Tour operators have denied the forecast of rising prices by 30-50% for Turkey

Turkish hoteliers, following the results of 2019, plan to increase the volume of Russian tourist traffic, which this year reached about 5 million people (+15%). According to experts, to achieve such ambitious results, hoteliers will not significantly increase prices, but, on the contrary, will show maximum flexibility. Russian tour operators said that prices for accommodation in 2019 will remain at about the same level. It is impossible to say about all the hotels, but basically the prices remain the same as they were in the current year. A number of hotels will increase the cost by 10–15% maximum. Of course, according to experts, more detailed forecasts for the season can only be made by February — March 2019, when the first stage of early sales will be completed. At the moment, the prices for early booking are at the level of 2018, the discounts, as in the previous year, reach the level of 40-50% of the base price. Alexan Mkrtchyan, the director of Pink Elephant travel agency chain, told that he had recently returned from Turkey, where he met with the management of a number of leading hotels. The top managers assured Mr. Mkrtchyan that a noticeable increase of prices will not happen, the maximum increase will be 7-8%. “On the contrary, Turkish hoteliers are inspired by the huge growth in demand this year and expect to improve these figures by 15–20% in 2019. Sergei Tolchin, the executive director of Intourist tour operator, agrees with his colleague and believes that prices in the next season will increase by about 10–15%. Other major tour operators have a similar opinion, not excluding some non-critical inflation growth for the destination. Recall, a little earlier, the executive director of the Association of Tour Operators of Russia, Maya Lomidze, said about forecast that grow of prices for Turkey could reach 50% this summer.