Accommodation & Food Services

The Accommodation and Food Services sector (NAICS 72) employs more people than any private-sector industry except healthcare, with restaurants alone accounting for roughly one in ten U.S. private-sector jobs. The sector splits into two subsectors with distinct economics: accommodation (hotels, motels, RV parks, campgrounds) and food services and drinking places (full-service restaurants, limited-service chains, bars, caterers, food trucks).

Accommodation is shaped by global brand families. Marriott International operates over 30 brands and more than 8,500 properties worldwide, while Hilton Worldwide and Hyatt Hotels compete for both business and leisure travelers. Most branded hotels operate under franchise or management agreements rather than direct ownership — a capital-light model that has defined the industry since the 1990s. Revenue per available room (RevPAR) serves as the sector's benchmark metric, tracked monthly by STR, the industry's primary data provider. Leisure travel hubs like Orlando, Las Vegas, and Maui concentrate the highest room inventories.

Food services is the more fragmented subsector. McDonald's, Starbucks, and Yum! Brands (Taco Bell, KFC, Pizza Hut) anchor the limited-service segment, while full-service dining remains dominated by independents — roughly 70 percent of U.S. restaurants are single-location operations. The FDA Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) governs supply-chain safety standards, and state health departments enforce inspection regimes that vary in rigor from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Third-party delivery platforms, led by DoorDash and Uber Eats, have restructured order economics, compressing margins for restaurants that lack direct digital ordering channels. Tipped-wage structures, governed by the Fair Labor Standards Act and state-level minimums, remain a defining and contested feature of the food service labor market.