Staying ahead of the curve: Using revenue management to help survive an economic downturn

On 11-12 November 2008, the Fourth Annual Revenue Management and Price Optimisation Conference was held at the Georgia Institute of Technology. The conference explored different business strategies that a wide cross-section of companies are using to manage the current economic downturn. Several common messages emerged from the discussions including: the increased importance of revenue management forecasts and monitoring activity; the increased need for open dialog among revenue managers with their sales and marketing colleagues and the critical role of targeted discounts to help avoid prices from spiralling downward. This paper summarises key discussions that emerged from the conference and highlights the experiences of three companies portrayed in keynote addresses given by Mark Shafer, Senior Vice President of Revenue and Profit Management at Disney; Dave Roberts, Senior Vice President of Global Revenue Management at Marriott and Brad Thompson, Chief Pricing Leader at GE Corporate.