SINGAPORE: Hotels around the Formula One track in Singapore expect to rake in higher revenues during the upcoming night race, even though Singapore had hosted the race for the last six years.
Ritz Carlton Millennia Singapore said half of its rooms for this year’s race have already been booked as soon as last year’s F1 race ended.
Room rates during the race would go between S$1,250 and S$20,000 per night with a required minimum stay of two nights.
The global economic slowdown also did not seem to have any impact on demand from corporate clients.
Ritz Carlton’s general manager Peter Mainguy said: “Our corporate demand for suites for entertaining is actually bigger than it has ever been.”
Ritz Carlton refurbished all of its 608 rooms a year and a half ago and this has also helped the hotel to price its rooms at a 16 per cent premium during the F1 weekend.
Pan Pacific Hotel was also recently refurbished, opening in August last year. The hotel prices its rooms from S$1,100 to S$5,600 a night.
The 790-room hotel changed its tact and aimed at attracting more group business this year.
Pan Pacific Singapore’s public relations manager Nathalyn Fong said: “It was a different strategy… we needed to try to see if we can get the volume we needed. It seems to work because compared to the past two years — we had the most group business compared to the last two years.”
However, challenges remain for Singapore’s hotel sector.
Property consultant CBRE sees average daily room rates growing slower from 17.5 per cent in 2011 to 9.5 per cent in 2012.
Singapore’s Revenue per Available Room (RevPar), calculated by multiplying a hotel’s average daily room rate (ADR) by its occupancy rate, slipped 2.5 per cent to S$217.10 in the first half of 2013.
But the F1 event is expected to help boost RevPar for Singapore hotels.
CBRE Hotels Asia Pacific’s executive director Robert Mcintosh said: “During F1, RevPar would probably be a premium to the average of the year of 10 to 15 per cent for the whole month. For that particular weekend, it could be 70 to 80 per cent to twice as much, perhaps even more in the next few days.
“Occupancy is about the average, the same. (It) can be three times as much or 50 per cent more away from the track.”
The real estate consultant forecasted overall RevPar to slip slightly by 3 to 4 per cent from last year.
Still, it remained positive on the overall outlook of the hotel sector.
Hotels around F1 track expect to rake in higher revenues
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