146 – Check In with Kevin Carey

Suite Spot: A Hotel Marketing Podcast

Join the Suite Spot in this quarterly series to hear from American Hotel & Lodging Association President & CEO, Kevin Carey, on the state of the hospitality industry and recent developments being made by the AHLA to move the industry forward.

Episode Transcript
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Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. As always, thank you for listening. We’ve got a fantastic episode for you today. Another industry check-in with Kevin Carey, interim president and CEO at the American Hotel and Lodging Association. Kevin, thank you so much for taking the time and joining me today.

Kevin Carey :
Hi, Ryan. Good day. It’s good to see you as well.

Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited to have you. You know, we’re gonna jump right into it. We spoke last in the spring season, right before a busy summer travel season. Listen, the travelers have been busy traveling to hotels. Hotels have been busy hosting, but AHLA has been busy as well, advocating for hoteliers and everything that you guys do for our industry. Let’s catch up with some of those big accomplishments and some of the most pressing issues right now. We know we, there’s always those issues that rise up. What are some of those that hotels should be most aware of right now?

Kevin Carey :
Oh as you said, it’s been an incredibly busy period of time. Certainly first and foremost for the industry. The support and the service our member companies provide for guests and the environment they create for our associates and workers is certainly first and foremost, our team here, both in AHLA and, uh, the foundation have been incredibly busy as well. Um, over the first half of the year, it’s been, uh, a, a peak period of activity at a state and local level with state legislators and legislatures in session, uh, and certainly in Washington here, uh, as, uh, the Congress starts to look towards end of the year in the election. So, we’ve been advancing our work, uh, at a state level on short-term rental sets of issues in Washington here around the passage in the house, uh, of the Hotel Fees Transparency Act. Um, and, and also work to ensure that we defeated the, the joint employer rule as well. There’s just a number of areas that we feel proud about as a team and that are really meaningful on behalf of the industry as well.

Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And but there’s still with all those wins, and congratulations to your team, there’s always work to do as you know, and some of those pressing issues that are at the forefront right now for our hoteliers. What, what are some of those that, again, hoteliers, even though it might be something regional, they still should be aware of because it has, it’s gonna have an impact on the entire industry.

Kevin Carey :
Absolutely. And really to identify two that are certainly getting a lot of our team’s attention and the industry attention. So first and foremost, in New York City, a bill was introduced in the city council several weeks ago, approaching about a month ago at this point. And this bill, the so-called Safe Hotels Act, has been positioned by his proponents as a simple licensing bill. And the bill sponsors have represented that hotels are unregulated, and that there’s an increase in crime occurring in hotels. This bill would do grave damage, not only to the hotel industry, to travelers, to workers, who represent and are employed by the industry and the city economy and the tourism economy itself. So this is bad for everyone. And we’ve been very actively involved in New York several times, meeting with members of the city council organizing the industry to have a strong voice in pushing back, on this ill conceived and flawed legislation. So we’re still working very actively on that and trying to underscore the grave damage that this would represent for the industry.

Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and sometimes, you know, these to hoteliers, everyday hoteliers, this might seem like, you know, some complicated issues and things of that nature, but you’ve got some great explainer videos on your social media on AHLA.com where hoteliers can get information to be more educated about this issue because, and show some of the effects that you were talking about there, Kevin, and learn a little bit more about, what this legislation can mean for everyday hoteliers. But, another win that I saw recently trending on ALA’s website was the hospitality law database, which was launched. Could you share with our hotel audience kind of the idea behind this, why there was a need to do this, and how hoteliers everyday hoteliers can leverage this?

Kevin Carey :
Sure. You think about ALA’s role where we promote the industry, we advocate on its behalf, and we also play an important role as the convening entity for the industry and all segments of the industry is how our membership model is designed within that. We provide services around the advocacy that we conduct on behalf of our member companies, whether here in Washington at a state and local level, or even increasingly on cross border set of issues. But we also provide a membership value proposition. And alongside the advocacy work we do, we felt rolling out this hospitality law database would give our members access to the laws that impact their operations on a nationwide basis. So this is a resource for our members. Obviously, it aligns with the work that we do on the advocacy front and felt that this was a natural extension in enhancing our value to our member companies, but also obviously very germane and linked to the work we do on a public policy advocacy basis as well.

Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And the more educated you can get hotels about, again, the issues that are at the forefront of our industry right now the more support you can get on your end, they’re gonna be able to reach out to their representatives to advocate for themselves as well with the help of such a strong arm, like AHLA. So, fantastic. You’ve talked about the advocacy work, the resource and educational piece that AHLA provides to hoteliers as well, especially around one of the issues we’ve been talking about, which is staffing shortages. And I wanna talk about this. We’ve actually been busy. The Suite Spot has been on a hospitality campus crawl across the state of Florida talking to some of those educators that are getting the next generation of professional hoteliers and hospitality workers out there. But I think one of the ways, small ways we can combat this is creating opportunities like internships, hospitality internships. We have hospitality marketing internship at Travel Media Group. We just wrapped up. I’ve seen a couple social media posts of your summer internship program at AHLA and thanking those interns in the work they’re doing. Can you discuss the importance of creating opportunities like for young professionals to do hospitality and hotel internships and the role of hospitality mentors in our industries could help us combat with staffing shortages?

Kevin Carey :
Certainly, kudos to you and your efforts on that front as well. But we’ve had a intern program here for a number of years. We’ve got a class of nine interns, who are still in their roles as we speak here. I think they’re preparing their, their final capstone presentations for their team, but they’re embedded in each of our key teams from the government affairs team to our membership team, our foundation team, our HR department. So they’re learning about the role of an industry association, learning about the hospitality and the lodging industry structure overall. And they just brought a great energy as well as enhancement to our culture. And they’re doing great work. I’m always so impressed with their poise and maturity, and they really just blended right into the team, and it’s been great to have them around the office. And, and we’re really proud about the program. And internship programs are always something personal level, that I’ve had a lot of time for. I started my career in two internships that were very foundational and exposing me to the business community and creating a pathway to the first full-time job, that I had many years ago. So it’s been great to see our team embrace that and also the response we’ve received from our, from our intern class. And they’ve had some opportunities to play a leadership role actually where they’ve reached out and helped to convene interns from other trade associations and even from some of our member companies, and forged a joint session that was hosted here in our office where they’ve built a rapport and some networking that they’re doing with fellow interns across a number of different organizations. So, we’ll be sad to see them go, but also, really proud about the accomplishments they’ve had and what they’ve contributed to our organization.

Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to see, and I can’t tell you how many times Kevin, I’ve been across interviewing a industry leader, and you know, how, how they have a very similar path. You know, they started either in an internship or they started as a summer job in college and fell in love with our industry or have a mentor that really guided them to say, “Hey, listen, you’ve got a career in this.” And, it’s always great to hear those stories, and it’s about creating those stories so that young professionals can be exposed to everything that our, our incredible industry has to offer. As, as you already know. And, you know, we had Alexi Khajavi from Questex on the podcast recently, he really set the stage for this year’s Hospitality Show in San Antonio, which the Suite Spot will be there and covering live, which we’re really excited about AHLA partners with Questex to put on this incredible show we’re both gonna be attending. What are you most looking forward to and why is this the must attend event for hoteliers this season?

Kevin Carey :
Well, we just had a joint working team session, earlier this week. And again, the enthusiasm, and the focus on just delivering, an outstanding offering for the attendees from the content that’ll be on main stage, to the breadth and the range of exhibitors will be on the trade show floor. And importantly the experience that’s gonna be created around the entire trade show and conference, including the evening social events, the ability to network, to interact with industry leaders and to really have that deep, meaningful content, that really differentiates the hospitality show. We were thrilled with the year one results that we delivered together as a partnership, and I’m confident you’re gonna see even further strides this year when we gather in San Antonio on October 28th to the 30th. So we’re thrilled to have you there, Ryan, and what we hope is thousands and expect to be thousands of other industry leaders and industry influencers who are gonna be on site to do business and connect with one another.

Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It looks and sounds to be, record breaking attendance. You know, I challenge, my audience, if you’re a hotelier, out there, check out the seminar and program and agenda that they have set for the, The Hospitality Show full of hospitality leaders, influencers, celebrities, some, it’s gonna be a really, really great show. We’re excited. But, you know, one of my favorite things about The Hospitality Show is you get all the brands together, right? All the industry leaders not just the sector. And you get to see, how some issues kind of rise to the top and you get to see a rallying cry around some really important issues, one of them being human trafficking, right? And the fight against that. And I know AHLA and the foundation and there are no Room for Human Trafficking Campaign, do a fantastic job and work, talk to us for those in our audience who aren’t familiar with this initiative and why is it, so important and should be at the top priority for hoteliers out there.

