2023-12-15 09:02:00
Without looking into the situation in detail, we might wonder what else the Horeca industry is full of? Covid is far behind us, and the energy crisis is moving in the right direction. However, the sector is still suffering and the hope of help from politics no longer even exists. “I hate this admission of weakness. I hate having to deal with restaurateurs for months who don’t see the end of the tunnel and who have nothing concrete to give them. There is today a total lack of confidence in the political world,” breathes Ludivine de Magnanville, president of the Brussels Horeca Federation.
Covid-19, energy, rise in raw materials and now employment: these bosses testify to the crises that follow one another in the hospitality industry
Today, this suffering comes from successive crises and what the next world has in store. “The Covid left the coffers empty, but we were able to put our heads above water during the recovery, with the strong return of customers and VAT at 6%. And then the energy crisis arrived, with inflation. We must see this as a boat which weathers a storm without sinking, but which loses 10 sailors each time. The difficulty today is that we no longer know how to give a main cause to the problems that the Horeca sector is experiencing.”
She also regrets the bad image that sticks to the sector. “I’m tired of people making us look like thieves or saying that hospitality jobs are underpaid. Things have evolved enormously, but not the position of the government, which does nothing to help us. During the last budgetary conclave, we made a series of requests. This was rejected 100%, and we took a 3% increase in taxation on flexi-jobs…”
Enough to ring the alarm bells. “70% of the Horeca sector is doing badly. In this 70%, there are two categories: those who have customers but who are not profitable, and those who have a big drop in attendance, for example because they have increased their prices to be profitable.
Bankruptcies in the hospitality sector at their highest since October 2018
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