Not all events are created equal in terms of hotel demand and guest spend
Not all events are created equal in terms of hotel demand and guest spend
The level of travel intent is greater for sports events and conferences than for a concert
People traveling for a major sporting event such as the Super Bowl will have an emotional weight behind their travel, providing hoteliers with immense pricing power. (Photo by JOSH EDELSON / AFP via Getty Images) (AFP via Getty Images)
https://www.costar.com/article/1600979562/not-all-events-created-equal-in-terms-of-hotel-demand-guest-spend
NASHVILLE, Tennessee — Events such as concerts, conferences, and sports can all net significant amounts of visitors to a given hotel, but each one can generate different levels of travel intent.
In order for hoteliers to properly prepare and capture the most demand possible, they need to identify the specific kind of traveler coming to their city rather than the sheer quantity of potential guests.
Nick Seaman, hospitality forecaster at STR, said the industry should challenge its preconceived notions about events and focus on forecasting human behavior rather than the events themselves.
"We've been conditioned to believe that event attendance equals hotel demand, but really it doesn't," he said during "The Event Effect" session at the recent Hotel Data Conference. "It only tells you [how many are] coming, and that doesn't really matter."
Seaman broke down event travelers into three categories: the pilgrim, the professional, and the tourist.
Each traveler group behaves differently than the others. Knowing which group is correlated to certain events can help inform how hotel demand is likely to shape up.
"A World Cup and Super Bowl attendee, they behave differently than a conference attendee, who behaves differently than a concert attendee," he said. "What I find matters is how far people are willing to travel, how long they stay, how early they book, and how much they're willing to pay and who's paying the bill."
The pilgrim
Pilgrims travel to an event because they feel an emotional weight around the occasion. Think about die-hard fans who are following a team to the Super Bowl, or players to a World Cup. These types of travelers are "willing to pay whatever it takes" and are experience-heavy, he said.
This strong desire gives hoteliers pricing power.
"The thing to remember about the pilgrim is it's all about that emotional connection to the event," Seaman said. "That's what drives the will and the willingness to pay such high premiums."
The latest Super Bowl in Santa Clara, California, boosted average daily rate by 260% and occupancy by 71% in the San Francisco market.
"They're not just buying a ticket to the event; they're buying an experience, a journey, a lifetime bucket-list thing, and that creates tons of pricing power because you've got people willing to pay whatever they want and can to see these events," Seaman said. "And you get a bunch of them all at one time with something exciting like NFL football and the championship of that league."
The demand build-up for these travelers starts to show about a week before the start of the event as practice and media events begin. ADR typically skyrockets a few nights out from an event before tailing off the night after.
"So we should be asking, how deeply do people care about being there? What are they willing to travel for? How many nights are they likely going to stay, and how much are they willing to pay to access the experience?" he said. "These events don't just fill rooms, but they change the way of how much you can charge for a room."
Pilgrims' booking windows tend to be sporadic given the emotional nature of their travel, Seaman said.
"They're making decisions based off the excitement as it happens, well before they get to their hotel room," he said.
Robert Morse, vice president of revenue management, hotels and resorts at Davidson Hospitality Group, said for an event such as the Super Bowl, hoteliers see waves of bookings and cancellations in the months leading up to the game.
"It's the way it just is. There's a lot of speculation, especially for the Super Bowl, and you've got these fans that are super passionate," he said.
The professional
Professionals are going to corporate events or conferences that they are required to attend for their jobs. Again, these travelers — or their employers, to be more precise — will pay whatever it takes to book a room for these trips, but they are in and out of a market depending on the start and end date of their event.
Unlike pilgrims, there's no emotional tie to the booking behavior of professionals.
"If you sign up to be at a conference, you're going to be there on other people's money all at one time and get to that incredible compression ... with extremely high premiums, and that's because you're going to be there," Seaman said. "You're there for the event, and you have to be there. There's really no choice. It's a functional choice."
