Hotel Vermont, one of the larger hotels in Burlington, is reporting its first sellout weekend since 2019. Other hotels say they have lower vacancy than usual, and Vermont campgrounds are filling up.
But a busy Memorial Day, or even a crowd-heavy summer, may not be enough for the hospitality industry to thrive, said Hans van Wees, manager of Hotel Vermont and co-chair of the Vermont Lodging Association.
“It’s very important for these places to get business because their cash flow is extremely low,” he said. “It’s essential for their survival.”
Early data shows an uptick in movement around the state, although Vermont hasn’t hit its peak tourist season yet.
A VTDigger analysis of a sample of major roads from the Agency of Transportation shows that vehicle traffic has risen steadily through the spring. It’s currently at about 75% of the level of May 2019.
The $9 million collected in meals and rooms taxes during the month of April exceeded the target of $6.7 million, suggesting that lodging use is rising, according to Vermont’s monthly revenue release.
Vermont State Parks are also expecting a busy weekend, said Nate McKeen, director of State Parks. Many campgrounds have already filled up.
McKeen said the parks attracted high interest in 2020, as the pandemic drove people to look for safer options for traveling. But as pandemic travel restrictions ease up and with increasing interest over the years, he believes 2021 could be a record year for state parks.
High bookings and call volume at the Woodstock Inn suggest that “revenge tourism,” people traveling because of pent-up demand, “is really true,” said Courtney Lowe, vice president of marketing.
“With European travel and Canadian travel shut down this summer, domestic travel is large,” he said.
Lowe said the inn had rising interest over the past few weekends, after the out-of-state travel restrictions were lifted. This weekend was on track to sell out for at least two out of the three days.
At Killington Lodge, Brianna Mangi said “considering it’s the off-season, we’re doing pretty well.” She expected the lodge to be close to sold out when last-second arrivals were factored in.
Van Wees said that because Vermont is less than a day’s drive for about 90 million people, including New Yorkers and Bostonians, the state tends to attract car travelers more than “distant domestic” tourists or international ones.
But even as interest in leisure travel rises, many lodging properties are still struggling with other aspects of the business. Group travel, such as events and conferences, has been mostly postponed through 2021, van Wees said.
He expects his own hotel to see 70% to 75% of its typical business because of the lagging conference activity. While weekends are busy, midweeks are quieter.
And many properties have a “huge backlog” of lost income and need to pay back their debts, he said. Meanwhile, weddings that were postponed in 2020 are coming back, but their deposits have already been spent, forcing the businesses to take on their costs alone.
Hotel rooms are a perishable inventory. Unlike, say, a car dealer, an unused room today cannot be made up for tomorrow, van Wees said. But he’s feeling “cautious optimism.”
“Summer is when we build up reserves for fall and winter,” he said. “Hopefully summer will be strong enough to see us through.”
