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An estimated 17,000 Airbnb users will book stays in the Philadelphia region during the World Cup, generating $167 million in revenue for the region, a new report finds. Hosts are expected to make $8 million, or $1,900 each.
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Kristin Hunt
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Hilton Worldwide in January will introduce a new top tier to its Honors rewards program and will lower the number of room nights required to attain membership in some of its lower tiers, the company announced Tuesday.
Beginning in January, travelers will attain Gold status in the Honors program after staying 25 nights per year, down from the current 40, and Diamond status after 50 nights, down from the current 60, according to Hilton. Benefits for both tiers will remain unchanged.
Requirements for Hilton’s Silver status will remain unchanged at 10 nights.
Travelers will attain the new top tier, Diamond Reserve, after staying 80 nights in a year and spending $18,000 with Hilton, according to the company. Members will receive perks including guaranteed 4 p.m. checkout, “exclusive” service support from “specially trained team members dedicated to delivering personalized assistance and priority care” and complimentary access to Hilton premium clubs.
They’ll also receive what Hilton calls a “Confirmable Upgrade Reward,” the ability on a stay of up to seven nights to confirm at the time of booking a premium room upgrade, up to a one-bedroom suite, according to Hilton. Once used, members can earn a second such reward after reaching the 120-night or 30,000-point milestones, Hilton said. The perk applies to either paid or reward stays at select Hilton properties.
“Diamond Reserve was created to recognize and reward those who entrust their travel to Hilton,” Hilton chief marketing officer and head of luxury brands Mark Weinstein said in a statement. “We know that enhancing the stay experience is the foundational building block to driving loyalty.”
Choice Hotels International earlier this month also added a new top tier to its loyalty program.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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IHG Hotels & Resorts will offer members of Delta Air Lines’ new loyalty program for business travelers an enhancement to join its own program for small and midsized enterprises, the company announced this week.
SME members of the Delta Business Traveler program, which the carrier launched last year and is available to all business travelers, are eligible for a “fast track” to Platinum Elite status in IHG’s One Rewards loyalty program is they also enroll in IHG Business Edge, the program it introduced in 2018 that offers discounts and perks to SMEs.
According to an IHG spokesperson, Delta Business Traveler members will receive a complimentary upgrade to Gold Elite status under their IHG One Rewards account after two qualifying night stays, and will receive Platinum Elite Status after a further three qualifying night stays at a participating property. Normally, members would need to stay 40 qualifying nights in a calendar year to reach Platinum Elite, the spokesperson said.
“Our established presence in the SME travel space underscores IHG as a trusted partner, and this collaboration allows us to extend benefits to an even broader audience,” IHG SVP of global sales Mark Sergot said in a statement.
IHG earlier this year announced a similar hotel-airline SME loyalty tie-up with Singapore Airlines.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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Second-quarter U.S. hotel bookings made using HotelHub technology dropped more than 13 percent year over year, according to the company. Additionally, average lead times for Q2 U.S. hotel bookings dropped nearly 7 percent from 2024 levels, “suggesting a growing reluctance to commit to U.S. travel too far in advance,” according to HotelHub, which provides travel management companies with hotel booking technology.
For the first six months of the year, U.S. hotel bookings made with HotelHub declined 10.65 percent year over year while global bookings dropped 5.35 percent, according to HotelHub.
“This contrasts to the first quarter of the year where total year-on-year booking numbers had remained fairly stable—despite a significant drop in U.S. bookings—and comes as businesses attempt to make sense of the unpredictable and ever-changing tariff policies issued by the new U.S. administration since April,” HotelHub in a report detailing its findings.
Still, HotelHub chief commercial officer Paul Raymond in a letter accompanying the report suggested the downturn might not fully reflect the current state of hotel demand.
“A short period of decline does not necessarily signal an ongoing negative trend,” according to Raymond. “Indeed, it can be a marker of resilience: it is simply good business sense to take a cautious approach as tariff negotiations play out. And while booking figures took a hit at the start of the quarter, we have seen a steady rise since.”
The average second-quarter global rate booked per night was $192, up less than 2 percent year over year, and it averaged $184 for the first half of 2025, up 1 percent. That’s “a stark contrast to the 5.39 percent seen in the same period last year (compared to 2023) and a positive sign for corporate travel budgets,” according to HotelHub.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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Yotel, the 23-property hotel chain known for its compact guest rooms, has named former Marriott International executive Phil Andreopoulos as its new CEO, the company announced Monday.