Pricing sensitivity is what sets this kind of traveler apart from a leisure-driven event.
"If everyone's expected to be there on Wednesday for the start of the event on other people's money, that's low price sensitivity, and that creates pricing power," he said.
Booking windows are more consistent for professional travelers compared to the other classifications. Once a professional is tasked with attending a conference, they'll book their travel and are unlikely to cancel. Occupancy on the books steadily grows in the months leading up to the event.
The tourist
Tourists, those who are traveling for a leisure event such as a concert, lean more on the transient side of the equation. They tend to look for whatever lodging option is the most convenient for them and have the shortest length of stay among the three classifications.
Seaman said the hotels see a boost from these events on the day of, but there's not a ton of buildup prior to or after the event.
"For the most part, you can see the impact happens the day of the event. They're in and they're out," he said. "It's never about how many people are coming, but it's who needs a hotel room, and it's really that simple."
The location of the leisure event can be crucial when determining these travelers' booking habits, he said. For example, a concert in Nashville is likely to net more tourists than one in East Rutherford, New Jersey, since tours generally reach more Northeastern markets.
A significant portion of tourists wait until about a week ahead of the event to book their hotel stays.
"When you're looking at the event asking, 'Is this a tourist event?' You're not going to know until a week out, really," he said.
Booking pace didn't show up until a couple of weeks out even for a mega-concert such as Taylor Swift's "Eras Tour" from a few years ago, Morse said.
"It was really like 12 days out that all of a sudden we saw that surge," he said. "We didn't drop pricing based on history in the first couple of concerts, but ... GMs were getting anxious, nervous [about demand] not coming in."
Why sleep is becoming a crucial luxury wellness amenity
https://hotelsmag.com/news/why-sleep-is-becoming-a-crucial-luxury-wellness-amenity/?
Janis Clapoff is a wellness, longevity, and luxury hospitality strategist based in Los Angeles, Calif.
Of everything a luxury property can offer health-conscious guests, nothing matters more—or is more overlooked—than a good night’s sleep. Not just the mattress. Not just a quiet, dark room. The sleep itself: the hours when the body repairs and the mind resets for the day ahead.
The properties getting this right aren’t offering comfort—they’re engineering recovery, and guests notice. A great mattress is a start; a genuine sleep program is something else, and guests who need one can tell within a night or two.
The Foundation of Everything Else
Sleep is the body and brain’s main recovery mechanism—a nightly housekeeping shift that clears waste the brain builds up while we’re awake, a process tied to long-term brain health. Consistent, good-quality sleep tracks with stronger immune function and emotional resilience.
Overstimulation is often the more specific driver behind poor sleep in guests who otherwise do everything right. Notifications and decisions late into the evening keep dopamine cycling and cortisol elevated at exactly the hour both should taper off. For many guests, the real barrier isn’t the mattress—it’s a nervous system that hasn’t had the chance to stand down.
A newer, ironic problem compounds this: orthosomnia. Guests become so fixated on their sleep-tracker scores that monitoring sleep starts to interfere with getting it. A wearable can be a useful tool, but the simplest, most reliable measure of a night’s sleep has little to do with a device: waking slowly and mindfully, then asking oneself the question: how do I feel?
There is much unconscious computation behind that one answer—more than any wearable captures. For properties designing a sleep program, this means less about adding technology to prove a good night’s sleep happened, and more about removing whatever gets in the way of it happening at all.
Comfort vs. True Recovery
Sleep used to be treated as something that would take care of itself once the basics were covered. But restorative sleep is rarely an accident—it comes down to details like a rushed late check-in, an early housekeeping knock, or glaring lights with no dimmer, especially for a traveler battling jet lag or unfamiliar surroundings.
The Westin “Heavenly Bed” moved the industry forward in 1999, making sleep a headline rather than an afterthought. But it was never a full sleep program—there’s still room for hospitality to go further.
