September sees Brit visitors to Spain rise 12%

British holidaymakers in Spain are breaking all sorts of records.

In what has already been a bumper year for tourism in Spain, new data from the country’s Tourism Ministry has revealed that British visitor numbers in September this year have increased by 12% compared to the same month in 2015…

The data shows that two million Brits visited Spain in September, and for the first nine months of the year Brits accounted for a massive 14.4 million of the 60.3 million tourists flocking into the country.

Over the course of September, Spain welcomed 7.9 million tourists, which was up 10.2% on 2015, while for the three-month period between July and September, the total number of international visitors recorded in Spain rose to 27.6 million, up from 25 million in 2015.

Projections from the Tourism Ministry forecast Spain to end 2016 having welcomed a record-breaking 74 million tourists, which is generally seen as excellent news all round for hoteliers, bar and restaurant owners, and many other strands of society and the economy.

While many resorts and cities are well able to handle these record volumes of visitors, the infrastructure in places like Barcelona – a tight-knit city – and Majorca – an island – cannot be expanded upon too much more.

Fortunately, however, the Costa del Sol does still have additional space in which to build extra hotels, resorts, roads and amenities, to keep pace with demand, and without upsetting the balance that has made the region, and others further up the coast, so perennially popular.

Meanwhile, according to research by tour operator Exceltur, the number of officially registered tourists, ie, those recorded at hotels, has risen by 2% in the past two years, while private rental platforms have seen a 75% increase in custom over that same time.