Andreopoulos worked at Marriott for nearly 25 years, most recently as chief commercial officer of Marriott’s Europe, Middle East and Africa region.
Andreopoulos “brings a wealth of commercial and operational experience and under his leadership, Yotel will enhance its distribution, direct business contribution and loyalty proposition,” Yotel and Al-Bahar Group chairman Talal Al Bahar said in a statement. “He will also drive expansion of both the managed and franchise businesses in key markets.”
The Al-Bahar Group, a Kuwaiti investment firm, is Yotel’s majority shareholder and earlier this year increased its stake to more than a 95 percent share after acquiring Starwood Capital’s 30 percent stake.
Andreopoulos replaces as CEO Hubert Viriot, who had served in the position since 2014 and will remain with Yotel as vice chairman. Viriot in a statement posted on LinkedIn said Andreopoulos would be “the perfect leader to guide Yotel as we pursue our ambitious goal of doubling our portfolio in the next five years.”
Yotel has 23 properties in 16 cities in the U.S., Europe and Asia, and said it has 11 properties in the development pipeline due to open within the next two years.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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Hospitality Solutions, the hotel reservation technology business acquired in July by investment firm TPG from Sabre Corp., has named former American Express Global Business Travel executive and Egencia president Mark Hollyhead as chief transformation officer, a new role, the company announced Monday.
Hollyhead will begin work in his role in “mid-September,” a spokesperson confirmed to BTN.
Hollyhead at Hospitality Solutions will “drive transformation by leveraging AI and other technologies to advance product development and strategic initiatives across the organization,” the company said in a statement.
Hollyhead served as president of Egencia when the travel management company was acquired by Amex GBT from Expedia in 2021. At Amex GBT, he served as chief product officer until his resignation earlier this year. Hollyhead before Egencia served in a variety of roles for British Airways.
TPG is operating Hospitality Solutions, which it acquired from Sabre for $1.1 billion and which offers a software-as-a-service platform designed to assist hotels’ distribution operations and retailing experience, as a separate business. Hospitality Solutions CEO Teresa Mackintosh in a statement called it “a formative time for Hospitality Solutions as we position the company for an exciting period of growth and transformation.”
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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SAP Concur has partnered with hotel distribution technology provider Gekko Group to connect the group’s technology with Concur’s Hotel Connector.
With the integration, travel management companies and corporate clients using Concur Travel can get access to the inventory of Hcorpo, Gekko’s hotel aggregation solution, which provides a “wide array” of rates including public, negotiated and dynamic rates, according to Concur. Gekko, which is part of Accor Group, reports hotel content across 180 countries.
Concur this week also announced it has integrated HotelHub’s content aggregation technology into Hotel Connector.
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mbaker@thebtngroup.com (Michael B. Baker)
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Citing what it called “a substantially reduced economic outlook,” Lodging Analytics Research & Consulting this week “considerably” reduced its U.S. hotel performance outlook from its prior forecast in June.
LARC now projects full-year 2025 U.S. hotel occupancy to decline 1.6 percent year over year, compared with a projected 0.8 percent decline in the June forecast. LARC projects the 2025 U.S. average daily rate to increase 0.8 percent from 2024 levels (compared with 2.1 percent in June) and revenue per available room to decline 0.7 percent (compared with a projected 1.3 percent increase in June).
LARC president and co-founder Ryan Meliker in a letter to clients cited an uncertain macroeconomic outlook and slowing U.S. job growth for the pared-down forecast.
Meliker noted second-quarter U.S. RevPAR declined 0.5 percent year over year even as U.S. gross domestic product increased 3 percent, concluding that “the strength of the underlying economy may be far more modest than the 2Q GDP print implies. For example, when excluding a tariff-induced net trade imbalance, Real GDP declined roughly 2 percent in the quarter.”
Additionally, Meliker in the letter wrote that “job growth has been declining since May 2025, apart from the healthcare sector,” adding that a stronger corporate embrace of artificial intelligence could limit job growth.
Still, “sluggish job growth may not have the same negative implications [for corporate travel] as it does for leisure demand,” Meliker wrote. “Entry-level roles are less likely to be corporate travelers and are the jobs most at risk from technological advancement. From a group perspective, trends continue to be holding despite the soft jobs data.”
