Japan Hotels Slash Prices

Above, the Hotel Sunroute Asakusa in Tokyo. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

If the coronavirus acts like it's common cold and flu cousins, it may greatly subside by spring (which is only a few weeks away).

Hopefully it will, but in the meantime, hotels in Japan are slashing prices for the busy early-spring travel season as occupancy rates have plunged.

The Nikkei Asian Review reported:

As Japan suffers a coronavirus-induced drop in travel, hotel chains are slashing room rates for about 30% of stays during the normally busy early spring season, a Nikkei analysis of online booking sites shows. 

Prices were down on average about 20% on Monday from those offered on Feb. 26 as shown on the Rakuten Travel and Jalan.net online booking sites for 1,087 of the 3,624 stays covered. 

The average discount was deepest for hotel stays in Fukuoka, which dropped 25%, followed by Kyoto at 24%. Prices for many stays in central Kyoto have more than halved in the last five days. 

In Tokyo, where the average price dropped 22%, stays in the foreign-tourist-heavy area of Ueno-Asakusa showed steep declines.

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