Lunar New Year 2024 &
Its Impact on Hotel FF&E
Chinese New Year (CNY), also known as Lunar New Year (LNY), is an annual 15-day celebration in China and Chinese communities worldwide. According to Western calendars, each year it begins sometime between January 21st and February 20th. But its official start is at sunset on the day of the second New Moon following winter solstice (December 21). LNY festivities usually continue until the following Full Moon.
Since the mid-1990s, people in China have grown accustomed to receiving seven consecutive days off work for the Spring Festival Golden Week, which often coincides with LNY. But traditional celebrations last longer than that.
Lunar New Year’s Impact on Hotel FF&E
Next year, LNY falls on February 9th, 2024, and continues until February 15th, 2024. This timing is important for hoteliers to be aware of since the holidays and celebrations halt FF&E production in this region. Deliveries of finished goods, parts, and materials coming from China are naturally delayed because all factories and shipping ports close during this period.
In fact, with some manufacturers, if production orders do not ship before December 31st, they probably won’t ship until March 1st once production and shipping ports are operating at full capacity.
Given the complexity of the global logistics market and its fast-changing pricing, Innvision works to stay in lockstep with all our vendor partners. This helps us know the order cutoff date for product to ship before the start of LNY.
For LNY 2023, we saw some improvements compared to the prior year. Each FF&E product category is different, but most cutoff dates were in October compared to September in the year prior. We are hoping for the same this time around and offering guidance to our clients that the order cutoff date is Friday, October 13th. We include US producers in this cutoff date since they often depend on parts or materials coming from China, which may experience LNY delays also.
Preparing for Lunar New Year 2024
As in previous years, you must plan for product from China to not ship until March if a vendor doesn’t receive your order before its LNY shipment cutoff date. You can expect water and customs clearance to take an additional five to seven weeks.
Given what we know today about the supply chain in China, we do not anticipate a slowdown in production.
In fact, we have seen increased speed and lower ocean freight costs. But even so, your procurement provider should maintain good communication with you. With such a large number of US-based manufacturers either having product components or entire products that ship from China, there are many moving parts in the hotel FF&E supply chain. We recommend that you stay prepared.
At Innvision, we keep our clients informed every step of the way during production and shipping. That way, the timing of product delivery on the job site will align with the property’s needs. Our production partners also work within Lean manufacturing principles to update our team with accurate shipping details. This keeps us in line with our goal: to help you put heads in beds as quickly as possible to ensure minimal disruption to your revenue stream.
To learn more about how we can help your next hotel project become a success, contact us!
