The top 5 stories in hospitality this week 28/11 - 02/12
Business tourist boom
The UK has seen no surge in post-Brexit tourism, with the number of leisure travellers visiting the UK dropping by almost 900,000 in the first nine months of 2016, according to the British Hospitality Association's (BHA) Travel Monitor Report. While the overall number of visitors rose by 700,000, this was driven by an increase in business travellers and people visiting friends or relatives.
Large cod and chips?
A campaign is calling for fish and chip restaurants to introduce standardised portion sizes in the UK. It comes after a study by lobby group Seafish found that a medium portion of cod can vary from 83g to 562g and medium chips can differ by over 600g across the UK.
TV chef's new restaurant
Great British Menu winner James Durrant is to open a new restaurant The Game Bird at The Stafford London Hotel next year. Durrant, who joined the hotel as executive chef in September, said The Game Bird will celebrate 'the best of British cooking' and feature a changing selection of pies, puddings and stews.
The Lowry changing hands
The Lowry - Manchester's first five-star hotel - has been put on the market just two years after it was sold to Westmont Hospitality Group for an estimated £40m. In a statement the hotel said it had undergone a major refurbishment and continued to 'outperform the market' despite being up for sale.
Aparthotel boom
Almost a third of serviced apartment providers are planning to expand in 2017, according to research from Savills and the Association of Serviced Apartment Providers (ASAP). Sixty per cent of operators expect leisure demand to rise in 2017, but 65 per cent said that corporate demand would likely fall post-Brexit.
For a full rundown of this week's news click here.
