Room for Savings: Optimizing Hotel Spend - Carlson

Buyers should use the full range of best practices
when negotiating with their top-spend properties,
but not necessarily with hotels that are
earmarked for “light” negotiations. According to
the research, a significant proportion of
companies are missing important savings
opportunities by failing to use the best practices
described in this section. For example, 18
percent never leverage spend on hotel
amenities, as shown in Figure 98.
Figure 98: Some best practices are rarely implemented by companies in hotel negotiations
Best practices used during hotel negotiations for better terms and conditions
Room nights/spend with hotel last year
72%
26%
1%
1%
Year-over-year rate comparison
70%
26%
3% 1%
Potential room nights/spend at the
property/destination
59%
32%
7%
2%
Competitor hotel rate benchmark
42%
41%
16%
1%
Length and quality of relationship with hotel
34%
52%
12%
2%
Company's track record in meeting
previous commitments
34%
49%
13%
4%
Other local market conditions
34%
40%
22%
4%
Additional spend on amenities
14%
30%
38%
18%
Under-utilized
best practices
Average length of stay
Arrival pattern
(day of week)
11%
8%
25%
41%
41%
35%
26%
13%
Advance booking behavior
7%
22%
50%
21%
Always Usually Occasionally Never
Source: CWT Travel Management Institute
Based on a survey of travel managers (97 responses)