Hotel spas down in 2010 but making a recovery this year
The recession led to hotel spa services suffering a 10.5 drop in revenues last year, reported PKF Consulting USA.
"PKF found that hotel spas experienced deeper declines in revenue and profits than did hotels, as measured by revenue per available room, or RevPAR," wrote the New Mexico Business Weekly.
The hospitality industry as a whole showed signs of a rebound in late 2010 nationwide, PKF reported, but hotel spa operations have been lagging behind that trend.
Resort hotel spas dropped the most, by 13.6 percent, according to the PKF report.
Spas in urban hotels took a slight hit with a 1.2 percent drop in revenue. PKF attributed that to the faster recovery of large metropolitan hotel markets compared to resort locations.
Urban spas also tend to draw more customers from the local community, analysts said.
The greatest declines came in mid-sized operations that had 10 to 20 treatment rooms.
"The mid-sized spas are caught in between offering the intimate experience of a small operation, and the grand showcase facility frequently found in a large hotel or resort," said Andrea Foster. vice president in the Boston office of PKF, in a news release. She is also the national director of spa consulting.
Hotel spa profits declined by 27.4 percent in 2010, following a 13.9 percent decline in 2009, according to PKF’s findings.
"These reductions came despite efforts by hotel spa managers to control expenses by cutting labor costs and operational expenses," said the Business Journal.
But the other side is that of the issue is that PKF is postulating that spa revenues started to grow in 2011. In addition they see that trend continuing. They base their conclusions on feedback from its clients in the industry, and the fact that the upper-tier chains are leading the lodging industry recovery, they said.
By David Wilkening
David
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