Sleep Starts at the Reservation
Many luxury properties already profile guests at booking —an anniversary, a deal to close, months of travel to recover from—and shape the stay accordingly. Sleep rarely gets the same level of attention. Every guest has a chronotype, a biological lean toward early or late sleep. And most frequent travelers carry social jet lag: the toll of living out of sync with their own body clock, which chronobiologists say can be more disruptive than time-zone jet lag, and doesn’t require crossing a single zone. A guest flying in from three time zones away may need only blackout curtains and patience; a guest running on five hours a night for three months needs something else entirely. Asking at booking what kind of sleeper someone is, not just when the flight lands, is what makes a sleep amenity personal rather than generic.
What Leaders in Hospitality Do Well
Six Senses’ ‘Sleep with Six Senses’ program is more than a marketing tagline—it’s science-backed, designed with sleep specialists. Guests are welcomed into a real conversation about their sleep habits and goals, and the environment follows: lighting that softens through the evening, menus that shift toward rest rather than stimulation. It’s one of the most intentional sleep programs in the industry.
Another example would be Canyon Ranch, which blends luxury with genuine medical expertise: guests can consult a sleep specialist, something most people would never do at home. That level of clinical guidance, offered in a setting built for relaxation, makes expert care feel accessible even on vacation.
At Lake Austin Spa Resort—a property I had the privilege of leading—the approach is different: deep, gentle relaxation for mind and body, no trackers required. Guided meditation, sound baths, floating sessions, and quiet evening rituals ease the nervous system into rest.
Restorative Sleep in Practice
Over the years, a turndown philosophy took shape around a simple idea: a guest shouldn’t have to work at winding down—the room should do some of that work.
- A small book at the bedside—something with a beautifully illustrated, meaningful story—paired with a proper reading light, so the last thing a guest does before sleep is quiet and unhurried rather than scrolling through a phone.
- A chamomile tea service for two, simply and beautifully presented, offered at turndown rather than left for guests to seek out on their own.
- A deliberately decluttered nightstand at turndown—no visible clock, no cables in sight, nothing blinking—so the last thing a guest’s eyes land on before sleep is calm rather than a screen.
- A bath card that tells the story of the bath itself—where the scent comes from, why it was chosen— alongside candles and a “bath book” at the tub, so a bath becomes a ritual rather than an errand.
- Soft music already playing when a guest first walks into the room, and just as important, real discipline among staff about noise near guest corridors after a certain hour.
What ties it together is consistency—doing all of it, where possible, so comfort feels considered from arrival until lights out.
The Opportunity Ahead
For wellness-focused properties, the opportunity goes further—sleep consultations, personalized in-room settings, evening programming built around decompressing rather than stimulating. It’s the next logical step for any property serious about wellness, and the foundation every other wellness practice depends on.
A property that helps guests genuinely recover — beyond simply a beautiful room to sleep in—offers something with real, lasting value. That’s the promise of regenerative travel: guests arrive tired and leave rested, and it starts with taking sleep as seriously as they already do.
Americans Flocked to This Country for an Easy Path to Citizenship. Then the Rules Changed
Sean-Pavone/Shutterstock
https://www.fodors.com/world/europe/portugal/experiences/news/portugal-citizenship-changes-new-10-year-rule-explained
Portugal has doubled its citizenship residency requirement for most immigrants. Here’s what the new nationality laws mean for residents and families.
For decades, Portugal built a reputation as one of Europe’s most welcoming countries for immigrants, offering a relatively accessible path to citizenship after five years of legal residence. In May, that reputation changed when sweeping reforms were made to the country’s nationality laws, adding restrictions and caveats that have left many immigrants feeling short-changed.
One of the most significant changes is that the residency requirement to apply for Portuguese citizenship by naturalization has been doubled from five years to 10 for most foreign nationals. For E.U. nationals and CPLP (Community of Portuguese Language Countries) citizens, such as those of Brazil, Angola, and Cape Verde, the citizenship pathway increased from five years to seven.
