Pubs with rooms are on the rise. With more than 5,700 pubs with rooms across the UK —equating to around 50,000 guest rooms—and 41% of operators planning to expand their offering, it’s a market full of momentum. Pubs with rooms are perfectly placed to meet the needs of guests who want the charm, informality, and character of an Airbnb, but with the service standards, food, and drink experience only a pub can offer. In the article, Are pubs with rooms the new boutique hotels?, The Caterer recently reported on the growing trend of consumers turning away from budget hotel chains to mid-market pub groups with rooms.

With the right technology in place, pub operators have a unique opportunity to capitalise on this trend—streamlining operations, improving visibility, and delivering exceptional guest experiences from booking to checkout.

One of the most important aspects of Zonal PMS is its ability to enhance property visibility online in the market by integrating directly with online travel agents as well as your own website. A joined-up tech stack which feeds directly into the OTAs, saves a lot of time and makes selling your rooms significantly easier —with real-time availability making it possible to sell rooms right up to the last minute.

The technology also allows you to track customer data, ensuring that the guest journey can be followed from start to finish. This level of insight provides you with valuable information to help tailor and deliver great service to guests.

We recently spoke to some of the Provenance Collection team to find out what benefits integrated technology has had to their business.

More time to focus on your guests

With Zonal PMS teams are freed up to focus spending more time with customers on creating great hospitality experiences for guests, where staff can be out on the floor engaging with customers, instead of spending time on admin. It’s not so much about eliminating tasks, but instead about freeing up staff to do what they really care about – creating great experiences.

Easily manage rooms rates

Zonal PMS enables pub operators to efficiently manage bedroom booking rates, especially across multiple sites. What could take up to 12–15 hours per week can now be handled in just a couple of hours with Zonal PMS —freeing up valuable time.

One system, one experience: service consistency across sites

Utilising one platform to manage your accommodation across your whole estate means that staff training is centralised across all sites, and service is consistent because staff are using identical technology across locations, processes such as booking, check-in, check-out, and billing are streamlined—ensuring accuracy and delivering a seamless guest experience.

Boost F&B sales with table bookings integration

We understand how frustrating it can be for guests to navigate a disjointed booking process—reserving a room, only to have to return to the website and click through again if they want to book a table as well. With the right technology in place, such as a table booking system that integrates natively with your PMS, guests can reserve a table in the pub’s restaurant at the same time they book their room. What’s more you can offer guests the opportunity to purchase optional extras whilst booking their stay and include optional extras such as Champagne, Flowers, Early Check-Ins and Late Check-outs. This not only streamlines the experience but also creates valuable upselling opportunities for food and drink, reduces admin for your team, and enhances the overall guest journey.

Reward and build guest loyalty

Zonal’s loyalty platform can also play a role here in helping venues encourage and reward repeat visits, where points can be collected and offers can be distributed through the platform. For example, hotel guests who stay regularly may earn points for each visit, and as it builds up, they’ll eventually have enough for a for a free stay.

In addition to rewarding loyal guests and driving repeat visits, an integration with Zonal’s loyalty platform can also help you boost guest spend during their visit and boost engagement with both the accommodation and F&B sides of your business. Loyalty rewards accrued from a guest booking a stay with you can be redeemed in your restaurant or bar, and vice versa, with any loyalty balance built from guests eating and drinking in your pub able to be used to pay towards their room during a stay.

Diners ditched dinner and large group bookings this Easter weekend, new insights from leading hospitality technology provider, Zonal, show.

The data shows that nearly half (44%) of all bookings made during lunchtime hours over the long weekend happened on Easter Sunday, with lunch making up 60% of total reservations on that day.

Across the four-day weekend, lunch remained the most popular time to dine on Sunday and Monday, comprising 56% of all bookings compared to just 28% for dinner.

In contrast, dinner proved to be more popular on Good Friday and Easter Saturday, making up 44% of bookings made on those days, compared to only 34% for lunch.

The data also revealed that experiences with fewer diners were favoured over larger group gatherings, with bookings for two people making up 33% of all reservations across the Easter weekend.

Tim Chapman, Chief Commercial Officer at Zonal, commented: “This Easter weekend, lunch clearly led the way in dining preferences, particularly on Sunday and Monday, when it accounted for 56% of bookings compared to just 28% for dinner.

“Unlike other celebratory events that are often associated with evening socialising and late-night gatherings, Easter typically emphasises daytime activities, such as family lunches, egg hunts, and community events. As a result, many chose to dine out earlier in the day, reinforcing lunch as the dominant mealtime.”

The number of guests booking more than a week in advance to celebrate Mother’s Sunday rose 10%

New insight from Zonal reveals a rise in bookings for Mother’s Day, driven by a notable increase in organised consumers making reservations further in advance.

Bookings made more than a week ahead were up by 10%, reflecting a growing trend of consumers forward planning for special occasions or events. Zonal research from earlier this year, revealed advance bookings (those made more than a week ahead) for the opening match of the Guinness Six Nations rugby tournament were up nearly 40% on the comparable period for 2024.

Lunch continued to be the most popular dining session for Mother’s Day celebrations, accounting for over half (59%) of all bookings, followed by dinner reservations, which made up 29% of all bookings. Potentially reflecting a growing preference for earlier dining times, bookings before 7pm accounted for the vast majority of total bookings (91%).