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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What appears to be increasing guest discontent with hotel food service and maintenance has driven down average satisfaction scores for hotel management companies in a new J.D. Power survey, released Wednesday.
The average overall hotel management company satisfaction score J.D. Power’s 2025 North America Third-Party Hotel Management Guest Satisfaction Benchmark was 682 on a 1,000-point scale. That’s just a touch down from the 683 average score recorded last year, but J.D. Power noted such overall year-over-year comparisons aren’t valid due to changes to survey methodology from last year.
That said, year-over-year comparisons of survey categories that stayed consistent remain sound, and J.D. Power pointed to two categories where guest satisfaction notably dropped: food and beverage—including quality of food, cleanliness of dining areas, food and beverage presentation and ambiance—as well the appearance of the hotel exterior and grounds, along with maintenance of pools, fitness centers and laundry areas.
In hotels where the owner is not operating the property, guest satisfaction ultimately rests with third-party management companies that operate on behalf of hotel owners,” J.D. Power hospitality practice lead Andrea Stokes said in a statement. “While these companies are all focused on bringing a level of standardization and consistency to the guest experience, we’re starting to see some challenges emerge where guest satisfaction is faltering, particularly for quality of food and beverage and hotel facilities upkeep, which can often indicate rising costs.”
As food costs increase for consumers, so they do for hotels, as does the costs of food and beverage labor, a category that hotel analytics firm STR said increased 15 percent year over year in 2024, more so than any other hotel labor category.
[Report continues below chart.]
Atrium Hospitality, an Alpharetta, Ga.-based hotel management company with 73 properties in its portfolio, including branded Hilton, Marriott, IHG, and Wyndham properties, topped J.D. Power’s list with a satisfaction score of 722.
J.D. Power surveyed 5,022 guests who stayed at a branded hotel between May 2024 and May 2025. The survey is based on seven categories, in declining order of importance: guest room, hotel staff service, value for prices paid, check-in and check-out, hotel facility, food and beverage, and hotel connectivity. That the check-in and check-out category is broken out separately is a change from 2024.
Third-party hotel operators with more than 14,000 branded hotel rooms under management were eligible for J.D Power’s survey.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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SAP Concur has integrated HotelHub’s hotel content aggregation technology into SAP Concur’s Hotel Connector, which will enable travel management companies to improve access to their hotel content within Concur Travel, the company announced.
With the HotelHub integration, TMCs can use its features within Concur Travel, including dynamic configuration and preferencing of both global distribution system and non-GDS hotel content, normalization and de-duplication of hotel content and PNR integration, according to Concur. It also includes enhanced search filter capabilities and the ability to display detailed property information. As such, TMCs can “drive more commercially advantageous bookings” through Concur Travel, the company said.
“The HotelHub integration into SAP Concur’s Hotel Connector will empower TMCs to deliver the right content, in the right place, at the right price, and reinforce their value proposition to customers,” HotelHub chief commercial officer Paul Raymond said in a statement.
Concur said joint customers of Concur and HotelHub have the implementation process underway for the integration, and the first launch should happen in the current quarter.
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mbaker@thebtngroup.com (Michael B. Baker)
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Choice Hotels International has named former McDonald’s and Hilton Worldwide executive Joshua Sloser its new chief commercial officer, effective immediately, the company announced Tuesday.
Sloser, who reports directly to Choice president and CEO Patrick Pacious, replaces as CCO Robert McDowell, who departed the company in January.
Sloser as CCO will “develop and implement the company’s commercial strategy, overseeing the digital channels including ChoiceHotels.com and mobile app, revenue management, third-party distribution and customer service to drive business growth and market share,” Choice said in a statement.
Sloser most recently served as SVP of customer and commercial innovation for McDonald’s, a company with which he worked for nearly five years. Previously, his experience includes stints at Hilton, where he spent nearly nine years culminating as SVP of digital, and Travelocity.
