In recent years, you’ve probably heard it again and again in the hospitality world: “The market changes too fast – it’s impossible to predict demand.”
NB: This is an article from Smartness
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But is that really true? Sure, competition has increased and traveler behavior has become less predictable. Yet there’s a tool that lets you keep your finger on the pulse of the market at all times – and it’s right in front of you.
It’s called the Pickup, and it’s one of the most powerful indicators you can track to understand how demand is moving in real time and how the market reacts to your prices, your competitors’ moves, or external factors like trade fairs, holidays, and even the weather.
In this article, we’ll take a closer look at what Pickup means, how to analyze it, and how to use it to guide your revenue strategy.
What is pickup and why it matters for your hotel
Pickup refers to the number of new bookings and cancellations received during a specific time period for future stay dates.
In other words, it answers the question: “How many rooms moved today compared to yesterday – or this week compared to last week?”
Think of Pickup like the speedometer of your hotel’s demand: by checking it regularly, you can see how fast your bookings are moving at any given moment.
Monitoring Pickup is crucial for several reasons:
- Adjusting your rates: When bookings come in quickly, demand is “hot” and you can safely push rates higher. When they slow down, it’s a sign the market is cooling and your strategy needs rethinking.
- Forecasting demand: By observing booking pace, you can more accurately estimate high and low demand periods, compare actual data with forecasts, and refine your revenue goals.
- Supporting marketing and operations: Pickup data also helps you decide when to run promotions and how to plan your staffing levels based on peaks and troughs in arrivals.
How to analyze pickup in 4 steps
To make sense of your Pickup, you’ll need to build a Pickup Report – a simple table that you update daily to visualize booking trends and turn them into decisions.
If you don’t have an automated Pickup Report, you can easily create one in Excel. Here’s how to do it in four steps:
