Raymond Martz : And Mike, so maybe just some additional color on some of those programs. So the workers’ comp program that Jon mentioned, that was something we — is unique. It’s — we took it back from our third-party managers because we thought we could do a better job actively managing it and being on top of it. So as a result of that program, we reduced our cost at our — these are the independent properties. Again, the benefit of the independent hotels. We are more controlled than say it’s brand-managed properties, which we can’t control. But we’ve reduced our workers’ comp cost by over 60% versus our — when our managers were operating. So that’s millions of dollars a year. We’re getting better outcome. We’re also — the other side is Curator.
Curator in a way is also our internal R&D group. They’ve gone out with new technology. We have new housekeeping tools that the housekeepers can be more efficient for how they clean rooms and schedule rooms in those areas. We’re also working on a new tool that Curator put in place is an AI chatbot, which will reduce the call center volume and pressure on the staff of the hotels where frees up the staffing there, and ultimately, will result in lower staffing. So, there’s a lot of those areas that we’re actively doing, and we have a lot more flexibility at our independent hotels because we could put those programs in place. And there’s 100 of them that are in place. Some of them add more value than others, but something we’re excited about, and we should see the results in the coming quarters here.
Jon Bortz: We’ve also been making investments in– in reducing energy usage and sustainability. A couple of examples I’ll give you, which, again, it’s some of the stuff is not rocket science and it’s not new technology, but the installation of filtered water dispensers in our hotels, as we’re replacing ice machines, we’re replacing them with dual machines that also provide filtered water so that we can eliminate plastic bottled water and all bottled water in our hotels. As we near the end of life on many HVAC systems, we’re installing new higher-efficiency systems in those programs in those properties. We’ve also added solar — we now have solar two properties, Chaminade out in Santa Cruz, but we also have solar on the Monaco DC in the center of the city.
So there’s a lot of things we’ve been implementing over time. But this year, a much more intensive focus on, frankly, some of this is just doing things the right way and not getting sloppy. And I think perhaps we’ve gotten a little bit sloppy in the last 18 months.
Michael Bellisario : Helpful. Thank you.
Operator: Thank you. The next question is coming from Gregory Miller of Truist Securities. Please go ahead.
Gregory Miller : Thank you. Good morning. Given your commentary on a softening macroeconomic environment, I thought to ask specifically on any affluent leisure trade downs. When you review your Star competitive set reports to our resorts, have you seen any evidence of a transient leisure consumer trade down? For example, are you upper upscale resorts gaining share from competitive luxury resorts — or do you sense you may be losing share to lower price resorts? I’m just curious if you’re seeing any impact.
Raymond Martz : Sure. That’s a tough one. I would say, I mean, the answer is no. We’re not seeing competitive trade down. I think I mentioned earlier certainly, when we’ve seen sort of a trade down from the perspective of trading back to maybe what people can actually afford versus the splurge suites or view rooms that in 2022 just coming out of being stuck in their homes during the pandemic. So there’s no doubt we saw that. Again, I think we’ve — I think that’s normalized within the portfolio. We’ve continued generally to gain share within our resort portfolio. Our occupancy index, as an example in Q1 was for our resorts in total, we’re up over — was up over 200 basis points. So I don’t think — I think that’s probably more to do with the dollars we’ve invested in our properties and the benefits of having higher quality properties with better service versus the properties we’ve been competing with in the market.
Gregory Miller : Okay. Thank you so much, Jon.
Jon Bortz: Greg, one other thing. Just one thing I want to respond to because it’s sort of a general — it was a comment in your question. I don’t think we’re seeing a slowdown in the economy and in travel per se. And I think we’re just more cautious trying to be pragmatic about what impact the Fed’s higher for longer is going to have on the economy later this year. It may not materialize. To some extent, the fact that it hasn’t materialized to any great extent yet. But it’s also cautiousness based upon what we saw in Q1, although, again, how much was weather, how much was the holiday shift and how much was softer performance it’s hard to differentiate those three at this point in time. What we’re not hearing we’re not hearing comments from clients saying, we’re changing our policy, we’re slowing down.
You have to get 35 approvals to travel. We are not hearing those things from the customer base. We’re not seeing a reduction in lead volume for group business other than the normalization of the booking trend that we’ve been talking about.
Gregory Miller : Great. I appreciate the clarification on that.
Jon Bortz: Sure.
Operator: Thank you. The next question is coming from Anthony Powell of Barclays. Please go ahead.
Anthony Powell : Hi. Good morning. I guess what you think on the transaction side? I know rates are higher now. So are you still seeing my interest for urban assets and how is some of the volume out there? Maybe a broad overview would be helpful.
