The Irish Hotels Federation holds its 81st Annual General Meeting this week, which will see hotel and guesthouse owners from around the country converge on Killarney to discuss the big challenges and opportunities facing their industry.
Last year saw record numbers in terms of tourism, however Irish Hotels Federation CEO Tim Fenn says there is a two-tier industry in the country at the moment.
"Dublin performed very well last year with an average occupancy of 84% but the rest of the country is lagging significantly behind at 66%," he said.
"There are many areas where tourism is very seasonal and hospitality businesses are struggling to break even during the off-peak periods.
"They're the people who can ill afford to take another hit, particularly the likes of the increased uncertainties around Brexit."
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Despite rising numbers of tourists coming in to Ireland, Mr Fenn says that there is an imbalance in where they travel once in the country.
There are also some areas of the country that are heavily dependent on British tourism - something that has been in decline since the Brexit vote.
"Certainly there's an imbalance there and what we're seeing there is, with the difficulties are facing, there is a drop in forward bookings which is very worrying," he said.
Overall, though, hotels are worried about the same global headwinds as the rest of the economy.
"We're also looking at the economic environment across Europe," Mr Fenn said.
"Germany is strong but France is showing some signs of difficulty... and then there's always the worries of the global trade wars that are on the horizon."
There is an ever-increasing marketing push to encourage tourism in Ireland - from the marquee Wild Atlantic Way and Ireland's Ancient East brands through to business, sport and even Star Wars-themed campaigns.
Mr Fenn says great work is being done in that respect, but the Government needs to focus more on rural development in order to boost businesses.
"We want to see a greater focus on the development of rural Ireland and increased funding for initatives that address seasonality and regionality," he said. "The difference between Dublin and the country is lost in the conversations around the regional balance and how our country is going to be developed in the future."
However it is clear that there is optimism about the future of hotels here, with thousands of new beds in planning and hotel groups from Best Western to Ireland's own Dalata in expansion mode.
"There is a future and the name of our conference this week is 'Looking Beyond'," Mr Fenn said. "What we're trying to do is to discuss a longer-term strategy as to how to deal with the growing of sustainable industry.
"We've had to deal with shocks before, but there's no doubt that we have some very challenging shocks facing us on the horizon at the present at time," he added.
