Davidson Hospitality Group President and CEO Thom Geshay said he's excited for the return to a more typical hotel transactions environment.
The company added nine hotels to its portfolio in 2023, despite it being a year with "not a ton of deal activity," he said.
Davidson's leadership has had to be thoughtful about boosting growth in an environment where the typical growth levers for third-party managers aren't available, he said.
Because of the larger, more complex assets in Davidson's portfolio, the company focuses heavily on total revenue per available room.
"We've worked really hard to grow the revenues in our restaurants and bars, our spas or retail businesses, all the ancillary businesses that go around that," he said.
The company has spent time recently finding creative growth avenues, including creating new divisions and selling services such as its sales and marketing function.
"I think 2024 is going to be a good year. I guess it's a year we get back to doing some transactions, and that's good for everybody," he said. "It's food for the whole ecosystem — lenders, owners, [private equity], operators. We all benefit when there's transactions going on."
Davidson celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2024, and Geshay has been with the company 35 of those 50 years. He said he takes pride in the culture Davidson has built over that span.
"I'm super proud because I have spent more years of my life working for Davidson than I did not working for Davidson," he said. "For me, there's a lot of personal satisfaction there. Believe it or not, I'm not the most senior employee at Davidson. We have a lot of people who have more years of service than I do. It's a culture we built together as a team."
Watch the video above for more from Geshay.