Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - (Page 37) www.HotelMotel.com/digital_edition HotelMotel.com | H&MM October 20, 2008 News 37 Groups Continued from page 1 efit hotels, they don’t make up the whole picture. Howard Feiertag, Hotel & Motel Management columnist and faculty member in the department of hospitality and tourism management at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, said the actual amount of group travel is far above those numbers. “People forget about all of these other groups,” he said. “It may be double [the money generated from corporate and association meetings] if you add in these other groups.” Group segments During a down economy, corporate meetings tend to trend downward as well. That’s why hotels need to be on the lookout for travel groups that are less affected. “Typically when we start a down cycle, the association and special market segments get a lot more attention,” said Mike Grippo, VP of sales and marketing for White Lodging Services. According to Feiertag, small meetings should always be a priority because so many exist. “I would suggest … [that] in one day, all of the people attending small meetings adds up to more people than all of the large conventions in any one day,” Feiertag said. Of the special market segments—sports, military, entertainment, religious and fraternal, sometimes referred to as “SMERF”—Feiertag sees military reunions as the “hottest” today. “Think of all the different veteran groups we’ve had that served in the military—all of the different branches and groups of veterans. It’s a very, very big group of the market. … Probably 100 or so different groups have reunions, Websites used to plan meetings Convention and visitor bureau site Hotel or chain site Google Local city site Expedia Travelocity Yahoo! Uniquevenues.com 76% 66% 53% 31% 12% 8% 7% 2% Source: Meetings & Conventions’ 2008 Meetings Market Report and they go to small hotels. They don’t need meeting space. They go to hotels during a soft period because they don’t want Feiertag to get the high VIRGINIA POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE rate. There’s 100-200 people [per booking].” The most steady group travel segment, though, is sports. “Sports activity is way up. People are spending money and teams are traveling,” Feiertag said. “That’s very big business, and people don’t look at it that way. Think of all the different kinds of sports and all the different sizes of teams, from 5-year-old kids on soccer teams— and they all travel with parents and chaperones—to college teams.” Tom Berkman, owner and GM of THS Co., a sports housing service, helps amateur sports teams book hotels. “From [Sept. 11, 2001], we never saw a downward trend or a slowdown in sports travel,” he said. “I think it was different than other markets. You’d hear hotels say corporate travel is down, but sports did not go down. … Sports is a rather economy-resistant market.” Amateur sports affect both first- and second-tier cities and both downtown arGrippo eas and subWHITE LODGING urban areas, depending on the sport. Teams coming for a championship are more likely to book a four-diamond type of hotel and look for a memorable, lavish experience, and teams traveling frequently look more for limited-service hotels with free continental breakfast, according to Berkman. “Hotels often don’t understand the market because they want higher rates,” Berkman said, “That won’t work for teams.” Carlson noted associations and sports teams currently are the most frequent group travelers at Hyatt, followed by corporate or pharmaceutical groups. “And then probably entertainment. That seems to be increasingly important,” Carlson said. In particular, television crews from networks like ESPN are common guests. Technology talks Beyond the pure numbers, group booking is fast becoming more efficient for the groups and for the hotels. White Lodging now uses a system called Delphi by Newmarket International to connect all of its hotels to the same database, helping the hotels gather and share information. “It allows us to be more effective on the sales side,” Grippo said. “It allows us to have a central database of information and it allows us to be more effective in the group market.” If a particular demographic or segment seems to gravitate toward one of its hotels, the sales staff will see it and be able to better target that segment, whether it’s a SMERF group or an association. “It’s all about placing it in the right place and time period—if you have the knowledge of what times are difficult to fill, what are your slower days or months [and what is] a good association business or a good special market program. If it’s placed in the right place with the right rate, it’s all good,” Grippo said. Also, hotels can fill their block with online group travel systems like Hotelplanner.com. On the site, hotels can sign up for free and view all of the available group leads— about 500 new leads a day, according to its CEO Tim Hentchel. “It creates a nice base of business for [hotels] booking in advance,” Hentchel said. “They can establish a base of business and a rate bottom and, as time gets closer, could increase rates for all additional rooms.” A majority of the leads are from social groups. Previously, the average contract rate was $100, but it now is $79 because of the economy, soft occupancy and “being able to yield-manage groups better,” Hentchel said. Hotels can access these leads not only to attract more group travel but also to access a wealth of information from a comprehensive online database. “[Hotels] put in several fields of data and get a better feel for seasonality in different market segments and can track and target groups better,” Hentchel said. “It allows the industry to manipulate that data and use it effectively to advertise, staff and … show how competitive they are in their market segment.” ccrowell@questex.com Travels constantly. INFOBASE ™ GIVES YOU THE MOST ACCURATE INFORMATION ABOUT THE MOST PEOPLE. have a better chance to make meaningful CIRCLE NO. 131 http://www.HotelMotel.com http://www.HotelMotel.com/digital_edition http://www.Uniquevenues.com http://www.Hotelplanner.com http://www.acxiom.com/infobase-x http://www.acxiom.com/infobase-x
Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 Contents Event Empowers Property-Level Leaders Boutique Bonanza Perspective Legal FAQ Consultant's Corner AAHOA Update Sales Clinic HotelWorld Update On Finance Trends & Stats Surprise Guests by Predicting Their Needs Transactions Worse Than Most Predicted Electronic Safes Housekeeping Services Marketplace Events Ad/Edit Index Classifieds Checking Out Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 (Page Cover1) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 (Page Cover2) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 (Page 1) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 (Page 2) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Contents (Page 3) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Boutique Bonanza (Page 4) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Boutique Bonanza (Page 5) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Perspective (Page 6) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Perspective (Page 7) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Consultant's Corner (Page 8) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Consultant's Corner (Page 9) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - AAHOA Update (Page 10) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - AAHOA Update (Page 11) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Sales Clinic (Page 12) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Sales Clinic (Page 13) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - HotelWorld Update (Page 14) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - HotelWorld Update (Page 15) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - On Finance (Page 16) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - On Finance (Page 17) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Trends & Stats (Page 18) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Trends & Stats (Page 19) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Surprise Guests by Predicting Their Needs (Page 20) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Surprise Guests by Predicting Their Needs (Page 21) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Transactions Worse Than Most Predicted (Page 22) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Transactions Worse Than Most Predicted (Page 23) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Transactions Worse Than Most Predicted (Page 24) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Transactions Worse Than Most Predicted (Page 25) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Electronic Safes (Page 26) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Electronic Safes (Page 27) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Electronic Safes (Page 28) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Electronic Safes (Page 29) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 30) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 31) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 32) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 33) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 34) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 35) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 36) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Housekeeping Services (Page 37) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Marketplace (Page 38) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Events (Page 39) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Ad/Edit Index (Page 40) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Classifieds (Page 41) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Classifieds (Page 42) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Classifieds (Page 43) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Classifieds (Page 44) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Classifieds (Page 45) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Checking Out (Page 46) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Checking Out (Page Cover3) Hotel & Motel Management - October 20, 2008 - Checking Out (Page Cover4)
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