“As we accelerate our global expansion and deepen customer engagement, Joshua’s proven ability to drive innovation, lead cross-functional teams, and deliver measurable commercial outcomes will be instrumental,” Pacious said in a statement.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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Sonesta’s Brian Macaluso discusses:
Sonesta International Hotels in the past five years has grown exponentially, from about 80 properties in 2020 to more than 1,200 today following the acquisition of Red Lion Hotels and other realignments. The hotel company has leaned into specialized segments, developing targeted programs for small and midsize businesses, medical meetings and government travel, among others. Sonesta SVP of global sales Brian Macaluso spoke with BTN managing editor Chris Davis last month at the Global Business Travel Association convention in Denver about the company’s evolving business mix, market approach and demand outlook. Edited excerpts follow.
BTN: It’s been a bit of a turbulent year. What’s your read right now on where everything stands in terms of business travel?
Brian Macaluso: At Sonesta individual business travel is still a little bit slower than expected. It hasn’t returned to where everybody thought it would be. So as we look forward, we see the year projections following what STR is saying. Everybody projected it to be a little bit more of a stronger year. And right now it’s a little bit lower than where it was expected to be.
It’s not like it’s doom and gloom, and it’s not like it’s sunshine and roses. And some cities are stronger than others. Just like [U.S. Travel at its IPW trade show in June in Chicago] talked about for the leisure travel coming into the U.S., certain countries are stronger than they’ve ever been ,and it’s counterbalancing Canada being down. And so that’s how we’re looking at it too.
BTN: Has Sonesta’s changes over the years altered who the typical Sonesta business traveler is?
Macaluso: Sure. Sonesta had 50 hotels and three brands four and a half years ago, and now we have 1,100 hotels across 13 brands. During the pandemic, everything was driven by nurses and [essential workers], and corporate travel was non-existent. As we’ve continued to move forward, we’ve enhanced our ability to welcome those travelers back.
We see more workforce travel, we see more displaced housing travel, and we see more extended-stay travel. We added economy, extended-stay, upscale and upper-upscale hotels. Sports has been a huge segment for us, and we developed an internal certification program that each one of our hotels takes to become Sonesta Sports certified.
Government travel has been a huge segment that has propelled us. Obviously, at the beginning of this year it was down, but we’re seeing pockets that are still supportive. State government still continues to travel, and we saw a little bit of an impact from federal government, but we’re starting to see it come back. But we take all of our hotels through [a certification] we call Government Ready. There’s certain things that a hotel has to have in order to welcome government travelers, including CAGE Codes. So while we’ve added different hotel portfolio to welcome guests, we’ve also added training for the hotels to welcome new guests.
BTN: Does that show up at the point of booking? Can you see that certification on the site?
Macaluso: It depends on who they’re booking with. We’re still launching the government ready program, but we work with veterans quite a bit, work with the [U.S. Department of Defense and Drug Enforcement Administration], all those entities to make sure they know that we’re available. But the good thing is that [for government business], you won’t be able to book the hotel unless you have all of these qualifications. So we’re [preparing] the hotel to be prepared to welcome government business.
We also signed a partnership with Meeting Professionals International on its Healthcare Meeting Compliance Certificate certification. Sonesta signed a partnership where we took all of our full-service Sonesta hotels through HMCC certification training. One person at each hotel becomes certified, and they went through a four-hour training class to make the hotel venue-verified. So now all of our full-service Sonesta hotels are venue-verified. When a meeting planner goes to book a hotel, they know these hotels are ready for medical meetings.
BTN: Are you comfortable with the business mix Sonesta now between business, leisure and group? Are you trying to shift that mix in one direction or the other?
Macaluso: In general, everybody would like business to come directly from their website. … We’re leaning into loyalty to help drive more loyal members for us. From a business mix perspective, we’re continuing to grow and evolve, but the main focus for us is to get the customers to come directly to the Sonesta website, become Sonesta loyalty members and drive that recognition because we want a guest to come and stay once and then come and stay again.
BTN: Some buyers prefer travelers book through travel management companies or booking tools rather than direct. Does that create tension?
Macaluso: I wouldn’t say tension. Our “Sonesta First” philosophy focuses on doing business with our customers the way they want to do business with us. if they choose to work with a TMC and they want to book through the GDS, we’ll make that available for them. If they want to book directly with us, we’ll make that available for them. If they want to book directly on our website using their corporate code, we’ll do that. Our Sonesta Global Preferred program gives a lot of our corporate travelers chainwide discounts, whether through [an online booking tool] or our website.
BTN: How is transient request-for-proposals volume this year, and are you noticing anything different in that process?
