The cold snap caused the Irish hospitality industry to be "hit from all angles", the CEO of the Restaurants Association of Ireland has said.

An Arctic airmass over Ireland caused temperatures to drop to lows of -8C in parts of the country, with Met Éireann issuing Yellow and Orange weather warnings this week.

On The Pat Kenny Show, the Restaurants Association of Ireland CEO Adrian Cummins said restaurants are among the businesses impacted by the cold weather.

"We found in certain parts of the country, there's a bit of a fear-factor around travelling - and obviously our customers and their safety is our number-one priority," he said.

"Over the last number of days, some restaurants had up to 30, 40 customers maybe in a 60-seater restaurant cancel, so that’s nearly two thirds of their business gone.

"When you put it into perspective they were prepping that morning, food was being prepared, there’s a cost-element as well, staff had to be brought in - those businesses probably lost money just down to the weather."

Commuters driving in frosty and snowy conditions in Kildare. Image: Eamonn Farrell/© RollingNews.ie

Mr Cummins said losing money due to cancellations is "one of the conditions of trying to operate a business'.

"People just didn’t go because they may have seen yellow and orange all in one go in terms of communications across the country and they just didn’t travel," he said.

"We're being hit [from all angles] during the cold snap."

Mr Cummins said January is generally a tough time for the restaurant industry.

"Businesses are quiet so every customer is very important to us in terms of cash-flow," he said.

"It is very tough in our industry at the moment in terms of the costs of doing business."

Weather warnings

Mr Cummins said Ireland needs to "revisit how we communicate to the wider public about weather warnings".

"Obviously safety is our first concern – we need to make sure we protect the population," he said.

"But then we need to look at and learn from other European countries where they have snow for three or four months of the year and how are they are able to operate."

Mr Cummins said Ireland could look to these other countries for further "learnings".

Met Éireann said last night that "milder conditions" will develop over the weekend.

Feature image: Snowy conditions in Ireland (L, RollingNews.ie) and a 'Sorry we're closed sign (R, Alamy)