year growth of 9.1%.

Visa Ireland's country manager, Philip Konopik, told The Irish Times that the growth of spending in the hospitality sector was due to increased expenditure on the "experience economy rather than on things."

The Index also showed that face-to-face spending decreased over the last three months, but, at 0.5%, its drop was slower than in the year's first quarter. Meanwhile, eCommerce spending increased by 8.9% compared to the same period last year, which Visa attributes to "the growth in popularity of online shopping among Irish shoppers."

IHS Markit economist Andrew Harker, commented: "Visa's Irish Consumer Spending Index provides further evidence of building growth momentum in household spending following a soft-patch earlier in 2017. There were some encouraging signs from categories that have been under pressure through much of the past year."

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