Majorca is looking to clean up its reputation as a boozy holiday destination by proposing a 24-hour public drinking ban. Officials on the Spanish island are reportedly hoping to transform Majorca into a luxury holiday destination similar to locations like St. Tropez. They hope to discourage the island’s usual clientele—”binge-drinking Brits and Germans”—and to attract wealthier visitors from places like China and Dubai. In addition to revamping their image by upgrading hotels and restaurants and building a glitzy casino, officials want to ban public drinking on the four-mile Playa de Palma strip and turn it into a destination filled with sports facilities and fine dining. “Booze tourism is out of date. If people want to get drunk, they should do it in the discos, not on the beach in public,” says Alvaro Gijon, deputy mayor of the island’s capital Palma. “There are other places in the world for them. We want people who are going to spend a lot of money.” An initial ban on public drinking has already been set this summer between the hours of 10 am – 1 pm. Approximately six million tourists visit Majorca every year and tourism accounts for 80% of the total GDP on the island.
