As more people receive one of the available COVID-19 vaccines, demand has been rebounding, Marriott International CEO Tony Capuano said.
Speaking during Marriott’s first quarter 2021 earnings call, Capuano said more than 95% of the company's hotels are open globally and worldwide occupancy has improved each month this year.
“In March, we saw the largest month-over-month sequential increase in global occupancy since the beginning of the pandemic,” he said.
Occupancy grew to more than 45%, an increase of 9 percentage points over February, he said. Global occupancy grew again in April to about 48%.
The recovery in Mainland China is encouraging, Capuano said. While several markets were under strict lockdowns in January and February, demand recovered quickly once COVID-19 cases were under control and restrictions relaxed. Occupancy was 66%, almost flat compared to March 2019.
“Despite limited international travel into Mainland China, we saw robust demand from both leisure and business guests in March,” he said. “Leisure transient room nights were above pre-pandemic levels for the third quarter in a row. Business transient room nights surpassed the pre-pandemic levels in March, up 5% versus March 2019.”
Group room nights in March were still behind March 2019 levels. Demand in this segment grew significantly after restrictions on large gatherings were lifted, he said.
“Seeing these trends in Mainland China running near pre-pandemic levels gives us confidence in strong, full recoveries across all customer segments in other regions as conditions improve,” he said.
Demand has picked up quickly at Marriott's hotels in countries that have had early and swift vaccine rollouts, such as the U.S., the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, Capuano said. The same is also true in markets where airlift has improved or travel restrictions have relaxed, such as Mexico, Macau and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Room demand continues to be heavily weighted to leisure, but the resilience of overall demand is clear, he said. When the European Union announced it expects to open its borders to vaccinated U.S. travelers this summer, Marriott’s reservation centers saw “an immediate surge” in call volume, he said. Occupancy in the U.S. has also increased. The U.S. and Canada region had the second-highest occupancy in March at 49%, just behind Greater China.
Corporate and group bookings in the U.S. and Canada remain meaningfully below pre-pandemic levels, but they are recovering, Capuano said. In March, special corporate bookings for all future stays exceeded February’s bookings by 25%, the largest sequential monthly increase in this customer segment since the start of the pandemic. April’s bookings grew by 13% over March.
Group bookings in the U.S. and Canada continue to pick up as meeting planners are increasingly optimistic about the recovery and feel more confident they can plan events, especially in 2022 and beyond, Capuano said. By the end of the quarter, group revenue on the books for 2022 was down less than 15% compared to pre-pandemic levels as compared to group revenue on the books at the end of the first quarter of 2019 for 2020.
“Perhaps more importantly, rates for group room nights booked in the first quarter for 2022 and 2023 are currently 6% and 10%, respectively, above pre-pandemic levels, demonstrating that we are not trading rate for occupancy,” he said.
Development
Marriott added more than 23,500 rooms globally during the quarter, according to an earnings release. That includes nearly 12,000 rooms in international markets as well as roughly 7,300 conversion rooms.
By the end of the quarter, the company’s worldwide pipeline totaled 2,800 properties representing about 491,000 rooms. Of those, 18,000 are approved but not subject to signed contracts. More than 222,000 rooms were under construction by the end of the quarter.
The pace of signings has picked up and is dramatically better than it was for most of 2020, Capuano said. Conversion activity was particularly strong, he said, citing the nearly 7,000-room all-inclusive resort conversion deal with Sunwing Travel Group.
“Given our impressive roster of conversion-friendly brands and the meaningful benefits associated with being part of the Marriott system, we expect our momentum around conversions will continue,” he said.
The numbers of rooms added to the system during the quarter was a 60% increase compared to the first quarter of 2020, he said. Of those, 31% were conversions, the highest percent in any quarter in six years.
Looking forward, Marriott expects gross rooms growth could accelerate to about 6% and net rooms growth could be about 3% to 3.5%, Capuano said. While there are some delays in construction starts, 45% of Marriott’s pipeline is under construction.
The expectation for net rooms growth includes the one-time 100-basis-point headwind from the 88 Service Properties Trust — or SVC— hotels that left the system, he said.
“We look forward to replacing the mostly limited-service, first-generation SVC hotels with newer products and are already in active discussions for new deals in nearly three quarters of the portfolio's markets,” he said.
By the Numbers
During the first quarter, Marriott reported comparable systemwide constant-dollar revenue per available room dropped 46.3% year over year worldwide, according to its earnings release. Similarly, it fell 46.3% in the U.S. and Canada and 46.1% in international markets.
Compared to the first quarter of 2019, comparable systemwide constant-dollar RevPAR fell 59.1% worldwide. It dropped 57.1% in the U.S. and Canada and declined 64.1% in international markets.
Worldwide occupancy reached 37.7% during the quarter, a 15.3% decrease compared to the first quarter of 2020. Occupancy in Mainland China neared its pre-pandemic level with 66% in March. In the U.S. and Canada, occupancy started at 33% in January and reached 49% by March.
The company reported a net loss of $11 million during the quarter compared to net income of $31 million in the first quarter of 2020. Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization totaled $296 million in the first quarter compared to $442 million during the same period in 2020.
Net liquidity totaled about $4.7 billion by the end of the first quarter. Broken down, that amounts to $600 million in available cash balances and $4.1 billion of unused borrowing capacity under its revolving credit facility.
Marriott has been working closely with its owners to control costs at hotels given their low occupancy levels, said Leeny Oberg, executive vice president and chief financial officer. Together, they’ve been able to reduce hotel break-even occupancy levels significantly, she said. Many of Marriott's initiatives to streamline operations and improve productivity, such as more efficient management and staffing levels, will remain in place after the pandemic to help offset wage inflation.
The company is assessing post-COVID-19 renovations and brand standards to find more ways to improve hotel profitability while also preserving the quality and experiences gusts expect, she said.
The operating environment over the last year has been challenging, but most of the hotels in the system continue to pay their bills, Oberg said.
“We have even seen the number of hotels on payment plans come down meaningfully over the last several months as occupancy has improved,” she said.
As of press time, Marriott’s stock was trading at $142, up 8% year to date. The NASDAQ Composite Index was up 5% for the same time period.