We live in a nice place but is the golden goose being killed?

Country Living with Francis Farragher

We’re all familiar with the moral of the ‘killing the goose that lays the golden egg’ yarn and I’ve met a lot of people over the course of this Summer who pointed out to me the quite staggering cost of taking a holiday in Ireland.

Not alone were many hotels quoting outrageous prices for weekend breaks but they were also ‘laying it on’ with the charges for a pint and a pint and bit of grub.

I still find it hard to grasp how some restaurants can justify charging the bones of €40 for a steak when you can go the shelves of a SuperValu or Dunnes and pick up two juicy ribeyes or sirloins for around a tenner.

Whether hoteliers, restaurateurs or pubs realise it in Ireland, they are pricing themselves out of the market and especially the domestic one – particularly so for couples or groups who have the flexibility to travel abroad at off-peak times.

When big events like concerts or matches are taking place in Dublin the hotel quotes can slip into the astronomical bracket where the cost of a couple laying their heads down for a night can touch €600 to €700, and possibly a tad more.

A while back a little ring-around for an overnight stay close to Aviva where The Eagles concert was taking place unearthed price of €800 for a room. Needless to say that offer wasn’t taken up, prompting me to vow that ‘I’d rather reverse the car down from Dublin to Galway’ rather than fire away money in such a manner.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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