Even allowing for Hillary Clinton’s convention bounce, there can be no denying it–Donald Trump is tanking in the polls. But those aren’t the only numbers that should concern the Donald. Apparently his effort to buy the presidency is dragging down his real estate empire’s bottom line as well.
The location trackers at Foursquare decided to take a look at foot traffic to Trump-branded hotels, golf courses, and casinos since Trump threw his hat in the ring last summer. In an article posted at Medium, Foursquare revealed that since Trump entered the field, foot traffic to the properties bearing his name from the summer of 2015 to the summer of 2016 has steadily dwindled compared to the same time in 2014-2015.
CNBC’s Dominic Chu dropped by MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” to discuss these findings with Mika Brzezinski. Watch here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOz_klZcZaU
Trump announced his candidacy in June 2015. Since then, Trump-branded properties have seen decreased shares of visits–or how much visits to Trump-branded properties account for the total visits to hotels, casinos, and golf courses in a particular area. Indeed, since Trump entered the race, only two months have seen increased foot traffic compared to 2014-15.
As a result, Trump-branded properties have missed the normal summer rush that most hotels and vacation properties see for two seasons in a row. The decline has been particularly stark since the primaries really ramped up in the winter of 2016; every month since March has seen double-digit losses. Most vacation properties get a spike in the spring from local residents and travelers, but Trump-branded properties didn’t get it this spring. By any definition, the Trump brand is tanking.
Foursquare reviewed foot traffic to the vacation properties owned directly by Trump, as well as those that are no longer owned by Trump but still bear his name. One of them was the Trump Taj Mahal, which still bears his name even though Trump lost most of his stake in 2009. Earlier this week, the Taj Mahal announced it will close for good after Labor Day–ostensibly due to a lengthy strike. However, Foursquare suspects that labor problems aren’t the real reason the Taj Mahal is tanking.
There’s a reason that Trump’s brand is taking such a severe hit. The great majority of properties that bear his name are located in states that are usually an automatic deposit in the Democrats’ bank account in every presidential election–New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and Hawaii. So it should come as no surprise that foot traffic to Trump-branded properties in these states has absolutely cratered since Trump got in the race. For instance, the Chicago Trump International Hotel and Tower, Trump SoHo, and Trump Taj Mahal all saw 17 to 24 percent drops in foot traffic compared to last year.
If not for the properties in Florida and Nevada that bear his name, Trump’s brand would really be tanking. These properties actually held on to their foot traffic in the summer of 2015. But since August 2015, all but three months have been down months.
When Trump started getting diarrhea of the mouth on a consistent basis, I suspected that it would take a long time for his brand to recover after the election. This report confirms it. When you’re in the hospitality business, losing one spring and two consecutive summers is, to put it mildly, not very good. Trump has already gone through bankruptcy five times in the last 25 years. If this keeps up, he may be looking at a sixth.