Macaluso: We see more off off-cycle RFPs, but in general, the volume of RFPs versus last year continues to increase. It’s increased year over year. Our goal is to get more exposure with all of our existing hotels as they grow. We’ve seen business cases increase for our hotels and more acceptances because [buyers are] seeing a Sonesta in a location that maybe they didn’t consider before. … We have a centralized RFP team that supports us.
BTN: Are SMEs and infrastructure-related travelers using RFPs or are they booking more informally?
Macaluso: It depends. A lot of smaller organizations will work directly with our hotels in the form of a local negotiated rate. Sonesta has a program called Sonesta Business Pass, which will allow an individual hotel to create a program to not only give them a negotiated rate at their hotel, but then give them a chainwide discount to use at any hotel throughout Sonesta.
A lot of our TMC partners have specific curated SME programs. We’re seeing a lot of SMEs, instead of coming directly to the hotel to book directly, are partnering with the TMC. We’ll work with them either way, because a lot of our larger corporate accounts do the same thing.
BTN: For a lot of hotel companies, staffing shortages were a major concern post-pandemic. Is it still?
Macaluso: Staffing was a huge challenge from the pandemic, we’ve leaned into quality assurance with each of our hotels, quality assurance audits to make sure they’re upholding the standards of what a Royal Sonesta is, what a Sonesta is, what an ES is. Three years ago, staffing challenges would’ve been probably the biggest topic. … There’s always going to be a staffing question, but from us, from a quality-service perspective, it’s not something that’s hindering us.
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businesstravelnews@ntmllc.com (Business Travel News)
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U.S. hotel occupancy, average daily rate and revenue per available room each declined year over year in August, hotel analytics firm STR announced Thursday.
U.S. occupancy in July declined 1 percent year over year to 68.2 percent, according to STR, marking the fifth straight month of occupancy decline. U.S. ADR dipped 0.1 percent year over year to $161.90, and RevPAR dropped 1.1 percent to $110.37.
STR said its top 25 markets “showed higher occupancy and ADR than all other markets.”
For the fourth straight month, New York City registered the highest June occupancy rate among STR’s top 25 U.S. cities at 85.2 percent, though that figure was down 1.1 percent year over year. New Orleans in July for the third straight month posted the lowest occupancy rate among STR’s top 25 at 53.9 percent, followed by Phoenix at 55.3 percent.
STR parent CoStar and Tourism Economics earlier this month downgraded their U.S. hotel forecast for both full-year 2025 and 2026, citing lower demand.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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Most global regions will see moderate hotel rate growth in 2026, with geopolitical instability and uncertainty around U.S. tariff policy “keeping a lid” on sharper increases, according to American Express Global Business Travel’s Hotel Monitor, published on Wednesday.
The Monitor—based on data from Amex GBT’s data lake along with inflation and GDP forecasts from the International Monetary Fund, modeled with open-source software Prophet—projects North America will be among those regions with moderate rate growth, particularly in the U.S., which could see a downturn in inbound demand. The Monitor forecasts that Mexico also will see only moderate increases with a strong hotel construction pipeline, while Canada’s rate growth could be higher. Toronto has the highest projected rate increase for the region in the Monitor, up 5.8 percent year over year, followed by Chicago (4.2 percent), New York and San Francisco (each 4 percent).
Amex GBT projects “relatively stable” hotel prices in Europe, though certain cities will have sharper increases due to changing policies. Short-term rental restrictions in Amsterdam—which also is seeing VAT increases—and Barcelona could help push up rates in those cities by 11 percent and 5.1 percent year over year, respectively, according to the Monitor. Rate increases also are likely to be higher in the U.K. due to increases to employer national insurance contributions, which will increase the wages that hoteliers pay employees. Amex GBT projects rates will increase 4.2 percent year over year in London, 3.9 percent in Manchester and 5.7 percent in Edinburgh.
In the Asia/Pacific region, Amex GBT projects strong rate growth for India, though not as high as rate increases this year. That includes a 6.4 percent year-over-year rate increase in Bengaluru, a 5.7 percent increase in Hyderabad and a 5.3 percent increase in Mumbai. The Monitor projects more moderate increases in China with some cities seeing rate declines, including Guangzhou, where it projects rates will decline 0.7 percent year over year.