The way residency is counted has also changed. Previously, the qualifying period for citizenship via naturalization was counted from the submission of a residency application. The date has now been pushed back to the issuance of the first residence permit, which can be problematic.
Portugal’s immigration agency, AIMA (previously known as SEF), has been accused of merry-go-round bureaucracy–difficulties obtaining residency and renewal appointments, plus lengthy delays in processing applications, mean that many foreigners have been left in limbo for months or even years through no fault of their own. The time they’ve spent waiting will no longer count towards their citizenship timeline.
Some have cited AIMA’s complacency as the root of their anger regarding the nationality law changes; having to deal with them on an ongoing basis for years has been described as maddening.
One such person is Leonice Oliveira, a Brazilian living in Portugal for seven years. She questions why she should have to wait more years to get her Portuguese passport. “I came in 2019 but only managed to get my documents in 2022 because of AIMA. If AIMA were actually efficient, I wouldn’t even want Portuguese citizenship. I don’t want to have to keep waiting years and years to renew my residency. With a Portuguese passport, it would be so much easier to live here.”
Salma Ben Rached, a Tunisian who has been living in Portugal since 2021, describes the changes as volatile. She says that AIMA took two years to process her first residency application. During that time, she was stuck in the country waiting for her card to arrive. She managed to submit her nationality application on May 18, 2026, the day before the law went into effect.
“I was one of the lucky ones, but it’s a horrible thing that has happened,” she says. “It’s like a broken promise from a government that was heavily marketing that you can come to the country, have safety, and have a life. You end up spending your money here, contributing to the economy, and things just change so fast with the laws. You’re constantly thinking, ‘What if my future here isn’t guaranteed?’ There’s no way of knowing if your future is going to be okay in this country.”
An Issue for Some Families
Heather Courtney, an American mom of two, was living in Mexico but came to Portugal because of the slower pace of life and ease of living—not to mention the prospect of a five-year pathway to citizenship. “We knew we weren’t going back to the U.S. anytime soon. In fact, probably never. Hearing that the requirements for citizenship changed kind of sucks because we were just shy of the five-year mark, and now I’m wondering what’s next for me. It matters less now because I’m married to an E.U. citizen and my son is an E.U. citizen, so I’m allowed to stay in the E.U. regardless.”
However, her older daughter will have to keep doing her residency renewals in order for her to be able to stay in the country. “She loves Portugal, and she wants to stay, but she did five years here, and now she has to do even more. We don’t see ourselves wanting to move to any other country in Europe, so it’s not bad, but it’s just frustrating. The new 10-year rule really should have applied to people who are just now coming over to the country.”
Because Courtney’s daughter is under 21, she could potentially qualify in Portugal as the family member or direct descendant of Courtney’s E.U.-citizen husband, rather than relying only on her original Portuguese residence permit. That depends on the family’s registration and documentation. Portugal also provides permanent residence to qualifying non-E.U. family members after five consecutive years of legal residence with an E.U. citizen.
The Pressing Matter of Grandfathering
One of the biggest complaints from immigrants about the law reforms is the lack of protection and rights for those already living in Portugal and already on the path to citizenship. The absence of a “grandfathering” clause has made some people feel blindsided.
“Our lives in Portugal are built on a specific plan: live here, contribute, and apply for citizenship after five years,” says Jesse Anderson, an American living in Portugal since 2021. “This new law has moved the goalpost from five years to 10 years. The scary part isn’t the change itself–it’s that they have applied it to those of us who are already here. If you add in the AIMA delays, we are looking at 12-15 years before we have security.”
His goal was to obtain citizenship for his children–ages 14 and 17–before they went to university; however, the changes have turned their timeline upside down. His eldest will no longer meet the requirements for citizenship despite having spent her formative years in Portugal. “The new law unfairly and onerously burdens children with new requirements that they can’t follow,” he laments.
