NASHVILLE, Tennessee — McKibbon Hospitality's Vice President of Revenue Management Jihad Lotfi said there's been a noticeable change across the industry in what types of travelers are coming to hotels.
Fewer leisure guests and fewer guests blending business with personal travel are the negatives, but there are some signs that midweek business is on the upswing heading into the fall travel season.
"We're seeing a slowdown on weekends and definitely a pretty significant slowdown on shoulder nights, especially Thursday nights," he said, speaking with Hotel News Now during the 2023 Hotel Data Conference. "It's not just isolated to McKibbon; it's coming across the whole industry. We're definitely seeing people slow down from arriving early or staying later. And on a weekend perspective, our [average daily rates] are not as strong as they used to be."
All of that means a return of business travel and group demand are more welcome than ever.
"Where we're seeing positives is an increase in negotiated and group midweek," he said. "Our Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays have seen pretty significant improvement, and we hope that will continue for the rest of the year."
Transitioning away from the leisure travel boom of the past few years is a difficult prospect for many hoteliers, but Lotfi said what revenue managers should keep in mind is to not to zero in on short-term thinking or be eager to race to the bottom with pricing.
"There's a lot of knee-jerk reactions. There's a lot of concerns about a potential recession," he said. "We're starting to see strategies that are impacting where pricing power is or where we can position certain segments and optimize our mix. We have markets, for example, where their retail rates are lower than 2019 retail rates. Unfortunately, we have to follow suit or be competitive from a benchmark perspective."
For more from HNN's interview with McKibbon's Jihad Lotfi, watch the video above.