Atlas / Sector
Sector profile
Food & Hospitality marketing benchmarks
Strongest on Brand & Positioning, with the most room to move in Retention & Loyalty. Food & Hospitality sits above the national average across 7 industries.
Building evidence · based on 53 businesses, growing
Sector signature
Bars are this sector. Ticks are the national average.
Sector strength
Brand & Positioning
+3 against the national line. The dimension this sector leans on.
Biggest gap
Retention & Loyalty
-0 against the field. The soft spot holding the sector back.
The spread
9 points
Between the strongest and weakest industry in the sector. A wide gap means the average hides real winners.
The map
Where this sector sits
Every dot is an industry we measure. The 7 industries in Food & Hospitality are lit in red. Choose any two dimensions for the axes.
Acquisition Performance →
Food & Hospitality sits below average on Retention & Loyalty and above average on Acquisition Performance. The spread of red dots shows how tightly the sector clusters.
The spread inside the sector
Every number is a Marketing Score out of 100, rolling six dimensions into one figure. 49 is a business doing the basics. 80 is one that markets like a business twice its size.
The distance between the strongest and weakest performer in Food & Hospitality is wide. A small cluster is genuinely good. A long tail sits well behind. The bar to lead this sector is lower than the reputation suggests. So where would you land?
In national context
Where the sector lands on the map
Every industry we measure, sorted low to high. The marker shows where Food & Hospitality averages out.
In this sector
Every industry in Food & Hospitality, ranked
Sorted by Marketing Score. Open any one for the full profile.
The read
What the numbers say about Food & Hospitality
On the whole, Food & Hospitality is a middle-of-the-pack sector. It leans on brand & positioning and trails on retention & loyalty.
Food and Hospitality ranks 6th of 11 sectors, 0.4 points above the national average. Brand & Positioning is the sector's strongest dimension. This reflects the reality that hospitality businesses live or die on reputation, reviews and word of mouth. The best operators have always understood brand, even if they would not call it that.
The sector spans a wide range of business models, from fast food chains with national media budgets to independent restaurants running on Instagram and hope. Travel Agencies & Tour Operators leads the sector. Events, Weddings & Experiences sits at the bottom on 59.6. The gap is not about food quality. It is about marketing infrastructure.
Data & Tracking is the lowest of any major sector. Most hospitality businesses do not have a CRM, do not track customer lifetime value and cannot attribute bookings to specific marketing channels. This is the single biggest drag on the sector's composite score.
Travel Agencies & Tour Operators is the highest-scoring vertical in this sector. The operators that survived the post-COVID shakeout are lean, digitally sharp and converting at high rates.
What to watch in food and hospitality
Reservation and ordering platforms like OpenTable, Mr Yum and Square are creating a data layer that most hospitality businesses never had. The venues plugging this data into marketing decisions will see disproportionate gains in Retention and Data Tracking over the next 12 months.
Events, weddings and experiences is a growth vertical. Experience-driven spending is rising in Australia and the businesses in this space that invest in content marketing and SEO will capture demand that previously went through word of mouth alone.
Patterns
What the Food & Hospitality numbers reveal
Computed from 53 scored businesses across 7 industries. Updated as new audits complete.
By the numbers
19.3-point gap between Enterprise and Small Business
Enterprise businesses average 74.6. Small Business averages 55.3. Scale creates a 19.3-point advantage in this sector, driven by dedicated marketing teams and infrastructure investment.
Who's leading
ASX-listed companies score 9.1 points higher than unlisted
2 ASX-listed businesses average 73.7 vs 64.6 for 51 unlisted. Public reporting discipline and larger budgets correlate with stronger marketing maturity.
How industries compare
Brand & Positioning (67.1) is the sector's edge. Data & Tracking (57.4) is the drag.
A 9.7-point spread between the strongest and weakest dimensions. Brand & Positioning is 2.9 points above the national average. Data & Tracking sits 0.2 points below national average.
What's shifting
0.4 points above the national average of 63.7
Food & Hospitality ranks 6 of 11 sectors. The gap is closeable. These are not structurally weak businesses. They are businesses that have not prioritised digital marketing.
