Rate Cutting: A look at canada

By Jason Wight, HVS Canada. As we have now passed the halfway mark of 2009, we can begin to see the impact that the global recession has had on the Canadian lodging industry. On a weekly and monthly basis, we continue to see declines in occupancy and RevPAR, and now, increasingly, average room rate. Cutting rates to get "heads in beds" does not stem the decline in demand but instead magnifies the decline in RevPAR. The performance of various markets in Canada bears witness of this truth.