We spoke with Chip Rogers, president and CEO of the American Hotel & Lodging Association (AHLA), about the affects of COVID-19 and what’s in store for the hotel industry.
What is the impact of COVID-19 on the industry?
If you doubled what happened after 9/11 and the financial crisis in 2008, you might be approaching where we are now. No one could have predicted this. You can prepare for downturns, but you can’t prepare for a cliff, and that’s what this has been.
What are the major pain points for hoteliers?
It’s cash flow. When you go from 67 percent occupancy down to the 20s, that’s devastation. There’s no revenue. Consequently, thousands of hotels have shut their doors. A month-plus ago, there were 900,000 jobs open in our industry. Today, about 75 percent of people are not working.
After the $2 trillion relief package, what are next steps you’re taking to help the industry?
We’re focused on liability protection for business owners. We want to make sure small business owners aren’t targeted for trivial lawsuits that may have absolutely nothing to do with the virus. The second part is continuing to work on revisions to the Paycheck Protection Program along with additional assistance for small business owners.
How can hotels ensure a safe and clean environment?
We launched Safe Stay, which sets forth the guidelines on how hotels should be cleaning, the products they should be using, the social distancing that needs to take place in the hotel, the use of technology to have contactless transactions, and what to do with foodservice. It will continue to be the industry standard as we’re going through this.
What is your outlook on recovery?
Leisure travel will bounce back by the end of summer, but the lucrative convention, meetings, and conference travel is not going to be back until next year. While occupancy rates will continue to creep up as people begin to feel it’s safe to travel, revenue will struggle for the remainder of the year. It will go down as the worst year on record for hotels. The good thing is that great need creates ingenuity, and we’re seeing that in our space.
Hear more on HD’s “What I’ve Learned” podcast.
