Choice Hotels European Hotelier Survey Reveals Stepping up Sales and Marketing Activities is Number One Business Priority for 2016

LONDON. 20 JANUARY 2016 Choice Hotels Europe, the company behind the Comfort, Quality and Clarion brands, today revealed the findings of its fifth annual “European Hotelier Pulse-Check”, which assesses its hotelier’s 2016 business imperatives and industry trends. Key findings include:

• •78% believe the hotel sector will realise sustained upturn and that room rates will continue to perform well
• •69% are planning hotel refurbishments in 2016
• •Stepping up sales and marketing remains top business priority
• •Room quality and features top list in ensuring repeat guest business
• •Increased use of channel managers to maximise revenue management seen as main industry trend for 2016

The survey reveals that Choice pan-European hoteliers are entering 2016 more confident than the previous four years with over two thirds (78%) believing that the hotel sector will realise a sustained upturn in 2016, compared to 55% who expressed similar sentiment in 2014. Hoteliers’ confidence in room rate performance is also growing with 78% of respondents expecting room rates to continue to perform well in 2016, compared to 68% the previous year, and up from 33% in 2012.

Value and features of their hotel rooms continues to be considered the most important element in securing repeat business to their properties, followed by staff service and price or value.

As with 2015, a refurbishment at their hotel is the main expansion plan for hoteliers (69%), and an additional 28% report that securing another hotel property for their portfolio is once again the second most likely expansion objective. The hoteliers also reported that stepping up sales and marketing activities to attract new customers remains their number one business priority for the fourth year running.

When asked to predict the main industry trend for 2016 over half (58%) of the hoteliers point towards increased use of channel managers to help maximise hotel and revenue management followed by further growth in the franchising model (22%). Further acknowledging how critical effective revenue management is to running a successful hotel operation, 62% believed they could realize between 2.5% and 10% in increased revenue if managed effectively, while a fifth (21%) believed they could realize more than a 10% increase.

A bank loan is still the first port of call for hoteliers looking for capital to expand their hotel operations (66%), with 8% now prepared to consider crowd-funding.

Looking at ways to attract the all important business traveller, 28% are planning to offer the highest bandwidth at their properties, 24% are looking to grow the number of client specific rates offered through major distribution channels and nearly half (43%) are going to sign up more business travellers to Choice Privileges, Choice’s global loyalty programme, whose members have a higher likelihood to return.

Finally, while people are now predicted to change careers between five to seven times during their working lives, 73% of respondents have never had another career and say they only ever wanted to work in the hotel sector.

Mark Pearce, senior vice president, international division, for Choice Hotelscommented: “Choice Hotels Europe’s Fifth Pan-European Hotelier Pulse-Check reveals that hoteliers are looking towards 2016 with confidence. They recognise that staying ahead of the competition with innovative sales and marketing strategies is key to their success as is the importance of effective revenue management. We help our hoteliers by providing expertise and best practice as well as putting the most sophisticated revenue-management tools into the hands of our franchisees”.

The “2015 European Hotelier Pulse-Check”, survey was conducted amongst 73 Choice Hotels franchisees, operators and general managers from the UK, France, Germany, Czech Republic and Italy in October 2015.