His children are the major reason he established SJC, a civic movement that was formally incorporated as an association in June. The aim of the association is to protect legal certainty and institutional fairness for residents in Portugal. Their current initiative is to tackle the grandfathering issue head-on.
“We aren’t just signing petitions. We produced a report and raised a legal defense fund to hire a lobbying firm,” he explains. Their report found that the nationality law updates could lead to an estimated loss of almost €16 billion for Portugal over the next decade–they hope to present their findings and their concerns to the Minister of the Presidency.
“The Portuguese government is making a purely political decision. They’re not taking into account the massive economic impact. I’m hoping the economic impact will cut through the party lines and rhetoric,” he explains. “We are down but not out. We need to show the Portuguese government that we deserve to be treated fairly. There is still hope that the regulation will include some sort of grandfathering.”
Anderson’s not alone in his frustration. Over 1,200 foreign residents filed a formal complaint with the Ombudsman regarding the revisions. They’re citing a breach of legitimate expectations for applicants who entered the system under the prior five-year rule.
Anderson adds that Portugal should also consider how much money it will lose from tourism due to the changes to the nationality law. “People were coming to Portugal to see if they wanted to move here initially as a vacation. For U.K. citizens, it’s around the corner. For U.S. citizens, you have to want to come here. Portugal is now losing out on all of that tourism and eventual income,” he notes.
A Different Side to the Story
Not everyone sees things the same way. Tara-Nicholle Kirke, a Californian mom of three living in Portugal, moved because she wanted to raise her youngest child in a place that is safe and where both their nervous systems felt grounded. “We’ve rooted ourselves in Portugal. I’ve just bought a 12-bedroom property that I’m turning into a boutique hotel and guesthouse for creators and writers. My daughter goes to school here. We have no intention to leave Portugal. We feel very appreciative that we’re able to be here. I’ve healed from an autoimmune condition since moving here.”
Kirke adds that “five years to ten years makes almost no difference because I was planning to be here, build businesses here, build communities here, and I was doing that anyway, a year in. I’ve been here three years. I’ve seen [the Portuguese government] change things and then unchange things. I watched as they made a big hullabaloo about reversing the golden visa and then they brought it back in different formats.”
She says, “The reality is a lot of the things that the Portuguese government did aggressively to generate the resources and the influx of people that they did worked and were great. And then they decided to mold the clay of their boundaries.”
Through her hotel project, some of her investors from the U.S. are getting their golden visa, and according to Kirke, none of them have been deterred by the change. “As far as I’m concerned, I’m happy here, building businesses here and bringing other investors and visa holders here, and the five years versus ten years for a passport is negligible to me.”
Saudi Arabia's new hotel staffing rules require up to three employees per room
Labor rules apply different worker minimums across hotel segments
Amsa Hospitality is embracing Saudi Arabia's new hotel industry staffing standards at its properties, such as the 471-room Radisson Hotel Riyadh Airport. (CoStar)
https://www.costar.com/article/78549882/saudi-arabias-new-hotel-staffing-rules-require-up-to-three-employees-per-room?
Less than three and a half years from its grand tourism plan, Vision 2030, Saudi Arabia has outlined proposed staffing requirements for all types of hotels and other accommodations.
The country’s Ministry of Tourism laid out the following guidelines for labor in a paper titled “Minimum staffing requirements for tourist hospitality facilities." Luxury hotels and resorts will need three employees per one room; five-star hotels will need four workers for every five rooms; heritage hotels will need three employees for every five rooms; four-star hotels will need three staff for every five rooms; three-star hotels will need two workers for every five rooms; two-star hotels will need one employee for every five rooms; and one-star hotels will need one worker for every 10 rooms.
Saudi Arabia's serviced apartments also have staffing requirements outlined in the new rules, which, if ratified, would be mandatory for the whole calendar year.
