Correspondence: Stowe Shoemaker, 229 CN Hilton Hotel and College, Houston, TX 77204-3028, USA. Tel: +1 713 743 7371; Fax: +1 713 743 2575; E-mail: sshoemaker@uh.edu

¹Silvia Milla graduated in December 2007 with an MS in Hospitality Management at the Conrad N. Hilton College of the University of Houston. This paper represents a part of her thesis, where she studied aspects of revenue management in the hotel industry.

²Stowe Shoemaker is the Donald Hubbs Professor at the Conrad N. Hilton College of the University of Houston.

Received 5 December 2007; Revised 5 December 2007; Published online 4 January 2008.

Abstract

This paper discusses future trends in revenue management (RM) in the hotel industry based on interviews with industry leaders. The integration of customer behaviour and preferences into marketing and pricing strategies appears to be a major future trend. Examples of this trend are the increased attention given to the analysis of total customer value both in the short and long term. Group RM is also receiving considerable attention from hoteliers. Many of the participants interviewed identified a need to improve the accuracy of forecasting, given the increased complexity of group business. To reap the benefits of these new strategies, companies will need to invest in technological as well as human support. In the past, RM has been driven by the search for technological solutions to improve RM techniques. In the future, it is foreseen that the customer will be the driving force of all RM efforts.