Market Trends

🏠 Grand Hyatt Atlanta in Buckhead completed its renovation, collaborating with DLR Group and designONE studio. The project includes new dining spaces, reimagined guestrooms, a 24-hour market, and a modern phone booth "The Nest". "The Fabled" lounge and Cassis restaurant offer crafted cocktails and breakfast, respectively, while "Le Petit Chef" introduced in February 2025 provides a dinner theater experience. The hotel boasts 42,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor spaces, including a Grand Ballroom for up to 1,000 guests, meeting rooms with Wi-Fi and AV, and an outdoor West Terrace with a garden and firepits.

🏨 Hunter Hotel Advisors announced the closing of $31.47 million in financing for three hotel properties in Atlanta, Georgia. Adeel Amin secured the deals: Home2 Suites El Paso Airport got $14.37 million (CMBS), Hampton Inn & Suites Houston Medical Center NRG Park $12.82 million (SBA 504), and Fairfield Inn Columbia Northwest/Harbison $4.28 million (SBA 7(a)). Notable is the Home2 Suites deal with a 12 percent debt yield and a ~68 percent loan-to-cost ratio. Despite market challenges, the firm provided tailored financial solutions.

🏨 U.S. hotel industry saw positive yearly comparisons through March 29, 2025. Occupancy increased by 4.4% to 65.1%, ADR rose to $161.65 (up 2.5%), and RevPAR grew by 7.0% to $105.19. St. Louis topped the Top 25 Markets with occupancy up 27% to 76.8%, ADR up 15.8% to $138.00, and RevPAR up 47% to $105.94. Conversely, New York City and Oahu experienced RevPAR declines of 9% ($229.99) and 5.4% ($217.74), respectively.

🏦 Mandarin Oriental now manages the iconic Hôtel Lutetia, rebranded as Mandarin Oriental Lutetia, Paris, joining its existing property on Rue Saint-Honoré. As the sole Palace hotel on Paris' Left Bank, it boasts a rich history since 1910, housing notable figures such as Picasso and Matisse. Following a 2018 renovation by Jean-Michel Wilmotte, the hotel merges tradition with modern luxury, featuring the Parisian Brasserie Lutetia, Akasha Wellness, and Bar Josephine. Owners, the Akirov family, share Mandarin Oriental's vision for luxury hospitality.

🎭 Maurice Ajanaku, Chief Experience Officer at Maison la Matrone, advises brands like Diageo, Accor, and citizenM on creating lasting emotional connections. "The Ritual Advantage" is a Strategic Playbook focusing on emotion, memory, and meaning for brand loyalty. It offers a 6-step framework for designing high-touch rituals, showcases 7 iconic case studies, including Hermès and Patek Philippe, and includes downloadable Brand Ritual Design Worksheets. The guide underlines the strategic importance of ritual in the luxury sector.

🏨 City Lodge Hotels has 7,381 rooms across 58 hotels in South Africa, with additional locations in Windhoek (Namibia), Gaborone (Botswana), and Maputo (Mozambique). The group offers a range of bed options including single, double, queen, ¾ beds, and king-size beds with mattress converters. Pillows come in two types per sleeping position and specialty pillows are available on request. Mattresses are cleaned quarterly, and bedding is left untucked. Linen is changed for every new guest and every three days for stay-overs, using eco-friendly detergents. The hotels also offer bespoke 'Bedtime Stories for Business People' at bedtimestories.co.za. COO Lindiwe Sangweni-Siddo emphasizes the group's commitment to quality sleep and additional amenities including meeting spaces, fitness rooms, and pools at select hotels.

🍽 In hospitality, frontline roles typically have higher turnover rates than management due to the career ladder structure. Successful strategies to reduce turnover include competitive wages, performance bonuses, self-scheduling, improved PTO policies, mental health support, career development, internal promotions, and a strong company culture. Economic uncertainty and efficiency improvements like self-service kiosks result in cautious hiring in the food service industry.

📌 Radisson Hotel Group plans expansion across Europe with over 37,000 new rooms globally. In 2024, the group had a historic year with numerous hotel signings and openings. It leads in the upper-upscale segment in Europe with brands like Radisson Blu, Radisson Collection, and Radisson RED. New collaborations include the Porsche Design Tower in Stuttgart and Manchester City Football Club in the UK. In 2025, Radisson reopened the Radisson Collection Hotel in Berlin and will launch HARBR Hotel Heilbronn (127 rooms) and HARBR Hotel Konstanz (76 rooms) in Germany, adding to its existing 64 hotels in the country. Four new properties in Norway and an entry into the Spanish and Portuguese markets mark the company's growth. In Paris, two flagship hotels are under development, and the Medlock Hotel at the Manchester City Football Club's Etihad Campus will open in 2026 with over 400 rooms. Radisson is also expanding in the Middle East, Asia, and the Pacific, with significant growth in India to reach over 200 hotels in operation or under development.

📍 Mabrian's analysis for 2025 shows the top nine Middle East destinations for growth: Türkiye, Egypt, Jordan, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait, and Bahrain, with a collective 12% share of global inbound air seats for the year. The UAE (+6.1%) and Türkiye (+6.3%) closely follow the global average growth of international air seats (+6.5%) over the next six months but fall slightly behind for the full year (+3.4% for UAE, +4.2% for Türkiye, compared to the +6% global average). Saudi Arabia stands out with a year-end projection of 43.1 million inbound seats, marking an +8% growth over six months, and +5.2% in 2025. Since 2019, Saudi Arabia and Egypt have seen substantial increases in international air connectivity, with +38% and +51% respectively. Jordan expects a +13% increase in inbound seats, reaching 6.5 million, while Egypt anticipates reaching 28 million inbound seats, an increase of +11.4% over six months, and +8.1% throughout 2025.