Latin America hotels should have a “strong 2026” with growing demand from international visitors, according to Amex GBT. The Monitor projects rates to increase year over year by 5.6 percent in Buenos Aires, 5 percent in Rio de Janeiro, 2 percent in Bogotá and 0.9 percent in Santiago.
In the Middle East and Africa, Amex GBT projects moderate rate increases due to a strong construction pipeline in the Middle East. That includes a year-over-year rate increase of 3.1 percent in Abu Dhabi, 1.4 percent in Doha, 2 percent in Dubai and 2.3 percent in Riyadh. The Monitor projects a sharper rate increase of 4.7 percent year over year in Cape Town, which has “high occupancy and a limited supply of hotels with security accreditation,” according to the Monitor.
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French hospitality giant Accor has named former Marriott International executive Ranju Alex as CEO of its South Asia region, which is comprised by India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, effective Oct. 1, the company announced Wednesday.
Alex has spent nearly 15 years in Marriott positions in India, culminating in her most recent position as regional vice president for South Asia. She has an additional 15 years of experience with Oberoi Hotels and Resorts.
Accor earlier this year announced it planned a joint venture with Indian conglomerate InterGlobe Enterprises that would manage both companies’ hotel assets in India. The companies continue to await regulatory approval for the JV. Gaurav Bhushan, who serves as CEO of Accor’s Lifestyle & Leisure brands and who would chair the JV once approved, in a statement cited Alex’s “wealth of rich experience, skills and relationships,” adding that “we look forward to building the foremost hospitality platform in the region under her leadership.”
Accor has about 70 hotels in the Southeast Asia region and an additional 30 in the development pipeline, according to the company.
A spokesperson confirmed to BTN that Accor COO for Asia Garth Simmons would remain in that role, with responsibilities outside of the four countries that make up the South Asia region.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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Overall business travel cost increases accelerated in the second quarter, with hotel rates in major cities for business travel expected to rise further in 2026, according to American Express Global Business Travel’s Business Travel Pulse report, published on Tuesday.
The Pulse’s business travel price index—based on data from Amex GBT’s data lake combined with analysis by its consulting team—shows that business travel prices were up 2.6 percent year over year in the second quarter, up from a 0.6 percent year-over-year increase in the first quarter. The index score gives airfares a weight of 65 percent, hotel rates a weight of 25 percent and the remaining 10 percent split evenly between rail and car rental prices.
The report also highlighted the cities that are projected to see the largest increases in hotel prices in 2026, using its data along with inflation and GDP forecasts from the International Monetary Fund and modeled with open-source software Prophet. In North America, Amex GBT projects the largest increases will be in Toronto (5.8 percent) and New York (4 percent). In Europe, Amex GBT projects hotel prices will increase 4.8 percent year over year in Madrid, 4.2 percent year over year in London, 3.7 percent year over year in Berlin and 2.4 percent year over year in Paris.
Other global cities in the report projected to have hotel cost increases above 4 percent year over year include Buenos Aires (5.6 percent), Rio de Janeiro (5 percent), Cape Town (4.7 percent) and Bengaluru (6.4 percent).
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Apartment-style accommodations provider Sonder Holdings has released its delayed first-quarter results, in which it detailed lower year-over-year revenue and a sharp decrease in its bookable inventory.
Sonder for the past 18 months has delayed filing quarterly financial reports with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission after announcing in March 2024 that it had discovered “accounting errors related to the valuation and impairment of operating lease right of use assets and related items” for 2022 and 2023.
Nasdaq has warned the delays have risked Sonder’s listing, and the accommodations provider this week noted it had received on Aug. 20 another such warning from Nasdaq concerning its delayed second-quarter filing.
Sonder in its first-quarter filing noted its live bookable units at the end of March totaled about 9,400, down about 500 units from the end of 2024. The company’s bookable nights were 858,000, a decrease of 21 percent year over year. Sonder in 2024 began an effort to reduce room supply, exiting buildings and leases representing thousands of units.
Along with the supply decrease, Sonder’s first-quarter occupancy rate increased 7.1 percentage points year over year to 83 percent. Average daily rate increased $4 to $167, and revenue per available room increased 13 percent to $139.
Sonder’s overall first-quarter revenue, however, declined 11 percent year over year to $118.9 million. Its net loss was $56.5 million, compared with a net loss of $50.5 million one year prior.
