Suite Spot: A Hotel Marketing Podcast: Recent Episodes
Travel Media Group & Ryan Embree
With just a little over a month away from the 2026 Independent Hotel Show Miami taking place, special guest and President of Staypineapple Hotels Inc., Dina Belon, joins the Suite Spot to discuss the Stayepineapple brand, the independent hotel industry, and what she is looking forward to from IHS Miami 2026!
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Back for another edition of season two of our independent hotel show series, where we are getting geared up and ready for that annual tradition down in Miami Beach at the Independent Hotel Show. We cannot wait. We’re gonna talk a little bit about it with our guests. We actually met for the first time in person last year at this event. We’re able to spend some time with her. Dina Belon, president at Staypineapple Hotels. Dina, thank you so much for joining me back on The Suite Spot.
Dina Belon:
Oh, thank you so much for inviting me, Ryan. This is amazing. I’m so excited. We had such a good time in Miami last year, it was a blast and, uh, talking to you felt like I was talking to a friend.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I appreciate it. I feel the same. Just honored to be speaking with you here. And I can’t believe we’re here. It’s we’re just months away from the Independent Hotel Show. It’s gonna be bigger, better than ever. We’re excited about it. We’re gonna talk about it. But we did have you on for the first time, so we had the opportunity. Usually, I start these episodes by a little bit of a background and kind of an introduction, but I’m gonna start a little unorthodox today. There was a post that I saw on LinkedIn, which by the way, for our Suite Spot listeners, make sure you say, uh, you follow Staypineapple Hotels and Dina. Great follows on LinkedIn. But there’s an, an article called Everything Staypineapple Hotels Dina Belon Does in a Day. And I thought that was such a cool and creative idea and concept. Talk to us a little bit about how that idea originated and give us a day in life. What is it like to be Dina Belon?
Dina Belon:
Well, I tried to be very honest. Hopefully it was fun too. I, there’s a lot of humor in my day, and so hopefully that came across. Um, the magazine, uh, that’s a local magazine here in, uh, east, the east side of Seattle and Bellevue and Kirkland area of Washington does those highlights of leaders in the area, um, on a regular basis. So it was fun, uh, a little stressful because you had to, like, take photographs and, you know, kind of just walk through your day. Um, I loved, though, really integrating my pets, because they’re a big part of my life. And so it started off with Molly waking me up at 5:45, which is actually what she does every morning. About 15 minutes before my alarm goes off, my little kitty cat starts yelling at me about wanting water. Um, so yeah, all the way until, you know, 8:00 at night and a lovely glass of wine with my husband. And all the shenanigans in the middle.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And I think it’s so cool because I think it, you know, we obviously work in the people business, right? In hospitality. Uh, we host people from all over the world, all different walks of life. Um, but to see, you know, sometimes, uh, I think right now, especially right now, right, when there’s all this talk of AI and technology and stuff like that, it’s really refreshing to see our industry leaders. And I get that. I have the, the privilege of getting that, interviewing some of the industry leaders when they talk to me about their, you know, beginnings and, and how maybe they started as a bellman or a front desk agent or fell into the industry. And I think the more that we can kind of humanize and show that these are people that really have a true passion for serving other people. Um, and then on the other side of the front desk, the guests that come into our lobbies, they are people too, whether they’re on a work trip, where they’re trying to escape. You know, sometimes it, it’s refreshing to take, take a beat and think about that. And that’s exactly what this article did for me because it is, you know, even though we’re hospitality, we’re in it, the hustle bustle, 365, twenty four seven. We’re still people, right? Yeah. We’re still people with our pets and, and, and our, uh, you know, what we like to do. Um, so it was a really cool, I think, uh, refreshing look. I wa – I definitely wanted to bring that in. Br – um, and, and your love of pets, it goes right along with your brand, uh, Staypineapples Hotel. And, you know, I’ve come to know and love through your content, your keynotes at the Independent Hotel Show, uh, following you on LinkedIn. For those audience members that might not be as familiar, uh, share with us, uh, a little bit about what makes Staypineapple Hotels so unique and one of a kind.
Dina Belon:
Yeah. So we are the opposite of corporate uniformity, uniformity. Uh, we’re really about, you know, a boutique sp – hotel experience with a lot of personality. Um, so one of the things that we’re well known for is the naked experience, um, which is, uh, a little eye-opening to a lot of people, but all it really is, is a fun, cheeky, which we like to do, uh, marketing way to talk about our bed and our bedding and our linen and our terry is so comfy, cozy and amazing, you’ll wanna sleep naked. Um, so it, and we give you an, a big cuddly robe so that you don’t come to the door naked.
Ryan Embree:
There you go.
Dina Belon:
Um, so that, that’s, that’s very indicative of the Staypineapple personality. Um, we’re also, um, not just pet friendly, we’re dog obsessed. Um, so we, uh, really go over the top with our pet program. We have a partnership with Soundz, S-O-U-N-D-Z, uh, that is, um, uh, sounds, uh, in music – Sure. That, um, pets like and that calm them when they feel nervous, um, that is available for guests, uh, at no cost, a 14-day, uh, free trial. And then, um, we have a partnership with, uh, an emergency veterinary, uh, service called Veg. Um, of course, you get beds and bowls and treats and, um, water bottles and poop bags and all kinds of stuff when you bring, uh, your furry friend. Although we’re dog obsessed, we also love kitty cats too. I have two kitty cats and two dogs. So, um, we, yeah, we’re, we’re pretty over the top with the pet thing. And then we have a, we have a number of the properties that have, uh, hotel dogs as well. Um, so one of the management staff ha – brings their dog to work every day and has really become a, a core team member. Um, you wouldn’t believe how many reviews we get, uh, with our, our furry, uh, friends being, uh, listed as their favorite part of the hotel.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I’ve seen them at trade show nows at industry trade shows. Yeah. You’ll have, like, a puppy break. Uh, brilliant. Brilliant.
Dina Belon:
It’s my favorite thing.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It just gets people in, in, in a happy mood. People love it. So, uh, and, and the focus of, of the dog obs – dog obsessed, um, i- i- is, is so smart. I mean, p – you know, people. We always think about how stressful travel is, obviously, from a logistics and s – and people standpoint, but obviously on our pets too. They’re in a place that they’ve never been before. Um, they don’t know that they’re heading across the country or even down the road. They’re in somewhere unnatural. So that’s really, really cool that you can kind of make them feel at ease there. And, and I’m sure the guest feedback, uh, from that has been really, really great to see. Um, now, you talked about, um, Staypineapple being a, a very unique boutique brand. Um, I noticed one word you didn’t mention in there, which is, uh, independent or non-branded. Uh, you prefer the term unchained. And I wanna explore that a little bit. I don’t wanna give you too much, uh, of a question. I, I’d like, like you to kinda run with that. Why do you prefer unchained to maybe independent segment or non-branded?
Dina Belon:
So to me, independent, non-branded, um, you know, indicates that we’re small or we’re isolated or, um. And, and I think it’s, um, diminishing to 30% of the hotel sector, which is truly unchained in both term, both ways that that term can be used. One, we are not attached to a chain in literal terms, but we’re also unchained from a limitation perspective. I think what is so amazing about the independent or the in – the unchained sector of the market to the guest is the founders, the visionaries, the leadership teams, the hotel teams at these hotels put their lifeblood and their passion and their vision and their belief in hospitality into these properties and into the experiences guests are gonna get. It is not a corporate ownership that is managed by a brand that has 5,000 other w – hotels just like it. And, you know, the onsite hotel team has reams of binders to tell them how to do their job. Um, we believe very much in no SOPs. Um, we have, uh, ultimate SOP. It’s do the next right thing. That’s the SOP for Staypineapple. It’s that simple. Just do the next right thing. We help the team understand that a little bit with kind of some guidelines, which is what is the best thing for you and your colleagues? What is the best thing for the guests? And what is the best thing for the business? And if you frame that question, those questions under do the next right thing, anybody can make the right decision at any moment, at every level of the organization. When we talk about empowerment, it isn’t, you know, we’ve given you a toolkit. I always loved this, because I worked in, in the brands. Um, and we always had a toolkit. You had a toolbox full of things that you could use to solve a problem. Well, I don’t need to give you a toolbox. You are a grown person that is a professional in the hospitality industry and you’ve entered this industry with a passion for people. Why would I tell you how to do your job, um, in every aspect with books of SOPs? Instead, I should get out of your way and let you be who you are in an authentic way. Because that connects with people. If, uh, you know, we put, we put people in our industry in a blazer, a Navy blazer, and a name tag, and tell them, “This is how you answer the phone. This is how you greet somebody. This is how you do this.” Basically, you’re a representation of the brand, so you need to fit in this box. Well, I believe in a different hospitality, in a hospitality that is, um, grounded in, um, real people and real human beings and, and mistakes even, and quirkiness, and stuff that you wouldn’t necessarily, uh, engage in or experience in your normal life. That’s why you’re traveling. You wanna experience different things and new things. You’re going to a new place. And so we don’t have, um, dress. We don’t have uniforms for our front of house team members. We do for back of house simply because we don’t want the back of house team to have to ruin their own clothes because the engineers get their clothes snagged and the housekeepers get their clothes dirty and, you know, so it’s more just to take care of our team. But, um, the front of house team doesn’t have uniforms. They get to wear their own clothes to work. That’s another idea. It’s like, I want you to be you, but wear this black polo shirt that makes you look like everybody else. Or Navy Blazer that makes you look everybody, right? Like the entire concept of what we think is normal and standard in our industry is the antithesis of what we’re trying to create as an experience for a guest. Um, so it’s really important to us, you know, you can have colored hair and ear piercings and tattoos. And I remember early in my career, it was always, um, I love to tell this story. Um, the, the dress code, because I was a manager, so I was allowed to wear my own clothes, but the dress code was, had to have, um, pants or a skirt, uh, a, a jacket, had to have a blazer, and it had to be of solid color. So what I’ve got on today would not have applied. Um, my shoes could not have open toes and an open heel, one or the other. And I had to have pantyhose on. So I lived in Florida.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Yeah.
Dina Belon:
That was the end of pantyhose in our dress code.
Ryan Embree:
Right. And I’m sure the person on the other side, you know, it, it, they were just obviously following the guidelines – Right. And the standards of what was put before them. And you’re absolutely right, Dina. You know, the, the one thing that we talk about all the time, and you talk to. Uh, I’ve talked to industry leaders about is, you know, what makes your management company brand property so great? Usually the first thing they say is they’re people. Yet, when you’re putting those people in a box, how great can they actually be, right? Every property is so different because of the individuals that make up that property. Um, so, you know, that thought process is, is so brilliant to, to think of the individualism and the passion can kind of shine through because it’s those stories that you talked about in the unchained or the independent sector that, that reason why I, this is one of my favorite series, because I get to sit and talk to independent hoteliers and, and hear their stories, their struggles, their challenges, but also their successes, their passions, where they built this, this property that has been, you know, where they’ve had these struggles, but they’ve gotten over the hump and they just love it so much and you can just see it come out in that, that, uh, conversation. It’s, and sometimes very different. Nothing to knock the brands, but sometimes very different when you’re talking to a GM of a branded hotel. Um, and it’s m- maybe just a stop on, on their way to the career. So it is one piece of advice I hear all the time is if you’re a hospitality professional out there, you know, maybe explore the independent hotel down the road. You know, get some good experience there. It’ll, you’re definitely gonna learn a lot, that’s for sure. Yeah. Um, you’re gonna get a lot of – Well, it depends on – Yeah.
Dina Belon:
Yeah, what you like, right? And I agree with you. One isn’t right or wrong. I spent the vast majority of my career in the, in the branded hotel space. Um, and I just found my happy place in – Sure. In the independent space, right? I, because I was always bucking the rules when I worked in the brands. And I didn’t, I didn’t even know what boutique and. I, I though boutique hotels were just little. Like, I literally, when I started at Staypineapple, I love the story too. ‘Cause when I started, I was like, “I’m gonna come in and show them how to write SOPs and, and brand standards, and we’re gonna standardize this, and we’re gonna scale it, and it’s gonna be, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.” I had, I told, because I had spent my whole career in that space. Um, I believed passionately in brand standards when I started at Staypineapple. And I remember, um, our CFO telling me, “Do not say the word brand standard. You will send Michelle off the deep end.” Michelle is our founder. Yeah. And I was like, “What? I don’t understand.” Yeah. “How could you not have brand standards? How do you even operate this place without brand standards?”
Ryan Embree:
Great point.
Dina Belon:
You’re being somebody else, right? Yeah. So it’s a harder position for our team members, I think, to be their authentic selves. Um, the next is really critical thinking. The ability to problem solve and, and, and be creative and figure out ways to, um. We know to say yes. That’s one of our sayings. We notice. We know how to say yes. Yes is not always a direct yes. Sometimes you have to go around to get to yes, but we know how to do that. And that’s all about creativity and critical thinking. And then really, the last one, um, I think is underserved in our industry, which is emotional intelligence. Um, that ability to read people. And, and it connects to that critical thinking, right? If I can, if I can, uh, connect with you on an emotional level and understand you better, understand your psychographics as a person, which is much deeper than that you like Diet Coke, right? I want to know things deeper than that about you. Then I can use that emotional intelligence to be creative and create, create hyper-personalized experiences for you. That is something that I think isn’t. It. The industry in general, particularly on the branded side, does not foster in our industry. If those things are interesting to you, then go check out the independent or unchained space, because I think you’ll be a lot happier coming from a recovering brand employee.
Ryan Embree:
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I, I love that. I love everything about that. I mean, those skills are. I mean, it’s, it’s at the core of hospitality, um, especially the emotional intelligence. And I think y- you’re absolutely right. It’s a skill needed now more than ever, by the way. Um, and it’s gonna get trickier to navigate. So we’ll be those, those younger, um, hospitality professionals and, you know, at, at, at any age, really, that invest that time and effort into honing in that skill that are gonna, that are gonna see successes there. Um, I wanna, I wanna take, uh, a step back, Dina, and kinda look at the hospitality landscape right now for independent and, or unchained, uh, uh, hotels. Where do you see opportunity in today’s landscape? And then maybe where are some of the bigger challenges that, that they’re coming up against?
Dina Belon:
Sure. So I think one of our biggest opportunities I just mentioned, which is hyper-personalization, um, we really look at this, i- if you kinda start at the beginning of the process of how you do hyperpersonalization. Um, it really starts with zero-party data for us. Uh, every brand or every group or every, you know, independent hotel is different, um, in their philosophy on this. I’ve certainly, um, experienced and, um, met with people that do research on their guests online. They look up your Facebook page. They check you out and see what you might be talking about. Um, we have decided to take the approach that we only wanna use data that you have freely and willingly given us. Um, so we communicate with our guests a lot, um, when we can. So there’s a little bit of a differentiator here when we talk about this. Um, if you’re coming in as an Expedia or a Booking.com guest, probably not getting this experience because we don’t have, we don’t have much information about you, and those OTAs don’t like to share. So, but if, uh, you’ve stayed with us before or it’s a direct booking, then we have communicated with you, um, in a way that is fun and cheeky and kinda starts to get you. Um, w- we like to, we like to encourage kind of a pre-arrival experience that is, um, engaging and, and, and gets you kind of primed for what Staypineapple is gonna be like. So you’re not, like, smacked in the fa – you know, you’re expecting a Marriott courtyard and you’re smacked in the face with Staypineapple.
Ryan Embree:
Right. You got a dog running up to you and yeah.
