“Hotel guests have generally been happier with their hotel experience in the past 12 months vs. the prior year as room rates dropped and crowds thinned, according to J.D. Power and Assoc.’s latest study that measures how well hotel chains satisfy their customers.”

The reasons for increased satisfaction according to the article:

“The travel downturn: With fewer people on the road, people who did travel found emptier hotels, which meant they encountered less competition for the treadmill in the fitness center, or less of a chance to stand in line at a busy convention hotel.”

“Cost: Hotel rates fell in the last 12 months, and customers generally felt more satisfied with what they received for their money.”

“Hotels operations: Hotels genuinely got better at pleasing their customers in the past year due to stiff competition for guests. “All of them are focused on improving guest satisfaction,” Schwartz says. Almost all of the chains increased their scores on a year-over-year basis – and not a single hotel chain saw its score drop significantly, he says.”

Our take:  It is somewhat surprising to see increased satisfaction as we are all battling with being understaffed.  Most hotels that we talk with have similar or higher occupancy but have much lower staffing levels because the ADRs are so low.  We believe that much of it comes down to cost.  Many guests are more satisfied simply because the rooms cost less and there is much more perceived value.

The top score was a tie between Ritz-Carlton in the ‘fanciest’ category and Homewood Suites in the ‘upscale’ category.  The Homewood Suites scored an excellent in value and the Ritz scored very good. 

Here are the rankings for a couple of the categories:

Fanciest – 1. Ritz-Carlton  2. Grand Hyatt

Luxury – 1. Renaissance  2. Embassy Suites  3. Marriott  4. Westin  5. Hilton  6. Hyatt  7. Doubletree  8. Sheraton

Upscale – 1. Homewood Suites  2. Walt Disney Resorts  3. Residence Inn  4. Hilton Garden Inn  5. Harrah’s  6. Springhill Suites  7. Hyatt Place  8. Courtyard by Marriott  9. Wyndham  10. Crowne Plaza  11. Radisson

Some interesting observations:

Out of 48 brands, only one hotel, the Ritz-Carlton, scored excellent on service.  Only 10 others scored very good.  The other 37 hotels scored average or worse on service.  Ouch.

Many full service brands like Doubletree, Sheraton, Wyndham, Crowne Plaza, and Radisson, are falling behind the limited service brands in overall satisfaction. 

Guest are experiencing a surprising number of problems.  Out of the 48 brands, not a single brand scored excellent, and only 7 brands scored very good.  The chain with the least amount of problems (Drury Inn & Suites) still had 14 percent of guests reporting a problem!  The chain with the most problems had 47 percent of guests reporting a problem.

Sounds like we all have some work to do on our guest service!

The article features some high profile hotel closures such as the W Hotel in San Diego and the Ritz-Carlton in Las Vegas.  The article also mentions how 76 California hotels have already fallen into foreclosure and that 330 out of the states 10,000 hotels have defaulted on their mortgage payments in the last year. 

As far as the cuts, the article really only mentions that Concierges are being replaced by lower cost employees and some hotels are changing their approach to food and beverage.

We have noticed quite a few changes at hotels over the last year or so to cut costs or drive revenues.  A few of the changes we see:

• Many hotels have closed restaurants and bars.  Instead of having 2 or 3, many have closed all but one restaurant and one bar.
• Hotels have cut costs and gone green by eliminating newspapers and printed folios.
• Parking rates are on the rise.  Many hotels have increased the parking fees for both self parking and valet parking.
• Breakfast buffets have really been changing.  The prices have increased and the quality and selection of food has decreased.
• Overall staffing has really decreased.  Many hotels have eliminated positions like bellmen or concierges.  Also, we see longer lines at check in because the hotels have less GSAs with similar occupancy as in the past.

What are you doing to survive?  Please post in our comment section!

Our take:  We agree with the travel industry analyst who said ‘it is the absolutely the wrong decision to make at a time when hotel demand is down from corporate business, conferences and leisure.”  It will save cash, but the timing is very poor.

In a follow up post, found here, three other brands seemed to distance themselves from Hilton’s strategy. 

Our favorite comment was from IHG’s Jim Abrahamson who said that rewards members are twice as profitable and elite-level members are 12 times as profitable.  He goes on to say “if one platinum-level member leaves us, we’d have to go out and find 12 new customers just to replace that one.”

Smith Travel Research is predicting no significant improvement for the hotel industry until 2011 at the earliest.

Our take:  This story has been picked up by many news outlets and is being used to show how badly hotels are hurting.  The main problem in that area is the 500 new hotel rooms that opened recently.  We think the hotel is just being smart and planning ahead.  Even in good times, many hotels close floors or even entire towers for weeks or months at a time.  Closing floors can save a lot of money on cleaning and energy costs if the demand for the rooms is not there. 

The story does a good job of reminding us all to take a look at our upcoming forecasts.  Do we have an opportunity to close floors and reduce costs?

October 7th – Anaheim

October 15th – Los Angeles (LAX Area)

October 20th – Los Angeles (Downtown LA)

The first 10 people to register will save $20.

Our take:  Good news for hotels.  Time-shares have been popping up everywhere in the last 10 years and have really overbuilt in many vacation destinations causing too much competition.  While customer satisfaction has really improved with time-shares, they are still one of the most expensive ways to take a vacation.  Time-shares tend to lose 80 percent of their value the day you buy one.

Have a time-share and disagree?  Post your comments below.

Read the full article here.