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Dallas-based hotel company Omni Hotels & Resorts, which has 50 properties open in the
U.S. and Canada, is investing heavily in its product and service as it looks to
ascend the hotel service-tier and capture more of the corporate market. Omni
chief commercial officer Jeff Doane, who
joined the company last year, spoke with BTN managing editor Chris Davis
last month at the Global Business Travel Association convention in Denver about
the company’s luxury ambitions, its push for small-to-midsize businesses and the
effects of macroeconomic uncertainty. Edited excerpts follow.
BTN: You’ve been
at Omni about a year and a half now. How has the experience been?
Jeff Doane: I
love it. My background includes serving as chief commercial officer at Accor
after it acquired Fairmont in 2016. I had worked for Fairmont for a number of
years, and probably the best experience was helping move Fairmont from a
four-star, upper-upscale brand into the luxury space, creating
more of an experiential type of brand. Omni is trying to kind of do the same
thing, and that really appealed to me. The culture here is strong, and everybody’s
going in the same direction and is focused on the same things.
BTN: How does
that upmarket strategy translate to the business travel segment?
Doane: You want
to tailor your product around the needs of your customer. There’s a service
experience that’s expected when you’re in that four- to five-star space. Then moving
from one that provides just that to a brand that’s creating more unique and
rewarding and personal experiences for travelers to me is the difference
between four and four-and-a-half stars. Then it escalates right to Ritz-Carlton
and Four Seasons where they have such attention on the guests. We want to be
right in the heart of that luxury space.
From a product standpoint, we’ve invested $2.5 billion in
our hotels over the past three to five years, and we’re poised to do the same
in the next three to five. We know that business traveler wants great Wi-Fi,
great breakfast, great gym, great sleep experience. Those are the things that
we’re really focused on in terms of specifically for the business traveler. And
that experiential side is, why are you in town and do you want a foam pillow or
a feather pillow? Do you want to be on a low floor or a high floor? What are
the things that specifically turn the needle for you?
BTN: Does that
change the corporate customers you’re targeting, either on a corporate or
individual level?
Doane: Within
every company there’s levels of travel. You may be at the midscale end of the
market, and you may be working with Amazon, but Ritz-Carlton is working with
Amazon too. So your customer ends up being the same, where you fall in that
spectrum determines who ends up staying in those hotels. Certain customers will
be like, ‘We just started working with you. This is fantastic. We love your
product.’ So it’s new to him. I think there’s a lot of that kind of opportunity
for us, but I think there’s also a lot of companies that we’re working with
where maybe a different traveler within their organization stays with us.
BTN: Along those
lines, all of the big hotel companies in the U.S. are multi-brand up and down
the line, including luxury. How do you carve a niche for yourself?
Doane: We’ve
always said we’re not replacing Marriott or Hilton or Hyatt. They have so many
dots on the map and cater to every traveler. It would be naive for us to think
that was possible. But we are a complementary brand for people who want higher-touch
service, and we think that we can win people over once they experience this.
BTN: The
macroeconomic picture has been volatile this year. What are you hearing from corporate
clients? Are they cutting back?
Doane: They’re
just plugging along. A lot of our customers say they’ve had a pretty good first
half of the year and a lot say the second half is going to be like the first
half.
[On tariffs,] we have to come with some conclusion on this
or something’s got to give. [In a session on GBTA’s Business Travel Index] the
speaker said if the tariffs end up at 20 percent, there will be an impact. I
don’t know that there’s not another way to look at it. So you’re hoping that
cooler heads prevail and it ends up in 3 percent to 5 percent range. The longer
the uncertainty lasts, the more it’s in people’s heads.
BTN: Are requests
for proposals or how buyers communicate changing?
Doane: We’re
seeing more customers saying, you know what, we work with the big brands and we
have that kind of relationship with them, but we’re looking to try to figure
out how we complement that. How do we create a more diversified set of options
for our traveler? This year, year to date, business travel revenue has grown
for us by 17 percent and volume has grown 10 percent
I think it’s the customer saying, ‘I don’t like to be so
boxed in.’ And we’re a little bit more of a one-on-one relationship with the
customer and that’s real important too because they like to know who to call.
BTN: You launched
the Omni
Select Business program in April. What’s the early verdict?
