\u201cYou have to get back to basics in a down economy,\u201d says Bill Upshaw, new COO of Windsor Hospitality Group, which is both practicing that philosophy and looking forward to substantial growth over last year in an industry that\u2019s increasingly struggling. A 25-year veteran of the hospitality business, Upshaw was most recently vice president of operations for Benchmark Hospitality. Previous to that, he had held positions at Marriott, Mariner Corp., the Durbin Cos. and Crestline-Barcelo. Windsor Hospitality is an affiliate of Windsor Capital Group, a privately owned hotel ownership and management company with 31 hotels in 13 states and nearly half of them in California. Windsor focuses on \u201cthe upper-mid tier,\u201d brands such as Marriott, Renaissance and Embassy Suites, Upshaw told CPN, and is the largest franchisee of the latter in the United States. Such properties often do well in downturns, as individuals and companies back away from luxury-grade hotels. Though \u201cwhat\u2019s going on with gas prices is impacting all forms of travel,\u201d Upshaw said, the hospitality industry has been hit by a triple whammy of the economy\u2019s slowdown, record gas prices and retrenchment by the airlines. The biggest cutbacks in travel, he said, have been in the \u201ctransient market,\u201d of individual business or vacation travelers, while the convention\/group travel side has been less affected. Overall, \u201cwe\u2019re seeing some slippage out there\u201d in the hospitality sector, Upshaw said, though Windsor\u2019s portfolio is going well and will probably be up 4 to 5 percent over last year. One big reason for that, he explained, was Windsor\u2019s ability to anticipate bad news. \u201cOur company recognized that there were clouds on the horizon\u201d and worked at both the corporate level and at individual properties to adjust, including targeting convention business. A big part of that, Upshaw said, has been a more aggressive outreach into the SMERF market, or Social, Military, Educational, Religious and Fraternal, which includes such areas as sports and athletic team travel, religious retreats and college and veteran\u2019s reunions. Earlier this year, MeetingsFocus.com noted that the SMERF sector has been both recession-resistant and \u201cone of the fastest-growing areas of the meetings industry.\u201d The site also commented that SMERF customers, who tend to be very budget-conscious, often have to be flexible from year to year, going to better properties in larger cities when the hotel industry is in a recession and moving to smaller markets when the economy bounces back and hotel occupancy rates rise. Strategically, Windsor is \u201cgoing to grow in all ways,\u201d Upshaw said, including acquisition and development. \u201cWe\u2019re very opportunistic in our approach.\u201d The company is looking at three approaches to growing its portfolio in a challenging economy. The first is the pursuit of third-party management contracts, where part of the sales pitch is that Windsor knows that hotel owners expect, because it is one. Second, Upshaw said, \u201cWe are still in an acquisition mode, though we\u2019ll be very careful about that.\u201d The company looks for markets with high barriers to entry and will consider repositioning or reflagging a property following a purchase. And third, Windsor still has some development projects in the pipeline, most of which, Upshaw noted, should be coming on line in time for the economy\u2019s next upturn, which he estimates will be in about 18 months. He doesn\u2019t believe that the hospitality sector is currently overbuilt and therefore expects some pent-up demand once the economy swings back up. There\u2019s a fourth strategy, too, and that\u2019s internal, with an emphasis on cost control. In an economy like the current one, Upshaw said, \u201cYou have to patrol the creep in payroll. You have to control your energy costs.\u201d On top of that, he said, \u201cThe cost of food has gone through the roof,\u201d leading Windsor to coordinate or consolidate buying as much as practical.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cYou have to get back to basics in a down economy,\u201d says Bill Upshaw, new COO of Windsor Hospitality Group, which is both practicing that philosophy and looking forward to substantial growth over last year in an industry that\u2019s increasingly struggling. A 25-year veteran of the hospitality business, Upshaw was most recently vice president of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1314,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37301],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1003837504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n