Nashville Technology Council

Randy Smith, CEO, Smith Travel Research

Randy Smith is Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of Smith Travel Research (STR), the leading authority on lodging industry performance trends. STR benchmarks hotel occupancy, rate, and revenue through its STAR program. In 2007, STR expanded their benchmarking efforts outside of North America with the creation of STR Global and now receives data from over 37,000 hotels worldwide. Their commitment to confidentiality and accuracy has set the industry standard for over twenty years.

STR tracks market share performance for virtually every major global hotel chain and most major owner & management companies through its STAR program. Clients rely on STR’s data quality and absolute data confidentiality to make strategic and operational decisions in the areas of sales and marketing, development, revenue & yield management, reservation forecasting, and internal audit.

STR publishes the U.S. Hotel Review, a weekly newsletter endorsed by the American Hotel & Lodging Association that tracks occupancy and room rates for the U.S., all fifty states, and the top 25 metropolitan markets. STR’s Global Hotel Review is a monthly newsletter that covers lodging performance data for most major international markets. Data from these publications is frequently published in Hotel & Motel Management, Hotels, Lodging Hospitality, Lodging Magazine, The Cornell Quarterly, The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. It is also used extensively by investment bankers, lodging equity analysts and hospitality consultants. STR data is used as the official source of lodging statistics for the U.S. Travel Data Center’s Travel Printout and by over 300 convention and visitors bureaus, state tourism departments and government entities.
 
Mr. Smith was a 2007 inductee to the Florida State University College of Business Hall of Fame. He is a member and past co-chairman of the Industry Real Estate Financing Advisory Council (IREFAC) and the 2002 recipient of the prestigious IREFAC C. Everett Johnson Award. He is also vice-chair of the American Hotel Foundation Funding Committee. Mr. Smith is a charter member of the International Society of Hospitality Consultants and a former member of the board of directors. He is the recipient of the 1996 Industry Pioneer Award of the ISHC for outstanding contribution to the lodging industry. Mr. Smith is a regular keynote speaker at the major industry conferences.

Prior to starting STR, Mr. Smith was Director of Research for Laventhol & Horwath and has nearly 30 years experience in lodging industry research. He resides in Nashville, TN, with his wife and son. Mr. Smith is an avid fisherman and hiker.