Tourist seasonality: how the summer peak reshapes a pub or restaurant

Nearly a third of overseas visitor spending in Britain lands in July to September, while Spain more than doubles its monthly tourist arrivals between winter and August. What that does to staffing and cash flow, and what operators do about it.

By Tom Beckett

Growth

Wednesday, 22 July 2026 4 min read

Illustration of a paved terrace with tables and parasols, a sun card and a leaf card pinned above, the scene fading from bright summer to a pale autumn sky

Every operator knows that summer is busier than February. Fewer have put a number on it, and fewer still have looked at what the swing does to payroll and the bank balance. The numbers below are national, which flatters nobody: a seaside pub and a city-centre wine bar sit on very different curves. Treat them as the shape of the problem, and check your own tills for the size of it.

What the national data shows

In Britain, VisitBritain’s final 2024 inbound update puts the year at 42.6 million visits and £32.5bn of visitor spending, and splits that spending by quarter: 18% in January to March, 27% in April to June, 32% in July to September and 23% in October to December. The Great Britain quarterly figures in the same report show 8.6 million visits in the first quarter against 10.4 million in the third, and £5.7bn of spending against £10.1bn.

Two health warnings. The Office for National Statistics badges 2024 International Passenger Survey data as “official statistics in development” and does not endorse comparisons with earlier years, and VisitBritain’s quarterly UK figures are its own modelled estimates. Use them for the shape of the year, not for a forecast. And they cover overseas visitors only: they say nothing about domestic trips, which is where many venues earn their living.

In Spain the swing is sharper in volume. The INE’s FRONTUR series recorded 5.1 million international tourists in January 2025, against 11.3 million in August. For the whole of 2025 the INE counted close to 96.8 million. The United Kingdom was the largest source country in January, July, August and December 2025, which makes British holidaymakers a large part of the Spanish venue’s peak.

What it does to the payroll

Spanish employment data shows the labour side clearly. According to Hosteleria Digital’s reading of the Labour Ministry’s affiliation figures, hospitality averaged about 1.87 million affiliated workers in 2025, and exceeded 2 million in the main summer months. In accommodation, employment peaked at around 500,000 in July and August against an annual average above 400,000.

The UK does not publish an equivalent monthly number that I could source for hospitality alone, so I will not invent one. What the advisers say is consistent, though. Menzies, an accountancy firm, describes the pattern as strong festive trading followed by a sharp drop in footfall and revenue in January and February, while wages, rent, utilities and loan repayments barely move.

Where cash flow bites

The trouble is the order of payments. Staff, training and stock are paid before the takings arrive, a point the funder Rise Funding makes about seasonal staffing. Menzies adds a second mechanism: VAT and PAYE liabilities often fall due after peak trading, when the quiet months have already begun. A venue can be profitable over the year and still run short in March.

What operators do about it

None of this is exotic. The same few moves come up across the sources:

A cash forecast, month by month. Both the Menzies guidance and Xero’s hospitality accounting guide lead with a rolling forecast that shows the lean months before they arrive, and with setting aside part of peak-season profit for the low season.
Flexible labour. Seasonal and part-time staff cover the peak, so fixed payroll does not carry through the quiet months. The trade-off is training and turnover, and a Guardian report on one Norfolk operator shows a business with a third of a 100-strong pub team on seasonal contracts.
Stock discipline. Xero points out that perishable stock cannot be carried through a slow season, so par levels and waste checks matter more when demand moves around.
Using the quiet weeks. Refurbishment and training belong in the trough, not the peak.
Watching the weather and local events. Xero’s guide suggests tracking sales against both, so a bank holiday forecast changes the rota, not just the mood.

What ORDR does about this

The first job is to see your own curve rather than the national one. ORDR’s reporting on sales shows how your venue has traded over time (the help centre covers how it works), so you can plan rotas and stock against what you actually did last July. And if summer brings guests who do not read your language, guests can read your menu in their own language through translated menus, which is a small piece of the peak you are already paying staff to serve.