Host more events to boost NZ hotels’ future - Accor

Wednesday, 2 April 2025

Pullman Auckland Airport is an example of a global brand attractive to an international audience, which also tells a local story for visitors to experience, Accor said.

New Zealand’s hotel industry had a tough year last year, with declines in occupancy and hotel room rates, but it has great potential for growth in future, a global hotel giant says.

Accor, one of the largest hotel operators in New Zealand, hosted its annual Pacific Franchise Conference in Auckland last week.

Proceedings kicked off with a presentation on performance trends across the hotel industry, based on new data from CoStar, a global provider of commercial real estate information.

Matthew Burke, regional director of Asia Pacfic at STR, CoStar's hospitality analytics division, said the data showed New Zealand was one of two major countries to see occupancy and average daily rate declines in 2024.

While Australia almost had its occupancy back to 2019 levels, New Zealand still had some way to go, although there were varying results across subsets of the market last year, he said.

Not having another event like the Fifa Women’s World Cup in New Zealand last winter impacted on the hotel industry.

“Demand continued to grow overall, but it softened out in winter before starting to grow again towards the end of the year. Not having a big event, like the Fifa Women’s World Cup the year before, made a difference.

“New hotel supply also came on the market at a time that demand was dropping, but the distribution of new supply was not evenly distributed around the country, and nor was demand.”

In Auckland, for example, supply increased by over 5% over the year to December, but demand did not change. In contrast, Rotorua’s supply was up nearly 10% but demand was up by about 15%.

Supply rose by between 1% and 2.5% in Wellington, Christchurch and Queenstown, but in Wellington demand dipped about 1%, while in Christchurch and Queenstown demand was up by about 6% and 4% respectively.

Burke said it made for different positioning of the key markets, with only Christchurch and Queenstown recording occupancy rates of above 70% over the year.

The other markets all had occupancy rates above 60%, but in 2019 all the markets had occupancy rates of around 80%, he said.

“Part of the reason occupancy was down in Auckland was an influx of new hotel supply built in expectation of the NZICC [New Zealand International Convention Centre] completion. With that now opening later than hoped, there is a lag effect. But demand is there.”

Wellington was reflecting the effects of government cutbacks, with a big slip in midweek occupancy rates and average daily rate heavily impacted, but Christchurch’s occupancy rates were solid and looking positive going forward, he said.

Accor’s Duncan O’Rourke says New Zealand needs to host more big events.

“There are early signs that winter 2025 will be tough again across New Zealand, with soft demand in forward occupancy in Auckland and Wellington. But there’s a slightly better outlook for the South Island.”

Burke’s presentation put forward a subdued near-term outlook for the country’s hotels, but The Post talked to Accor’s two top executives for the Asia Pacific region and they saw big opportunities going forward.

Duncan O’Rourke is chief executive of Accor’s Middle East, Africa, and Asia Pacific division. He said the company saw a lot of potential in New Zealand due to its natural beauty, great people, and interesting culture.

But the country needed more big events of all types, from business conferences to cultural and sporting events, he said.

“The NZICC in Auckland will be critical for stimulating demand as it will bring in more international events, and they not only fill hotels, but also benefit cafes, restaurants, bars, and shops.

“They also tend to attract high yield travellers, and about 30% of business travellers come back after a good conference experience. People are always looking for new destinations and experiences.”

He said Accor would be promoting New Zealand as it had 46 hotels around the country, and wanted to increase its presence further.

People are looking for authenticity when travelling, and New Zealand fits that bill, Accor’s Adrian Williams says.

“Growing at the right rate is important though, and we don’t want to offer cookie-cutter hotels that could be anywhere. We want our hotels to have a strong cultural connection to the city they are in, and to reflect their location with local design, staff, suppliers and produce.”

To that end, Accor planned to expand its franchise model in New Zealand. The company currently has 11 franchise properties, but it was on the lookout for well-run hotels to partner with, O’Rourke said.

“We are interested in hotels that want to work with a market leader when it comes to commercial distribution. But we don’t want local hotels to lose their identity, we want to support them while giving them international exposure through our platform.”

Accor’s Asia Pacific chief operating officer, Adrian Williams, said that in a world where people were looking for authenticity when travelling, few places fit the bill more than New Zealand.

“It has a quiet charm about it, and it is possible to have a ‘typical’ but unique New Zealand experience, with Māori culture richly intertwined. That is what people are looking for in international travel these days.”

He pointed to the Pullman Auckland Airport as an example of a global brand attractive to an international audience, but which told a local story for visitors to experience.

There were strong growth opportunities in New Zealand, and the company was capitalising on them with the opening of several new hotels over the coming year, he said.

Accor was set to open a Tribe Hotel, and its first Pacific Jo&Joe Hotel in downtown Auckland in the middle of this year. Work on a 191-room Pullman Hotel in Hamilton’s CBD was underway, and the hotel was scheduled to open in 2026.

Williams said the measures the Government was putting in place to support tourism were great, but he would always encourage governments to look at more opportunities to support events.

“Events drive tourism, and benefit the economy. They add to the buzz of a destination, attract people to it, and lift the spirit of locals.

“A strong event calendar encourages investors to keep investing, building businesses and putting in more infrastructure.”

Accor operates more than 400 hotels in the Pacific region under brands such as Sofitel, Pullman, Mövenpick, Grand Mercure, The Sebel, Novotel, Mercure, and ibis. Globally, it operates more than 5680 hotels.