As we celebrate Hotel Management’s 150th anniversary year throughout 2025, the editorial team will be looking back to see what has changed over a century and a half—and what has stayed the same.
In Hotel Management’s Oct. 17, 2011 issue, Robert Mandelbaum—then director of research information services for Colliers PKF Hospitality Research—examined how the U.S. hotel pipeline was poised to grow in 2012 and beyond. He also discussed how limited supply and growing demand can drive occupancy and average daily rate)
“Based on the September 2011 editions of PKF Hospitality Research’s Hotel Horizons forecast reports, the lodging inventory in 50 of the nation’s largest markets is forecast to increase 0.9 percent in 2012, or a total of 18,938 net new guestrooms,” Mandelbaum wrote at the time. “This compares to a national forecast for a 0.6 percent increase, or 33,159 rooms.
“With continued limited supply growth beyond 2012, major market occupancy is forecast to reach 67.8 percent. This sample has not seen aggregate occupancy levels this high since the mid-1990s.
“PKF-HR is forecasting lodging demand in these 50 markets to increase 2.5 percent in 2012, resulting in an average occupancy rate for the year of 65.8 percent.”
And despite political shifts, natural disasters and a global pandemic, recent numbers are not terribly different from more than a decade ago. In the October 2024 issue of Hotel Management, Mandelbaum—now research director for CBRE Hotels Research, which acquired PKF Consulting in 2014—reported that the demand for hotel rooms in the major cities is expected to increase 2.3 percent. This, in turn, would result in occupancy growing by 0.9 percent. As such, he continued, “average daily rates in the major markets are projected to increase by 2.4 percent in 2025, which is greater than the national average of 1.8 percent.”
This article was originally published in the February/March edition of Hotel Management magazine. Subscribe here.