Business-transient travel is a tough nut to crack these days.
For months, the hotel industry has anticipated the return of business-transient demand in hotels, looking closely for any signs of midweek bookings inch up. But it’s really slow going, and the lack of business travel is dragging on weekday occupancies big-time across the board in the U.S.
But here’s the thing — even if business people aren’t going on as many business trips as they did before and staying in hotels while they conduct that business, people are still working. I mean, thank goodness employment levels have regulated somewhat.
And business people gotta do business, right?
Yes, we’ve talked to exhaustion about hybrid meetings and fewer people meeting in person and blah blah blah. For every person who says virtual meetings are the promise of the future forever, there are just as many people talking themselves into the fact that virtual meetings are terrible and face to face is the only way to do business.
We don’t know yet how all this will shake out. Anyone who thinks they know is clearly trying to sell you something — probably hybrid-meeting technology “solutions.”
The fact is, hoteliers can still take advantage of business-transient demand — it just may not all necessarily be in the form of an overnight stay in a guestroom quite yet.
I think for so long we’ve defined business-transient demand as someone coming in to your city from out of town to stay the night, usually during the middle of the week. And yeah, that’s super profitable when business activity is at normal pace.
But I think we’ve forgotten the “business” part of “business-transient demand.”
So how are you helping guests get their work done? Maybe that’s the simplest question to ask yourself.
Yes, in most cases and ideally, you’re helping them get work done by giving them a clean room to sleep and shower in while they’re away from home.
But there are a lot of other elements to “work” and “business,” right? And based on my own career as a businessperson, three of the key elements to business are coffee, happy hour and a place to sit with an outlet.
Go on, tell me I'm not wrong!
Those are three things the hotel industry typically does very well, particularly hotels of a certain caliber.
This article published last week in the Washington Post is a great look at how traditional office Fridays have changed since the pandemic-induced shifts in work between office and home. More people are working from home on Fridays, which means fewer people in offices those days but more people in, you guessed it, bars.
The article quotes a Minneapolis bar GM who says, “Since they’re not at the office [as much on Fridays], people come in early to pluck away at their laptops while they sip a cocktail or two. By 4:30 or 5 on Fridays, we’re completely full.”
And if people working from home on Fridays or any other days are starting happy hour early, I guarantee they’re also starting coffee hour early.
Your lobbies and outlets are fabulous places to work, provided the coffee is flowing and the outlets are powered up.
I can think right now of 10 fabulous hotel bars and coffee shops — not even Starbucks outlets — that are a.) gorgeous and b.) a lot more open, empty and enjoyable to work in than my local Starbucks or high-end standalone bar/restaurant.
Be that place for the business people in your area. It may help fill the gaps until "real" business-transient demand comes back.
Doing something like this already? Let me know. Email me, or find me on Twitter or LinkedIn.
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