Dina Belon:
So one of the things we do is ask a very open-ended question, um, in a pre-arrival email to all of our, uh, direct booking guests. And it says, um, basically in a cheeky way, I don’t remember exactly how it’s phrased, but it’s why you come in to stay with us. And you would be shocked at the amount of information that people share with us and, like, get into deep personal things and tell us all kinds of stuff. That is a trevor – treasure trove of information. Again, that’s stuff that matters. Not whether Jack Daniels is your favorite, you know, liquor. Uh, like, I wanna know that you’re. What, what do you volunteer for? What, what are you passionate about? What do you care about? Are you married? Do you have kids? You know, like, the things that, that you really, really make you who you are, right? That’s, that’s what we really look at for hyper-personalization and allows our team to use their creativity. So that’s just step one, right? Gotta have the information. And then two, you have to have a culture of people that are encouraged and inspired to be creative, to do fun, interesting things, not just deliver a bottle of wine to your room. What?
Ryan Embree:
Yeah.
Dina Belon:
Right? Um, like, do something that’s about me, not about you. It, like, that’s what I always say. To me, the bottle of wine in the room is about you buying my loyalty. It’s about you as a hotel. It’s not about me as an individual. So everything should be about the individual and about what makes them excited or happy or feel welcome or feel like they belong, um, there. How many times have you walked into a hotel and you felt like there was a cool club and you didn’t belong?
Ryan Embree:
Mm. Yeah.
Dina Belon:
So awful. It is the worst thing about hotels, I think. One of the other things that I just find, um, disheartening about our, our industry is that many people that are not related to the hotel business think you can’t go in a hotel if you’re not a guest. That’s so sad to me, right? Like, there’s, there’s this perception of a barrier, and it’s the opposite of what we should be. Like, we believe our hotels are very much a community hub. And so we encourage the community to come into the hotel. And we don’t even, we don’t have a lot of food and beverage. And some of our properties don’t have any. Some have just limited. We have a few full-service restaurants, but it’s not about us wanting to make money in our restaurants. It’s about us wanting to create an atmosphere in the hotel that is engaging and activating for the guests that are coming. ‘Cause the guests wanna interact with locals. They don’t want to interact with somebody from New York – Right. When they’re in Seattle. They wanna hang out with Seattle people, right? Yeah. So it’s, it’s a real win-win model, but you have to turn, you have to turn that barrier so many people think exists.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you touched on two things there, Dina, that at the core of this independent hotel show series, it really comes back to, which is loyalty, you know, just fierce, fierce loyalty for inde – I mean, the type of loyalty that I hear from guests talking about independent hotels is very different from the other points or nights that I’m, that I’m hearing in, on the other side of it. And, and it’s a depth that will be word of mouth. I mean, when you talk about word of mouth, like, that is the ultimate s – what marketing can’t buy, right? That storytelling that they’re going to be able to provide you champions of your brand and advocates for your hotel. Uh, the second thing is local community engagement and getting the community on board with what you do. I see it no greater place than Miami when we’re at, at the independent hotel show. And they talk about trying to just infuse that Miami culture into their own properties. And it does attracts a lot of locals. And, and you’re absolutely right. It’s, there’s a parallel where probably somewhere where you, where we talk a lot about reputation and people being scared of those one-star, two-star, or even negative feedback in any sense of it, embracing that and saying, “I don’t want one-star reviews, but I wanna see the negative feedback so that I can fix it, right? I want those, I want those locals to come into my hotel. Um, I don’t wanna put that barrier up because I wanna be that community hub. I love that. So what about any challenges you think right now?
Dina Belon:
Yeah, I think, um, the, there’s, there’s a number of challenges. I mean, I can, I can talk about the obvious, the headwinds on inflation, the cost of human and financial capital, maintaining service quality while we’re trying to maximize profit.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. All those talking points.
Dina Belon:
Yeah. They’re not very fun topics though. Um,
Ryan Embree:
100%. Yeah. Uh, seismic shift happening, technologics pl – like shifting beneath us. Uh, I think you’re absolutely where it’s gonna impact everyone from the big brands all the way down to the small independent hotel who, who thinks, “Oh, this is, this isn’t coming for me. It’s gonna have wide ranging effects. It’ll be very, very interesting to see.” But share your concern, but also hopefully that little bit of hope there too, that it, it does go that right way and hospitality stays in, in somewhere where we come to know and, and love our industry. I wanna shift gears. Another thing I’ve, uh, learned about you over the years following your content and your career is your work, uh, inspiring, empowering the next generation of female hospitality professionals. Dina, I’ve seen you on stage at, at multiple panels, uh, a- a- around this subject. Tell us a little bit about the work you do behind the scenes and any tips you would share for up and coming Suite Spot female listeners or just the listeners in general here.
Dina Belon:
Yeah, I do. I love this topic. I, I love to empower women. Um, I think, uh, uh, we’re, we’re a force in this industry, um, and our voice should be heard. Um, so I, I like to support other women by a couple of things. Um, you’ll, you’ll, you’ll start to notice, I like to simplify things down to like one, two, three points at most. Yeah, I like it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I love that. I love that story. And I think we, you know, it’s inspiring to hear those, right? Because it, it can be scary sometimes. Um, but to hear those, those stories, those real life, um, you know, personal, uh, examples in front of you, those are the things that maybe get you that extra bit of confidence there. And it’s, it’s very, very cool to see. So, uh, appreciate your work there. And, um, you know, ex- excited to, to share that with those tips for the audience. Definitely wanted to, to, um, go into that topic a little bit. Um, but this is the Independent Hotel Show series. We might change your episode to say Unchained Hotel Series. But, uh, we’ll, we’re gonna. This is. We’re talking today about the Independent Hotel Show happening this year, September 16th and 17th. Uh, Miami Beach. Remember, listeners, uh, don’t forget to use promo code Ryan26. That’s for a complimentary, uh, registration. Dina, you’re on the advisory board. You’ve been a long time supporter of this show. What inspired you? Take me back to when you were first kind of asked to get involved with the show. Uh, what inspired you to get in, like, first involved with it? And how do you see it supporting independent hoteliers?
Dina Belon:
Yeah. I was, uh, introduced to it before the very first one and asked to be on the advisory board. And it was an immediate yes, and yes, what can I, what can I do to help? Because I knew that there was a gap in our industry in the independent space for a place for independents to get together and have real conversations and real opportunity to collaborate and learn from each other. We’re so isolated, um, in, in many ways. Like, we don’t have a mothership to create all of the stuff, the, you know, programs or education or philosophy or how do you do this? Or what do you do with that? Or, you know, how do you get mustard stains out of the towels? You know, like, anything. Like, we don’t have a mothership that helps us, that hands us a bunch of stuff and tells us how to do it. Each of us are creating all of this on our own. And that’s part of what makes our sector of the industry so unique and great, is that you get a different experience at every property because they’re all created through a visionary process. But there’s also a lot that we could share best practices and adapt what somebody else is doing to what we’re doing. I, like, I love to talk to, um, suppliers and vendors and tech companies, um, that reach out to me all the time because I learn from them. I learn what they’re doing, um, how one of their customers is doing something. You know, like, we constantly have a need for new knowledge and collaboration in our space that didn’t exist. And so this show is one of the only things that are really in our space focused on us and give us the opportunity to do that. It is an incredibly good show. It’s so well curated from, uh, an educational perspective, from the sessions. There’s multiple stages. Um, everything is in one room, which I love. Um, you can, you know, you can be listening to a panel discussion that’s really energizing, and then you’ve got a 10-minute break and you can run over and see a vendor that you wanted to talk to because you’ve only got 10 minutes. And then you get, you know, it’s not spread out. It’s not like the big shows where, you know, you’re gonna have to walk 10 miles to get to something. And the people that are there care and are focused on the independent space. So you’re also not gonna get the eye rolls and the you’re too small and we don’t care about you, and oh, you’re not part of Marriott, uh, you know, conversation, whether with vendors or with anybody, right? The, the people that are here are passionate about this part of the industry and are ready and willing to help anybody that comes to the show improve what they’re doing. Uh, like, I love helping other independent hoteliers, uh, in any way I can. In any context, talking about distribution, talking about guest service, talking about, you know, any, any part, because there are enough customers out there for all of us. I know we’re competitors, but, um, helping, helping everybody lift is a much better strategy than trying to elbow somebody out.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. We’re all in it together. 100% agree. And it’s funny, you know, you were mentioning at the, at the top of the answer about, you know, how independent hotels don’t have some of these resources that the big brands do. Uh, you know, one of the, one of the common things that big brands do is have an annual conference, right? And they get everybody together and, and share ideas and challenges. This is like the annual conference for independent hotel shows. So it’s a sense of belonging. Um, it’s a different energy. It’s a different. It’s, it’s a different type of, uh, uh, of event. Um, it. So real quick, first, uh, tip for any first time attendees that, uh, might be going.
Dina Belon:
Yeah. Um, I think two. Again, I love my, my two or three points. Um, be curious. So show up curious, um, and, and open and willing to share. Um, because that’s what your, your analogy to a brand conference is perfect because, um, that’s what we’re there to do is help each other. Um, and being curious will help you just be a sponge and take things in. Um, use, use AI in this scenario, um, and help
Ryan Embree:
That, that’s a great. Yeah, that’s a great mindset to, to enter this show into. My tip is gonna be make sure you see Dina Bellin on stage, uh, because she’s gonna be there once again. You’re gonna be moderating a powerhouse panel. Hospitality is not a department. Um, give us a sneak preview, if you can, of what that discussion might unpack and maybe your thoughts on the topic.
Dina Belon:
Yeah. It’s really gonna be, you know, about how hospitality is a culture. It’s not a silo. It’s, um, it’s really formed over time through behavior and modeling. Um, it’s not training manuals. It’s not a poster on the wall. It’s values. Um, it’s about, um, really taking everybody in your organization, whether it’s ops, which always seems obvious, but the finance departments, you know, HR, uh, the marketing team. Like, is everybody aligned to your mission and values as an organization? And you as a leader, are you practicing, as a lifestyle, the culture of your organization? So hospitality is not about the ops department. It is about the entire organization following a. Identifying first, have you identified?
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Great point. Yeah, it’s, I mean, it’s hospitality, right? And what we’re always trying to, to try to accomplish, uh, at the end of a guest day is to really, uh, not just, not just feel, feel the, the hospitality, feel the s – the, uh, uh, the, the service that we were providing them. Uh, not just feeling like they, they stayed in, you know, four rooms in a, four rooms in a box, right? That’s, that’s what – Yeah. The old saying.
Dina Belon:
How many hotels have you forgotten –
Ryan Embree:
Right. That’s a wonderful point. Wonderful point. And a great segue into our next, because I think you’ve got an unforgettable, um, uh, portfolio over there. So we’re gonna do some rapid fire here, Dina, to get to know you and your, uh, portfolio a little better at Staypineapple Hotel. So, uh, we always like to start with our favorite view from one of your hotels.
Dina Belon:
Definitely Chicago. So we’re in the loop and we look right at the Chicago Theater sign. And then three blocks down the other way, you can see the edge of the bean. And then there’s this amazing jazz mural, uh, from the corner rooms of the building. The, the incredible view. And we’re an urban city center, so views are not generally our vibe. Um, right? It’s usually another building next door. Um, but that one, that is really incredible.
Ryan Embree:
That makes for a good one. Uh, favorite fun fact about one of your properties?
Dina Belon:
Oh, uh, this is personal. Uh, uh, Fetch, which is our recycling program, is, um, all built around our dog obsessed culture. Uh, again, we like to be, you know, funny and cheeky. Um, so Dash, who’s our, um, our mascot, um, the pineapple pup. Um, he helps with waste reduction education, the Fetch program. Get it? Fetch, dog.
Ryan Embree:
Oh, I love it. Yeah. There you go. Uh, favorite signature dish, um, or amenity?
Dina Belon:
Hmm. Um, there’s a couple. Oh, goodness. These, this is hard. This is really hard. I, I mentioned the naked experience already, so I’ll let that one go, though that is one of my favorites. Again, personal. So you might start to see, I have a little bit of slant towards sustainability. Um, I am. It’s a, it’s a personal topic that I’m very passionate about. Um, our water bottles. Um, it was a huge lift for us to figure out. So, uh, what, I don’t know, five years ago, we used to have, um, unlimited water bottles available to our guests. Um, it’s part of our health and wellness program. We believe that, you know, hydration is a big part of health and wellness, particularly in en – urban environments when you’re walking a lot, you need to stay hydrated. It gave me a lot of heartburn.
Ryan Embree:
Hey, there you go. Great marketing goes along with it. Uh, favorite guest experience?
Dina Belon:
Um, definitely Surprise and Delight, which is our, uh, strategy around that creative, uh, you know, hyper-personalization for guests. Uh, really creating those moments that create memories and stories.
Ryan Embree:
And then last favorite piece of art.
Ryan Embree:
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, like a little Easter egg, yeah.
Dina Belon:
Exactly. An Easter egg hunt at any Staypineapple is go find the Marty Goldstein, uh, Harvey dog.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Well, there it, there it is. Challenge, um, put out there for our Suite Spot listeners, uh, visiting Staypineapple Hotels. Well, Dina, thank you. You’ve spent, um, quite, uh, some time with us. Um, thank you so much for sitting down. As we wrap up today, we do like to look into kind of our hospitality crystal ball. Uh, try to predict the future, which is becoming more difficult to do every single day, uh, now with every, the technology and AI. But, you know, as president of Staypineapple Hotels, what’s your vision for the future of, uh, the brand?
Dina Belon:
Yeah. You know, I think we’re gonna continue to expand on our ability to connect with guests and make them feel like they belong when they’re at Staypineapple, that they’re part of the family. And I know that sounds kitschy, but it’s, it’s a very real emotional, uh, mission for us. And, and in the broader context, what we believe the hospitality’s, hospitality industry’s role and responsibility in society is, and will become even more important as robots take over the world.
Ryan Embree:
I agree. Yeah, that was just gonna echo that same sentiment. I think it’s gonna become more and more im- important. So we need, uh, brands like Staypineapple Hotels to, to keep true to that hospitality mission statement. So Dina, thank you again, uh, for taking the time to join us here on The Suite Spot. Any final thoughts before we wrap up?
Dina Belon:
Just go out there and be you, you know? Uh, don’t be afraid to, uh, come play in the independent space and definitely come to the Independent Hotel Show in Miami and, uh, let’s have a cocktail.
Ryan Embree:
Let’s do it. Uh, both Dina and I will have the privilege of being down there in Miami. We hope to see you in person. Dina, thank you so much for joining us here on The Suite Spot, and we hope to see you at the Independent Hotel Show in Miami. Thank you. And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next time here on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with cover art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The TMG Hospitality Trailblazers welcomes the latest addition to the series, Kim Wootteon, Sr. VP of Commercial Strategy at Kampgrounds of America, Inc. to discuss the outdoor hospitality landscape and how artificial intelligence and technology are playing a key role in connecting different generations of travelers to the KOA vast portfolio of properties.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your co-host, Ryan Embry.
Cassady Quintana:
And I’m your co-host, Cassady Quintana.
Ryan Embree:
We’re excited to have you here with us for another edition of our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. We’ve been running this series for quite a while, paving those management companies, individuals that are paving a way into the future for hospitality, which feels like is changing on a weekly basis. I’ve been really looking forward to this episode. A familiar face and voice with us. It’s the first time you’re joining us virtually. Kim Wootteon, Senior Vice President, Commercial Strategies at Kampgrounds of America. Kim, thank you so much for joining us back on The Suite Spot.
Kim Wootteon:
Yes, it’s great to see you both. Thanks for having me today.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re gonna have a super fun conversation. You have an incredible brand. We can’t wait to jump in. But before we start talking about Kampgrounds of America and KOA, I wanna start because we missed it when we were in Arlington at the Digital Transformation Summit of getting a little bit about your hospitality background and journey that led you to such a cool position at KOA.