Doane: A year ago
I came to this show thinking we could be better at business travel. We
learned that a number of the big brands have those kinds of programs just for
small to medium-sized companies. Well, Omni is a small to medium-sized hotel
company, so I think we’re a natural for that.
We’re real happy with how it’s progressing. We thought 50 to
75 accounts would be a good start, and we’re already at 200.
BTN: Does its
success give you any ideas in terms of enhancing it?
Doane: We came
out with a 9 percent discount off of our normal rates, and we realized that
probably wasn’t rewarding enough. So just recently we changed it to 12 percent.
BTN: Are you
integrating AI into your RFP process or operations?
Doane: Not in
RFPs yet, but we’ve moved our reservation system to the cloud. There’s a
certain amount of AI involved in that in terms of knowing your guests and
understanding them. We are working with a company called BlueConic to better
understand our guests. If we know what a traveler wants from us, we can take
better care of them and develop those personalized offers.
BTN: How are you
approaching 2026 rate strategies?
Doane: The latest
projection I saw from CBRE was like 1.8 percent to 2 percent growth for next
year. [Note: CBRE
in May projected full-year 2025 U.S. average daily rate to increase 1.2
percent year over year and revenue per available room to increase 1.3 percent.]
I’m not sure we’re back to stabilized occupancy altogether in the United
States. I don’t know that there’s enough pressure for hotel companies to really
try to drive rate. You’ll try and move it to accommodate cost increases. We’re at
that stage of trying to get our foot in the door with a lot of companies and
try and expose our product to them and their travelers. And that’s not the time
where you’re pushing for double-digit increases, you know?
BTN: What’s ahead
on the development front?
Doane: We have a
beautiful brand-new hotel opening in Fort Lauderdale in October, right at the
marina and convention center. We are working on a project in Raleigh, N.C.,
again right at the convention center. Same thing down in New Orleans. And then
there’s a bunch of other projects that we’re talking to people about.
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businesstravelnews@ntmllc.com (Business Travel News)
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The U.S. General Services Administration for fiscal year 2026 will hold its standard allowable per diem rates for federal travelers steady at 2015 levels, the agency announced Friday.
GSA’s standard lodging rate for the 2026 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1 and runs through Sept. 30, 2026, is $110, the same as it is in fiscal year 2025. GSA’s standard meals and incidentals allowance for the 2026 fiscal year is $68, likewise unchanged.
It’s the first time in five years that GSA has not increased the per diem year over year. GSA in a statement said the decision not to raise the per diem reflects “the federal government’s commitment to being a responsible steward of taxpayer dollars,” adding that the steady per diems “are made possible by the reduction from the historically high inflationary pressures seen during the previous administration.”
“GSA’s decision ensures cost-effective travel reimbursement while supporting the mission-critical mobility of the federal workforce,” GSA office of government-wide policy associate administrator Larry Allen said in a statement.
The rate, which applies to federal government travelers as well as those traveling on government-contracted business, applies to everywhere in the U.S. not designated as a “non-standard area,” which have per diems higher than the standard rate. GSA for fiscal year 2026 will hold the number of non-standard areas steady from 2025 at 296.
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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Sonder Holdings CFO Michael Hughes has resigned from his position, effective Aug. 15, the apartment-style accommodations provider announced Thursday.
Hughes, a longtime hospitality industry financial executive, joined Sonder in January. Interim Sonder CEO Janice Sears will assume CFO duties for the company on an interim basis as well, the company announced.
Sears became interim CEO in June upon the resignation of co-founder Francis Davidson. The company in a Thursday statement said it expected to appoint a permanent CEO by the end of 2025, and that it expected that person to be “actively involved” in the search for a new CFO.
Sonder since March 2024 has delayed filing financial results with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, citing “accounting errors related to the valuation and impairment of operating lease right of use assets and related items” for 2022 and 2023, and has not filed first- or second-quarter results this year. Nasdaq has warned the delays have risked Sonder’s listing, and in a Thursday SEC filing Sonder indicated it expected another such warning concerning its delayed Q1 report.
Sonder last week announced it had raised about $24.5 million through the sale of promissory notes, which Sears in a statement said would “help Sonder execute our strategic plan and position the Company for long-term growth and value creation.”
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cdavis@thebtngroup.com (Chris Davis)
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