Tim Chapman, Chief Commercial Officer, Zonal, commented: “The rise in early bookings for Mother’s Day highlights a clear shift in consumer behaviour, with guests increasingly planning their celebrations in advance and favouring lunch as the main event of the day.

“For operators, this offers a valuable opportunity to plan ahead for next year – by engaging guests early, promotions around quieter times, and ensuring they’re prepared to meet the demand. Capitalising on the growing trend for early lunch bookings will allow operators to optimise service, elevate the guest experience, and drive revenue growth during this key occasion.”

Valentine’s Day looks to have been a success for hospitality this year, with our latest figures showing that overall bookings were up 8% compared to 2024, providing a much needed boost for the sector at a time when every cover counts.

However Mother’s Day is fast approaching, and we still have a full year of occasions to look forward to and plan ahead for. With this in mind, what learnings can we take from guests’ booking behaviour on Valentine’s Day, and what can we as hospitality businesses do to adapt to customer behaviour, and increase bookings?

When are guests booking?

Whilst overall bookings were up 8% compared to last year, we did see some interesting changes in consumer behaviour when looking at how far in advance of the day they made their bookings.

Valentines Day itself, as well as the day before, saw the most bookings made, with a combined 55% of the total bookings in 2025 being made last minute. This is lower when compared to 2024, however, where last minute bookings made up 66% of the total.

The biggest shift in behaviour appeared for those booking 4, 5, or 6 days in advance. Whilst these bookings only made up 13% of the total number, we did see a 40% increase in bookings made in this timeframe compared to 2024. This was closely followed by bookings made over a week in advance, with a 22% increase on last year.

Combined with reduction in consumers booking last minute, all signs point towards a shift towards booking earlier this year.

What was the most popular time?

Broken down by session, dinner reservations were the most popular, making up 81% of bookings, followed by reservations for lunch at 17%. This breakdown is almost exactly the same as 2024, when Valentines Day also fell during the working week. Whilst a significant skew towards a post-work meal out is to be expected, it does still show a not insignificant demand for lunchtime reservations on special occasions, even if they happen to fall on a weekday.

During the evening, the hour between 18:30 and 19:30 was the most popular time to book for, making up 40% of bookings, and 19:00 itself coming out as the overall most popular time to book.

What can we learn from this?

Despite these trends indicating a shift towards booking earlier, the majority of bookings are still made last minute, presenting both a challenge and opportunity for operators looking to capitalise on occasions.

Firstly, real-time table availability is a must-have for any business’s bookings system. With the majority of guests booking either last minute or in the few days leading up to an event, and significant demand for tables during the peak hour on the day, it’s important to make sure your system isn’t making you miss out on any potential bookings. Our reservations and table management platform, Zonal Bookings, always displays live table availability on your website, allowing guests to immediately find a date and time that meets their requirements, and allowing them to book with confidence. This also eliminates any possibility of double bookings, and minimises the chances of a guest choosing to go elsewhere if your system wasn’t displaying the correct availability.

With tight integration into Zonal’s EPoS, automated updates also allow you to eliminate manual table updating processes that take up staff time, as well as free up tables to be sold again quicker. Once a table has paid their bill, the table’s status is automatically updated in Zonal Bookings and can then be released after a set period of time, allowing your team to set it up for the next set of guests and eliminate any delays in marking the table as available again – helping to better cater to guests looking for last minute table availability – as well as helping you to serve more covers!

Despite the last minute bookings rush, customers are increasingly looking to make their bookings earlier, and the right tech can help you capitalise on this trend. Setting up and promoting any special offers well in advance can be a great approach to encourage guests to book earlier, helping you to better plan staff and stock requirements; whilst adding upselling opportunities to both your booking journey, and any reminder comms, can help you boost revenue and increase spend per head from guests ahead of their visit.

Click here to find out more about Zonal Bookings, or alternatively get in touch to speak to one of our experts.

Bookings already up by nearly 40% compared to last year, new data shows

With the Guinness Men’s Six Nations rugby tournament set to kick off this week (Friday 31st January), the latest figures from leading hospitality technology provider Zonal, reveal bookings in pubs and bars are up a huge 38% for match times, compared to the comparable period last year.

Moreover, the insight from previous years’ trends shows that most bookings for Six Nations games are made just a week ahead of fixtures – in 2024, for example, 81% of bookings for the first day of the Six Nations were made within a week of the event. This suggests pubs can expect a further surge in fan bookings.

As the tournament progresses, in order to cope with demand, operators could think about offering incentives to persuade customers to book further in advance to help with planning for stock and staff requirements and ensure their booking systems are easy to use, optimised, and well promoted. Digital ordering, whether that be via the web or an app, can also help improve guests experience by enabling them to place orders directly from their seats, ensuring they don’t miss any of the game and help to reduce bar queues.

Tim Chapman, Chief Commercial Officer, Zonal, commented: “Technology is a crucial tool in making sure venues can handle the increased volume of bookings during major events like the Six Nations. Ensuring your booking platform is robust, and that staff are trained to manage busy match days efficiently, will be key to taking full advantage of this busy period.”

“By leveraging tools that provide real-time table availability and streamline the booking process, operators can ensure they’re well-prepared to capitalise on these high-demand dates and drive revenue throughout the year.”