US hotels are projected to spend $131 billion on wages and benefits in 2026, up from $128 billion in 2025, and that number keeps climbing even as staffing shortages persist across the industry. The American Hotel and Lodging Association separately found that 65% of hotels are still short-staffed, with housekeeping and front desk the hardest roles to fill. If you own a Best Western property, you're paying more for labor and still fighting to fill shifts, which makes how you hire, not just what you pay, the thing actually worth fixing.
We compared 6 hiring platforms for Best Western owners specifically, looking at mobile application experience, screening automation, and franchise fit for an independent operator running their own property.
Best Western isn't structured like Marriott, Hilton, IHG, or Choice. It operates as a member-owned association rather than a traditional investor-owned franchisor, meaning owners are members who retain a vote in how the brand is run and pay assessment dues, typically a small percentage of room revenue, that fund shared marketing and reservations rather than a standard franchise fee. The system spans approximately 4,300 hotels across around 100 countries and territories, under a portfolio of 18 brand tiers, from the flagship Best Western and Best Western Plus, to upscale concepts like Best Western Premier, Vīb, GLō, and Aiden, to the boutique Sadie brand.
What that structure means in practice is that Best Western owners tend to run smaller, more independently operated properties with less corporate infrastructure behind them than a Marriott or Hilton franchisee typically has. Best Western supports owners with its "I Care" customer service training program, which includes VR simulator scenarios for front desk, housekeeping, and breakfast staff. That's a genuinely useful tool, but it only pays off if you can keep a seat filled long enough to use it.
How we ranked these: mobile application experience, screening automation, fit for independent owner-operators, and honest limitations based on vendor documentation and verified reviews on G2 and Capterra.
HigherMe is built specifically for hourly, high-turnover hiring, which lines up with how most Best Western properties are actually staffed and run. Candidates apply from their phone in under five minutes, no resume required and no account to create, which matters when you're competing for the same local, hourly applicant pool as every other hotel in town.
Key features:
As an independent member-owner, you're already managing more of your own operation than a franchisee under a bigger corporate umbrella. HigherMe's automated screening and mobile-first application close the gap between posting a job and getting someone hired faster than a general ATS, and it scales cleanly if you add a second property or brand tier. Pricing is quote-based, so request one specific to your property.
Best for: Best Western owners at any scale, from a single property to owners running multiple locations across brand tiers.
Fountain is a true high-volume hiring engine, processing thousands of hires a year globally, with strong analytics and integrations across HRIS, payroll, and background check systems. A $100 million raise in 2026 reflects real enterprise momentum behind the product.
That scale comes with enterprise pricing and minimums that don't make sense for a single independent property. Fountain is built for organizations hiring at a volume most Best Western owners simply aren't operating at.
Good for: Large multi-unit Best Western ownership groups with dedicated recruiting staff.
Hireology is built with franchise and multi-location structures in mind, with approval chains, location-level reporting, and franchisor-facing dashboards native to the platform.
The tradeoff is pace. The workflows are structured and compliance-heavy, which adds friction when you need a housekeeper hired same-day, and reviewers note the mobile candidate experience trails mobile-first competitors.
Good for: Best Western owners running several properties who want strict, documented hiring processes.
Homebase added an AI Hiring Assistant onto its core scheduling and time-tracking platform, automatically screening applicants and posting jobs to Indeed and ZipRecruiter. If you're already scheduling through Homebase, the convenience of hiring in the same place is real.
Hiring is still an add-on rather than a purpose-built applicant tracking system, and there's no franchise-level, multi-property dashboard for owners managing more than one location.
Good for: Best Western owners already using Homebase for scheduling who want basic hiring bundled in.
Harri combines recruiting, scheduling, and time and attendance with a hospitality-specific talent marketplace reportedly connected to around 34 million hospitality workers. For an owner coordinating staffing across a few properties, that breadth is a real advantage.
Harri is a full workforce management suite rather than a lean ATS, and implementation takes longer than a tool built to do one job well. Smaller, single-property owners may find it more than they need.
Good for: Best Western owners who want hiring bundled with scheduling and time tracking across multiple properties.
GetHired is a straightforward job board and ATS built for small businesses, with an accessible entry point for an owner moving off spreadsheets for the first time.
Evidence of active use in hospitality specifically is thin, and it lacks AI screening, video capability, and any multi-location tooling built for franchise or multi-property operators.
Good for: A single-property Best Western owner who wants a simple, low-cost starting point.
Wages are climbing across the industry whether or not your staffing problem is solved, so the only real lever left is how fast you can turn an applicant into a hire. As an independent member-owner, you don't have a corporate recruiting team to lean on, which makes the right hiring software less of a nice-to-have and more of a operating necessity. Visit higherme.com to see how it fits your property.
1. What is the best hiring software for Best Western owners?
HigherMe is built specifically for hourly, high-turnover hospitality hiring, with a mobile-first application, AI pre-screening, and a multi-location dashboard, which fits how most independent Best Western owners actually staff their properties.
2. How can an independent Best Western owner hire staff faster?
Cut friction from the application itself. A mobile application under five minutes, paired with automated screening like HigherMe's NextMatch AI, gets you a ranked shortlist the same day instead of a stack of resumes to review manually.
3. Does Best Western's membership model change what hiring software I need?
Not the core need, but it does raise the stakes. As a member-owner without a large corporate structure behind you, a hiring platform that automates screening and application intake matters more, since there's no recruiting team picking up the slack.
4. Can one hiring platform manage multiple Best Western properties or brand tiers?
Yes, with the right platform. HigherMe's multi-location dashboard lets owners running properties across different Best Western brand tiers, from Best Western Plus to Aiden, manage every pipeline from one login.
5. Is AI screening useful for a single, independently owned hotel?
Yes, particularly because you likely don't have staff dedicated to reviewing applications. AI screening ranks every applicant against the same criteria automatically, saving hours that an independent owner doesn't have to spare.