Kevin Carey :
Yeah, so thank you for that setup. The AHLA has been playing a leadership role, on this effort to prevent, and to combat human trafficking since 2019. We just recently, our AHLA foundation hosted the third annual No Room for Trafficking Summit, bringing together organizations, our industry organizations who were providing funding for via our new survivors fund. All focused around elevating the training, the awareness, and the efforts to support survivors of human trafficking. It’s such a, a powerful event and program. I believe we’re approaching close to 1.8 million hotel industry employees who’ve been trained in just the exponential impact and ripple effect in a positive way that that has a elevating awareness for people who can spot the signs and take action. The Survivors Fund, we announced at the event awards totaling up to a million dollars, for organizations who are on the front lines, of supporting the survivors of human trafficking. So this brings the entire industry together, not only the hotel brands, but owners, the management companies, but also the vendor community is active in this effort as well. So it’s an important and a serious issue, but also one where you can see that this industry making a difference.

Ryan Embree:
No, absolutely. And if you ever have any doubt or want to be inspired to support this cause, I challenge you just listen to one of these incredible stories and the difference that it is making right now. So, again, thank you to you and your organization for all the work that you do. It’s such an important cause for the hotel industry. Kevin, we know you’re boots on the ground, right? You’re traveling all over the country, talking to industry leaders, hotel brands, hotel management companies, and individual hoteliers at these regional hospitality events. We talked about at the top. We’ve got a lot of external factors right now. We’ve got inflation, rising interest rates, construction costs, and all that with an election year at the end of the year. So what’s your general sentiment? You know, when you put your ear to the ground, you talk to these everyday hoteliers out there, I mean, we just came off a great summer. But what’s the general sentiment out there about our industry and what to look forward to in 2025?

Kevin Carey :
Yeah, you touched on it Ryan. I think a number of factors that people would recognize, as creating some degree of uncertainty or some headwinds, and profitability is a challenge right now in the industry because of those factors, interest rates, the consumer health of the consumer, operating costs, even some of the public policy issues that we talked about in New York and Boston, those can create uncertainty as well as translate into real operating cost implications for the industry. So all those things are certainly present, and certainly the conversations I have with our members, acknowledge those. But from a medium and a long-term perspective, there’s still great recognition of this industry’s vitality that the sector of travel and tourism, will grow over time that people value those experiences, whether it’s individual ones for leisure, the group, and meeting events that they attend as well as for business travel. So you still see that long-term opportunity set, and I think that’s reflected through the investments industry is making in new brands, new concept development, investments in key markets. So that balancing between short term challenges, but also this long term growth trajectory is really front and center, in almost all the conversations I have with our industry leaders.

Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s a great point. I mean, no longer can anyone question the resiliency of this industry after the last few years, but there is, you know, we’ve got the rise in business travel still surging. Fantastic to see, as you said, exciting announcements with new brands, new projects. We talked to some of them on the podcast here. There’s still so much hope on our industry and the consumers they’re still traveling. At the end of the day, we’re all travelers and we love to see it. So thank you again for all the awareness and education that, that your team do. And again for my audience, I really encourage you, visit AHLA.com, get educated on some of these issues that Kevin and his team are really fighting and advocating so much for everyday hoteliers. So, coming up on it now, but wanted to see if you had any final thoughts before we wrap up today, Kevin?

Kevin Carey :
Well, thank you again, for inviting me to join you. We will absolutely look forward to seeing you in San Antonio, the end of October for The Hospitality Show. And also as always just a sincere thank you on behalf of our team on the AHLA and the foundation side for our member companies investment, in AHLA and their leadership involvement and thought leadership involvement in driving the industry forward on the issues we’re active on. So thank you.

Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Well, we appreciate it as well. Thank you to all of our hoteliers listening out there, and hopefully we will see you at The Hospitality show here in a couple months. We’ll check in with you as well next quarter. Kevin, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot, and we’ll talk to you next time.

Kevin Carey :
Great. Thanks, Ryan.

Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.