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THE LONG READ Key Pillars of Luxury Hospitality: Service and the Emotional Connection
June 29, 2017
by Suzanne Godfrey In a series of pieces on luxury hospitality based on interviews with leading hoteliers in Paris, Suzanne Godfrey examines the key pillars that define the luxury hotel, or more specially, the Palace. Here she explores the need for service that goes over and beyond … to create an emotional connection. "That's when you win in services, making you feel at home" - Aaron Kaupp, General Manager, Le Royal Monceau Raffles, Paris "We want to have a private home feeling" - Jean-Pierre Trevisan, Director of Operations, Ritz Paris Around three-quarters of the 526 standards that the influential Forbes Travel Guide u...
Nobody Asked Me, But… No. 180: Hotel History: Roosevelt Hotel (1893) New Orleans, Louisiana (504 rooms)
Stanley Turkel | June 28, 2017
by Stanley Turkel, CMHS 1. Roosevelt Hotel, (1893), New Orleans, Louisiana The original Roosevelt New Orleans Hotel was built by Louis Grunewald, a German immigrant, as the Grunewald Hotel. In 1908, it was expanded with a fourteen-story 400-room annex. The expansion was designed by the Milwaukee architectural firm, H.C. Koch & Sons who also designed the Pfister Hotel and the City Hall in Milwaukee. The Grunewald was the site of The Cave, one of America's first nightclubs. The subterranean supper club came with waterfalls, stalagmites, stalactites and a line of chorus girls dancing to a Dixieland jazz band. The Cave remained in o...
Branding and Hospitality: What’s Your Differentiation?
June 28, 2017
By Grace Goni Not a week appears to go by without the opening of a luxury hotel somewhere in the world. Just take a look a consumer travel magazine and you'll see all sorts of new concepts and offerings flooding the market. Until about 15 years ago, the differentiation between luxury hotel brands was clear. Guests knew who was who and what was what. Today, the market is saturated with many different hotels, brands and offerings. If you factor in the disruption of new entrants due to technology, it is not surprising that customers are confused. As client demands are also changing, is it any wonder then that many luxury hotels are struggl...
Hospitality Financial Leadership – Separating Group and Local Sales in Banquets
David Lund | June 28, 2017
By David Lund If your hotel has a reasonable amount of meeting space (+10,000 ft) and your banquet business is a significant contributor in your Food and Beverage Department (+20% of F&B revenue), you are going to want to separate local banquet business from group banquet business on all of your financial statements, forecasts, budgets and daily reporting. At this moment you may be asking, "Why would I want to do that? That sounds like a lot of work." There are some very good reasons to make this practice a standard in your hotel. I see many hotel financial statements and most are missing the boat because they do not separate group ...
Your Wi-Fi Is Hot! Better Get a Cold Drink out of the Minibar
Minibar Systems | June 26, 2017
Most minibar installations today are cutting the cables and going wireless. Minibars have officially become unplugged. It's about time! Many minibar installations today are cutting the cables and going wireless. Hotels are happy to have the flexibility to install minibars anywhere in the guestroom, without being restricted to the traditional armoire. This is one of the newest trends in guestroom design – put the minibar in the entryway, snacks on the desk and spa tray in the bathroom. "Having all these in-room retail devices operating wirelessly creates a nice sense of space and access to cold drinks, snacks and sundry items", say...
Hospitality Financial Leadership – What’s the System?
David Lund | June 21, 2017
By David Lund When we are creating financial leadership in our hotel we're focused on the system we use. When I say "system" in this context I am not talking about a computer system. We may use a computer and software when we construct the forecasts and budgets. What I'm talking about in this article is the Financial Communication System. What's my system for creating financial information in my hotel? How does it work and how can I enhance the system and get a better result? This article focuses on creating and maintaining an effective business system in your hotel. "Systems are everything to a business. Don't change the pe...
The Top 5 Questions Hotel Companies and Tech Suppliers Need to Ask When Looking for a Development and Consulting Partner
Andrew Sanders | June 20, 2017
By Andrew Sanders, VP, Travel & Hospitality - North America for DataArt Long gone are the days when a company would "off-shore" its software development requirements as a regular course of action - especially within the travel and hospitality industry. As our industry becomes increasingly dependent on technology to support operations, there is now the need to find a technology and consulting partner that understands not only the inherent complexities but also has the development resources required to truly deliver. Our industry can be viewed, at times, as being somewhat 'Schizophrenic' due to the influx of new platforms and ...
How Boutique Hotels are Delivering Their Own Brand of Luxury
JLL Real Views | June 19, 2017
By Maggie Nichols Travelers searching for a luxurious hotel stay don't have to look far in cities like New York, Chicago and San Francisco. Hotels that include world-renowned spas and five-star restaurants are not hard to find in these primary U.S. markets – but in secondary and tertiary markets, the hunt can be a bit more challenging. "Luxury hotels have historically been located in cities like New York and Chicago because that's where hotel owners can charge room rates high enough to offset the hotel's higher operating costs," explains Lauro Ferroni, Global Head of Research at JLL's Hotels & Hospitality Group. "Running a Rit...
