The Daily Populous Tuesday July 23rd, 2024 evening edition
Authored by fortune.com and submitted by fuelerion

Restaurants in some Turkish holiday towns are sitting half-empty in peak tourist season, as many locals find it’s cheaper to holiday in neighboring Greece than stay and eat in one of their own country’s world-famous resorts.

Angry citizens have taken to social media to share their bills, including the equivalent of $640 for food and drinks for five people in Bodrum and $30 for five scoops of ice cream in Cesme. Meanwhile from Mediterranean Greek islands just a few kilometers away, their fellow Turks boast they’re paying far less than prices at home.

“There’s a huge difference between the service and product quality, as well as prices here and there,” said Murat Yavuz, a retired Turkish banker who regularly visits Greece. “Restaurants here have used inflation as a pretext to push up prices.”

Restaurant and hotel prices rose by an average 91% in June from a year earlier, topping already eye-watering headline inflation of 71.6%. The sector constitutes a third of the services economy that the central bank has highlighted as a particular cause of concern in its fight against spiraling prices.

The exodus has been helped by the launch of a fast-track visa program in March this year as part of a diplomatic effort to ease tensions between the long-time rivals. And Turks are not the only ones swarming Greece’s islands. Tourists from around the world have flocked there in such large numbers that the country is now considering imposing restrictions on cruise ships.

“We’ve lost our price advantage,” Kivanc Meric, an executive at the Association of Turkish Travel Agencies, told Euronews in an interview, citing the “over-valuation” of the Turkish lira. Meric said he expects as many as 150,000 Turks to go to the Greek island of Samos this year, up from around 40,000 in 2023.

The lira’s real effective exchange rate, a measure of its value against foreign currencies, is at its highest level since late 2021.

Eateries across the country are seeing an erosion of purchasing power among clients. Kaplan Ilhan, 57, chef at a fish restaurant in the resort town of Kusadasi, said business has declined by about 25% compared to last season. “The cost of living is a factor, but rumors on social media about Greece being cheaper also play a big role,” he said.

The 128-branch Big Chefs casual dining chain has seen its overall customer numbers rise as “the upper segment is shifting to us,” said Chairwoman Gamze Cizreli. “But we’re observing a decline in spending per person.” The company is cutting costs to cope with the decline, including by producing its own electricity, she added.

“With interest rates at 50% and inflation above 70%, people are in shock,” said Baris Tansever, founder of the upmarket Sunset Grill & Bar in Istanbul, who says business is down about a quarter from last year.

Prices are now out of reach for the white-collar crowd he aimed to attract when he opened his restaurant in 1994, Tansever said.

chrisr3240 on July 23rd, 2024 at 09:09 UTC »

I was in Fethiye recently. One of the restaurant owners was telling me that even the Turkish are holidaying in Greece because the prices at home are so expensive.

Joebranflakes on July 23rd, 2024 at 08:55 UTC »

Erdogan was a fool. Guy decided modern economics were a scam and thought he could rewrite the rules to fit his beliefs. Well now inflation is out of control and the guy had to backtrack yet somehow the Turkish economy is still spinning in the drain. Hope he’s proud of himself.

dnarag1m on July 23rd, 2024 at 08:40 UTC »

I was in Turkey last year thinking hey, with that inflation things can't possibly be expensive. How silly. Supermarkets, local markets, airbnb's (now illegal) and tickets to museums and such were quite expensive compared to Spain. Food in 'locantasi' were cheap, but hey, that's the barebone basic stuff.

Other things that annoyed me is the constant high pricing for anything foreigner - Simcard? That'll be 25 euros for you (all the low pricing sim offerings are for locals only) no matter which brand you pick. And limited data.

Rent a bicycle? Prepare to pay a lot more than you're used to in your own country and get a bicycle from the stone age. Want to grab a taxi? Get ready to pay 4-10x the local people's rates (I speak basic Turkish so they scam me less, but they try anyway). And Taxi apps aren't better - they'll ask for a lot more than the quote from Bitaxi or Uber.

People are nice, and the country is beautiful. But it's expensive compared to some other European destinations and sometimes even compared to Holland, Germany (Supermarkets especially). No point in going anymore.

p.s. Let's not even talk about Istanbul Havalimani airport. It's by far the most expensive airport I've ever been to - prepare to pay 20+dollars for the most basic of meals (a sandwich or some tiny bits of kebab). Internet is limited and you'll be forced to pay after the first hour and a half or so is done for.