New occupancy milestone in U.S.: U.S. weekly hotel occupancy reached the 60% mark for the first time since the start of the pandemic, according to STR’s latest data. May 16-22 (percentage change from comparable week in 2019):
- Occupancy: 60.3% (-15.1%)
- ADR: US$115.57 (-13.6%)
- RevPAR: US$69.69 (-26.6%)
ADR also reached its highest point of the pandemic but was still US$18 less than the corresponding week in 2019. RevPAR also hit a high point when compared to 2019. Miami (+2.8% to 76.0%) was the only top 25 market to report an occupancy increase over 2019. And San Francisco/San Mateo saw the steepest decline in occupancy when compared with 2019 (-45.5% to 47.9%).
In terms of ADR, Phoenix (+6.7% to US$122.97) and Tampa (+0.3% to US$140.09) were the only markets with levels higher than 2019. None of the top 25 had RevPAR levels higher than the 2019 comparable. And the largest RevPAR deficits were in San Francisco/San Mateo (-70.0% to US$66.53) and Boston (-66.9% to US$64.22).
Hotel Santa Barbara up for sale: A well-known Santa Barbara hotel is up for sale, according to reporting from Noozhawk. The Hotel Santa Barbara, built in 1926, has been listed with an asking price of US$49 million. The hotel sits upon a little over a half-acre with 75 guest rooms, a lobby, and six street-level retail spaces, with the retail anchored by a Starbucks Coffee.
Young travelers eager to ‘chat’: Messaging and chat options — like SMS, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger — are viewed as the preferred method for travelers (and especially younger travelers) to engage with their favorite travel brands, according to a new survey commissioned by software company LivePerson. Data from that survey showed that nearly three-fourths of consumers (73%) prefer messaging to calls when making airline, hotel, or other travel-related reservations. Among 18- to 23-year-olds, the number reaches a massive 90%.
Florida County partners with hotels to inoculate workers: Florida’s JW Marriott Miami recently held a one-day event, in partnership with Miami-Dade County, to encourage hotel workers to get inoculated. It was the first of several planned drives by Miami-Dade and hotel managers. The new partnership comes as a local labor union, which represents 7,000 hospitality and airport workers in South Florida, said at the time that 60% of their members were still out of work as a result of the pandemic. About 40% of them identify as Haitian or Haitian American. The Miami Herald reports that the county has also reached out to other hotels in the areas where events have already been scheduled — like the Fontainebleau — so that those hotels’ employees and families can also attend the events if so inclined.
First M Social for U.S.: London-based Millennium Hotels and Resorts has opened the first U.S. location for its M Social lifestyle brand. First launched in Singapore in 2016, M Social is the brainchild of property-hotel veteran Kwek Leng Beng, Millennium & Copthorne Hotels executive chairman. The 480-room M Social New York opened on May 27 and is the third location for the brand, which has an outpost in Auckland in addition to the Singapore location.
Bankrupt San Jose hotel picks Hilton: The owner of a bankrupt Fairmont hotel in downtown San Jose has selected Hilton as its new operator in an attempt to reboot the shuttered hotel, which closed its doors and filed for bankruptcy in March. According to reporting from Mercury News, the hotel’s owner said it was crucial to replace its existing hotel management with an operator that could help extricate it from bankruptcy via cash support.
Hawaii bill to pause hotel permits advances: A local Maui county committee voted on May 25 to recommend approval for a bill that would place a moratorium on building permits for visitor accommodations, according to reporting from Maui News. If approved, the measure would temporarily pause visitor accommodation development in West and in South Maui. Ultimately, the bill ties visitor accommodation development and an increase in tourism to negative impacts on the environment, claiming that the pause will help prevent additional air, noise, light, land and water pollution.
New exec for Saudi Ministry of Tourism: Former Mexican tourism minister Gloria Guevara Manzo has been appointed as chief special adviser to the Saudi Ministry of Tourism, according to reporting from Arab News. Guevara Manzo has previously served as president of the World Travel and Tourism Council since 2017, and is also considered one of the most influential women in the sector globally. She also served as minister of tourism and CEO of the Tourism Promotion Board of Mexico between 2010 and 2012.
Curator adds 5 new member hotels: Bethesda, Maryland Curator Hotel & Resort Collection added five new member hotels to its portfolio. The new hotels include Inn at the Market in Seattle (the first non-founding member hotel to join the group), as well as The Edgewater Hotel from Noble House Hotels & Resorts, also in Seattle, and three Provenance properties: The Boston-based Revolution Hotel, The Bradley in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Woodlark in Portland, Oregon.