Business Hotels are Short in Supply in Japan
Ask any of your company-employed Japanese friends how they fare with "shuccho" plans. Nine out of ten, they will say:" Oh, my goodness, I don't know why but I' m having bad time reserving business hotels".
By "shuccho" he means business trip and he is saying he can't reserve hotels at destination. Why so?
Now, Japan is making an all-out effort to activate tourism, targeting 30 million per annum by 2020, and the number of foreign tourists is definitely increasing - some 13.4 million in 2014. And the general tendency is that they look for less expensive lodgings and the so-called business hotels happen to be the least expensive - hence your Japanese friend's hardship.
A regular single room at any of those business hotels used to be 4,800 yen a night. Now the rate has gone up to 9,500 to 12,500 per night.
An information site "Today's Business"(August, 2015) quotes the Japan Tourism Agency as saying that the portion of foreign lodgers rose was 9.5% in 2014, almost double the rate in 2011 and that hotels in the outskirts of large cities with lower occupancy rates will have to be somehow activated to meed the rising demand.
Experts point out there should be hotels exclusively for businessmen on business trips on expense account. Speaking of expense account, some complain their companies do not always cover overpaid hotel bills.
Business trips to Osaka are particularly costly as possibility is almost nil for making reservations at low-rate hotels. A man is quoted as confiding he had raked up his courage and reserved a lady' pack that happened to be available - amid icy stares.
Tourism is an industry - an important one for country like Japan. The Olympics ahead with a huge influx of foreign visitors, Japan has one high fence to clear.
