What’s in store for Phuket Hotels Q1 2017?

No matter where I have gone the past few weeks, around the island, up to Bangkok, down to Singapore, or elsewhere a common question keeps raising it’s head about how is the Phuket trading climate for hotels the first quarter of the year.

I happened to run into Claas Elze of Apara Asset Management the other day, who shed some light on what’s driving the numbers when comparing year-on-year hotel performance.

His top 3 disruptors were –

Chinese New Year came in January this year, while last year it occurred in February and helped lengthen peak trading. This year peak season was effectively shorter.

In 2016, February was a leap year so 29 days compared to 28 this year, hence one day of lost revenue.

Another key holiday variable is Easter with this year pushing out to April when many hotels have already adjusted high-season rates downward so yields are hit Last year the holiday was in March.

So there you have it, some quick wisdom when viewing hotel results in a year-on-year comparison and again the nuances of yield management tend to play into the equation.