Kim Wootteon:
My kind of career path has been quite interesting. It’s really led to the role I have today. So the first 12 years of my career was spent in retail. And for all of you millennials, I started with PacSun. I was an OG, skate and surf lifestyle fanatic. And I worked in retail for 12 years and really learned operations, marketing, and quite frankly, leadership. PacSun was a really great people-centric company. And it’s really where I got my foundation for leadership and my drive for results. And then I transitioned for retail into the more traditional hospitality sector and worked for four years with Marshall Hotels and Resorts, leading sales, marketing, and diving into revenue management. And then was recruited by a company called Bluewater Development, who was really pioneers within the outdoor hospitality industry and very traditional owners in the indoor hospitality industry. So great experience. I was introduced to KOA with them and the entire glamping and camping sector of hospitality, which was super exciting. And then also got to work with some really great brands such as Marriott and Hilton and IHG and independent properties, independent campgrounds. It was quite an eclectic mix of properties, that I got to support in sales, marketing, and revenue. And I joined KOA about five years ago, leading marketing at the local level. And in 2022, we established the commercial strategy team at KOA, and, I now oversee revenue management, local marketing or field marketing, retail, distribution, and sales across the entire KOA portfolio, both our owned assets and our franchise locations, and support for KOA, Inc. as well.
Ryan Embree:
So this is why I love this question so much, because we get such an eclectic melting pot of backgrounds of hospitality professionals, maybe starting in retail. I hear F&B a lot recently. And then you go from the brands, you go, outdoor hospitality, and you get this big melting pot, and it kinda defines who you are as an industry professional, but also gives you, I think, an appreciation of some of those other places that you’ve been or even properties which can span from the giant resorts that we’ve seen all the way to, maybe it is a campsite where it’s a lot more local and kinda community and, and tight-knit feeling.
Kim Wootteon:
Absolutely. Absolutely. I’ve enjoyed my journey. It allows me to bring perspective to the work we do every day that is unique. And we’ve done a really great job at KOA of hiring a team of leaders and a team of people, in the field with really diverse backgrounds, which I think is a great compliment to the diversity across our portfolio.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, I think it’s interesting because you talk about this new team that you guys have created at KOA and the things that you’re developing and introducing into this outdoor hospitality. But for our listeners who may not know too much about KOA, we have a lot of hotel listeners. So if you can just give us a little bit of background about the brand and how it’s found its way to becoming one of the number one outdoor hospitality leaders.
Kim Wootteon:
So KOA was founded in 1962 by Dave Drumm in Billings, Montana. He saw this surge of travelers heading to the world’s fair in Seattle, and he opened the Billings Campgrounds, on his property along the Yellowstone River. And today, Kampgrounds of America is the largest system of privately owned campgrounds across the US and Canada with over 500 locations. We have 50 locations that are owned and operated by KOA, and 450 plus locations that are franchised. It’s a really interesting segment or vertical within the hospitality industry. Incredibly diverse portfolio, incredibly diverse guests. And we’re really fortunate to be the leader within this segment of the industry.
Ryan Embree:
And we mentioned at the top of this episode, this is our TMG Hospitality Trailblazer series. Now, I don’t think there is a much more fitting brand than KOA as far as being a trailblazer when you, when you think about that term, but I’ve been surprised to learn from getting to know you and the KOA brand of the different modern way that we kind of talk about trailblazers in our industry. And so, Kim, you and your team have been doing some incredible work. We’re gonna mention it in this episode, but what do you think makes the Kampgrounds of America brand a true embodiment of trailblazers and trailblazing in our industry right now?
Kim Wootteon:
It starts really with our vision at KOA. And our vision is to be the world leader in defining and advancing the business and experience of outdoor hospitality. And that’s been a focus for our company for years. We have taken a really unique approach to, I’d say, the traditional hospitality industry. We understand camping, we understand hospitality, and we are really committed to being the leader within not just the outdoor hospitality space, but the overall hospitality space in general. And it really starts with knowing our guest. And we are fortunate. We have tons of first-party guest data. We have years and years of history. And we’re known in our segment of the industry for the research we do to really better understand our guest and how our guest changes and what they expect. So it’s a really unique advantage. And the research we provide is not just for KOA and our franchisees, but it’s for the entire industry. And trailblazing shows up in a variety of ways, almost every decision that we make as a brand. So from the guest experience standpoint, we’re launching a new koa.com website that’s really powered by AI and focused on personalization and trip planning and flexible cancellation policies and the guest’s ability to manage reservations. So some of the more traditional things that you would see in the hospitality industry, but with some unique features that are custom to how guests like to camp. From an organizational structure standpoint, we have a commercial strategy team, which we really are the only one in the industry that has a full commercial strategy arm. And we have an AI team. We built our AI department at the beginning of this year, and that team continues to grow and really focus both internally and externally on how we can use AI to enhance the employee experience and the guest experience. And then within outdoor hospitality, technology has kind of always been a little bit of an opportunity. We don’t necessarily follow some of the mainstream tech choices that you see in indoor hospitality. So our focus has really been how do we align with what works well within indoor hospitality? We’ve been exploring OTA integrations and an RMS integration and enhanced text messaging capabilities and housekeeping modules to help operations be more efficient. It’s about really how can we be the first in the outdoor space to align most closely with what works in indoor hospitality, and then try to address the points of friction where we can that are really unique to outdoor hospitality.
Cassady Quintana:
I love that you mentioned this balance of outdoor hospitality and what that means to people, but also finding those opportunities for technology because that is the trend these days, right? Is AI this, AI that, and how can we bring in that technology? And we know that KOA has built such a recognizable brand in outdoor hospitality. So how do you guys find that you’re balancing and maintaining what Dave built back in the ’60s, that trusted legacy of what KOA is with continuing to try and attract a younger generation or maybe people that have never been camping before?
Kim Wootteon:
It is a really fine balance that is not easy. We truly work at it every day and we’re really, really fortunate to have such a legacy brand and such a trusted brand. And so it’s really this balance of how do we stay rooted in our core values and our mission with connecting people to the outdoors and each other while meeting guest expectations for who the camper is today? And so, we see participation in camping across all generations, which is really fascinating. In 2025, participation among adults, 65 or older, reached its highest level in eight years. So we’re seeing this rebound in the boomer population. 25% of all new campers in 2025 were boomers. And at the same time, younger generations, particularly millennials, continue to make camping a really meaningful share of their leisure travel. So it’s this ongoing challenge of how do we attract and retain campers? It’s the same challenge everybody has in our industry. And then keeping existing campers and getting new ones to come back. It’s really that frequency question. We’ve seen some shifts in frequency over the past several years. Our more legacy campers used to take two, three, four trips a year. And we’re seeing that frequency diminish slightly. New campers come and experience it. And maybe don’t, maybe don’t camp again in the same year. It may take one camping trip a year. So that’s a unique challenge our industry is navigating. But we do a lot of research to understand what inspires each generation to camp, and we work really hard to deliver memorable experiences to keep them coming back. But I think the thing that is consistent across all generations and what really matters most to campers, whether they’re new or they’re legacy campers, there’s some core foundational items that we really pride ourselves in across the KOA system. So safety and security is one, cleanliness and quality. We have a really rigorous quality assurance program, and we visit every single campground every single year to ensure each campground is meeting quality assurance standards. And we’re okay to say goodbye to those campgrounds that maybe aren’t meeting our standards. Campers are looking for some self-guided recreation. So if they want to be in the outdoors and really utilize their time as they see fit, the amenities and the recreation continue to play a critical role in that decision-making process. Pet friendliness is really critical and so many people in outdoors love to camp with their pets. And so it’s vital that all of our properties be really pet-friendly. And we have pet-friendly accommodations, pet walks, and camp canine parks. Pets are, are really an extension of our guest base, truly. And then basics like clean laundry, clean restroom facilities, clean laundry facilities, all the essentials that are needed for a great camping experience.
Ryan Embree:
You definitely have the advantage of a memorable experience on your end, right? I think that has been the knock on the indoor hospitality space, is that sometimes it’s your hotel stay or experience there might not be the most memorable part of a trip versus camping feels like something, if done right, and the quality is there, that is a memory that’s not just gonna stick with you for a year that you might just tell a couple people about, but maybe decades. Maybe it becomes a family tradition, and I’m sure you have some incredible stories to share there. But as I mentioned at the top of this episode, Kim, we had the pleasure of meeting you in Arlington, Texas at the Digital Transformation Summit and Hospitality and Hotels. And again, from what I knew about Kampgrounds of America then and what I know now, it was like kind of one of those spaces where I was like, “Well, I wonder, I wonder what KOA is doing in this space.” And then I got to hear your keynote and I was blown away. But it was also one of the most fascinating conversations I had at that event because of the relationship with technology where some of your guests might be looking for an escape from that technology while others kind of see it as this is the baseline and maybe WiFi isn’t a tech- technology to them. Maybe that’s just a standard for them. So it’s so interesting. It’s fascinating. I’m sure it’s that balance what you’re talking about, Kim, but you also have to balance between the guest and you also have 450 franchisees out there, right? And you’re an owner yourself of 50 properties. So I wanna get into both of those kinda spectrums. One is, what are you seeing the guests, their relationship with technology when it comes to KOA? And then maybe you can speak to the owner side of it, of are you hearing owners wanting to implement more technology or are they kind of resisting that when you’re saying, “Hey, let’s start to look at these new kind of maybe fancy technological updates.” I know there’s a packed question there, so.
Kim Wootteon:
Yeah, no. And lots to unpack within that question. So let’s start with the guest first and really the unique expectations that come from our campers. And while historically, camping has been a way of a form of leisure travel where you can kind of disconnect from everything that’s going on in daily life and really spend time in the outdoors, nearly half of all campers, about 47% site wifi as very important. So we have learned over the years that wifi is a utility. It is not an amenity anymore. It is a price of admission expectation for campers. Technology and remote work is still shaping camping behavior. And then Gen Z is the most likely to work while camping. So, we cater our experiences to every generation. And so Wi-Fi becomes a critical, critical component. While we’ve seen a slight decline in work camping, with people going back to the office and those just individual changes, it’s still really important. And it, what’s really unique is new campers, and again, kind of new campers, 25% of all new campers last year were boomers. So when we think about new campers, they are more likely than experienced campers to prioritize connectivity. So about 50% of new campers versus 43% of experienced campers. So access to technology directly influences length of stay and the experience. So we have focused heavily on tech and not just wifi at the campground, but how technology is used throughout the guest journey. Have we made it really easy for them to book and find the campground that meets their experience expectations? What’s the communication with the guests look like pre and post, or pre-during, quite honestly, and posts say through text messaging or, or other forms of technology? How easy can they find their site? Just all of those simple things where tech is a really great way to create efficiencies in operations, still have really, really connected touchpoints, relationship-wise, because I think that is, one of the most critical pieces of outdoor hospitality is the relationship our owners build with their campers. And then can they connect while they’re on site? And for those who don’t want to connect and really wanna disconnect during their stay, have we effectively marketed those sites that are best for them to stay in? Have we created connectivity zones where if they do choose to connect, there’s a place on the campground that is best for that, and the rest of the park could be more of a disconnection zone. So really thinking about how a camper is using the space. On the flip side, our owners, this has been an interesting challenge and journey. Just like our campers, our owners are incredibly diverse as well. We’re really blessed. And I think this kind of lends to the success of our legacy brand. We have legacy owners within the KOA brand. We have franchisees that have been in the system for 50 and 60 years. They’ve been here since the beginning, and that ownership has passed down through generations, which is really rare to find across our industry today. We have a lot of individual owner operators that, they gave up their careers as nurses and as architects, and they follow their passion for the outdoors, and they built and own, decide to buy a campground and and be entrepreneurs. And then we have a lot of investors coming into our space, that are diversifying their portfolio. They have hotels, like that public storage and outdoor hospitality is just a natural transition in their portfolio diversification. So the diversity amongst our owners is a unique challenge when it comes to technology. And then across multiple, age demographics as well. So from a wifi standpoint, we make it a requirement. It is now part of our quality assurance. We incentivize our owners to deliver really great wifi. We have a wifi royalty incentive program, and they can receive reduced royalties for a select period of time if their wifi meets certain standards. We believe it’s that important to the guest experience. And then really from tech adoption, I think that’s where we see some of the larger pieces of friction as our industry evolves and we’re constantly trying to balance the expectations of the guests with the needs of our owners and operators. Things like a couple years ago, we were getting ready to launch online reservation management. Okay, I can, I can book, I can change, I can cancel my reservation all on my phone through the app or otherwise. And then was faced with quite a bit of resistance because it was different and it was new and it took some of the control out of the hands of the owner. And so different components of that have kind of made it out to the public, and then there are some key components that have not quite made it out yet. So it’s really that balance of how do we meet guest expectations and owner expectations? But at the end of the day, we do have the responsibility to ensure our brand stays profitable and our owners are profitable. And so sometimes we do have to make those decisions that may not be as favorable to our owners, but are truly the best decision for the business. And it comes down a lot to training and education and really making sure they understand. So we have a great learning and development team, great communications team, a great project team that really ensures all of these initiatives come to fruition in the way they need to be successful.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and you also have, like you said, 50 properties that you own and manage, which I’m sure is a great kind of sandbox that you can play before you roll something out across the entire brand. But to put this in perspective for our listeners, you just mentioned that maybe there was some resistance to the online bookings that you were talking about, all the way to the owner that you were talking to me. I had to bring this up again, that there was drones bringing firewood to campsites at your property, right? So, I mean, that is the spectrum that you’re talking about. And I think that also is on the guest side. And that’s why probably, you and your team do such a great job of keeping your ear to the ground with these guests and constantly staying. I thought it was a fascinating stat that you talked about, Kim, where you’re saying that the first time campers are expecting more tech than maybe your returning campers or campers that have done that before. And I think that is a, it’s a telling statistic of, “Hey, we’re gonna try this for the first time. We’re gonna go camping.” And they’re coming to the camping site and being like, “All right, well, where’s the plugs and where’s the, the wifi and all that stuff?” Versus the campers that have been there have been like, “Oh, you, you’re camping. What are you talking about?” So interesting.
Kim Wootteon:
It’s a fun challenge.
Cassady Quintana:
I’m glad you mentioned that because when I think about it from a marketing perspective, you’ve talked about the different types of guests. You also have diverse owners, but you have diverse guests. When you think about hotels in the hotel industry, a lot of them have their niche and what they expect their demographic to look like when they come visit them. And so they can kind of cater that marketing a little bit better. But you have people ranging from children all the way up until boomers, and so they’re all expecting something different and they all want it to be exactly what they want. So when I think about it, I’m Gen Z, and this outdoor hospitality thing has really started to become a big thing for us. Like, whether it is because we wanna fully disconnect everything is too technologically advanced now, or I want a little bit of the best of both worlds. I wanna feel like I’m in nature, but also I can check my Instagram later if I really need to. So when you guys think about that from a marketing perspective, what do you think is driving that Gen Z interest, but also how do you develop a marketing strategy so that you can connect with those new campers and that, that younger generation?
Kim Wootteon:
Oh, my gosh. It’s a nonstop kind of everyday challenge that our teams work through at both the national level. How do we really connect the brand to people? I mean it’s so much of the success of our brand, and really camping and outdoor hospitality in general is built off of some, like, this emotional connection to nature and this desire to be outdoors. And how do we be part of that journey? And how can we be a catalyst to creating that experience for people, whether it’s their hundredth time camping or their first time camping? And there’s so many different tactics and strategies, within the marketing space that are available to us now. And it’s constantly evaluated with AI. We are traditionally rooted in SEO, and now we’ve got GEO to adapt to. But the Gen Z population within our camper mix is about 13% of all of our campers, as of 2025, and had been up to about 25% of our camper mix in 2022. So a really significant portion of all of those people that are participating in camping are in that Gen Z demographic. And it really comes down to doing a lot of research and understanding, what motivates people to connect to a brand, what’s important to them, whether it’s sustainability or looking at the health benefits from being outdoors, whether it’s the thrill of trying something new and really adventure-seeking, whether it’s we camped with our parents as kids, and we wanna try it again as adults. And the value proposition for, especially Gen Z is not to that point in life where you’re fully invested and you have a ton of disposable income. And so camping has always been a really affordable way to travel and leisure travel and experience and see things. So it’s this balance of how do we connect with each generation on the right channel? Social media plays a really critical role in our marketing strategy, having a presence across multiple platforms, Facebook, which tends to cater to a little bit more of our Gen X and baby boomer population, TikTok, Instagram, other channels for Gen Z. So social media plays a really key role, and we’ve seen a huge insurgence of social media conversions in our marketing strategy over the past several years. And then the technology piece of some of our generations like to pick up the phone and call and ask questions about their stay. And then others really just wanna be 100% booked online, make all of their change, and make all of their choices without any human connectivity. So finding that balance. But the, the Gen Z demographic is really fascinating. And I love watching how they use campgrounds. We see a lot of Gen Zers use campgrounds as that hub for all of their outdoor adventures, really wanting to spend time in nature and are utilizing a campground to facilitate that experience.
