Pets Win | Equinox Expands | RevPAR Turnaround

Hello friends - before the podcast, I started Hospitality Daily as a daily email summary of the stories I found most interesting. Since then, I haven’t had time to maintain this, but over the past few weeks, I’ve been experimenting with how we could use AI to pull together stories we should know as hospitality leaders. Today, below, is the first version of this. You can unsubscribe if this isn’t interesting to you (link at end of this email), but I’d be grateful if you reply to this email and tell me what would be interesting.

I really feel we can create a daily briefing together that helps us all in our work and aligns with this publication’s mission to inform and inspire each day with ways to delight people and drive profitability. That’s why below you’ll see stories by section: guest experience, people & process, commercial (sales/marketing/revenue), and money moves (financial updates).

Before we get into the news — Congratulations to Daniel del Olmo on his appointment as CEO of Sage Hospitality Group, to Leire Leoz on becoming Chief Franchise Officer at Accor's Premium, Midscale, and Economy division, and to Heather Stege on her new role as COO at Peregrine Hospitality. Wishing David Flueck all the best as he departs Marriott after shaping Marriott Bonvoy into one of the most consequential loyalty ecosystems in hospitality.

Guest Experience

U.S. birth rates are at record lows, pet ownership is soaring, and the travel industry is following the money. Rafat Ali reports that hotels and airlines are increasingly designing for pet owners and childless adults over families, a demographic realignment reshaping amenity programming, room design, and marketing spend. Sixty percent of travelers worldwide now bring pets on trips, per Amadeus research, while adults-only properties and pet concierge services are proliferating across segments. Read more on Skift

Wellness is becoming central for luxury hospitality, and Equinox Hotels is building an entire global brand around that bet. CEO Chris Norton told Forbes the company plans to roughly triple its footprint to about a dozen properties within seven to eight years, with the first hotel outside North America opening at Saudi Arabia's Amaala development on the Red Sea, a Caribbean expansion to Anguilla already announced, and Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and London on the target list. Equinox's chairman told CNBC this month that "health is the new luxury," and Norton's expansion strategy reflects that conviction: high-performance living, recovery programming, and fitness-integrated design as the core product, not an amenity bolted onto a traditional hotel. As fitness-driven travelers become a larger share of the premium market, the question for incumbents is whether wellness remains a spa menu add-on or becomes the reason guests choose you. Read more on Forbes

Luxury hotel prices keep climbing, but is the experience keeping pace? Robb Report's latest examination of five-star hospitality finds a widening gap between rates and service delivery, with staffing and training as the core issue. "The small moments of unforgettable care, the incredible attention to detail, and the savvy anticipation of a need before it transpires" still separate the best properties from the rest, but a drop in enthusiasm across the sector is eroding those moments. Four Seasons, Park Hyatt, Aman, and Belmond continue to hold the line. At $500+ a night, the rest of the market has to answer for the gap. Read more on Robb Report

People & Process

Choice Hotels put 800 associates in build mode at its 11th annual Mastery tech summit in Scottsdale, with teams hacking and pressure-testing AI solutions against real business challenges. The week includes a "Capture the Flag" cybersecurity challenge, an AWS AI league, and Make-a-Thon competitions where winning innovations get considered for company-wide deployment. Last year's Hotel Suite modernization project, born from the same summit, cut timelines by months and saved over $750,000. Instead of buying AI off the shelf, Choice is training its own people to build it. Read more via Choice Hotels

PwC is building a "Human Skills Project" focused on critical thinking, storytelling, and curiosity, as the firm argues that knowledge alone is no longer a differentiator. Managing Partner Jeanelle Johnson discussed the initiative on the latest Hospitality Daily podcast. Listen here now on Hospitality Daily

Server, housekeeper, and cook roles are the most in-demand hospitality positions in Miami, per OysterLink, as the market posted a 12.4% ADR increase to $287.84, the highest year-over-year jump among major U.S. markets. The markets charging the most also need the most workers. Read more via OysterLink

Commercial

The five largest hotel companies now run roughly 40 lifestyle brands, 2,000+ properties, and 350,000 rooms, and Skift Research argues brand proliferation is hitting a wall. With AI compressing hotel discovery to a handful of options and consumer loyalty shifting toward personalized rewards over portfolio breadth, the edge is moving from more brands to sharper ones. There are now 1,200+ hotel brands globally; Marriott lists 30+, Hyatt 25, Hilton 24. Developers are voicing concern: "With all these brands coming out and all these legacy brands losing their value, are we adding too much supply to the market?" The next wave of brand strategy may be subtraction, not addition. Read more on Skift

Money Moves

AHLA's 2026 State of the Industry report puts the profitability gap in sharp focus: GOPPAR is still at roughly 90% of 2019 levels, squeezed by operating costs outpacing revenue growth. The hotel workforce is projected to add 30,000 jobs this year, bringing direct employment to 2.2 million, with wages and benefits approaching $131 billion. Hotels generated $85.1 billion in taxes in 2025, up $1.7 billion from 2024. AHLA signals cautious optimism with FIFA World Cup and America250 expected to lift demand, but is clear that 2025 "stability" did not equal full recovery once inflation is factored in. International inbound travel remains below pre-pandemic levels. Read more on Lodging Magazine

U.S. hotels posted RevPAR of $102.35 for the week ending Feb. 21, up 6.2% year-over-year, with occupancy at 62.2% (+3.1%) and ADR at $164.56 (+3.0%), per CoStar. New Orleans led RevPAR gains at +31.4% on Mardi Gras, and Las Vegas saw occupancy jump 20% to 83.3%. The sixth consecutive positive week suggests 2026 demand is building real momentum. STR's Isaac Collazo cautioned on CoStar's Tell Me More podcast that the trend is driven by demand rather than pricing power, and it's still early. Read more on Lodging Magazine

New York led all Northeast markets in hotel investment volume in 2025, with luxury ADR rising 8.8% to $580.33 and RevPAR up 9.4% trailing twelve months, per CoStar. Context for Gencom's recent $320 million Ritz-Carlton Central Park acquisition: institutional appetite for Manhattan trophy assets isn't slowing. Read more on CoStar

And that’s a wrap! How can I make this daily brief better for you? Hit reply and let me know…

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