Two years of Covid delivers £115bn loss

The full extent of the damage done to the hospitality industry by Covid-19 has been revealed as a £115bn loss.

As one of the hardest hit by the pandemic, the sector has seen £114.8bn of sales lost versus what was expected for 2020/21.

With a full 24-months of data available, hospitality, which in normal times generates up to £140bn a year, has lost 43% and 45 full weeks of sales since March 2020.

Now, with the sector facing rising costs across the board, UKHospitality is urging the government to continue its support of the industry by keeping VAT at its current level of 12.5% on sales of food and soft drinks.

The latest edition of the UKHospitality and CGA Quarterly Tracker reveals that hospitality enjoyed £17.3bn (121%) final quarter growth in 2021 compared to the same period the year before.

However, that is still down 32.3% in the 12 months to the end of last December versus the 12-month period ending December 2019. That is the equivalent of a £43bn loss across hospitality in 2021 against expected 2019 levels – the last full year with which to compare. 

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