If everything goes according to plan, Munich’s Lord Mayor Dieter Reiter (SPD) will be standing in the Schottenhamel marquee on the Theresienwiese on Saturday, September 17 at twelve o’clock sharp and tapping the first keg of Spaten beer. The official starting signal for the 187th Oktoberfest, which is taking place again this year after a two-year Corona break and – so the innkeepers and hoteliers in particular hope – will be well attended. But despite the great joy that folk festivals can be celebrated again, the large rush of potential Wiesn visitors has so far failed to materialize, at least in the hotel industry.
If you look at the number of room bookings in Munich, 31 percent of all hotel rooms are currently unoccupied during the Wiesn weeks. No comparison to the pre-pandemic years, when the number of advance bookings had steadily increased since 2015. In 2019, shortly before the start of the Oktoberfest in Munich, not only were the inner-city hotel rooms almost fully booked, but also those in the neighboring districts.
Not so this year. If you were looking for a room in Munich for two people at the beginning of the week for the period from September 23rd to 25th, i.e. on the second weekend of the Oktoberfest, a simple Google search spit out 735 hotels in the city alone, where bookings are still possible . In addition, 409 other accommodations such as holiday apartments or guesthouses are suggested. This does not even include offers on sites like Airbnb.
Angela Inselkammer, head of the Ayinger Gasthof and president of the Bavarian Hotel and Restaurant Association (Dehoga), doesn’t find it all that unusual. A query from the Munich hoteliers revealed that the current bookings for the Wiesn are around 15 percent below the level of 2019, as Inselkammer confirmed in an interview. There has been a slight decline, but according to Inselkammer, ten to 15 percent of all rooms in Munich are still free in the week before the Oktoberfest.
No price explosion so far
What is also striking in 2022, however, is that the hotels still available are not unknown or inconveniently located accommodations. For example, there are still many free rooms in the hotels of the Ibis group, which are usually booked up quickly due to their mostly central location and the comparatively low prices. Many accommodations that are in the immediate vicinity of the Theresienwiese still offer space, and even the luxury addresses Kempinski Munich and Bayerischer Hof still have capacity for well-heeled Wiesn fans who have traveled a long way.
Speaking of luxury addresses: The offers are also reasonable in terms of price. Places on the Oktoberfest campsite are available from 109 euros for two nights, hotel prices start at 122 euros total price for two people and two nights in a double room. In previous years, not only were possible remaining items unaffordable, but the hotels also determined early in the year how high the surcharge for the Oktoberfest would be. An evaluation of the comparison portal Check24 showed in 2019 by what percentage the hotels increased their prices. The result was between an affordable 37 percent and 524 percent surcharge per night. No comparison with 2022. After two years of the pandemic, some hotel owners seem to be offering their rooms at Oktoberfest according to the motto “Better less than no money at all”.
Nevertheless, the hoteliers are satisfied with the current occupancy rate, says Angela Inselkammer. It is assumed that “at least the Bavarian state government does not currently prescribe any upper limits for events” and that the Wiesn – as announced by Reiter – will take place without restrictions. Even if, according to Inselkammer, politicians still lack a “concrete plan” when it comes to handling a possible further wave of pandemics in autumn. “Another lockdown would be the death knell,” says Inselkammer. You can count on the government not to make this mistake again. “The Wiesn is taking place. There is no plan B.”
No preparations made for possible cancellation
Inselkammer therefore wipes the question of preparations for a possible Wiesn cancellation off the table. You can’t always “act with the handbrake on”. The motto is to look ahead. Cancellation options or booking adjustments that went beyond the normal standards would therefore have made very few. This means that if the Wiesn were to be canceled after all, most travelers would either have the option of visiting Munich without the Oktoberfest or they would have to bear the cancellation costs themselves.
Most of the bookings this year come from other European countries, and Inselkammer says there are also more inquiries from the USA this year. These had been declining in the years before the pandemic. On the other hand, bookings from China, Brazil and Russia in 2022 would be below the pre-pandemic average. The latter in particular is not surprising given the war in Ukraine.
But it is precisely in such events that Inselkammer sees another reason why the Wiesn should not be canceled under any circumstances. In times when one crisis is chasing the next, one cannot take away the last bit of joie de vivre from people. It is now the task of all organizers to convey to the guests and employees that they should not worry.