2010 by the numbers

At the start of each year, I sit down and work out our sales productions for hotels for the calendar year just gone. I didn't do it in 2009 because, well the numbers took such a dive from 2008 and 2007 due to the GFC/economic slowdown that it just didn't seem worthwhile. So back in 2008 I compared production to 2007 for each city but since I've skipped a year, I won't worry about doing that this time. This year (2011) it will certainly be interesting to compare against the 2010 numbers.

Anyway, here is a list of the capital cities and which were the most productive for us (from best to worst):

1. Darwin
2. Brisbane
3. Perth
4. Sydney
5. Adelaide
6. Canberra
7. Melbourne

Apologies to our friends in Tasmania, but we did hardly any room nights in Hobart so I don't have them on the list. 2010 was the first year that our home town of Brisbane wasn't our biggest city. Thanks to a very large client that we look after, Darwin was the big mover on the list and sales were substantially ahead of Brisbane in second. Melbourne has really dropped off for us over the last few years and has now fallen to the bottom.

Thanks to the aformentioned large client, our top 2 hotels in the country are in Darwin. Here is the list of the 10 hotels around Australia that we make the most bookings with:

1. Mantra Pandanas (Darwin)
2. Mantra on the Esplanade (Darwin)
3. Mantra on Hay (Perth)
4. Oaks Charlotte Towers (Brisbane)
5. Mantra on Northbourne (Canberra)
6. Chifley at Lennons (Brisbane)
7. M on Mary (Brisbane)
8. Aarons All-Suites (Perth)
9. Citigate & Sebel King George Square (Brisbane)
10. The Portal Hotel (Brisbane)

Mantra Pandanas exterior

Darwin trip

I'm sure most of my friends are tired of me talking about Darwin when they ask how business is going ... but what can I say, its been a LARGE part of things over the last few months. While I "patiently" wait for the main part of our business to return to normal (that is helping the travel management companies during peak dates), we've been making hay while the sun shines by booking plenty of long-stay accommodation in Darwin.

So a much needed trip to Darwin took place last week. I had been keeping an eye on the Virgin Blue happy hour specials and it paid off as I picked up flights for basically half the normal price and began planning the visit. Almost all of the accommodation we've been booking in Darwin has been at Mantra Pandanas and Mantra on the Esplanade so they were my first point of call when it came to organising a room for myself. Thanks to Angie in sales, I was given a one bedroom water view apartment (pictured below) at Pandanas which was very nice. I was lucky enough to be on the top floor so had great views, the apartment was a good size and of course fully self-contained.

Virgin Blue has only one flight from Brisbane in to Darwin and one flight out each day and they're not pretty. Land at 12:45 am and fly out at 1:40am ... ouch! I didn't mind too much as it was a really quick trip to see the two Mantra properties, say hi and thanks to the reservations staff that have been looking after us and also check out the newly refurbished Holiday Inn. It was a good trip and great to put faces to names that we've been working with so closely.

And yes it was of course pretty warm up there and it took me a few days to catch up on lost sleep ...