Staff churn has always been treated as an HR problem. Something to monitor, report on, and accept as part of life in hospitality.
But what if it's actually a revenue problem?
New industry-wide analysis from people and data specialist Pineapple – in partnership with Sona – suggests exactly that. And the numbers are hard to ignore.
The 2025 H2 Insights Report analysed workforce and financial data from more than 35,000 employees across 75 national hospitality brands. The findings reveal a strong correlation between high rolling staff churn in Q1 and Q2 and weaker revenue performance in Q3 and Q4.
Here's the headline: brands operating with 12-month rolling churn above 66% in H1 recorded an average -11.15% decline in location revenue during H2. Meanwhile, more stable operators (≤66.2% churn) achieved +29.63% revenue growth per site over the same period.
That's a 40.8% performance gap between high-churn and low-churn operators.
The report doesn't claim direct causation – but the statistical relationship is striking. What Pineapple describes as a "delayed operational drag" means that workforce instability earlier in the year may quietly suppress your ability to capture seasonal sales uplifts when they matter most.
If your teams are constantly rebuilding through spring and early summer, they're not ready to perform when peak trading arrives. New starters aren't up to speed. Experienced staff have already left. The operational muscle memory that drives great service – and great revenue – just isn't there.
The analysis identifies a clear tipping point: every 1% increase in H1 churn correlates with approximately a 1% reduction in H2 revenue growth per location.
For operators already navigating wage inflation and margin pressure, that's a significant finding. It suggests that keeping annual staff churn below two-thirds may be commercially critical to protecting peak trading performance.
The report also highlights a sharp spike in churn during Q3, with 12-month rolling churn rising to 75.8% and quarterly churn hitting 20.7%. This followed a Q2 period where labour costs reached 35% amid mandated wage increases, alongside a dip in engagement scores.
Although labour percentages eased to around 32.5% by year end, the data suggests earlier workforce disruption had lingering commercial consequences. The damage was already done.
Philip Eeles, co-founder of Pineapple and the industry pioneer behind Honest Burgers and Breadstall, put it plainly:
Operators now have data-led evidence connecting people metrics to commercial outcomes. For chief people officers who've long argued for more resource and budget, this is the kind of ammunition they've been waiting for.
As Sona's VP of Hospitality, Paul Watson, added:
Workforce churn has historically sat in the HR silo, disconnected from revenue conversations. This analysis changes that. If your teams are constantly rebuilding, the operational drag doesn't disappear – it compounds during peak trading.
In an industry where seasonal uplift can determine annual profitability, operators can't afford to rely on hindsight. They need forward-looking workforce intelligence that helps them anticipate pressure points, stabilise teams early, and protect revenue before it's lost.
The 2025 H2 Insights Report builds on Pineapple's earlier findings around internal progression and management stability – reinforcing the growing view that workforce resilience is a key competitive differentiator in hospitality.