Barcelona nightclubs plan to extend summer with the America's Cup

Barcelona's nightclubs, especially those on its seafront, are also preparing to welcome the America's Cup. With a regatta calendar that will start next week and end in October, the city's leisure sector hopes to extend the summer season with the tourists brought by the competition because, as the general secretary of the Barcelona Nightclub Guild and owner of Wolf, Ramon Mas, says, "one of the things people do when they come is go out." That is why the fifty or so venues in the Catalan capital plan to organize themed parties, with nautical themes as the protagonist of the decoration and musical programming. They have also created a special cocktail for the occasion.

But, especially, leisure venues will fill up during the regatta with parties and corporate events organized by companies, but also brands and sponsors linked to the competition. "It will be an event that will move business like trade fairs do," summarizes Mas, "events like this that position the city are positive and help the city not lose momentum." In a survey conducted by the Barcelona Nightclub Guild and Fecalon, more than half of the establishments surveyed believe that the competition will help boost the image of the Catalan capital as a luxury tourist destination.

The sector forecasts an almost 4% increase in the income of the city's nightclubs in August, September, and October. A growth that will skyrocket even further in seafront venues such as Shôko, Pacha, Opium, and CLDC, with a turnover 35% higher than in the same period a year ago. At a labor level, more than a third of the city's companies plan to increase their staff by an average of two workers, which is estimated to translate into an overall increase of 100 employees throughout the Catalan capital.

Unlike the nightclubs in the upper area of Barcelona, those located near the beach depend much more on tourists and, as Mas points out, the America's Cup will help them get through the cold months of downtime better. These establishments are not exempt from criticism and their continuity is being questioned, with different scenarios on the table. One of them, to expand the Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM), dependent on the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), there, seems to be moving away after the recent doubts expressed by the Barcelona City Council. According to a PwC study, the nightclubs on the seafront are those that generate the most revenue and employment in all of Catalonia, with revenues of 165 million euros and more than 3,100 jobs.

The expected increases in turnover in the coming months must be fitted into the record years that leisure has been experiencing since the end of the pandemic. Without specifying figures, Mas points out that 2022 was the best they had experienced in a long time, a trend that continued in 2023 and that is now calming down in 2024. One of the legacies that COVID has left among these venues has been advance sales, with 2022 seeing everything sold out a week in advance, a trend that has been relaxing but remains, with half of the tickets bought today in advance.