Skift Take
In a Skift interview, IHG CEO Elie Maalouf said he's seen no pullbacks in travel demand outside of China. He touted the company's geographic diversification and how the hotel group is doubling down on tech upgrades this year.
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) reported earnings Tuesday, and said it isn't seeing signs of demand weakness outside of China.
"We're watching the data that's coming out on the U.S. economy, but we're not seeing anything in our numbers right now," said CEO Elie Maalouf. "In Q2, we saw an acceleration. Looking into July, we saw a broad continuation of that pattern. Even early into August, it seems to be the same."
Marriott and Wyndham recently suggested consumers may be pulling back on travel demand in the second half, and they modestly lowered their full-year outlooks.
But IHG, the third-largest Western hotel group by room count, said the post-pandemic tourism wave was merely moderating and normalizing to pre-pandemic levels. The group's outlook remains cautiously optimistic, thanks partly to performance gains from its technology investments.
A key measure of hotel demand is revenue per available room, and IHG reported a 3% rise in this figure worldwide in the first half of the year. Revenue per available room rose 2.5% in the U.K., 4.8% in the rest of Europe, and 9.2% in the Middle East.
Modest Impact of China's WeaknessIHG saw revenue per available room fall by 2.6% in China. But the group didn't see a dramatic impact from that on its overall performance.
That news contrasted with Marriott, which cited weakness in China a