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Starwood Hotels 2010 Year-End Statistics and Elite Cost Estimates

Starwood Hotels reported its Q4 2010 financials yesterday. I am not a stock guy. I like the room rate and hotel numbers data from these reports to get an idea of where travel trends are happening.

Loyalty Traveler Quick Observations on year-end 2010 compared to year-end 2009:

  • Occupancy for Starwood Hotels is up in every global region, particularly Asia Pacific (over 7.0 percentage points) and Latin America (6.7).
  • Africa is one region where Starwood Hotels showed slower occupancy growth at 1.9 compared to the next lowest growth region here in the U.S. / North America 4.8 and Europe at 4.9 in the mid-range occupancy growth for 2010.
  • W Hotels is 2010 highest performing brand in Starwood Hotels at 4.7% Average Daily Rate (ADR) increase and 9.4 occupancy increase. W hotels also leads all Starwood brands for highest average occupancy 73.7%. W hotels are located in major cities and business is coming back. The two W Chicago hotels were packed with suits during my week in Chicago October 2010.
  • St. Regis and Luxury Collection are reported together by Starwood Hotels. These luxury brands had weakest performance of Starwood brands with lowest overall average occupancy at 62.9% and the greatest room rate decline (down 1.9%). Still, Average Daily Rate of $296 for these two luxury brands was more than double the room rate for Sheraton (ADR $143) and 26% higher than W hotels (ADR $234).
  • St. Regis and Luxury Collection had lowest occupancy percentage of any Starwood Hotels brand at 62.9%. However, this is a rise of 5.2 percentage points and the best occupancy rise of any brand behind W Hotels (9.4). Starwood luxury segment hotels are seeing a comeback. But the luxury segment also suffered the biggest downturn in the past two years after the ‘AIG effect’ triggered by the late-2008 conference at St. Regis Monarch Beach, Orange County, California.
  • Average room rates in Europe, Middle East and Africa have declined since 2009 and are still  dropping for last quarter 2010.
  • Asia Pacific is a hot hoteliers market with rates rising 12% year-to-year for last quarter 2010.

Starwood Hotels 2010 Q-4 Statistical Data

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2010 Year-End Statistics

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Estimate of annual hotel spend needed to earn SPG elite status

The average room rate for Starwood Hotels in North America is $154 for Q4-2010.

  • SPG Gold elite = 10 stays = $1,540 annual spend for 10 one-night stays.
  • SPG Gold elite = 25 nights = $3,850 annual spend for 25 nights.

 

  • SPG Platinum elite = 25 stays = $3,850 annual hotel spend with one-night stays.
  • SPG Platinum elite = 50 nights = $7,700 annual spend with 50 nights.

SPG Gold elite will likely range in price from $1,540 to $3,850 in annual hotel spend to earn.

SPG Platinum elite will likely range from $3,850 to $7,700 in annual hotel spend to earn.

Many frequent guests will spend far in excess of these upper range hotel spend values.

And some SPG elites will spend far less than the lower range values shown here.

A savvy shopper with flexibility in planning hotel stays can reasonably expect to reach 25 stays at low cost Starwood Hotels for about $2000 in annual hotel spend or an average $80 room rate. If SPG offers a ‘stays count double’ promotion during the year, then the total hotel spend can be even lower than $2,000.

9 Comments

  • JohnnieD February 4, 2011

    I am Gold via spending on SPG Amex card. Do i get Platinum if I have 25 one night stays??

  • og February 4, 2011

    Is there a way one can break up long stays into smaller stayes to hit the 10 stay threshold?

    Ie, i spend 10 nights at a particular property for work, can I break it up into 10, 1 night stays or is this frowned upon? seems like it would be a lot of work for the property if one were to do this..

    i am spg gold btw, trying to map out a game plan for this year..

  • Ric Garrido February 5, 2011

    JohnnieD – Yes, 25 one-night stays earns SPG Platinum.

    og – Hotel hopping or “mattress running” is the concept of changing hotels frequently rather than staying at a single hotel on an extended stay in order to accelerate stay credit for elite status.

    Since SPG requires 25 stays or 50 nights for SPG Platinum elite, it is possible you could stay 40 nights in hotels and still not earn Platinum if you only had 15 to 20 hotel stays.

    Important to remember that you cannot stay at the same hotel on consecutive nights and get multiple stay credit. Even if you check out and check back in on a different reservation, the SPG program rules count consecutive nights at the SAME hotel as one stay.

    Here is an example of a strategy I have done many times over the years to maximize stays.

    Assume I need 3 nights in a hotel in San Francisco. I spend Thursday night at Westin Market Street since it is the cheapest rate for a weekday. Then I go to Le Meridien for Friday night when rates are low. On Saturday night I go back to Westin Market Street.

    My 3 nights in San Francisco earn 3 elite qualifying stays. As long as I change hotel properties, I can stay in Starwood Hotels on consecutive nights and earn a unique stay credit for each hotel.

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  • ryan July 29, 2013

    Dear Ric Gariddo,

    Thank you very much for you useful post. I am a final year student of hospitality BA degree in switzerland, I kindly ask your permission to use this data for academic reason and if this possible to provide the reference of from where did you get the date from.

    Thank you very much

    Kind regards
    Ryan rionaldi

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