Why Hotels Are Setting up Shop in Suburban Shopping Centers
JLL Real Views | June 15, 2017
By Laura Agadoni Imagine stepping outside your suburban hotel, and instead of jumping in a car to shop or eat, you can easily walk to all your favorite stores and restaurants. Across the U.S., new hotels are enabling their guests to have local amenities on their doorstep – by backfilling vacant shopping center space. It's not just an arrangement that benefits guests and the hotel chains; it's also helping to revitalize American shopping centers that may have lost a middle-market anchor. Over the past two years, large format anchors have closed. JCPenney, Macy's, and Sears and Kmart are shutting down 324 stores between them across ...
Treat Guests Right With Welcome Refreshments
Larry Mogelonsky | June 14, 2017
By Larry Mogelonsky, MBA, P. Eng. (www.hotelmogel.com) Certain tactics never fail. Offering your guests a little amuse bouche or free beverage upon arrival is an excellent way to get them in a good mood after the stress and exhaustion of travel, helping to set the pace for the rest of their stay. Most hoteliers are aware of this in a general sense, but it is the execution where we often stumble. The expected welcome refreshment is a bottle of wine, a small cheese tray, a fruit place, crackers, cookies or any combination of the five. Nowadays, though, you must look beyond the perfunctory and truly own this aspect of the guest experience ...
Hospitality Financial Leadership – Why Doesn’t My Director of Finance Step Up?
David Lund | June 12, 2017
By David Lund Your DOF is a great accountant. They do a solid job running the accounting department and they are very efficient. Your monthly financials are timely and overall the accuracy is high. The internal audit reports are very strong and they manage the accounting staff and departmental communications well. What's the problem then? What you really want and what your business really needs is a DOF that's a "financial leader". The kind of DOF that's going to teach and lead the non-financial managers in your hotel. You want the DOF to be as effective with the forecasts and commentaries as they are with the day to day accounting. You...
Disruptive Innovation in Hospitality: Are We There Yet?
June 8, 2017
By Dr. Carlos Martin-Rios Society both likes and fears the concept of disruptive innovation. We like to experience new ways of traveling and creativity in cooking dishes; at the same time, we may be somewhat anxious or even afraid of getting into a self-driving car or eating something cooked by a robot chef. The term 'disruption' is widely used by the media to denote a form of breakthrough that takes place in rapidly-changing markets. It can mean different things to different people, along a continuum from incremental change to radical transformation. According to conventional wisdom, a provocative marketing campaign may be seen as 'dis...
Why Hotels Are Getting on Board With Sustainable Development
JLL Real Views | June 8, 2017
By Jim McClelland For a sizeable number of today's one billion tourists, the prospect of pristine mountain slopes, sun-drenched beaches and nature at its best is worth traveling long distances for. Yet for all the good they do for local economies, a steady stream of tourists can also have a significant environmental impact as infrastructure springs up to accommodate their needs while increased water consumption and waste generation put pressure on local resources. The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) estimates hospitality's annual footprint to total around $4 billion in energy use, 1.2 trillion gallons of water and millions of ton...
Tourism Tidbits – Some of the Best Practices in Tourism Security, Risk Management and Crisis Recovery, Part 1
Dr. Peter Tarlow | June 7, 2017
By Dr. Peter Tarlow This June we shall be holding the 23rd Annual Las Vegas International Tourism Safety and Security conference and in honor of our conference, this month's Tourism Tidbits focuses on issues of security and safety. Although the public, media, and politicians expect continuous 100% safety and security, reality is that total security does not exist. What is true of the non-tourism and travel world is even more so in the world of travel and tourism. Not only are tourism and traveling security problems often more challenging, but the traveling public can also easily be frightened, and in the case of leisure travel decide si...
Key Pillars of Luxury Hospitality: Quality and Consistency
Dr. Suzanne Godfrey | June 7, 2017
By Suzanne Godfrey It's no longer about the best quality furnishings, facilities and technology. Many people, especially those who can afford to stay at high-end hotels, already have these in their homes. These are expected. But still quality matters. It has to be the "best", in fact the very best. Quality products, in all of the hotel's "products": the facilities, the fixtures and fittings, the service and in the delivery of it. From the best crystal (Baccarat) to the finest china and table linen. Quality craftsmanship and the attention to detail is a dimension of luxury itself. It is on display in the dining room, in the choice of fab...
Disruptive Innovation? What Disruptive Innovation?
Stuart Pallister | June 6, 2017
By Stuart Pallister The hotel room of the future is likely to be a combination of the high-tech and high-touch. EHL's YU Virtual video highlights the former, with virtual reality creating the ambiance we want in our hotel room. And what then of artificial intelligence (AI) and robots? What role will they play in hospitality? EHL's prestigious International Advisory Board (IAB) met recently in Lausanne to discuss disruptive innovation in hospitality and education. In a panel discussion on the topic 'Leading through disruption', Wilhelm Konrad Weber, a partner at Swiss Hospitality Solutions, said technology is definitely driving the hospi...
