Average hotel prices around the world fell by about 14 per cent in 2009, according to research conducted by hotels.com, citing data from more than 94 000 hotels internationally.

It was not until the end of 2009 that the international market registered a marginal recovery in prices, according to a statement from the site's president David Rosh.

A significant decline in price levels was registered in major cities around Eastern Europe, according to the report. Russia's St Petersburg and Moscow were the hardest hit with the latter experiencing a 27 per cent drop.

Moscow is still home to some of the most expensive hotels in the world, however, with an average night costing about 154 euro a night,  only about four euro cheaper than Monte Carlo.

"Tourists enjoyed record low price levels in Eastern Europe as proprietors drastically reduced their prices. In spite of this, the number of tourists, especially from countries like the United Kingdom, decreased," Rosh said.

Defying the trend, however, hotel prices in Istanbul rose by 16 per cent in 2009. Turkey, despite the downtrend, remained a favoured destination for Bulgarians, according to a National Statistics Institute report (NSI), with about 101 000 people travelling to the country either for holidays or business.

Against the backdrop of the global economic downturn, Bulgaria was one of 26 European Union states (Sweden was the sole exception) that saw a drop in hotel guest numbers in 2009, according to figures released by the bloc’s statistics office, Eurostat.
 
Throughout the 27 EU member states in 2009, there was a drop of more than five per cent in the number of nights spent in hotels and similar establishments compared to 2008.
 
The number of nights spent by residents in their own country in 2009 fell by 1.6 per cent and hotel nights spent by non-residents fell by 9.1 per cent on the previous year.

For Bulgaria, the figures were that there was an overall decrease of 16.5 per cent. Among residents – in effect, Bulgarians staying at hotels in Bulgaria – the decline was 8.7 per cent, while for non-residents the figure was 19.5 per cent.