Managing hotel occupancy: how to cope with seasonality?

Some hotel owners believe that tourist demand and occupancy are seasonal. However, according to Andrey Marenchuk, executive director of Ribas Hotels Group, the seasonality indicator does not work on high-quality facilities.

“Sometimes it happens that the management of a hotel with 25 rooms is handled by a full staff: chief accountant, head of sales, marketer. All this is actually an additional administrative burden. Your reporting is not important to the guest. Therefore, divide what a tourist needs (cost) and what your administrative burden is. And you will be surprised when you find out that the latter takes about 50% of expenses,” Andrei Marenchuk said.

It is important to review the processes that can be optimized in order to reduce the administrative burden. Try to balance the expenditure and revenue parts. Also, sometimes there are situations when it is possible to integrate online services to optimize the number of staff.

“When designing our hotels, we, based on experience, initially create them optimized. For example, when launching the Ribas Karpaty we abandoned the position of the SPA administrator, replacing it with a counter with clean towels,” shared Andrey Marenchuk. Also, based on a rational approach to cost optimization, in the summer only one doorman works in the staff of the Ribas Karpaty hotel (due to the fewer things tourists have). However, in winter, when guests arrive with several suitcases, two doormen are on shift.

Another foreign example is the citizenM hotel chain. Its target audience is rational travelers. In this regard, the operator has applied this principle in their hotels: the guest chooses when he needs cleaning in the room, and whether it is needed in the first place. The cost of the room depends on it.

So, in order to balance the budget, and make sure it does not affect your service, analyze what is really important for your guests – for which they are willing to pay an increased room rate.

Create the right products, then they will be balanced on the budget in the future. And in order to avoid mistakes, you should contact specialists – management companies who can do it for you. Ribas Hotels Group is always ready to optimize the operation of your hotel.

Subscribe to our blog to keep up to date with the latest information on the Ukrainian hospitality market!