The Saudi government's proposals have been put out to public consultation, with a decision to be made by the end of this year and enacted on Jan. 1, 2027.
According to newspaper The Saudi Gazette, “the regulations require hospitality establishments to maintain the minimum number of employees continuously throughout the calendar year.”
Hotels that have obtained a license before the regulations were announced will have 180 days to comply with the requirements, while hotels moving to a higher segment will have only 90 days to do likewise. Saudi authorities will ensure compliance on and after the first day of next year, at which time penalties can be imposed, too.
Higher expectations
Hotel staffing requirements used to be a lot simpler everywhere, with limited food and beverage and no outsourcing, said Philip Wooller, area director for the Middle East and Africa at STR, CoStar Group's hospitality analytics division.
“Now, they are a lot more complex. Some hotels in the United Arab Emirates have multiple restaurants, some outsourced, some managed. The Atlantis has over 40 restaurants,” Wooller said of the 1,544-room hotel in Dubai. “With all those factors to consider, how do you draw a conclusion?”
For example, a hotel company that manages more than 30 hotels in the UAE might work on the basis of 0.5 employees per room and for the luxury hotels 1.5 to 1.7 persons per key, Wooller said.
“But again, its subjective. … Thinking back to my days [as a hotelier myself] those numbers are elevated from United Kingdom standards but not by too much, maybe 25% higher. I used to run a 442-room hotel, and I had over 200 staff. The Saudi table says I should have had 265 members of staff,” he said.
Saudi Arabia's hotel staffing standards are sensible ones that will further develop and reinforce quality of service, Wooller said. In the Middle East, hospitality service standards often are higher and costs generally are lower for salaries, although, he added, “the jury is slightly out on that one.”
The UAE does not have specific numbers of required staff per class of hotels.
Muin Serhan is CEO of owner, developer and management firm Amsa Hospitality, which has six hotels in Saudi Arabia, with another two soon to open. Serhan said his firm’s partnerships with Saudi schools such as King Khalid University are bringing international service standards to the kingdom.
In 2024, Amsa initiated the Amsa Academy to further prepare Saudi workers for hospitality roles. Serhan said the vocational training academy is open not only to future Amsa Hospitality employees but to any Saudi graduate, even those who go on to work for other hotel groups.
“Partnering with local universities is key to our mission at Amsa Academy because it gets graduates into real hotels early," he said. "Saudis already have hospitality in their DNA, that welcoming instinct is cultural. What’s needed now is training them to the level international travelers are accustomed to. That only comes from structured time on hotel floors across the kingdom, learning the standard, not just the theory.”
Miret Padovani, founder and CEO of Dubai-based business advisory Hotel Marketing Space, works extensively in Saudi Arabia and has had the opportunity to meet many young Saudis working in hospitality. She said Saudi Arabia has one of the youngest populations in the world, with approximately 60% of Saudis being under the age of 30.
“That’s a great supply of talent, but supply alone doesn’t solve a staffing gap. I believe it is the industry’s responsibility, together with the public sector, to prepare that talent for hospitality roles,” she said. “What stands out is their enthusiasm to learn, develop their skills and grow in their careers, as well as the pride they take in contributing to the future of hospitality in Saudi Arabia."
Budding tourism
On June 18, the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Tourism released its latest tourism numbers. In 2025, the country saw 123 million inbound and domestic tourists, approximately a 6% year-over-year increase.
Tourism spend that year was approximately 304 billion Saudi riyals ($80 billion), a record 7% year-over-year increase, and the sector contributed 4.9% of the country’s gross domestic product.
The tourism ministry's report added that women now comprise 47% of Saudi Arabia's tourism workforce.
“Non-religious purposes accounted for approximately 52% of total inbound overnight visitors’ purpose of trip in 2025, representing more than half of all inbound overnight visitors, compared to 44% in 2019,” the report added.
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