Choice Hotels Asia-Pac CEO, Trent Fraser, has said he sees Adelaide as a pivotal city which will play a major role in the recovery of the travel and tourism sector in the post-COVID and lockdown phase.
The company has enjoyed strong growth in Adelaide and its outer suburban areas both throughout the pandemic and in recent years prior, signing numerous new properties to its network across The Ascend Hotel Collection, Quality Hotels, Comfort Hotels and Econo Lodge brands.
Signings have included the new Comfort Hotel Adelaide Meridien, part of which has been dual-branded as an Econo Lodge. The Quality brand has also boosted its presence in the city in the form of the Quality Apartments Adelaide Central, signed under a franchise agreement with 1834 Hotels.
In Adelaide’s outskirts, another franchise agreement with The Haus Group has seen The Lodge by Haus, The Studios by Haus and The Manna by Haus join the Choice family, with the latter two becoming part of The Ascend Hotel Collection.
Speaking exclusively to HM, Fraser said he anticipated the South Australian capital to play a major role in the post-COVID recovery period.
“Adelaide has a lot to offer as a destination, both in the city itself and in nearby regions such as Hahndorf where three of our new properties are located, and our collective pivot to domestic travel has placed a spotlight on some of these excellent local regions and experiences,” Fraser said.
“The state of South Australia is seen to be safe for travel, the conference and corporate segments is expected to have a sharper comeback, and we want to be best positioned to offer inventory to these markets which will in turn support our partners as they lean on us for recovery support.
“Our new properties have chosen Choice Hotels Asia-Pac over our competitors as they are confident in our abilities to provide this support and we are proud to have these new partners in our portfolio.”
Fraser added that the company overall has withstood the effects of the pandemic well and is primed to make waves across its member network when travellers are able to move once again.
“Our flexible, owner friendly, asset light model has resulted in Choice Asia-Pac being well positioned to take advantage of the rebound, with a full team of operations, sales, marketing and revenue managers retained to assist our existing and new properties coming into our family of franchisees,” he said.
“We have partnered with white label management companies to assist owners with tailored Hotel Management Agreements (HMAs) where appropriate. We have been over-indexing on RevPAR compared to our midscale competitor set through the pandemic in both Australia and New Zealand and have achieved historic highs in our corporate fair market share.”