Hotstat’s Data Suggests Hotels End 2021 Closer To Pre-Pandemic Levels

The year 2021 ended with the global hospitality industry inching ever closer to the 2019 pre-pandemic levels. This is what Hotstat’s 2021 hotel performance report seems to suggest. The report calls 2019 levels as ‘the recognized baseline of recovery’. The good thing is that we have seen remarkable recovery and improvement in almost all the major hospitality markets of the world including USA, Europe, Middle East and Asia.

The experts are saying that we may not see a total end of Covid19 anytime soon. The virus may continue to exist but in a less dangerous form, similar to flu virus, and we have to learn to live with it.

“It appears that COVID-19 will not be fully transitory but exist in an endemic state, meaning collectively we will have to live with it, similar to the flu,” said David Eisen, the report’s editor and director of hotel intelligence.

The worst phase of the pandemic may be over but there have been some drastic changes that have happened in the hotel industry in these past two years. Hotel operations may never be the same anymore. The pandemic has probably changed a few things forever for all of us.

For example, the labor crisis has forced hoteliers to change the way they operate. Housekeeping has been one area which has seen many a changes lately –  at the onset of the pandemic, daily room cleanings were halted in consideration of guest and employee safety more than anything else, but the same trend is continuing now because of shortage of workers.

There has also been a sort of resetting and reshuffling of the whole industry, with some hotels closing their doors while few others emerging bigger and better than before. Cost structure has also changed.

While room bookings and revenues seem to be on the rise, the industry is facing different sort of challenges now, with the two of the biggest challenges right now being labor shortage and global supply chain disruption. These two issues could have a major impact on the recovery in 2022 and beyond.