Ryan Embree:
This question is certainly resonating with me. I’m a little bit older millennial. I have a two and a five-year-old. And I remember camping as a kid. I wanna take my kids, but I also do not want to just maybe stay in a tent and not have any sort of. So, I want, I want that, that nice little balance of, yes, we are camping, but we might be going into a nice air-conditioned cabin or lodge, and we might be able to still watch a little TV. But I think it’s fascinating what we’re talking about, because that’s exactly it. And Gen Z, they’re great storytellers. Let me tell you about marketing. They’ll do most of your marketing for you if you put them in the right position, especially on Instagram and TikTok.
Kim Wootteon:
I’m really fortunate on my team. We have a really diverse team as well. And I have, I have kind of boomers and I have a ton of Gen Zers on my team. And so it’s great just to watch those generations meld and figure out how we, how we best connect to our owners and our audience. We spend a lot of time in the outdoors just as a team, when we have meetings and stuff like that. And I just love what comes from it. And then we take those best practices and really implement them with our guests because it’s, it’s the same. We all camp. Most of us in our team, we love spending time in the outdoors. So it’s like what’s gonna be attractive to us? We are our own demographics, right?
Ryan Embree:
Kim Wootteon:
Thank you. We’re really, really proud of this recognition. And I think it speaks to just the uniqueness of the brand. So we have a unique mix of brand standards and entrepreneurial spirit. KOA is a franchisor unlike no other, you know? And I’ve worked with a lot of the big franchisors, especially in our industry. I’ve worked with the Marriott brand and Hilton and IHG and Jellystone and Sun Outdoors. But what I think I love most about KOA, which makes it such an attractive business opportunity, is, we’re hyper-focused on quality. We’re hyper-focused on our brand position consistency. We have three brand positions within the KOA brand. We have the KOA journey, the KOA Holiday, and the KOA Resort to really help campers identify and connect with the experience they’re looking for. But what I love the most about our franchise that is different from a lot of others is that each location is truly unique to space and place, which fuels the creativity and the pride of our owners. So there are certain things that you will find very standard across the KOA portfolio, and there, there’s an expectation campers have with KOA, but every single location is unique. And that’s what makes the system of campgrounds truly special. You’re not gonna get the same overall experience at any two locations. And our owners take an immense amount of pride in understanding the market that they’re in, understanding their campers, and building an experience that drives them to come back and stay with the KOA brand and book again, and at the same time, is quite profitable. So that unique blend of uniqueness and standards is what really sets us apart. And I will say to you, I remember this, if I didn’t shout out just the incredible support that KOA offers its franchisees. Again, I’ve kind of worked with many franchisors, but the support that KOA offers is quite unique. I’m very, very proud to be part of that. We have an amazing field operations team, franchise operations team. We have a team of just passionate, dedicated franchise business coaches that are working with our owners every single day to help them truly grow their business and optimize their investment in the KOA brand and then their campground. We have a whole coaching team within commercial strategy focused on marketing and revenue, and how to maximize revenue and optimize profitability. And then multiple other departments across the organization that really, their customer is the franchisee. And so I think this is a really adequate representation of the hard work our team puts in to support our owners on a daily basis.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I mean, with a, such a complex ecosystem that we kind of talked about throughout this episode, it’s a true testament to the work you and your team are putting in to be recognized. So again, congratulations to you and your team on that. We’re gonna shift gears. This is the rapid fire portion of our episode. I love doing this and I was looking forward to your portfolio specifically. You’re no stranger to travel, Kim, you’ve already mentioned. So we’re gonna get to list a series or a series of questions to get to know you and the KOA portfolio a little bit better. So let’s start with favorite view at one of your properties.
Kim Wootteon:
Yeah. So, and just for the record, so I have been to well over 100, almost 200 KOAs across our systems. I’ve been really fortunate to see a lot of our portfolio with some amazing, amazing properties and experiences. But I was just recently at the campground in Fredericksburg, Texas, which is under construction. We are building it and it’ll be introduced to the KOA system this fall. But the view from The Overlook, which is sort of our main building in the back part of the campground with all of our food and beverage and our meeting space and our pool and our lazy river, the view is absolutely spectacular overlooking the entire campground. The sunsets are great, and it was just, it was a really magical moment.
Cassady Quintana:
Awesome. Ryan, write that down. We gotta take a look at when that one opens up.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, for sure.
Kim Wootteon:
You’ve gotta come experience it. And, and Ryan, we do have some amazing glamping accommodations, so you’ll get all of the amenities of home and a really cool outdoor setting.
Ryan Embree:
Love it. Best both worlds, for sure.
Cassady Quintana:
All right, Kim, favorite fun fact about one of your properties?
Kim Wootteon:
Oh my gosh. There’s so many options because we have such a diverse portfolio. But one of the things we learned as we were prepping for America 250 and just kind of learning our history is the Mystic KOA campground in Connecticut has a house on property that wasn’t built in the United States. It actually existed before the United States existed. It was brought over as settlers have founded that area. And it’s still standing on our campground today. And there’s a lot of history with that property.
Ryan Embree:
So it’s one of my favorite questions to ask, just because you get to learn these, these stories that you would have no idea about. Very, very cool. What about favorite guest experience or amenities at one of your properties, Kim?
Kim Wootteon:
So, the Mount Rushmore KOA Resort at Palmer Gulch has a rodeo, like a full-on rodeo.
Cassady Quintana:
Awesome. Something for everybody. There’s something for everybody at every different property. Yeah. So kind of with that in mind, what’s one of your favorite locations of your properties?
Kim Wootteon:
So it’s funny. So I am a camper myself and I love to spend time outdoors. And I have kind of this unique mix of properties that I love to visit because, every time I camp, I look for a different experience. So I love, like, Lake Placid, KOA, it’s just that, like, quintessential camping experience, really, really wooded and nature-driven. If I’m looking for just incredible beauty with really, really amiditized recreation, I love the Astoria KOA on the Oregon Coast. If I want a tropical resort retreat, I go to Sugarloaf KOA or Fort Myers KOA. So it’s just, it’s. I don’t know. I can’t pick one. I love too many of them, which is my problem and why I’m always on the road and traveling.
Cassady Quintana:
It’s a good problem to have.
Kim Wootteon:
Exactly. I know, right?
Ryan Embree:
That’s what I was gonna say.
Kim Wootteon:
Oh, my gosh. Yes. We, we are really hyper-focused on 2027 right now as a leadership team, which is crazy. I’m like, we’re all happy through 2026. But yeah, we ha – we’ve had a ton of really large projects this year as a brand, and really in, in that vein of trying to modernize our brand to meet the guest expectation, the owner expectations, and stay that, brand of choice. Both of our projects, the development of our AR team and the rebuild, redesign, and launch of our new website, as well as campground landing pages and a new content management system are going incredibly well. We are on track to launch in Q4 with a slew of continued enhancements throughout 2027. A lot of really AI-focused efforts for koa.com, specifically in trip planning and just communication on a site, as well as personalization. We know that that’s so important. How does a guest land on the site and how is everything really customized and tailored to what they’re looking for and what their needs are and how they’ve came to before? So those two teams have been really, really critical in, in the rollout of this project. And selfishly for me, the AI team does a, a lot of work with our internal teams, and how do we impl – improve the employee experience? So the work they’ve been doing just, I mean, so many efficiencies for my role and so many other roles across the organization around really quick access to data within our KOA ecosystem. Like every bit of data I could ever want to access is available through our AI platform. I am able to ask questions quickly, research things quicker, and really get to an end result, which makes the analysis of our business so much easier in identifying trends and opportunities. So those two pieces are just really game changers, not only for our brand, but in the industry right now. And 2077 is stacking up to be a pretty, pretty insane year as well, with just really double down focusing on how do we continue to attract guests, retain guests, really strong focus on that short-term leisure RV camper, and kind of that mash of how do we take all of our legacy campers and all of these new campers and really just exceed expectations to grow the business next year.
Ryan Embree:
Wel like I said, a true embodiment, a brand that is truly trailblazing in hospitality. So wish you luck with all of those projects. We’ll have to keep a close eye on which campgrounds we’ll do an onsite. I still haven’t given up on that dream of doing –
Kim Wootteon:
No, we’re, we’re gonna get you outdoors, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Let’s do it. I’m, I’m looking forward to it. I can’t, I can’t wait. So, Kim, we know you’re busy. Thank you so much for taking the time to join me and Cassady here on The Suite Spot.
Kim Wootteon:
Yes, thank you both. It’s a pleasure.
Cassady Quintana:
Thanks, Kim.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Thanks, everyone. And thank you for listening to Suite Spot. We’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with cover art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the latest Social Success Series Podcast episode featuring special guest and Social Media Manager at Remington Hospitality, Anneleise McEvoy!
Anneleise joins the podcast to talk all things social media for Remington Hospitality as well as hotels in general and how they can not only improve but maximize their social presence online to drive bookings to their properties.
Cassady Quintana:
Welcome to the Social Success Podcast, where we have conversations with top hospitality professionals about successful digital marketing strategies, emerging trends, and how to connect with today’s travelers. I’m your host, Cassady Quintana. Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Social Success Podcast. I am your host, Cassady Quintana. Super excited for today’s episode today. I have Anneleise McEvoy, social media manager at Remington Hospitality. Anneleise, thank you so much for joining me.
Anneleise McEvoy:
Absolutely. So first of all, thank you so much for having me.
Cassady Quintana:
Absolutely. I’m super excited you’re here. Obviously, we’ve talked a little bit before this episode, so I’ve gotten to know you some and especially from your LinkedIn presence, but for our listeners who may not be familiar with you or Remington Hospitality, could you give us a little bit of background about how you got to where you are today?
Anneleise McEvoy:
Absolutely. So I’ve always loved social media marketing. I’ve been passionate about it ever since college, and it was a career path that I always wanted. I started out in college being super involved with clubs and internships where I did social media. So in 2020 when I graduated, I moved to Dallas to pursue, pursue a career in social media marketing at a food and beverage, a food and beverage marketing agency that’s top year in Dallas. I started out as a social media specialist, went all the way up to a senior account executive. So I worked there for three years, and then at my three-point mark, I was like, “How can I mix one of my hobbies, which is traveling, into my career?” And so I was scrolling through LinkedIn, one day and came across a job posting at Remington Hospitality, reached out to my now boss, Alexis, and she told me about this aw- awesome opportunity that she was building a in – house social media agency for their portfolio of hotels. And so the rest is history. I am a social media manager at Remington, like you said. And one week is different than every… Every day is different, is what I’m trying to say. I might be in Key West learning about a hundred-year hotel or making content on a private beach, or I might be closer to Dallas where I’m based now in Fort Worth, marketing a trendy girl dinner experience on their rooftop. So that’s what I love about social media. Every property has its story and I get to help tell that story through social media.
Cassady Quintana:
Absolutely. And I’m glad you mentioned the different locations, because that kind of leads me into my next question. You know, at Remington, you guys have properties that span across very different markets, like you said. Something in Key West not going to resonate with someone that’s looking at a hotel in Texas. So when you guys are kind of building those strategies, how do you make sure that it feels unique to each property but still staying, you know, efficient as a corporate social team?
Anneleise McEvoy:
For sure, for sure. So one thing I always say, you can’t market a property that you’ve never experienced. And I’m sure that that’s true in every industry. I knew, I know that it was true in the food and beverage industry too. So before I build a social media strategy, I want to walk the property. I want to eat at the restaurant. I want to meet the team and experience it like a guest. So that’s where you discover the little things that make the hotel memorable, the experience. So that’s the first thing. I wanna visit the hotel like a guest. And then I pair that with the brand standards. So for example, if you’re a Marriott, a Moxie should feel completely different than an autograph collection. Every hotel should have a personality, but in that personality, we’re working in the brand standard. So at the end of the day, hotels don’t sell rooms. It’s all about the experience. We’re selling experiences. So social media’s job, every content creator’s co – that come into the property, our job is to create a place where someone wants to book before they even book. So that aesthetic feed is where they picture themselves experiencing.
Cassady Quintana:
Oh, I absolutely love that. And it’s, it’s interesting because when we think probably when you first started in social media or even when we were in college, social media was a completely different thing than it is now. We’ve seen all these updates and especially in this new age of AI, things are changing. So do you and what you’ve noticed with your job, like, how has social media changed, you know, even from two to three years ago and how has that changed your day-to-day role with what you’re doing at Remington?
Anneleise McEvoy:
Honestly, everything. Like six years ago, social media landscape changes literally every single day. I feel like I open Instagram and there’s a new update. Like last week, you can scroll through an Instagram carousel, I’m sure you’ve probably seen, and you don’t have to pick one caption. You can caption each photo now. So just things like that. There’s just always another update that content creator social media managers have to publicize out to the property teams as well. But I actually think that’s one of the most exciting parts of social media because it’s ever-changing and we can… There’s always something new to learn. And then on top of every algorithm that’s changing, I think the biggest thing that’s changed in the social media industry is influencer marketing. Because when I started six years ago, I would give an influencer a pizza and beer and they would post five inseed posts about it. And they would post it all on their stories and tag us and even do weekly posts. And I just gave them a pizza and beer. And now creators understand the val- value that they provide and are asking for paid collaborations, which I don’t think is a bad thing because we’re getting more of that quality content. But the challenge there is finding a partnership that works for both parties because for everyone watching, you probably know that hospitality budgets aren’t as big as people think. So even the marketing budget. So I think it’s about negotiating with influencers and giving them what they need as well as what we need. And then the last part of that question I think that’s changed is, of course, AI. I think I have a pretty strong opinion on it on the marketing landscape. I think there’s a right way to use AI. And a lazy way to use AI. So of course, when you’re scrolling your LinkedIn or any social media platform, you see captions with those M marks and you assume that they’re a AI-generated caption, but I think marketers should use it to enhance their ideas. Right. In my career, I found that all marketers have creativity. So it’s just an enhancement. Make a good idea great and AI is not here to replace creativity, I would say.
Cassady Quintana:
I definitely think it’s, can be used as a vehicle, like you said, to enhance the skills you already have. And even just to, like, bounce ideas. I know I use AI a lot of times, like, “Hey, I have this post idea. You know, what do you think about it? ” Or, you know, asking AI to just clean up my copy a little bit or, you know, helping me along the way. And we’ll talk a little bit more about AI further down. But since you mentioned influencers, I did wanna ask you about that because you do work closely with influencers. So from your point of view, like you said, not, not every influencer is a match and not every influencer is gonna deliver what you want them to deliver. And a lot of the times when hospitality professionals think about influencers, they just want someone with a lot of followers, right? They just want the big numbers, but there has to be alignment. So for you, and when you guys are working with influencers, kind of what separates a good partnership from someone, you know, that maybe not f – maybe doesn’t fit that well? And how do you guys go about finding those influencers?
