The Black Sea hotspot remained the cheapest European beach resort for a fourth consecutive year, according to the annual Holiday Costs Barometer, compiled by Post Office Travel Money. Prices in Sunny Beach are now lower than at any point in the past five years.
The survey examined the costs of 10 key holiday items across 19 beach resorts including a range of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks, plus sun cream, insect repellent, a UK newspaper and both lunch and evening meals. The cost of these items added up to just £37 in Sunny Beach, which represents a 10% fall on 2016. This was well ahead of two eurozone destinations: the Algarve in second place with a total cost of £58 and Spain’s Costa Del Sol, which was third cheapest at £61.
The three most expensive resorts were Ibiza, where the 10 holiday items cost £131, followed by Sorrento in Italy (£119) and Nice on the French Riviera (£117).
Cheaper meals
“Tour operators have already reported that holidays to Bulgaria are selling like hot cakes and our research makes it clear that Sunny Beach will offer cash-strapped holidaymakers unbeatable value this year,” said Andrew Brown from Post Office Travel Money.
“Meal costs are really the deciding factor in Bulgaria’s favour. Over the course of a week’s holiday, lunch and evening meals for two will cost around £175 in Sunny Beach, but this could mushroom to over £600 in more expensive resorts in France or Italy.”
The slump in the value of the pound against the euro since last year’s EU referendum has caused in-resort prices to increase year-on-year for the majority of the resorts featured in the study. But this was not true of Turkey, the only European country whose currency has fallen in value against the pound over the past year. This meant that prices in the Turkish resort of Marmaris dropped by 4% to a total of £68 for UK holidaymakers even though local prices have actually gone up by 11% over the past year. Marmaris ranked as the fourth cheapest beach resort – down from 11th position a year ago.
Another cheaper option in the eastern Med is the Cypriot city of Paphos, a European Capital of Culture during 2017, which ranks fifth overall for in-resort costs at £74.
In-country variations
The Post Office research also points to “significant differences in costs” between resorts within the same country – particularly in popular destinations such as Spain, Portugal, Greece and Croatia. In Spain, for example, the cost of the 10 holiday items in the Costa del Sol (£61) was £15 lower than in neighbouring Costa Blanca (£76) and £28 lower than in Majorca (£89).
Ibiza was more than twice as expensive in-resort at £131 than the Costa del Sol. The differences were not so dramatic among the four Greek islands in the research, with Crete at £81.84, the cheapest destination, followed by Zante (£82.36), Kefalonia (£84) and Corfu (£90).
“Greece is looking very popular this year with tour operators reporting increases of up to 40% in bookings but it will pay bargain hunters to factor resort costs into the overall price they pay for their package,” added Brown. “Swapping resorts could save a lot of money and this applies to popular resorts all over Europe as well as Greece.”
