Publicans’ appeal over Plate

Drop the prices and bring back the traditional day meeting for Wednesday’s Galway Plate – or risk numbers continuing to fall.

That’s the view of the chairman of the Galway branch of the Vintners’ Federation of Ireland (VFI) Tom McDonagh, who says the week started off slow for city publicans but ended on a high due to the heavy rain.

The owner of E Brun Bar on Lower Dominick Street said a number of customers had complained about the high price of entrance tickets.

“I won’t want to be critical of the racing committee. The Races are a great boost to the city and long may it last and but I do think €30 is a bit expensive for people,” he said.

“A lot of my customers complain you can’t buy a ticket for the week – that’s something they really should look at.

“It’s also now all evening meetings except for Thursday. For years and years and years, the Galway Plate was a big family day – I’d like to really see that going back to a day meeting.

“It’s losing a great tradition and it’s a bit sad. So many Galway people would go out for the first race at 2.10pm and come into town after 7pm and make a night of it – now they don’t leave the racecourse till 11pm and a lot of them don’t bother coming into town at that point.”

The Chair of the Galway branch of the Irish Hotels Federation has revealed that the Revenue Per Available Room among 14 city hotels was down 9% compared to last year’s race week.

Nigel Canavan, general manager of the Salthill Hotel, said the data, based on information the hotels log anonymously to a survey, shows rates were down 7% last week while occupancy rates dropped by 2.3% in comparison to 2018.

See full story in this week’s Galway City Tribune.