Anneleise McEvoy:
For sure. I think what you just said, people think about the follower count and just look about at follower count. It’s all about the vetting process upfront. So you’re looking at engagement rate. I’d rather work with someone with a higher engagement rate, a smaller audience, and people that are connecting with their followers, and you can see that that’s genuine than someone that has over a million followers and doesn’t have a connected audience. And I find that their content is more authentic anyways. One of my favorite success stories, actually happened the other week. He did have a lot of followers, but it’s not even about his content. It was the creator. We always, after creator partnership, we always ask what we could have done better or how their story went. And it was a creator telling us he brought his whole family, extended family, and he already booked a trip for Thanksgiving with his family again, because they loved the experience so much. So that’s when influencer marketing, influencer relationships become more than just the content. It creates future guests because they’re gonna keep coming back. And if they’re passionate about the property, you know that you have an ongoing partnerships. I think that’s super important to create those ongoing partnerships as well.
Cassady Quintana:
I love that you said that because when you were talking about that, it makes me think of the parallel of just hospitality in general and how hotels treat their guests because, you know, you guys hired this influencer to come create content and share his story about his stay there. Yeah. And in turn, he wants to come back. That’s the same exact thing in the same way that hotels should treat their guests too, because they’re kind of like micro-influencers in a way. Like they’re telling their friends and family if their stay was good, they’re gonna post about on social media if their stay was good. So I love that there’s that parallel there. And a lot of times, influencers can be expensive. I think we all know that, especially in this age. Yes. Like they’re making enough money to live off of it, but there are those micro-influencers that do still have dedicated audiences. So I think it’s important not to, you know, just look them over because they may not have the biggest numbers that you’ve ever seen. But kind of along those lines, I wanna talk about, you know, content that hotels can post because I talk a lot about on my webinars and other podcasts about content that’s evergreen or things that can work across the board. So is there any kind of content that you guys do at Remington that you see that works well no matter where the property is located? Like just some type of evergreen content that you see that works really well?
Anneleise McEvoy:
For sure. And I think, again, this works for across the board for every industry because I found this in the food and beverage industry as well. But two things that always perform best, pets and people. So if you’re a pet-friendly hotel and you’re not posting that dog, you’re missing an opportunity and it helps that I am, I have a golden retriever. So every day, that’s one of my favorite parts of my job. I do community management as well as content creation. And so every day I get to go on the hotel social media and scour the comments, send the DMs everything and I love to repost pet content as it comes in. But also my favorite type of content is, highlighting people behind the performance. So, whether it’s a chef, a bartender, a housekeeper. Remington, actually, our motto is driven by people powered by performance. And social media is one of the best ways to bring that to life. I actually have a story about that at one of our Key West properties. It’s been around for maybe 20, 25 years, but we have a bartender that works there that she has worked there the whole entire time. Every time I post a photo of her, I’m not kidding you, I get 250 organic comments commenting about her, their experience with her. A story about her, how she makes the best drinks, how they’re booking the hotel because of her. And when I go to lifestyle photo shoots and see her, she explains that the guests are her friends. Yeah. She’s traveled the world with some of the guests. So it’s always about highlighting the people behind the performance and behind the scenes as well. And people like seeing that connection. They don’t like just seeing the evergreen. So I think posting people is a way to do that.
Cassady Quintana:
And in a way, I feel like that is evergreen. You know, she, you just said she’s worked there the entire time, like – Yes. And people love her. So, you know, keep posting. I love that because I have that same kind of relationship with some hotels that I regularly go to with my family, like bartenders or – Yes. You know, general managers, things like that. And that makes, like you said earlier, like, we’re booking an ex – an experience and not just somewhere to sleep, right? So having that comfortability with people that work at the property just makes it better. And social media, we work in, like, the, the most feel-good industry. Our social media to reflect that, you know, it’s, like, it’s the most exciting industry to me because it is changing every day. There’s something new to talk about. People are always wanting to travel.
Cassady Quintana:
People love to travel. Like, it should be fun content to kind of match that. But kind of on, you know, the other side of social media marketing and some things that can scare hoteliers is, like, that paid social strategy. So for you guys at Remington, do you have a paid ad strategy? And if you do, what is your, you know, attack to figuring out, okay, we’re gona put some money behind this post, or we’re gonna keep this one organic. Is there a strategy there, and what does that look like for you guys?
Anneleise McEvoy:
There’s a strategy. I think that’s one of the things that has changed in the social media marketing world since six years ago as well. I think s – all social is pay to play. Yeah. So you need an organic strategy and you need to layer in a paid strategy. So paid social for me always starts with one question. If a hotel asks, “Hey, I would love to market a seasonal activation or I’d love to market, let’s say, Easter Brunch, Father’s Day brunch, 4th of July, what’s the business goal? What… Who do you want to see? Start with that one question. What’s the business goal?” And we just invest in where paid can reach the right visibility and right audience, and support the business results that we created in that strategy. So always start with that one question.
Cassady Quintana:
I love that. I think that’s a great way to go at it because it helps hoteliers that may be doing their own social media for their hotel. Like, okay, I do, I know what my goal is for this post. So if you already have that in mind, that’s a great way to kind of look at your strategy and understand which ones should be organic and which ones should be having that ad spend behind it. Definitely. We kind of mentioned this earlier that, you know, authentic, feel good, sh – posting your people. You know, we’re seeing a lot of… Instagram has honestly flipped a little bit. When it first came out, it was very, like, post your best photo with the best filter. Yes. You want that perfect shot. But now it’s like, that we don’t want that anymore. We don’t want polished photos on Instagram. We want authentic. We want real. So I know I’m sure you guys have a lot of user-generated content. I’m sure you have great photos of the property. So how do you balance that of, you know, we do wanna show what the property looks like, but we also wanna show the authentic everyday scene of the hotel. So what’s that balance like of UGC, of user-generated content, photos and videos you guys have taken? How do you kind of balance that together?
Anneleise McEvoy:
Like you said, I don’t think it’s an either/or conversation. I think you need to have both. Professional lifestyle photography and videography is our evergreen content. Right. I think the cool thing about Remington when I came on, hotels did understand that they needed lifestyle photography and videography. So we’ve gotten to do a lot of lifestyle shoots and create social media campaigns that are evergreen. And throughout the year, kind of with our lifestyle photo shoots, we also ask the property, “Hey, do you have any events that are gonna be coming up since we’re in July for 4th of July?” And ask them from there if they want some professional photography. But basically, that lifestyle evergreen content is the foundation of what we post. So I have, I would say 80% of our content calendars are that professional use po – more polished look that you were talking about. But I think that you’re right. I don’t think that we’ve moved away from the aesthetic feed to people want to visualize themselves in the feed. How am I gonna experience that rooftop bar? How am I gonna swim at the pool and get drinks brought to me type of thing? So that’s where we layer creator partnerships. And usually with our creator partnerships, we request one reel to be part of their deliverables where we can do a collaboration post where we share that engagement. It goes on both pages. And then UGC, user-generated content is an interesting conversation because obviously you don’t wanna post every single post that you’re tagged in. Right. So our process, we vet, at the beginning of the month what we would like to post. And then you have to be careful about permissions. So we always ask if we can po- post before posting it, but layering that in as the last one to make the page more authentic. And I think, I mean, to conclude, the best hotel pages balance both.
Cassady Quintana:
Absolutely. I totally agree. And you guys, you know, you’re managing multiple properties social media so obviously you can’t be at the property every day capturing that content in real time. And a lot of hoteliers and people that work at hotels, like, we’re, we’re hands off with social media because Remington is doing that for us. So is there, you know, how do you kind of get that buy-in from them, you know, if there is something going on at their property, like, “Hey, can you please get some photos, like, so we can in turn post this on social media?” ‘Cause I know, you know, it, it can be hard to get them to, to want to do that, right? It’s like the last thing on their mind because they’ve already given that to you guys. So is there a way to create that buy-in without, like, making it seem like we’re just asking them for more and more and more?
Anneleise McEvoy:
Scary. I mean, as you’re scrolling your own social media, I know that, I would be daunted by creating a reel of the activation I just told the marketing team. Right. So I don’t expect any hoteler or a director of sales and marketing to become a content creator. I start all of my social media calls like that. I expect one thing for them to be passionate about the thing that they want to market. Yeah. Passionate about the idea that they had to bring to me. And let’s give an example of maybe we have a rooftop market, farmer’s market experience. So when you’re talking about passion with that idea, I can make it come to life. Not everyone has to be a content creator, but you can create a social media champion on property. So designate one social media champion and I hop on a call with them. They’re usually very excited to capture the content. And then we make it easy with ideas and tell them how to get the best lighting, give them guidance on the best, the best clips and tell them that you don’t need to mute the clips. We’ll put on the music later. Right. It’s just about guidance and encouragement. But basically having one social media champion and having that passion is all you need.
Cassady Quintana:
Oh, I love that. And I think most hotels can find at least one employee that would be happy to do it, right? A happy to take those photos. And I’m sure they love their own social media, so why not, you know, do it for the hotel too? I would be that person for sure. I would love to, I would love to just go around properties and, you know, shoot content for them.
Anneleise McEvoy:
People even even raise their hand and say, “Hey, I wanna do this. ” And those are the best kind of people because you know that they’re, they’re really passionate about it.
Cassady Quintana:
And I’m sure it makes your life easier because you don’t even have to worry about finding that person, right? They’ve already made themselves know. So I’m sure that’s really helpful. And it’s cool to hear your guys’ process because, you know, when you work with a management group or you’re working with, you know, an agency like Travel Media Group to do your social media, it’s almost like sometimes it can be hard, I think, for hoteliers to fully be hands-off or, you know, there’s that kind of balance you have to have of, like, I’m passionate about it. I want people to see our hotel’s personality, but I’m also trusting someone else to make that come to life. So I think having that relationship with them and making sure that they understand, like, you want to bring their vision to life, right? So this is kind of an off-script question, but do you have trouble, like, do they have trouble coming up with ideas? Like, how does that balance work if you guys presenting ideas versus them saying, “This is what we wanna talk about this month?”
Anneleise McEvoy:
Like you said, I think two types of hotels. Some hotels come with me with 25 ideas, “Hey, can we post about National Lollipop Day?” Yeah. And I kinda have to reign them in and say, “Hey, let’s look at the brand standards and go back to our social media strategy. And I’d love to post about these five things that you brought up because, it’s in the area.” For example, the example that comes to mind is a DC hotel last year had, was close to the zoo, and they had pandas that were just born, and they wanted to post about it. And I was like, “That was kinda random, but we can make it a thing.” Right. They wanted to make it a whole activation. So they do come up with ideas. It’s all about balance in that relationship and being able to say, “No, that really doesn’t fit the brand voice,” versus, “Hey, yeah, let’s, let’s make that an idea.” So I have hotels that bring me ideas. We talk to the hotels at least once a month to present our ideas, whether that’s a local idea, what I just said about a panda being – Right. Born and it’s a, it’s a big piece of news. Or it’s more like National Wine and Cheese Day, “Hey, you should hop on this and we should get some local cheeses to come out and enhance your already done hot happy hour.” Yeah. So kind of both, both ways. We present ideas, sometimes they present ideas, but I like both.
Cassady Quintana:
That’s best of both worlds right there, have a little bit combo, because that allows you to still have your creative side too. So, okay, kind of shifting back, I know we touched on AI a little bit, but is there any AI tools, or workflows that you guys have utilized, you know, into your social media process? And how do you think AI is gona kind of fit into social media as we continue to move forward?
Anneleise McEvoy:
I actually think AI has made creativity in the marketing world more important, not less. Audiences know, like I said earlier, when something doesn’t feel authentic. And AI is not taking everyone’s jobs, as everyone’s saying. Hospitality is about people and the best stories still come from real guests, real employees, and real experiences. So they’re leaving those reviews. They’re leaving the comments. And I think we’re the liaison between the comments in the hotel. So for example, like I said about community management, we do community management every day, and I look at comments and reviews. I have one specific hotel that has been open, the same one as the bartender one, has been around for about 25 years, and people are repeat guests. Right. And they, they comment all the time, “Hey, I have 25 days till my vacation. I’m celebrating my wedding anniversary.” And so we could do an AI response back to that, but I like to send via email that comment to the hotel team and work with them on a special amenity that we can give someone because some of the comments I see, they’ve gotten married there, et cetera. So creating those real experiences that AI hasn’t. But yes, we do use AI. I think it’s just as enhancements. I don’t think that in the social media world, you should put your whole content calendar in there and use all of the captions, the cookie cutter captions that it comes out with. And then I think really interesting, the newest thing about AI that I’ve seen is AI influencers. And so I’ve seen a couple, of those and I think it just all goes back to being authentic. And some of those employees that you’re seeing in the AI influencers are not real places that these repeat guests are used to. So I think it’s a good thing and you can use it for lazy ways, like I keep saying. But just enhancements to already ideas. We put in different activations that we’ve though of and it’s came out with even better ideas. So yes, we do use AI.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. I mean, I think you kind of have to these days. It’s, it’s everywhere. And so if you’re not utilizing it, you know, you, you might as well be utilizing it in some way to help, help enhance your strategy or just to bounce ideas off. But I’m, I’m glad you mentioned that about, you know, employees that don’t actually exist. And I haven’t seen that influencer thing. I’m gonna have to check that out after this, but it’s, that’s kind of scary, actually, like, when you think about it. It is. ‘Cause that stuff looks so real. And if… Imagine you saw that. Imagine that you saw an em – an employee at the hotel and then you get there and then you never see them. And it’s like, it can be hard to make sure, like, okay, do I believe this or not?
Anneleise McEvoy:
Like you said, I mean, different… AI is just improving every day as you know. Right. And different generations look at that differently. And if an older generation looks at that AI influencer and they’re like, “Whoa, we wanna go there and we wanna experience this view and the view isn’t – Right. Like it is, then it’s not real.” So – Yeah.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. Yeah. It can definitely have a negative effect too. And we might even see, you know, negative comments, negative reviews about, you know, I saw this image on their social media and this is not what it looks like because maybe they used AI. And it’s like – Yes. A very fine line there. And we see it too with responding to reviews, and like you mentioned, responding to comments too, how it’s pretty easy to tell if something was just AI generated, but if you can take those comments and respond back to them like a real person and then like you said later on, they come to visit and you remembered that and you did something special for them, I think that’s awesome. And we can’t lose that humanity aspect of hospitality. And I don’t think we will. Like I think at the – Me. The base of hospitality is people and that’s what makes a hotel stay special is the people behind it. ‘Cause at the end of the day – Yeah. It’s just a building. It may be the most beautiful resort ever, but if the staff is not nice and they don’t have a good experience with them, like, overall, it’s not a great time. So look – I agree. I appreciate your insight on those. So before we wrap up, I like to do these, like, rapid fire questions. Okay. So I’m gonna give you questions and, like, first thing that comes to your mind, all right? Okay. Perfect. So what is one hotel social media trend you think is overused or overrated?
Anneleise McEvoy:
Lots of trends. I mean, I think we live in an era of pop culture. And not every brand needs to participate in every single trend. So we live in an era of all these trendy TV shows, award shows, the Super Bowl, all of these things. And sometimes saying no to a trend is having a strong brand voice. Yeah. And it’s not all cookie. So I would just say don’t hop on all of the memes just because they’re trendy.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. It’s like, I don’t know if you saw during the World Cup, the Levi Stadium had to cover, you know, their logo with the white cloth and all these brands are doing all of a sudden. And it’s like, it’s, that’s not what the, you know, that’s not why it blew up. Or the same thing with the – No. The couple that just climbed the Empire State Building with the flag, and now people are putting their stuff on the flag. Everywhere. It’s everywhere. It’s like, okay, guys. And I get it. I get why people are doing it because they want, they want that viral moment. But anyways, I digress. So, okay.
Anneleise McEvoy:
I have three. So I would say, I mean, I’m in social media, but I’m also on social media doom scoo – scrolling a lot. So my local one would be Dallas Hotel Swexen. I think it’s a boutique hotel and they have a really cool aesthetic feed that w – like I was talking about lots of professional shots. So taking inspo from there. Why I started in s – hotels, I love LOEs. The story of the Plaza. So I love looking at the Plaza Hotel in New York and they have a great dog-friendly program. They get robes and room service for dogs. It’s just, it’s great to watch. And then the Lafayette in San Diego, I think it was recently transformed from a motel actually. I think it’s an independent, but they have a lot of great programming for food and beverage and pools and everything. And so I like looking at what events they have going on.
