Today marks a milestone here at HotelNewsNow.com. It’s been two years since we launched the site and began our journey to deliver the most relevant hotel industry information in a timely manner.
To commemorate the event, I’m cleaning my office. It’s amazing how much one accumulates in that time.
Two years ago, the world was reeling from the crash of the financial markets. Our headlines focused on “chaos,” “pain” and “troubled times.” Apparently, I focused on collecting napkins from Chipotle and Post-It notes with story ideas.
While the hotel industry is not quite out of the woods, it’s safe to say things have gotten better. The hotel demand comeback is clear. The Asia/Pacific region has seen the strongest return of revenue per available room (+22.7% in July). Real estate transactions are transitioning from the exception to the rule. Pricing power is becoming a reality.
HotelNewsNow.com has been busy learning, reporting and adapting during that time, too. The 4,000 figure I threw out in the headline refers to the number of articles housed on our site. (Technically, we’ve got 4,033 as I write this). That’s 5.48 items for each day of the past two years. As a special look back at those archives, here are the top 10 most popular articles by author:
• Jeff Higley, editorial director: “New STR hotel forecast: 2011 can’t get here too soon.”
• Patrick Mayock, features editor: “5 questions every revenue manager should be asking.”
• Shawn A. Turner, finance editor: “Starwood: Top Hilton execs knew about corporate espionage.”
• HotelNewsNow.com staff: “Hotel Acquisition Funds List.” (Free login required.)
• William Edmundson, columnist: “8 things to look for when searching for a GM.”
• Daniel H. Lesser, columnist: “Hotel capitalization: Caveat emptor” and “Hotels never stabilize.”
• Joel Ross, columnist: “Industry uses wrong metrics to project RevPAR.”
• Newswire: “STR releases updated forecasts for 2010, 2011” and “STR releases 2008, 2009 and 2010 projections."
While I’ve briefly paused to reflect, HotelNewsNow.com certainly is not sitting still. In fact, next week Jeff Higley will be reporting on his exclusive interview with Chris Nassetta after visiting Hilton Worldwide headquarters. Patrick Mayock will be bringing back exciting news from The Lodging Conference in Phoenix. I’ll be reporting from Wyndham Hotel Group’s conference in Las Vegas. Shawn A. Turner is headed to Colombia for the South American Hotel & Tourism Investment Conference.
We’re also working on some exciting changes to HotelNewsNow.com. The redesign of the site, which aims to make news viewing easier than ever, is slated to be finished in early November. (Feel free to tell us what you think!) The editorial staff will welcome a new team member later this month as well.
So, to all of our readers and contributors: Thanks for making the past two years fun and gratifying. We look forward to many more adventurous years of hotel industry interaction.
Plus, with my office cleaned I’ve got a refreshed list of stories to follow up on!