Hospitality Financial Leadership – The Russians
David Lund | June 6, 2017
By David Lund When heads of state come to visit your hotel they usually make a bit of a show. The Russians are no exception, they even bring their own warship, the KGB and a wad of cash! I had the pleasure of witnessing the Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev arrival in San Francisco in June of 2010. He flew in the presidential plane, meanwhile his missile cruiser Varyag sailed into San Francisco Bay to accompany his visit. Heads of state often have a ship accompany them on their state visits. The first and previous last time a Russian warship entered San Francisco Bay it was almost 150 years earlier during the American Civil War. The Ru...
7 Tech Tips to Improve Your Guests’ Experience
Chamberlin Public Relations | June 5, 2017
With a seemingly endless and ever-changing array of technology available for hotels, how do you know what is worth your time and money? Fortunately, the wealth of options means that you can find the perfect fit for your hotel's needs. After extensive research, here are a few of our top picks to help you connect with your guests before, during, and after their stays – and most importantly, keep them coming back. Before the Stay Get Social: It's imperative for hotels to have a social media presence, especially on Facebook and Instagram. Potential guests will not only visit your website, but will also check out your social media plat...
Nobody Asked Me, But… No. 179: Hotel History: Julius Manger: One of The Greatest Hotel Owners of The Twentieth Century
Stanley Turkel | June 5, 2017
by Stanley Turkel, CMHS Hotel History: Julius Manger (1868-1937): Julius Manger was born in Boonville, Missouri. He graduated from the Tulane University Law School. At the age of twenty-eight, he engaged in the coffee business and was later associated with his brother, William, in the construction business in Galveston, Texas. They later located the hub of their business activities to New York City where they built more than 500 homes in the Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn. They also built the Builders Exchange Building in Manhattan and in 1907 traded it for the Plaza Hotel in Chicago, which was the beginning of their successful venture ...
Your Guests’ On-Property Experience Is Your Best Marketing
ALICE | May 30, 2017
ALICE provides the tools hoteliers need to optimize their guests' experience in-stay. Stop by Booth 1245 at this month's HITEC for a live product demo. Marketing to your guests isn't just about winning them over at planning and booking. Given the influence of TripAdvisor and social media in a guest's decision to book with you over the competition, the "stay" phase of the customer journey is your biggest opportunity to win a loyal guest review. Indeed, "service" has been ranked the #1 most influential factor in a guest's decision to leave a review. But winning reviews isn't the only game in town. Learn how ALICE - the hospitality ind...
All-Inclusive Hotels Have a New Look for a New Era
JLL Real Views | May 30, 2017
By Laura Agadoni Today's All-Inclusive hotels still tempt vacationers with all-you-can-eat buffets and free flowing drinks, but that's where the similarities end with the traditional All-Inclusive model. The All-Inclusive, or AI, vacation has been around since the 1950s when the idea of a comprehensive vacation package that included meals, lodging, and entertainment appealed to cost-conscious travelers. It's still a popular concept today, but the business model behind that concept has evolved dramatically. Take, for example, the food in the plentiful buffets found at many All-Inclusive resorts. Today, that food is likely to be locally ...
Hospitality Financial Leadership – Creating Property Performance Commentaries
David Lund | May 30, 2017
By David Lund Creating a great commentary for your owners and corporate is a monthly mainstay in almost every hotel. It can also be a large dose of drudgery. This article is about how you can create an effective system in your hotel to generate a strong and meaningful commentary based on information from all areas of your business. Creating this kind of information system in your hotel is a powerful tool. This commentary power tool can help you drive superior financial results if you approach it with the right spirit and a system to follow. Who invented this commentary and why? The need for a commentary exists because of the principle o...
The Hotel Room of the Future
May 30, 2017
By Stuart Pallister What will the hotel room of the future look like? Ecole hôteliere de Lausanne, which has been promoting blue-sky thinking on innovation and the future of hospitality, staged a contest last year and then produced an impressive video based on the two winning concepts. If EHL's vision on YouTube is anything to go by, we'll check into our room in 2033 and then be able to select – courtesy of virtual reality or VR – our preferred location, whether it's, say, Lake Geneva or perhaps the Seychelles. Nowadays, we have wi-fi, a telephone and probably a flat-screen TV. But as hotel guests become increasingly t...
Hospitality Financial Leadership – Share the Financials in Your Hotel or NOT
David Lund | May 22, 2017
By David Lund In your hotel, you either share the financials with you leaders, the department managers or you don't. If you already share the financial statements, you know the power it unleashes with your team and the result it helps to create. If you don't share you're wondering what the management team will think about the money and how much goes to you and the owner. You naively think no one needs to know about the finances in your hotel. You think it's none of their business. You're also pretty sure the team will judge you and your results. You're probably thinking the money is top secret and on a need to know basis. Or maybe y...
