Leverage your utility data.
Join a growing network of hotels optimizing utility costs and enhancing property value through Utility Performance Benchmarking (UPB).
Why care about utility efficiency?
Utility costs are the fastest growing operating cost in the lodging industry. No wonder European hoteliers name energy costs as their largest concern.
(Sources: US Environmental Protection Agency - Energy Star for Hospitality; European Accommodation Barometer 2022)
80%
of guests confirm that traveling more sustainably is important to them.
(Source: Booking.com Sustainable Travel Report 2023)
37%
of the accommodation sectors carbon footprint stems from building energy and heating consumption.
(Source: World Travel & Tourism Council - A Net Zero Roadmap for Travel & Tourism 2021)
Who we serve.
Hotel Operators
UPB Global helps hotel operators gauge their hotel’s performance and set it into context by comparing the efficiency of comparable properties. Utility costs play a significant role in the hotel’s P&L; therefore, monitoring and benchmarking such expenses is essential.
Investors, Developers, Owners, …
UPB Global allows hotel owners to contextualize their property’s energy, water, and heat efficiency. In times of increased ESG scrutiny, the real estate market is looking to consider such variables in property values. The collected and analyzed data can be utilized to make purchase, construction or lease decisions. Find optimisation strategies for your current portfolio to enhance real estate value and reduce operating cost.
How UPB works.
Property is registered: Your property is registered in our data base with specific data points, including your utility data (energy, water, heat) and the individual complexity and features of your hotel operation and brand
Comparable properties are suggested: Based on the previously described data points, an algorithm and the UPB team suggest comparable properties that could be included in your CompSet.
Client selects CompSet: You review the suggested properties and freely choose which ones you would like to have in your CompSet.
Client receives benchmarking: After cleaning, analysis, and calculations with the provided data a comprehensive benchmarking report is provided. This contextualizes your hotel’s efficiency and highlights opportunities for improvement.
The Benchmarking Report.
At UPB, we provide detailed, data-driven benchmarking reports using descriptive statistics to help you understand your hotel's utility efficiency in comparison with your competitive set. You will see the following core elements:
CompSet Overview: Shows your hotel and the hotels you have chosen to be compared with. This includes data points such as age of the hotel, number of rooms, and so on.
Performance Overview: Summarizes your hotel's performance in key metrics like electricity, water, and heat usage, alongside the industry average and your hotel's ranking (Index).
Descriptive Statistics: Provides a statistical breakdown, including the median, quartiles, percentiles, and standard deviation. These measures allow you to understand where your hotel stands in comparison to the rest of your CompSet.
Visual Representations: Box plots highlight your hotel’s performance across metrics. We ensure anonymity by removing outliers that could reveal the identity of competing hotels. Our approach focuses on the most relevant data points—like the 5th and 95th percentiles—while excluding extreme values to provide a clearer picture of your efficiency.
Our goal is to empower you with actionable intelligence so you can make informed decisions about your hotel’s energy usage and sustainability efforts. If available, PMS data is also used to carry out deeper analyses.
The report shown above has been created using randomized data and is an approximation of what a final benchmarking report may look like.
Our vision.
Through a data-centred approach, we want to revolutionize hotel utility management. By providing precise, actionable benchmarking services, we enable our clients to understand, compare, and optimize their energy usage exactly according to their competition. Through continuous innovation and expansion, UPB Global contributes to a more energy-efficient, cost-reduced, and sustainable world for your guests.
Meet the team.
Jeremias Wirtz
Co-Founder
CEO
During his time at EHL Hospitality Business School, Jeremias found his passion for numbers and data analysis. Various internships within hotel operations and asset management fully immersed him in the industry but also confronted him with the challenges it faces today. With UPB, he combines his expertise in data with his experience in hospitality to drive greater efficiency and sustainability across the sector.
Felicitas Hockemeyer
Co-Founder
Head of Finance & Legal
After a hospitality apprenticeship, a B.Sc. in BA and Economics, Felicitas started her career auditing hotels at Deloitte. Following a LL.M. in Commercial Law, she gained valuable operational and administrative experience as an asset manager and general manager. With executive experience within Accor, Oetker Collection, and Arabella Hospitality, she has fully embraced the hospitality field.
FAQs
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Utility benchmarking for hotels provides key benefits by offering a broader industry perspective on your property's utility usage. While internal comparisons within your portfolio highlight trends, benchmarking against external operators offers more accurate, actionable insights. This allows you to identify efficient properties as well as those underperforming, enabling targeted strategies to improve cost efficiency and operational performance.
Additionally, continuous benchmarking helps you track progress over time and stay competitive in an industry focused on optimizing utility use. By understanding how your properties compare to industry standards, you can make data-driven decisions that enhance sustainability efforts, improve guest appeal, and strengthen your bottom line.
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Absolutely, your data is kept private and secure. Your utility data is used solely for benchmarking purposes and is shared with other participants only in an anonymized and aggregated manner, ensuring that no individual property can be identified from the data provided.
General details about your hotel—such as location, size, and type—may be used to select appropriate competitive sets for benchmarking comparisons. However, your specific utility data remains confidential and is never disclosed to external parties without your explicit permission.
For more information, feel free to reach out or refer back to your existing contracts.
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Our utility benchmarking service operates on a subscription-based model, featuring annual data processing fees for each property you enroll in the program. The cost per property varies based on factors such as the size of your portfolio, the number of properties, and any specific requirements you might have.
If you are interested, please fill out the contact form. We will get back to you with a tailored quote and more information.
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While various benchmarking methods exist, including Linear Regression and Stochastic Frontier Analysis, we have found that Descriptive Statistics offer the most accurate insights, as supported by academic studies.
Descriptive statistics offer a clear, easy-to-interpret method for understanding where your hotel stands. Our reports let you track your property’s performance year-over-year and pinpoint areas for improvement. This method is particularly well-suited for smaller CompSets, as it delivers statistically significant insights without the need for large datasets.
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You have complete control over the hotels against which your property is benchmarked. Recognizing that meaningful comparisons are crucial for actionable insights, we offer you the flexibility to select a competitive set that best aligns with your objectives. We will recommend appropriate hotels based on factors such as service level, size, location, and other relevant data points to help you make an informed decision. However, the final choice remains entirely yours.
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Our goal is to empower you with actionable intelligence so you can make informed decisions about your hotel’s energy usage and sustainability efforts. You can leverage the data provided by the benchmarking report to plan out the next priorities to become a more efficient, sustainable hotel operator.
In addition to the report, we provide a detailed guide to help you interpret the statistical indicators and visual data. Should you need further assistance, the UPB team is always available to help you understand these insights.
We’d love to work with you!
Find out how your hotel performs against the competition.