Cassady Quintana:
All right. There you heard it first, listeners. If you need social content inspiration, definitely go check those out. I’ll be checking those out after this too. Okay. what’s your favorite Remington campaign or post that you’ve done or that you’ve been a part of?
Anneleise McEvoy:
It’s actually happening right now. So Laconcia Key West is turning 100 this year. Nice. And I love it because, we layered so many different marketing strategies into the campaign. So we had a lifestyle photo and video shoot. And the video shoot was focused on reels where it compares vintage to now time. Actually, every week in July we are releasing, a different video. So that’s been fun. And then we had a couple weeks ago, we teased a social media giveaway. So they were established in 1926. So we teased this giveaway and we were giving away five lucky people, $19.26 a night rates. And so if they commented at the certain time that we posted, first five got this and of course we had blackout dates app, et cetera. But since we tease it, we got about 200 comments in the first minute. And so we had to be on the first five commenters and that was really fun. And they’re all staying in 2026. So it’s been a really fun 100-year campaign. That’s awesome.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. I wish I would’ve known about that. I would’ve tried to enter.
Anneleise McEvoy:
I would say create those experiences. I would say if you have a ho- hotel happy hour and it’s just in a hotel bar and maybe you’ll Your branding is European. You make a European happy hour with a viral Aperol Spritz that people are going to take pictures of. Maybe it comes out in a cart. Maybe you train people to say a special word when they get this Apparel Spritz. It’s all about experiences on social now because that’s what you get, that’s when you get your user generated content. So it just makes sense. So create those experiences.
Cassady Quintana:
Love it. All right. Well, before we wrap up, I like to ask everybody, you know, kind of looking ahead to 2026, I can’t believe we’re already more than halfway through the year. It’s crazy. But what are some social marketing trends you’re seeing right now that hoteliers and other social media managers should pay attention to?
Anneleise McEvoy:
I think it’s actually going back to what hospitality means. I know we’ve talked a lot about people and experiences and everyone is talking about all of these trends, but it’s actually just saying, “Hey, we’re in the hospitality industry. Travelers are looking for not just a place to stay anymore. They’re not just putting their head on the pillow. They’re looking for a place where they can experience everything. They can walk to everything. They have all, they have a navigator at the front desk telling them what the closest d- destination spots. They’re curating that itinerary for them so they have to do no work. Our job as marketers, social media managers, content creators is to translate those experiences into content that makes someone think, “Hey, I wanna go there.” And then you can layer in all of the trends that people are talking about. But it’s really those, “Hey, I wanna go there,” moments that get you those bookings.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, for sure. Well, you’ve had great advice all this entire episode. I appreciate you taking time out of your day to do this. For our listeners, is there anywhere they can find you, connect with you, or Remington?
Anneleise McEvoy:
Yes, we have social media. Remington Hospitality is our handle on TikTok and Instagram and LinkedIn, so go follow them. And for me, Anneleise McEvoy on LinkedIn is great.
Cassady Quintana:
All right. Perfect. Well, Anneleise, thank you so much for joining me today. I had a blast talking to you and thank you everybody for listening to this episode and we will see you next time on the Social Success Series.
Anneleise McEvoy:
Thank you.
Cassady Quintana:
Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcast so you don’t miss an episode. The Social Success Podcast is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with cover art by Bary Gordon. I am your host, Cassady Quintana, and we hope you enjoyed this episode.
Tune in the latest Suite Spot episode as special guests, Dave Jacoby, Founder/Owner of Hotel Lucine and Kaleigh Wiese, Founder and CEO of Ode Places, take a moment to discuss the independent and boutique hotel landscape and the 2026 Independent Hotel Show Miami in this episode for the Suite Spot Independent Hotel Show Series.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot podcast. This is your host, Ryan Embree, here with another episode of our Independent Hotel Show series. This is season two. We’ve done quite a number of these independent hotel show series episodes, but this is the first one where we’ve got multiple guests. So I’m excited to bring them both in today. First with me, Dave Jacoby, founder and owner of Hotel Lucine, and Kaleigh Weise, founder and CEO of Ode Places. Dave, Kaleigh, thank you so much for being with me today.
Dave Jacoby:
So excited. Thanks for having us.
Kaleigh Weise:
What a way to kick off the independent hotel show. Dave and I got to share the stage last year.
Dave Jacoby:
We did.
Kaleigh Weise:
And I feel like we could have talked for a million more hours. And we’re friends, but also we’ve worked together, so I feel like I’m excited to be on together.
Ryan Embree:
Alright, well this is awesome. I’m excited. We’ll, we won’t be able to speak for a million hours, but we’ll definitely have some time today. And I’m excited, but as tradition here in the Suite Spot, one of the wonderful things about our industry and hospitality is people come from all different walks of life to get into our industry. Sometimes you fall into it with a summer job, sometimes you start as a bellman. Like myself, we love to hear these stories. We live and breathe these stories in hospitality and share them with others. So let’s start by just a proper introduction and maybe your hospitality journeys that led you to your respective positions. Kaleigh, let’s start with you.
Kaleigh Weise:
Yeah. Well, there’s a lot to unpack here. So if you see me at the show, come find me. I have been self-employed by whole entire career, and I have always been obsessed with the form and function of business. Like, how do you have a brand that really resonates despite, you know, I see your brand is like a lighthouse, right? Like, how are you attracting the right people? But also at the end of the day, like that business has to be incredibly healthy. And then you layer on a hotel, which is a 24/7 breathing company. And so how do you make sure that you have the longevity with systems and processes and you have a brand that continues to resonate as the years develop. And so I got my start serving in essentially helping brand and position and help with coaching for hospitality and service-based businesses. And then that naturally led into places where people slept, right? So I actually was working with event venues for a long time and when we got into the lodging conversation, I was like, now this is fascinating, a one time event versus like, keeping this up 24/7, what does that look like? And so we, I started out places essentially in 2018 after being in Northern California in the Santa Cruz Redwoods, we got to support a property out there. And I was like, the resonance that I got to feel to plant seeds of purpose into the land there of those 80 acres and understanding the choices we made would affect short-term and long-term generations really put me on a trajectory where that’s where I’ve committed my work so far.
Ryan Embree:
Really cool origin story there. And a lot of parallels from the event industry to hospitality and lodging. So, Dave, what about you?
Dave Jacoby:
Yeah, thanks. So I’m born and raised in Philadelphia, but somehow I ended up in Galveston, Texas, so I did not have that on my bingo card growing up. But here I am, out of college, worked in some finance and kind of hotel development related positions. First in New York City, then went to graduate school, then moved to Las Vegas and actually was in the casino space. But throughout that whole kind of portion of my journey was developing projects that were other people’s ideas and kind of on behalf of others, even though, you know, in Vegas, for example, I led development and opening up a resort there, moved to Galveston, where my wife is from. And my family’s now based in 2016. And just felt like I fell in love with Galveston, but felt like Galveston needed a slightly different hospitality experience here. Something with a little more soul that matched the soul that this whole town has. But the hospitality offerings that I didn’t feel like harnessed that soul really well, yet found an old kind of out of favor motel on the beach and figured out a way to acquire it and came up with a brand and a design and a team that we put together. And it’s been a labor of love and, you know, blood, sweat and tears sometimes, but a lot of smiles and happiness too. And we’re going on three years open, so, okay, that’s kind of how I got here.
Ryan Embree:
That’s like the America, the hotel American dream, what you’re doing right now. And listen, I went to school for hospitality and I think just this conversation already between the event management, hospitality, the gaming that you’ve included. I mean, this is like hospitality management 101 through the experiences, but certainly a familiar one where you’re bouncing around. But it sounds like you found your home there in Galveston. I was really excited about this conversation because it’s very rare I get to talk to two guests that have kind of built their brands from the ground up, right? And I think this is a challenge and a task that especially independent hoteliers have to kind of face and building their story and building a brand that resonates with travelers, especially today. So how important is branding and storytelling to connect with guests? Because I think that is what independent hotels strive to do is create this connection that might be missing right now and, you know, really hopefully leads to loyalty in the future. And what maybe advice would you share from your own personal kind of branding journeys? Dave, we’ll start with you and then go to Kaleigh.
Dave Jacoby:
The brand is so central to what we’re doing. We sort of started with that brand identity, and I use the term identity not as like a business jargon term, but it really is an identity. We personified our brand and there are still decisions that we’ll make where we have this fictitious Aunt Lucine that we will use as a muse for decisions we make around property. And it’s sort of a guiding light for us. But, I think the concept of kind of personifying your brand really helps make it make sense, at least for me. So, I look at how do we connect with our guests? I really look at how we connect with our local community and use that as the window in to our guests with the kind of overriding assumption that if our whole town and local surrounding population considers us part of the fabric of that neighborhood, that the outsiders will, that authenticity will come through. Outsiders will see that that’s where they’ll want to stay. So then, back to the personification of it, just like in your personal life, if you are friends with a group of people, you need to add something to that group and you need to then take something back from that group. So I sort of look at Galveston as the environment here is like a play. And instead of us coming in and saying, well, what is everyone else doing, we’ll do that too. So that we fit in saying, well, how do we add a new main character to the cast here? And I sort of look at it that way. And so what are we adding that’s different, but how does it fit into and, and be complimentary with everything around it? And that’s, that’s kind of how we, we looked at how we fit in and what we offer to our guests both, as, you know, overnight hotel guests and local community that might eat, drink, hang out with us.
Ryan Embree:
Kaleigh?
Kaleigh Weise:
Well, I wanna also compliment Dave and Keith have done such a phenomenal job at Hotel Lucine that they have a brand bible, if you will. And I think that it is a testament to how the vision casting of Aunt Lucine infiltrates, the purchases that they make for design, the plants, the employees, the uniforms, how they want them to talk and walk, and all of that alignment I think resonates really well with attracting the right talent, but also attracting the right guests. And so I think having intentionality, I always say, your brand is what other people say it is. So we have to remember that we have control over how we position our brands and what we want. So I think intentionality is first, which I think Hotel Stein does. On the flip side of that, I think we have to be realistic about who is traveling and who is coming to the hotel or who is also the consumer. Obviously on the B2B side, I usually like to pick three to five different personas, and I think that that helps shape making decisions. We have a property we’re working with right now that is on 12 acres. There’s 43 cabins. It’s primarily outside, right? It’s like, okay, who is the ideal person who’s looking for a property like this? And I think the clearer that you can get with that, it helps you understand where your revenue programming is gonna come for, like, come from. It helps you understand like where you should put costs. Like do they care about the amenities? Do they care about the soap? Do they want a robe in the room? And I think sometimes we make decisions that are too close to maybe how we would like to travel or what we think is best, and we forget what our guests might be looking for, which then leads to greater revenue opportunities and better residents that leads to people wanting to come back because they feel like they belong there, right? Like that was created for them. So that’s kind of the flip side of I think knowing who you are, but knowing who your guest is is equally as important.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, a hundred percent. And there’s, I mean, guests are leaving us clues constantly on who they are based on online feedback, social media posts, reviews, there’s so many things. Even just a day-to-day conversations, you would be surprised, a tip that everyone gets, you know, you wanna know, you wanna learn about what guests think about you, just hang out in your lobby for a couple minutes during breakfast and just hear the conversations about what people are saying about their stay. But Dave, I loved your point there about talking about being embedded in the local community because you think about people that really prioritize a unique experience in the independent hotel space, which they’re independent hotels are so positioned to do, if you don’t become a part of your community, they’re looking for that unique kind of experience that only an independent hotel can provide them. If you’re really embracing your local community and sharing those same kind of aspects of it’s gonna hopefully resonate with that traveler. And then hopefully they amplify that story a little bit in some of the ways that I was talking about. But one of the things we’re gonna talk about the independent hotel show in a second in September, very excited about that. But one of the things that I love about that show is sometimes as independent hotels, you might feel a little bit like you’re on an island because you don’t have that big brand behind you, right? So getting a bunch of independent hoteliers together, you hear about some of the challenges that are going on right now. And unfortunately right now there’s a lot of noise in our industry. Economic shift, geopolitical factors, rising operational costs and margins are very thin, can be challenging for independent hoteliers. Where do you guys see opportunity right now? Because independent hotels are always looking for that little bit of edge. Where do you see opportunity right now in the state of this industry and maybe where do you see some shared challenges that we have to kind of battle as an industry for independent hotelilers? Kaleigh, let’s start with you and then maybe Dave you could zoom in maybe a little bit more on your property and market.
Kaleigh Weise:
I think the biggest thing that I’m seeing is, I talk about all these revenue drivers as like little dials. We get to tweak and twist, right? And I think that through some of the impacts that we’re having that are things that are outside of our control, right? There’s only so much we can do with some of these things. There are a few things that you actually can kind of take control over. And I think that investing more in the community and finding opportunities to drive revenue with the people who are in your local area who maybe aren’t traveling for the summer or fall or Christmas or whatever that might be through that event programming, it is not uncommon for us to go into a independent hotel and they haven’t really ever thought about events, especially if they’re under, let’s say 60 keys. Even 20 to 40 or 80 is a great number because you have an opportunity to having a full buyout, or you can have 40th birthday parties or a wedding or something like that. And that can be a huge revenue driver. And so I think as we look at shifts that are happening with, you know, the average event or wedding right now is booking a hundred or event is booking 120 days out. I think the average wedding is booking somewhere between nine and and 14 months out. You can start forecasting revenue a little bit more in control and then focusing on your rooms and your distribution in shorter term pickup opportunities. And so I think understanding where are all of your revenue drivers? What do you have control over? What do you not have control over? And where are, maybe there are opportunities that will be very low lift to you to be able to fill dates and have revenue coming in ways that haven’t been the pickup that you anticipated.
Ryan Embree:
yeah, and food and beverage, huge opportunity and doesn’t, you’re absolutely right, Kaleigh. It doesn’t necessarily need to be travelers from outside of your market all the time. The hotel restaurant, I feel like has got a bad rap for the last decade or so, but it is turning around, right? And it’s a place where people want to be. It’s a social setting where when people come, you might be hosting people and for the holidays or what have you, and you might find yourself at a hotel restaurant even if they’re not staying there. So it’s certainly a shift in what’s happening right now, but especially for independent hotels. Dave, what about you? What have you kind of seen in your market and maybe any creative solutions for some of these challenges right now?
Dave Jacoby:
I mean, I’ll sort of piggyback off of what Kaleigh said a little bit there, but it’s events and Kaleigh has sort of focused on booking events from, you know, outside groups. I’ll sort of look at it more as your internal event programming I think is also really important. And, and that’s, and it’s our kind of best way that we use to connect with our local community. And what that event programming is can be so many different things. It sort of depends who you are, who is in your community, and how do you fit into your community, what do you offer? So kind of when I talked about earlier, need to offer something back to your community that you’re in, for us that means a lot of live music. We’re very plugged into the local live music scene and we have a great curated music program every weekend night, all year long. And then in the summer we have a series called Sunset and Sounds, which is sort of larger bands that are touring. Some are touring the U.S. Some are based in Austin or elsewhere in Texas, and they come down to hotel scene and we put on free shows for hotel guests, the community, whoever wants to go. We do wellness events and that might be cold plunges or sound baths. We’ll partner with local organizations that wanna do fundraisers or other events. And it’s just a way to activate the space. It’s a way for people that are not from your town to have a experience where they feel like they’re integrated into what’s happening in that community. It’s a little more interesting for them as a visitor. And if you’re staying at a large chain hotel down the street or in another market, they just can’t deliver that. They don’t have the people, enough people with decision making power that are in the community that are focused on that. It’s just not the way they’re built. So that’s really the advantage I think independents do have over the larger chain hotels. We might not have the distribution systems and some of the other marketing spend, but we do have the ability to deliver on a day-to-day basis and experience that’s just different than what those larger hotels can.
