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CORONAVIRUS
April 8, 2020263 | Risk Adjustment: Hotel tech platforms face their own COVID-19 crisis
Last week, Zoom, a video-conferencing program, was prime bait for hackers who infiltrated conversations taking place among people working from home during the coronavirus pandemic. As if Zoom bombers weren’t bad enough, a day or two later, the internet-based program crashed because it could not handle the surge of users from businesses, schools and friends read more
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CORONAVIRUS
April 3, 2020262 | Strongest Link: Hotel procurement specialists keep supply chain connected
The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted the global supply chain. With most whole goods and components coming from China, the U.S. hospitality industry began to scramble in January to keep the supplies coming. Manufacturing has resumed in China as the crisis has reportedly eased there, but the outbreak has yet to reach its peak in the read more
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CORONAVIRUS
April 1, 2020261 | Let’s Make a Deal: Coronavirus crisis alters hotel transaction landscape
The U.S. hotel industry has practically grinded to a halt in the wake of the coronavirus crisis. As Lodging Leaders shared in our previous report, Episode 260, hotel business performance has declined to unprecedented levels. Another area of the industry that the COVID-19 pandemic is impacting is hotel transactions. Properties remain on the market, but read more
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CORONAVIRUS
March 30, 2020260 | Startling Statistics: Industry analysts stunned at depth of downturn
Last week, several hospitality-focused analytical companies released data that specifically show how the coronavirus pandemic is decimating the U.S. hotel industry. The picture they paint is grim. And – though experts say they believe the industry will eventually resurge – the months ahead will be hard. In this report we review reports from STR, CBRE read more
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CORONAVIRUS
March 27, 2020259 | Trust Factor: Hotels can channel the right message during the coronavirus crisis
While many of the country’s 57,000 hotels have closed during the coronavirus pandemic, owners and operators are spending limited resources and a whole lot of time on retooling their property systems and deep cleaning rooms and public areas. They want to be ready when the nation starts traveling again. And that’s a message that needs read more
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CORONAVIRUS
March 25, 2020258 | Cash in a Crisis: SBA launches COVID-19 loan program, but experts urge caution
Dave Shah grew up in his family’s hotel and watched his parents and other hoteliers struggle to stay in business during the Great Recession. He thinks the economic situation for hoteliers during the COVID-19 crisis is growing worse than that time. Shah founded Pineapple Capital Group five years ago to help hotels and other small read more
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CORONAVIRUS
March 23, 2020257 | Hotels Become Hospitals: Government takeover of lodging leaves big questions for owners
As hotels in the U.S. are forced to dramatically scale back operations or close altogether because of the new coronavirus pandemic, government officials are looking to use the empty rooms to fight the spread of the virus or help patients recover. Meantime, hotel operators are taking a fresh look at cleaning procedures to assure guests read more
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CORONAVIRUS
March 20, 2020256 | What’s a Hotelier To Do? AAHOA’s Cecil Staton on the industry’s ‘dark times’
Cecil Staton has had his hands full to say the least. He has been at the helm of AAHOA, the world’s largest hotel owners association, for just four months. The new coronavirus outbreak and its devastating effect on the travel industry has hotel owners turning to him for solutions. This is the third installment of read more
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CORONAVIRUS
March 18, 2020255 | Workforce Woes: Hotels try to avoid layoffs
Seemingly overnight, the new coronavirus pandemic has dramatically curbed travel in the U.S. Hotels are feeling the pain as occupancies dropped to historic lows, in some cases down by 80 percent. The American Hotel and Lodging Association on Monday reported major hotel managers said they’ve laid off or furloughed one million employees. Long Live Lodging read more
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CORONAVIRUS
March 16, 2020254 | High Cancellations and Low Demand: Hotel pricing in a steep downturn
The U.S. hotel industry is undergoing an unprecedented experience as the new coronavirus or COVID-19 grows more and more real every day. Long Live Lodging and its Lodging Leaders podcast has decided to put a temporary hold on its usual programing from one report a week and move to providing updates throughout the week with read more
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FRANCHISING
March 11, 2020253 | Franchising Report Part 1 – Power Struggle: New hotelier organization lobbies for franchisee protection
Fair franchising. It’s a phrase that’s been used countless times in negotiations with brands, at industry conferences and among associations formed to ensure a balance of power between franchisers and franchisees. As the hotel industry in the U.S. celebrates nearly a decade of growth, leaner times are ahead, say forecasters. Owner operators are cutting as read more
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BHARAT SHAH LEADERSHIP SPEAKER SERIES
March 4, 2020252 | The BulletInn #2: Coronavirus and group business; Sara Blakely of Spanx at Hunter conference; and short-term rental’s surprising shift
Welcome to the second edition of BulletInn, a news report of Long Live Lodging and its Lodging Leaders podcast. In this episode, we cover three topics: The spread of the new coronavirus and its impact on travel and the legalities around cancelling group meetings in the U.S. Surprises in a report by CBRE Americas Hotels read more
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LODGING LEADERS
February 26, 2020251 | Channel Mix: Hotels balance costs of guest acquisition, OTAs and overall business opportunities
Online travel agencies. Hoteliers love them. Hoteliers hate them. Brand.com, GDS, call centers, travel agents, groups and so on. There are many types of business in every market. In this episode, Lodging Leaders explores how hotel owners and operators can learn to use third-party platforms such as OTAs and when to tap other resources for read more
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LODGING LEADERS
February 19, 2020250 | Cold Calls or Warm Greetings: How to meet people and build a network
Do you love to mingle and meet new people or would you rather sit home and watch paint dry than subject yourself to a crowd of strangers? Today’s hospitality environment practically demands you attend conferences and other people-focused events if you’re going to be successful in business. But how do you: Make events work in read more
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DIVERSITY
February 12, 2020249 | The BulletInn: ALIS 2020 news updates
At the beginning of the Americas Lodging Investment Summit on Jan. 27th, a panel of women in hospitality leadership advised the audience that, in some cases, it is smart to move down a career rung to be able to make a much bigger climb up in the future. Forward, Women Advancing Hospitality, is a project read more
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F&B
February 5, 2020248 | Recipe for Success: Hotel F&B gets a redo
About 25 years ago, as the number of limited service hotels in the U.S. began to grow, hotel franchisers began to add perceived value to their brands by offering guests a free breakfast. Today, the lines are blurring between limited and full service as hotels add a variety of paid and free food and beverage read more