Conn. lodgings take $500M hit in pandemic year
After tallying more than $1 billion in revenue in 2019, Connecticut hotels booked just $532 million last year according to survey responses from a large percentage of venues statewide.
Room occupancies at
Connecticut hotels plummeted last year to just above 40 percent on average, according to a census of the industry by Tennesseebased market research firm STR, down from 63 percent on average in 2019. Room reservations peaked in
August at 56 percent, down from 2019 summer occupancies above 73 percent.
Connecticut trailed the average occupancy rate nationally last year of 44 percent, which STR reported was the lowest on record. Adding up all rooms and days in the year, Connecticut hotels were stuck with more than a billion empty “room nights.” This is far beyond the low point of the Great Recession which was 786 million room nights.
In its annual assessment of the state of the industry released Thursday, the American Hotel & Lodging Association, or AHLA, stated leisure travel is showing signs of a comeback, with Saturday bookings running well ahead of weekdays. The association added it does not see business events coming back meaningful until a full return to normal office operations by employers.
In an earlier report, AHLA estimated that as many at least 180 Connecticut hotels would be at risk of closing without government aid. The owner of Sheraton Stamford Hotel elected to close the 380-room facility last November, with plans to redevelop it including the possibility of congregate housing.
President Joe Biden has yet to propose any specific bail out of travel businesses like hotels and cruise lines, with a $900 billion stimulus package passed in December carving out funds for airports, rail transit and bus lines.
Hotels throughout the state have received assistance through the federal Paycheck Protection Program, including several in city centers like the Stamford Marriott Hotel & Spa which tallied $1.4 million to keep 100 people on the payroll. Other downtown hotels receiving PPP funding included the Bridgeport Holiday Inn on Main Street; the Blake Hotel in New Haven; and the Goodwin Hotel in Hartford.
A new round of PPP funding opened up this week to businesses that have seen revenue drop at least 25 percent, with PPP loans forgiven by the U.S. Department of the Treasury if businesses do not lay off workers during terms set by the agreements.
Speaking Friday to members of the Connecticut Business & Industry Association, Gov. Ned Lamont did not address any possibility of further state assistance to hotels and by extension tourism. This month, the state distributed $35 million in grants to hospitality businesses covering restaurants, hotels and tourism.
As new COVID-19 cases began spiking in December, Marriott International CEO Arne Sorenson told investment analysts at a Dec. 1 conference that he remains hopeful for a rebound as mass vaccinations accelerate globally. Sheraton was one of several hotel brands Marriott picked up in its 2016 acquisition of Stamfordbased Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide.
“We should see a shift towards the environment in which the virus is receded into the rear view mirror, and we’re then looking at ... what’s the demand?” Sorenson said. “How long does it take for people to get back on the road? How long does it take for the meetings to get booked?”