Kaleigh Weise:
And I would like to comment that, you know, we’re seeing data around three hour drives being really hot, right? So I think sometimes you think you’re marketing to the next nearest city or, you know, looking for that destination destination visitor. I think really thinking about who are those markets that are within a three hour drive that are easy pickup for you once they know that you exist and you’ve again pointed your lighthouse of your marketing and branding in their direction, I think that’s a wonderful way to pick up opportunities for guests and community and events and things like that.
Ryan Embree:
Hey, I am the father of a 5 and a 3-year-old. And let me tell you, I’m a huge proponent of the three hour trip because that’s about as far as I can get before all of us go a little crazy. So you, you can bet I’m definitely looking for those opportunities to get out there and have that type of experience that Dave, you know, it’s around this time of year when we’re I’m talking to independent hotels that I get so inspired because the freedom of having an independent hotel and the activations and programming that you can put on, I think sometimes independent hotels, because they see some of these big branded hotels not doing some of this programming. They think should I be doing it? And it’s maybe because they have so much red tape in their branding, they have to get approval from, legal or their brand to actually run these things that they’re just not doing it. So it’s such an opportunity, and again, I get so inspired to kind of see that because the way the ingenuity that these independent hoteliers have is just, it’s second to none in our industry. It’s really creating a very cool experience, which is now being showcased and highlighted easier than ever via social media and reviews. So as we talk about industry trends, I wanna see, Kaleigh, you were talking about the three hour trip, right? Wellness is a big one, f &b, what are some of these maybe traveler trends that you’re starting to see bubble up and emerge right now? And how can independent hotels capitalize on these trends and over maybe branded competitors? Dave, you want to start maybe any trends that you’re noticing in your market in Galveston?
Dave Jacoby:
I’d say one might be the, and to use a buzzword here, the bleisure trends or the business leisure trends. So we will find, sometimes we’ll get small groups, maybe it’s a board or a small creative agency or something like that, that will come and have an offsite with us. And it’s partially meant to be used as a brainstorming session or some obvious business function to their meeting. But it’s also a time to hang out. Some of these groups might bring spouses with them or there might be a business component and then they’ll stay for the weekend and then it’s a little more freeform or social at that point. Or I’ll sort of see this bleisure happen from the other direction where someone will say, Hey, I want to come for a weekend and be at the beach, but why not come on Wednesday night and I’ll stay and I’ll just, I work from home anyway. That’s become so much more acceptable for all or part of the week for so many people. What does it matter if I work from home, from home home or from a hotel or a hotel lobby where I’ve got coffee? And it can be tended to. So we sort of see leisure trips happen in both those directions where the, the work kind of lends a little more leisure and the leisure lends a little more work.
Kaleigh Weise:
We also have a great living room for people to work and hang out and stay and enjoy beachside.
Dave Jacoby:
We do, we do. I sit in there often and you’re, and you’re right that it is when I overhear what people are saying about the hotel, I do my work, but I also eave drop and pop in on people and help out with things.
Ryan Embree:
It’s funny ’cause you know, modern day design for hotels now are accommodating for that. They know that the flexible workspace and they’re building lobby common areas a little bit larger or maybe even not so siloed so that people can mingle, interact, but also have some spaces to work from. So certainly a trend there. Kaylee, what are you seeing maybe from, as you zoom out?
Kaleigh Weise:
I mean I think experiences and add-ons are something that I continue to be surprised by. So if I’m the North American Ambassador for Muse, so I of course love Muse, but also cloud beds and stay in touch and all of, like, they all offer these add-on options where a guest during checkout or pre-arrival, they can add that early check-in. I’m blown away by the amount of people who opt into that $35 pre-check in or wanna add a bottle of wine to the room. Like those little details, it’s so helpful when they’re coming to have that reminder that we can make this a more customized stay for you. And so I think the sweet spot is no more than seven upsell opportunities. But I think that that even bleeds into, I know when we were helping with Hotel Lucine I’d ideate on some of these things, it’s like they ended up doing pop-up dinners on the balconies of their rooms and adding, I forget, a couple hundred dollars right? Or picnic baskets that people could take offsite. And I think people are hungry for having that almost like travel agent like experience where if the property can customize an itinerary for them or enhancements for their stay, I think they’re very excited and eager to be able to take advantage of that. So I think that’s a trend that’s happening and desirable, but something that I see a lot of independent hoteliers are stuck in the day to day and maybe not adding the attention that they could that will see the revenue that really is low hanging fruit out there.
Dave Jacoby:
Kaleigh’s so good at that. I mean she helped us with that as she mentioned, but she’s got this ability to kind of come in and just see what’s going on every day and she’s not seeing anything you don’t see immediately. But then she also sees these other opportunities of ways to personalize the guest experience in a way that you’re happy to do and isn’t a heavy lift for you and the guest is happy to pay for. And it’s just such a win-win. It’s almost like you get the surprise and delight moment right outta the gates and the guest pays for it too. It’s a great, it’s a great combo.
Kaleigh Weise:
Just a matter of training the staff and getting in on the website.
Ryan Embree:
That’s right. Very important. Get the buy-in from the staff. But you mentioned that word personalized. I mean that’s what we’ve been striving for in this industry for a long time. Personalization and with the rise of technology and AI like I put here, it’s not a podcast in 2026 if we don’t use those words. I don’t think I anybody would listen if we don’t talk about that or that buzzword. But I do wanna talk about it because I think especially with independent hotels, they might be more excited than most because it could figure out a way they could use AI and technology to maybe shrink the difference or find that edge against a branded competitor and maybe not feel so, you know, just David versus Goliath in that sense. So Kaleigh, have you kind of seen any competitive or creative uses of technology and AI in the industry, especially with independent hotels? And then maybe Dave you could share a little bit of your thoughts as well.
Kaleigh Weise:
I definitely see us being in a bit of a purgatory and as I’m talking about this, I’m thinking fast forward a year from now and I think agentic agents are at our fingertips for having access to supportive administrative help. And I see what Muse is working on behind the scenes and it’s like we’re gonna be living in a very different operational world. In I think all the best ways. And when I think about the future of an org chart at a small independent property where you have to get stuck in the day-to-day right now planning and preparing for guests and double checking things like being able to be synced in when Uber’s about to when Uber’s about to drop off your guest. And being able to be prepared with that timing. I think we’re gonna see our front desk admin become hosts for the first time and really have the time and empowerment to be able to greet them with the level of detail and customization. I also think the automations, I think we’re gonna snap that into being just such a helpful tool to ask the right questions or personalize the spaces. So I think currently it’s very challenging, let’s say for an independent hotel to offer a pillow menu, if you will, for the right pillows that that guest is gonna want. But I think in the future we’re gonna be able to have the opportunity for putting a time and attention into creating experiences that guest deserves that’s customized based on various preferences or interactions. And so I think it’s a really exciting time for actually hospitality to take back the spotlight. And that’s why people join this industry, right? Is they love hosting people and giving people experiences. And I think sometimes the admin takes away from that, you know? And I think that it’s gonna allow us to be more competitive when it comes to distribution. All of us didn’t go to school to be revenue managers, right? And I think that is a, that is a calculated game that to be able to have tools that can help support us and making sure that we’re optimizing the proper ADR and and pickup cost to be able to book our occupancy moving forward. I think it’s a really exciting time. I think we’re just in the purgatory of it right now. It’s like at our fingertips, but we’re not quite there. But I think about a year from now, things are gonna feel like it’s restabilizing in a really exciting way.
Ryan Embree:
So Dave, from an owner’s per perspective, you’ve, you just talked about how carefully you’ve kind of curated and built this incredible experience at Hotel Lucine. What is your thoughts on when you think about implementing technology or, or some sort of new AI initiative into the guest experience and how you make sure that doesn’t impact your brand too much?
Dave Jacoby:
I like the term Kaleigh used about purgatory. I don’t think we’re quite there yet. If you look at the amount of, certainly in the independent space, useful applications of AI in the day-to-day life versus the amount of words in print publications about AI, it’s a massive imbalance there. To me, the right ways that AI can be implemented are ways that are invisible to the guests. So the example Kaleigh was using is one that we’re, I’m rolling out actually now in kind of bits and pieces is how do you use AI to improve your day-to-day workflow? And for me, if it’s, I can unleash it on my Google drive and have it pull a bunch of information and synthesize it and put report together for that I can then give to our team. We’ve got better data and that would’ve taken me three hours, but I let it run in the background for 10 minutes and it’s done. You know, things like that to get better insights on your business, that can be done. Now, to the extent we can use AI to free up front desk agents, I’m working through a specific protocol on that now, just to get all the, what’s your pet policy, what time is check? And we just get so many emails that are repetitive in nature to answer. And the front desk agent isn’t always on top of it. Sometimes they’re doing other things, and I’d rather they be eyeball to eyeball with a guest acting as a host or hostess to the people that come in and providing person to person hospitality and not in the computer. We can free that up. You can do that now. So it’s a matter of just setting the systems up and taking the time to do it. And you can set it up with as much automation or oversight as you want to do, but it’s a matter of taking the time to actually do it so that you can free up those personal interactions. Because that’s where we as independent hotels, I think are, that’s what we people come to us for, is for that personalized touch and feeling like they’re having a human interaction and they’re not at a big corporate commoditized hotel. So we wanna give them that as much as we can.
Kaleigh Weise:
And I mean, I think human-centric is so important. I think we can, we can still remain to have a human-centric business with these tools. I hear all the time people feel like they’re so behind with using AI. And I guess even for those listeners today, I think you can relinquish the shame because the speed in which AI is gonna continue to grow is gonna continue to grow. And I think the application of that, depending on what market you’re in, what tools you’re using, I think if you can focus on one implementation thing that’s gonna actually help you serve your guests better, you’re not behind. It’s really just pacing that is right for your team, for your guests, and what’s gonna be right for you. But also don’t be afraid of it. Like, I think that there’s a lot of exciting things and tools that are only gonna be able to support us as an industry.
Ryan Embree:
My big bold prediction is that I think the GM of the next couple years is actually gonna look a lot more like maybe the GM of 20, 30 years ago before all of that kind of work that what we traditionally thought a GM had to do with reports and all of these things that actually some of those desk jockeying kind of tasks, AI can, agentic AI could potentially take care of for you. And then you get back to kind of doing what both of you described as, you know, that face-to-face human interaction. So what I’m hoping is that, you know, a lot of this technology actually kind of causes more of our service driven people and hospitality professionals to kind of rise to the top and create some really cool, memorable experiences and maybe just get that service back to where it was. Because it just feels like there’s some aspects of it in some hotels where it just, we completely missed the mark. So that’s my, maybe that’s me being a litte too, but that’s, that’s my 2 cents and what I hope happens.
Dave Jacoby:
No, no, I think that makes a lot of sense. And I thought of one other great application for independent hoteliers for AI. We don’t have an in-house IT guy. We don’t have an in-house like maintenance tech. We’re just not big enough to carry those positions. But you can go to your, claude, chatGPT, whatever it is, and say, why did my TV turn on three times in the middle of the night by itself in room 212 last night? True story, this happened and the guest was upset. And then I explained what my systems are and how they work and what they can, you give it a little bit of input information, it’ll help you diagnose. I haven’t yet tried the recommendation ’cause I’m on here talking to you guys. But there are all kinds of solutions you can ask for help for and they might not be right, but before you’re spending money to call out an HVAC technician, find somebody who can handle whatever this one specific system you have is and can service that you can troubleshoot a lot of these things and 60, 70% of these things you can fix on your own because it’ll walk you through it. It’s really a helpful way to save money. And that also helps guests experience, right? Because now if that TV’s not turning on three times middle of the night for that guest tomorrow night, she’ll be happy.
Ryan Embree:
Love it. Yeah. There we go. Just claude gonna be employee of the, of the week over there at Hotel Lucine every week If we get that figured out. But I do wanna shift our attention to the reason we, you know, started this series, the Independent Hotel Show this year happening September 16th and 17th in Miami Beach. We could not be more excited. And for our Suite Spot listeners, don’t forget to use promo code Ryan26 for a complimentary registration. Dave, you’re on the advisory board and Kaleigh, you’re a brand ambassador like myself. We were on a call talking about the show just the other day. I wanna get your thoughts on what inspired you to get involved with this event and maybe some of your personal favorite aspects of the show. So Kaleigh, let’s start with you and then Dave, you can answer.
Kaleigh Weise:
I have been an active conference goer my whole career, right? Like a little bit of hustling, a little bit of gorilla marketing. And when I look back at the growth and success in my career, it really comes down to the thin threads and the people that I meet. And I think to have an opportunity to pull up a seat at the table for independent hoteliers who do feel very isolated most of the time, right? They don’t have any other friends who have independent hotels to call. They feel like they’re stuck in the day to day. This will be the fourth year. And I’ve been able to be a part all four years. And I think it’s really exciting to even meet back up every year and hear about the growth that each person is experiencing, but also what’s working in their market and not, and just because you’re in Boston or you’re in Galveston or you’re in Monterey, California, you’re gonna find that you have more the same than different when it comes to the day-to-day challenges of operating a business or being able to get in front of the right guests that you know that you deserve, that are paying the price point that you want. And so to have an opportunity to hear what’s relevant in terms of content, but also talk with other people is just invaluable. And so I continue to be really excited about the niche of, you know, the subsegment. The industry is so large in lodging and we really haven’t had a place until the Independent Hotel Show that gathers this segment of people who are doing it. Owner operated and small with a passion.
Ryan Embree:
Agreed. Agreed. Yeah. Passion is is a word we hear a lot at that show. Because you can just see, I mean these are, you guys are both founders like I mentioned before. I mean the passion behind your brand, the storytelling makes such a huge difference. And to have that much energy and a place Miami Beach of all places, right? One of the independent hotel capital of the world, to see and hear all of that is a truly a memorable experience. Dave what about yourself?
Dave Jacoby:
Yeah, so unlike Kaleigh, I do not go to a lot of conferences. It’s not generally my thing, but I’ve been into this show and really loved it. I loved how we mentioned earlier how a lot of independent hoteliers haven’t really had a lot of places to congregate and kind of coalesce their thoughts together. I found the panels awesome, even the ones that I was like, well that’s doesn’t really touch what I do in my day to day, but I’m here so I’ll listen. All of them. I found really interesting. More than that, it was just the people that were there, these other independent hotel helped hoteliers who had done gone on their own journeys to get wherever they got. And they had all figured it out. Ghere was not a lot of resources in front of them telling them how to do what they needed to do. They just, they needed to pay their mortgage, they just did the next right thing and got there. So hearing the stories of how people solved whatever the issues were that were in front of them and sharing my own stories and finding the commonalities of maybe the setting was different or the problem was different, but really the approach was very the same. Or getting inspiration from people who have figured out things I hadn’t figured out yet and learning from them. So I really like just the being able to learn so much kind of one-on-one from people and in and in some of the sessions.
Kaleigh Weise:
I also think they do a great job of pulling together vendors and resources. It is not uncommon for an independent hotelier to go to Costco for some of their… Or order on, you know, Walmart.com or Amazon. And I feel like there really are great resources out there that are made for independent hoteliers and to bring them into the room to have a conversation around cost savings or ability to be able to elevate the amenities that they have on site. I’m really excited ’cause I think of the show floor this year is gonna be bigger and better than ever from what we were hearing in preparation. And so I think it’s a wonderful opportunity that people should allow time to walk the floor in addition to hearing the sessions because those vendors can really change their bottom line quite significantly with implementation.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And it’s so cool to see the eclecticness of the independent hoteliers there from, Dave, you’re a great example coming from Galveston, Texas. You could be coast to coast anywhere from like a little five room air bnb rather to a giant independent hotel in a major market. So just everything in between, all different shapes and sizes when it comes to independent hotels, independent hotels. That’s why we love them so much. That’s why we like hearing the stories and why it’s such a unique space and hospitality. And to be able to spend those couple days putting the spotlight on sometimes, this really, really unique segment, it’s such a privilege. We’ve had the opportunity to cover the show for four years as well. So we’re very excited and hope our Suite Spot listeners will join us in Miami Beach this September. So as we wrap up, I do like to just kind of give the opportunity for any final thoughts as we wrap up today. I want to thank both of you for taking the time to join me today. Kaleigh, any final thoughts before we wrap up?
