H&LA’s Laurel Keller was quoted in a Cleveland Plain Dealer article about the occupancy and hotel demand in the Cleveland hotel market, fueled by increased tourism and the new convention center.   

BY: Susan Glass, The Plain Dealer
PUBLISHED: January, 2015

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Hotel occupancy in 2015 climbed nearly 2 percent in Cleveland, a hike experts say is fueled by a growing tourism industry and a convention center that is steadily attracting new business.

But there is some concern about whether that occupancy growth can be sustained in 2016 – despite the Republican National Convention — because Greater Cleveland is due to add 10 new hotels with more than 1,800 new rooms in the next year.

“That is quite a supply increase for Cleveland to absorb,” said Laurel Keller, vice president of Hotel & Leisure Advisors, a local consulting firm.

 

 

Even with the RNC monopolizing rooms for a week in mid-July, Keller and others think hotel occupancy will likely decline in 2016, until demand can catch up with the new supply.

“There’s going to be a dip once everything opens up – there always is,” said Mike Burns, senior vice president of convention sales and services for Destination Cleveland, the city’s tourism bureau. “It’s a question of, how do we all work together to continue to create more demand?”

To read the entire article, click here.