No Pick-Up, No Pulse: Why It’s So Important for a Hotel

Recently, during a conversation with a friend, he asked me a question that had clearly been on his mind:
“How can you spend your whole day analyzing bookings?”

I smiled and said, “Think of it as feeling the heartbeat of a hotel – you’re not standing at the front desk watching guests check in, you’re checking the pick-up.”

He looked puzzled. “Pick… what?”

I explained matter-of-factly: The pick-up measures the change in a hotel’s booking status over a specific period of time (usually until the end of the following calendar year). It shows how many additional bookings have been made compared to the previous day, week, or another reference point – including cancellations.

This makes pick-up a key indicator for assessing current market demand and the effectiveness of pricing strategies.
Example: If you had 80 rooms booked for next week yesterday and today there are 90, the pick-up is 10 rooms. If it’s the other way around, bookings are dropping – the hotel’s heartbeat slows, and that directly affects revenue.

My friend frowned and asked: “Okay, but what do you actually need to analyze pick-up properly? How do you make sense of it?”

I told him you don’t need complex models – just a few basic metrics:

• Room nights: How many additional nights were booked? What’s the impact of cancellations?
• Revenue: How much income do the new bookings generate (minus cancellations)?
• Average Daily Rate (ADR): Are the new bookings above or below the current average? Is the ADR rising or falling?
• Comparison values: What was the pick-up yesterday? On the same day last year? That’s how you tell whether the hotel’s pulse is strong or weak.

Example: +20 room nights compared to yesterday, plus X euros in revenue, ADR slightly higher. Sounds good.
But if last year on the same day the pick-up was +30 room nights higher, that’s a warning sign. Looking at multiple perspectives at once – that’s key.

However, visualizing pick-up is also crucial for understanding and interpreting booking dynamics. Depending on the period you choose – two weeks or several months – the picture can change dramatically.
A short lead time highlights spontaneous or last-minute demand, while a long lead time reflects strategic or planned bookings.
So, the chosen visualization greatly influences what conclusions you draw from the pick-up and which actions you take to optimize booking behavior.

Why Pick-Up Analysis Matters Every Day

• Early warning system: Pick-up shows how active current bookings are – like the hotel’s pulse.
• Quick reaction: If there’s available capacity, pricing or marketing actions can be adjusted promptly.
• Operational planning: Housekeeping, staffing, and other resources can be better managed.
• Learning from comparisons: Reviewing last year’s data reveals what factors drove success.

What to Pay Attention To

To properly assess pick-up, comparisons with other key metrics are essential. In particular, budget, forecast, and OTB (On the Books) figures play central roles.

The budget defines a hotel’s financial targets, usually on an annual or monthly basis – it’s the benchmark against which actual performance is measured.
The forecast, on the other hand, is a dynamic projection based on current booking data, market conditions, and historical experience.

While the budget is set at the beginning of a period, the forecast is regularly updated to reflect the most realistic expectations for future performance.
The OTB value shows the current booking status at a given point in time. The pick-up explains the change in that value, helping to better understand and interpret deviations between forecast and budget.

Example: If a hotel is currently below budget but shows a strong positive pick-up, demand appears to be recovering and the forecast should be adjusted upward.
If, however, pick-up remains weak for several days despite high budget targets, it’s time to review pricing or distribution strategies.
Pick-up thus acts as an early warning system, enabling management to detect deviations early and take corrective action.

Other important considerations include:

• Events & market conditions: Major events can boost pick-up, but that doesn’t automatically mean prices should be raised across the board. Competition, distribution channels, and market dynamics must be considered.
• Avoid overreacting: A single weak day isn’t cause for panic – multi-day trends are more meaningful.
• Cross-department collaboration: Continuous communication between Revenue Management, Sales, and Marketing allows coordinated pricing and distribution strategies, and helps identify optimization opportunities together.

After a while, you start reading these reports like a novel – a bit of drama, some suspense, moments of joy, and hopefully a happy ending.

Pick-up is more than just a number on a dashboard.
There’s a little thrill each morning when opening the reports: “What changed overnight?”
Relief when the pick-up rises – a frown when it stagnates.

Perhaps pick-up really is the heartbeat of a hotel: sometimes faster, sometimes slower – but without it, nothing works.

Written by Johannes Beck