Solid demand from Wyndham Hotels & Resorts'
"everyday business travelers" even amid the Covid-19 omicron
variant's U.S. spread helped boost the hotel company to a strong fourth
quarter, executives said during a Wednesday earnings call.
Wyndham specifically highlighted what it called
"infrastructure accounts," a sector that president and CEO Geoffrey
Ballotti during the call said "represents the majority of our domestic
business segment, contributed over 10 percent more revenue to our hotels in the
fourth quarter than in 2019 and made up half of the newly negotiated business
accounts that our sales team signed this year."
That sector, along with the strong leisure segment, helped
boost Wyndham's revenue per available room throughout the quarter, even after
the omicron variant began its spread. "Our December RevPAR in the midst of
the omicron surge was the strongest demand month of the quarter, growing 15
percent domestically" from 2019 levels, he said.
Extended-Stay Launch Plans
Wyndham expects continued strength in the U.S.
infrastructure business travel segment throughout 2022 due in part to the
November 2021 passage of the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill. To further
target the blue-collar business travel segment, Wyndham plans to unveil its
first economy-tier extended-stay brand this spring, Ballotti said.
Details were few, but Ballotti said Wyndham has been
designing "over the past year in consultation with several of the
industry's most experienced extended stay developers."
The extended-stay sector, and particularly its economy tier,
has proven
resilient throughout the pandemic, and Ballotti said it's a segment for
which business demand should remain high.
"Our developers are asking for an economy extended stay
brand, our franchisees are asking for it. And most importantly, our corporate
accounts are asking for it," Ballotti said. "We know that there are
over 10 million construction workers out there that travel every week. And we
also know that relocation and long-term assignments are going to continue to
pick up. We're going to see, we feel, millions of more essential workers
hitting the road with the coming Infrastructure Bill. … These are our business
accounts."
Q4 Performance Results
Wyndham's fourth quarter 2021 net revenue totaled $392
million, up from $296 million year over year but down from $492 million in
2019. Net income totaled $48 million, compared with a net loss of $7 million
one year prior.
Systemwide fourth-quarter RevPAR increased 52 percent year
over year on a constant-currency basis to $35.99. U.S. RevPAR increased 58
percent to $43.84. Wyndham projected full-year 2022 RevPAR growth of 12 percent
to 16 percent year over year.
The company's development pipeline on Dec. 31, 2021,
included more than 1,500 properties and more than 190,000 rooms, up about 5
percent year over year.
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