Which hotel brands in USA and Canada get most guests?

The answer to which hotel brand gets the highest percentage of guests in the USA and Canada may very well surprise points and miles junkies. The numbers also give an explanation as to why Marriott repeatedly wins the top hotel brand awards in various surveys each year.

Phoenix Marketing tracks hotel data and through September 2013 the Marriott Hotels, the full-service flagship brand of Marriott International, leads all hotel brands for the number of guestroom nights in the USA with 7.3% share of all room nights. That is 1 out of 15 guests just in Marriott full-service hotels. Add in Courtyard, Fairfield, Residence Inn, Towneplace Suites, SpringHill Suites, Renaissance, JW Marriott, Ritz-Carlton and the market share of Marriott is huge. .

While Marriott may not seem so surprising, the #2 hotel brand for total share of guest room nights will likely surprise you – Best Western hotels received 7.1% of all room nights in the USA. Best Western was the leading brand last year.

There are 505 Marriott Hotels in the USA with 140,000 rooms. Best Western has 2,160 hotels in the USA. I can’t find the room number data for Best Western, but it is probably close to 140,000 rooms too since the typical Best Western hotels has far fewer rooms than the typical Marriott.

Best Western leads north of the border

In Canada Best Western International is the leading hotel brand with 16% share of all guest room nights. Holiday Inn at 6% and Holiday Inn Express at 6% are the next leading brands in Canada.

Overall about 25% of Americans stay in a hotel in any given month.

I would have guessed Holiday Inn Express was the brand leader in the USA with nearly 2,000 hotels and about 172,000 rooms in the Americas which includes all of North and South America. I imagine HI Express will become the room nights brand leader in the next couple of years.

Recently I read that the midscale hotel market segment has the weakest numbers in occupancy for the USA. I guess that is why full-scale Marriott is coming out on top of Holiday Inn Express and Best Western for 2013.

Personally I think Marriott Rewards MegaBonus where two stays earn one free night at a category 1-5 hotel has been the best promotion bonus of 2013. Marriott brands have received more guest room nights from me in 2013 than in any other year. I love getting free hotel nights to reduce the cost of future travel.

Source: http://phoenixmi.com/pr/recent-study-finds-marriott-leads-share-of-room-nights-in-u-s-takes-top-spot-from-best-western/