Many travelers in the U.S. never set foot in a hotel during a business or leisure trip – even when it’s several hours away from home.
It’s not just because of growing competition from home sharing platforms like Airbnb and VBRO. Whether they’re driving or even flying to a nearby locale for a cultural event or for a business meeting, people often prefer to head in and out of their destination in one day rather than stay overnight.
It’s a familiar phenomenon to tourism professionals. In recent years, there were 12 million day trips to Denver, Colorado; and in Minnesota, 57 percent of travel was comprised of day trips—with 38.2 million day trips, compared to 29.3 million overnights.
While not all day-trippers can be converted to overnighters, there are ways hoteliers can encourage visitors to extend their trip – which will also benefit their longer-term guests.
“The key is to create a guest experience that serves as a natural extension of the local environment,” says David Holder, Vice President of Tourism, JLL. “Hotels that offer memorable encounters in authentic atmospheres can help win attention from short-term travelers.”
No guest left behind
Of course, the big question is how. Winning over business travelers, for example, goes beyond simply offering the facilities they need to conduct business, such as great connectivity and meeting space. It might also mean providing special packages with room rates and dining options included or offering more elements of home, whether it’s the ability to watch a favorite show via in-room streaming entertainment, or grab a ready-made breakfast bag for an early morning ride to the airport.
For leisure travelers, it’s often more about connecting them with the local events that sparked their interest in the area in the first place. Are they coming for the local music scene? Create a concert calendar to display in a public common area and provide easy-to-score tickets in the lobby. Even better, bring music in-house for live entertainment. Still, there are ways work and pleasure do mix, at least for hotels looking to woo both kinds of short-term travelers.