Where they are
NSW dominates with 24 of 53 businesses
45% of scored businesses in this sector are headquartered in NSW, averaging 66.6. VIC (14), QLD (10), SA (4) follow.
Where the gaps are
Domino's Pizza Enterprises leads the sector at 80.3
16.3 points above the sector average. Scores 12.4 points above its own industry (Fast Food & QSR). ASX-listed. Enterprise scale, based in QLD.
Frequently asked
Common questions about Food & Hospitality
How does the food & hospitality sector compare to other Australian sectors for marketing?+
Food & Hospitality scores 64 out of 100, ranking 6 of 11 Australian sectors. This is 0 points above the national average of 64.
The sector's strongest dimension is Brand & Positioning. Its weakest is Data & Tracking.
Based on 53 scored Australian businesses across 7 industries. NR Marketing Intelligence, April 2026.
Which food & hospitality companies have the strongest marketing in Australia?+
The top 5 performers across all food & hospitality industries:
1. Domino's Pizza Enterprises in Fast Food & QSR, ASX-listed
2. Marriott AU in Hotels & Resorts
3. Flight Centre in Travel Agencies & Tour Operators
4. TripADeal in Travel Agencies & Tour Operators
5. Accor Hotels (AU) in Hotels & Resorts
Domino's Pizza Enterprises leads, 16 points above the sector average.
Based on 53 scored Australian businesses across 7 industries. NR Marketing Intelligence, April 2026.
Do larger companies have better marketing than smaller ones in food & hospitality?+
Yes. Enterprise-scale businesses average 75, while Small Business averages 55. That is a 19-point gap.
However, Marriott AU, TripADeal, Accor Hotels (AU) all outperform the Enterprise average despite being smaller. The correlation is clear but not absolute.
Based on 53 scored Australian businesses across 7 industries. NR Marketing Intelligence, April 2026.
Do ASX-listed food & hospitality companies have better marketing?+
2 ASX-listed businesses average 74, compared to 65 for 51 unlisted. Listed companies have an edge, likely due to dedicated marketing teams and public accountability.
ASX status verified against ASX300 listing. NR Marketing Intelligence.
What is the biggest marketing weakness in Australian food & hospitality businesses?+
Data & Tracking is the weakest dimension, 0 points below the national average of 58.
This is the single biggest lever for improvement.
6-dimension scoring model: Digital Maturity, Acquisition Performance, Conversion Efficiency, Retention and Loyalty, Brand and Positioning, Data and Tracking.
How reliable are the marketing scores for food & hospitality businesses?+
Scores are built from a 6-dimension model using up to 150+ data points per business: GA4 analytics, Search Console, Google Ads, site technology, Core Web Vitals and public data.
53 businesses are scored in this sector, benchmarked against 70+ nationally. Each score carries an evidence depth rating so you can see how much data sits behind it.
Evidence depth: Very High (4+ sources), High (3), Medium (2), Baseline (public signals).
Which food & hospitality industries perform best at marketing?+
1. Travel Agencies & Tour Operators (68.277778)
2. Fast Food & QSR (67.933333)
3. Hotels & Resorts (64.775556)
4. Restaurants & Independent Food Service (64.095714)
5. Cafes & Coffee Chains (63.63125)
6. Tourism & Experiences (59.98125)
7. Events, Weddings & Experiences (59.588571)
The 9-point spread shows meaningful variation between industries in this sector.
Based on 53 scored Australian businesses across 7 industries. NR Marketing Intelligence, April 2026.
How can food & hospitality businesses improve their marketing score?+
Three high-impact moves:
1. Strengthen data & tracking., this is the sector's weakest dimension and the fastest path to a higher score. Even basic improvements move the needle 5 to 10 points.
2. Close the gap on brand & positioning. The sector already scores 67 here. Businesses below that benchmark are leaving easy points on the table.
3. Study the leaders. Domino's Pizza Enterprises and Marriott AU show what good looks like in this sector.
Based on 53 scored businesses across 7 industries. NR Marketing Intelligence.
Stop reading the average
The Atlas shows the sector. We read your business.
The map tells you what Food & Hospitality does on average. Get Our Take tells you what you do, where you leak and what to fix first.