Sales up at billionaire German family’s Kerry hotels

The Kerry luxury hotels business owned by the billionaire Liebherr family from Germany boosted sales last year as the tourism market recovered, although the group still recorded losses of €6 million.

Killarney Hotels operates the five-star Europe lakeside hotel resort in the Kerry tourism town, the nearby Dunloe hotel, also a five-star, and Ard na Sidhe, a country house that was voted one of the best affordable hotels in the world by Conde Nast.

Sales at the company’s hotels were up by more than 10 per cent last year, with total revenues including sales from a group-owned farm rising to about €13.5 million.

The group was pushed into an accounting loss, however, due to a €6.5 million non-cash charge on its assets, despite the recovery in the property market, which is particularly apparent with hotel assets.

The Liebherr family, which also operates a major crane manufuring facility in Kerry that employs hundreds of staff, have propped up Killarney Hotels with loans of €45.5 million, the accounts show.

Despite the recovery in the sector, the group is still sitting on retained losses of more than €105 million.

“The sector is in good shape,” said the directors of the group. “However the industry is going through a period of change.... Killarney hotels ahs to evolve to compete in a digital world.”

The group is run by Michael Brennan, son of a former PV Doyle hotelier and a brother of Jurys Inn chief executive, John Brennan.

The Liebherr family, of German origin but now based in Switzerland, run a huge construction machinery empire with revenues of €9 billion.

Markus Liebherr, the late son of the group's founder, rescued English premiership football club Southampton from administration. It is now chaired by his daughter.