Kaleigh Weise:
Yeah, I feel like the, the topic I wanna touch on is a lot of hoteliers in the making are interested in the show and I feel like there’s a little bit of intimidation showing up, not really having background or knowledge or even knowing what they’re getting themselves into. And so I guess from an affirmation perspective, this is a wonderful show if this is an industry that you’re curious about or you wanna learn more about or you wanna have the conversations around. And so we look forward to hopefully welcoming you in September.
Dave Jacoby:
Yeah, I will echo that. And kind of say there are a lot of people at this show that are interested in the space and maybe are there to learn and they’ll find that people are there like myself or other people who have kind of gone through the process and developed their hotel. I would just say to all of them here, what I’ll say to you at the show is, I didn’t know what I was doing either when I started and a lot of us don’t. And there’s no playbook. There’s not gonna be a playbook. You’re not gonna find one that’s gonna tell you what to do at all steps. You just surround yourself with smart people. You need to know what you can and cannot do and where your limits are and kind of take the plunge and figure it out as you go. And your decision making in the moment is really gonna be what’s gonna drive the process. And if you’re always waiting to have the full roadmap, you’re never gonna have that roadmap.
Ryan Embree:
Maybe that’ll be our next endeavor as the independent hoteliers playbook and we can publish that as a couple authors.
Dave Jacoby:
Yeah, a long book.
Ryan Embree:
Yes. Take a lot I’m sure.
Kaleigh Weise:
Variation A, B, C, D.
Ryan Embree:
Exactly.
Ryan Embree:
Well, Kaleigh, Dave, thank you so much. I really appreciate you taking the time, sharing your stories today. We cannot wait for September at the Independent Hotel Show. And thank you all for listening to the Suite Spot. We will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Being that the 2026 Independent Hotel Show Miami is only a couple of months away, this special IHS Series episode features the VP of Development, U.S. & Canada at Minor Hotels, Genna Panagopoulos!
Genna joins the Suite Spot podcast to discuss:
- The Minor Hotels Brand & Special Announcements
- The Independent & Lifestyle Hotel Landscape
- The 2026 Independent Hotel Show
- Creating Unique Experiences for Travelers
And much more.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We are here for the second season of our Independent Hotel Show series. That means we are gearing up, if you can believe it, for the Independent Hotel Show here in September and Miami Beach. I am so excited and equally excited to bring in a familiar voice. We had her on the podcast just a couple months ago in New York City, Genna Panagopoulos, VP of Development North America at Minor Hotels. Genna, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Hey, thanks for having me again.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, excited to have you. We were talking off camera. Typically, I usually do the virtual interview before meeting you in person, so this is a little bit more comfortable here, virtually back in, in, I think you’re in Atlanta. I’m here in our TMG headquarters in Orlando, but second time on the Suite Spot. We really didn’t get to get into your hospitality background, kind of a tradition here. Wanna introduce you to our audience a little bit more, intimately and in depth. Talk to us a little bit about your background in hospitality and the journey that led you to Minor Hotels.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Well, it starts a long time ago because I grew up in the hospitality industry. Typical greek immigrant story. My father came here with just a few dollars in his pocket and ended up building a pretty successful restaurant business in Detroit. So if you ever are in Detroit, if you say Jimmy, the Greek people will know him. But I went to, I obviously grew up in Michigan, went to Michigan State, really, and started studying hospitality with the intent of taking over the restaurant business. And then I did an internship for my father and realized I did not love it as much as he did. And so I ended up falling into the hotel space and specifically hotel investment, real estate development, and have just fallen in love ever since I started my career at Davidson Hotels and Resorts back when they were in Memphis, actually on their business development team. And then they moved to Atlanta, ironically, next to IHGs headquarters. So I was with Davidson for a few years, hopped in over to IHG, where I was for 10 years, did everything from feasibility to business development to even brand, which is a little bit unique. And I don’t wanna undermine that because I had a lot of people say at the time, why would a developer ever go to brand? Like, that’s, you’re where you wanna be. But for me, it was so critical to kind of unlocking new opportunities in the future because the skills I gained in a year and a half on the team work just the role that I’m in now is super helpful because it’s, it’s kind of like wearing two different hats, right? A creative versus a mathematician. So anyways, I was there at IHD for 10 years, and then this opportunity at Minor came up last summer. I was so ready and excited to take on like a new challenge and I thought that it’d be a really fun and exciting new endeavor for me with this combination of my background. So, it’s exciting. Minor’s been super supportive and it’s a little weird to go from working in an office with thousands of colleagues to being the one of one in an entire continent, but it’s been great so far.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And what a unique opportunity. We’re gonna talk about that here in a moment because I think it’s absolutely fascinating. But your story is very familiar. I mean that we hear all the time from our guests, a lot of them start in that f&b kind of space and then transition over to the hospitality side, but super comprehensive skillset, which I’m sure has set you up for success in your role at Minor Hotels. Now, we met face to face at NYU IHIF, where just a couple weeks removed. I call this kind of takeaway season where everybody’s on LinkedIn, kind of frantically typing their takeaways and what they felt about the state of the industry right now, what we’re looking back on New York City, maybe you could start kind of zoomed in version of how that event for you and then maybe back up with an industry lens on some of the biggest takeaways from your time at New York City.
Genna Panagopoulos:
So from a Minor perspective, we had a really successful conference. So we had tons of meetings while we were there. Really good ones too, on some deals that were hopefully perpetuating. And then we’ll be announcing maybe by the Independent Boutique Hotel Show, but it was, the energy was very live, the excitement for Minor Hotels, was very visceral people, I think, you know, hoteliers are really looking for brands that understand their position. And because Minor is, you know, I always describe it as an owner first, then an operator, now a brand, right? And we still own an owner lease a vast majority of our portfolio. So we know what it’s like to be in their shoes, quite honestly. So it was a successful, like I said, the energy was there. It’s very validating to know that a lot of our marketing is working and all of the, the word of mouth and the fact that we’re out there, iI’m having to educate people less and less with every conference about who we are. So that’s great. Zooming out on an industry lens, you know, I think, you know, even just looking at beginning of the year to NYU IHIF, this sentiment is very different, right? You know, at the beginning of the year there was so much excitement over the World Cup. You and I spoke about that at NYU and it’s, it’s obviously been tempered quite a bit, and the K economy is still happening. We’re seeing luxury, the rates of the projects that I’m working on, I’m just shocked at how high they are and, how well the competitors are doing in the upper luxury space. It’s really fascinating. So I’m definitely seeing that as well. But the sentiment, and appetite to grow is definitely there. People are still looking to place equity, not ton, not huge amounts, but we’re, we’re seeing that there are still gaps on that front.
Ryan Embree:
The resiliency of our industry, I think, continues, right? It just, the momentum there, every single time we see a headwind, we continue to push through, which is really, really cool to see that owner. And, and from a development, I mean, new brands, new projects being announced, this is the space that we’d love to see, you know, more and more because there’s more and more demand growing travelers continue to prioritize travel and the experience economy, which is great for us hoteliers. So we just need some more rooms here, which is obviously what you’re tasked with, right, Jenna? So, but I wanna talk about Minor Hotels. I know you talked about needing a little less education now, but educate us here on the Suite Spot. I mean, Minor Hotels, brand spanning from select service all the way up to that ultra luxury segment ton of brands. They don’t have time for all of them today, but maybe you could share some of your personal favorites and within the hotel, Minor Hotels portfolio, what makes those brands unique?
Genna Panagopoulos:
Yeah, sure. So yeah, like you said, we now have 12 different brands, four of which were launched last year right before I joined the company. But we have these two lineages, I think within Minor Hotels history, right? We have our roots, which come from Thailand, and Anantara and Avani are great examples of that. And then we have our European roots from acquisitions over the years. So we’ve got brands like…that came from Portugal, NH, which is a very established brand out of Madrid. The four that we launched last year, offer really unique things that we never had before in our portfolio. So as we were looking to grow, we knew that that was something we’d have to have to kind of have on our menu of options for potential hotels, because some of these brands don’t work in every asset type and not every market, though most of our brands have a lot of flexibility to be able to grow into different asset types. But I guess my favorite, and I’m really excited about the Wolseley hotel brand we launched last year. So Minor International owns, which of course, Banner Hotels Resorts is a part of, owns Wolseley Hospitality Group out of London. And there’s a really beautiful institutional restaurant called the Wolseley that’s very famous. If you ask anybody from London, they definitely know the Wolseley. In fact, most people I know that just traveled to London know the Wolseley. So we own, we own that company and decided to take that brand into the hotel space, which is interesting because it’s a restaurant moving into the hotel world. And our first one will open in New York next year, but it’s been really fast. I think it’s really fascinating. There’s a lot of membership club opportunities with that one. And so that’s kind of an new trend we’re starting to see in the luxury space.
Ryan Embree:
It’s gotta be great to be able to have that breadth and spectrum of property or investment type for an owner to come in and say, this is maybe the market that I’m interested in pursuing, and then figuring out and kind of curating and tailoring what asset, what brand is gonna fit best there. And we talked about this a little at NYU, but I think, again, your job is so fascinating. You have this well-established, extremely popular worldwide brand, and here you are tasked with bringing it into the North American market, right? I’m sure there’s a lot of envious developers out there, what has been kind of, and really you only get to launch a brand like this into a new market only once. So what has been kind of your approach, Jen? I’d love to get kind of the background on what’s been your approach and what kind of feedback you’ve been initially hearing. Have owners been kind of waiting for this, you know, to arrive here and, and what are you hearing from owners right now?
Genna Panagopoulos:
It’s a tale of two stories as they say, right? So in the luxury space, there’s so much excitement. We are very established, people in that space know us, and wanna be the first to help us develop here. So that’s where we’ve seen the vast majority of our interest. Now, when you shift to looking at some of the upper upscale through the select service brands that we now also offer franchise, which I don’t know the stat off the top of my head, but it is a large component of those properties, those segments are operated by third parties and franchised. So being that we’re newer into that space, that’s where the challenge has been. So, but yeah, in terms of the hardest thing and I have to tackle every day is where do I spend my time? Because there’s constantly deals coming my way. We have to, we have to be quite strategic and mindful about what has the most likelihood of being the best representation of our brand in our target markets. So early on, when I started, I think the first four weeks of me taking the role, I had developed a pretty cohesive development strategy of where we wanted to spend that time. And where that is really any of the top, let’s call it 20 markets in the US that have international demand. So we have top markets that don’t have as much international demand, and we’ll look at those, but we just think that our value is gonna come from driving international business into these hotels. And then totally opposite from that, with Anantara, our, you know, wellness, upper luxury experiential brand. We are really excited about finding deals in kind of everywhere else except for those urban markets, right? So hard to get to places. Last week I was driving through Utah and Colorado, six hours in between each of them. So just to give you a little flavor, we were looking at a couple different opportunities in those states. You know, Hudson Valley is somewhere we wanna be Montana, Wyoming. So, you know, it’s a little bifurcated our approach to our various brands. But we’re trying to be very diligent and strategic about it. So we don’t get distracted by things that aren’t going to help us grow here. Because once we have good examples, we really believe the first few have to be really good. Once we have those, we’ll be able to drive further, further growth at a more quick pace.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, absolutely. And what you were talking about how best to spend your time, I think that’s a, a challenge that hoteliers have had since the dawn of this industry. But it’s very exciting and very cool to hear those different approaches because, you know, you have the privilege of having that background, of having that history and, and culture already built over an in another market, bringing that here. But you also have the exciting new flavor of providing something new, maybe in some, some very experiential markets right now, which experiential travel is just absolutely exploding another traveler trend right now. And you already have some several success stories we touched on at NYU. Let’s dive a little deeper into some of those projects, Genna.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Yeah, so we’ve got, I guess our next one that I’ve already kinda spilled the beans on it, but the releases are already out there, but the first Wolseley in the world will be opening next year in New York in the former Lambs Club property. And I think it’s just such a fantastic market to open the first Wolseley hotel. You know, theoretically it could have been in London and hopefully we do have one in London soon, but it’s a very special cherished brand and it’s not the one thing I also just wanna spend a moment on, even though it’s luxury and it’s this very quintessential British kind of formal service style, it’s egalitarian at its roots, it’s really meant for everybody. So you could walk into the, into the Wolseley in London and see celebrities next to politicians and you’re Joe Schmo walking in off the street, you don’t need a reservation. And so I think it’s a really beautiful evolution of the, of the history of that brand. And I’m so excited for it to land in New York.
Ryan Embree:
So we can announce right now in 2027. The Suite Spot will be on site. We can do nice little episode up there hopefully.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Next, next conference in New York. We’ll be able to do it there.
Ryan Embree:
Alright.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Yes. And then a little, actually, I guess the next one that’ll open in 2029 is Anantara Turks and Caicos, which is a 100% residential hotel, really, really beautiful resort heavy wellness, you’ll find with Anantara. We really lean into the wellness, longevity space. And so, we pride ourselves on always being at the forefront of the latest wellness, the direction wellness is going. And so longevity, for example, right now is very important to us. And we’re seeing that bleed into the residential space. So, you know, just the way that’s getting threaded into the residential experience, into the hotel guest experiences is very fascinating to watch. And then in 2030, we’ll also have another Anantara in Miami, very close to design district. It’s kind of at the epicenter of where design district, Edgewater and Midtown all meet the views from the hotel will be incredible. There’ll be a helipad, a 30,000 square foot spa. And then a mix of hotel rooms, residences that people are living in, and then also residences that can get rented out to hotel guests as well. So we are super excited, I think, you know, having these three hotels in these three markets, right? We’ve covered New York where we already have a hotel, by the way, the NH collection, Madison Avenue, we’ve had there for a few years, which we actually own. And then, you know, Miami, which is a key market, obviously very heavy international demand, but just if you had to tell me to pick one plate, one urban market to put it an Anantara, that would be it. And then Turks and Caicos is such a important market for U.S. leisure travel. So these couldn’t have been better, better markets for us to be entering and launching region.
Ryan Embree:
Congratulations. What a strong pipeline and really cool projects you’re working on, excited to kind of see those and the announcements as they start to roll in and the pictures, those views that you’re talking about. But I think, you know, the Turks and Caicos property is something we’ve been talking about on the podcast. That CALA region is also booming right now. So, you know, it’s not just, I think sometimes when we say, you know, obviously bringing into the North American market, we tend to go a little bit more domestic, but to expand that into CALA I think is gonna be absolutely critical. ’cause you’re right, so much of that US domestic travel is now spending, you know, time and money in those areas, and looking a little bit more towards that for their experiences. So exciting all around. And of course we love, you know, we’re based here in Florida, so we’d love a new project. We’ll, we’ll definitely be keeping an eye on that Miami project that you have. But this is speaking of Miami, this is our independent hotel show series. Talk to us, you know, why you feel some of the Minor Hotel brands fit within this independent and lifestyle category. And what advantages do you see independent hotels or even experiential brands and lifestyle brands have in today’s hospitality landscape?
Genna Panagopoulos:
I’ll answer that last question first. If you don’t have that experiential, that’s table stakes today. So, we’re, I believe we’re only gonna see that become more and more important as the years go on. Because if you look at the consumer data of what the younger demographic, where they’re spending their money, it’s not experiences. It’s not, it’s no longer on goods. So having these really cool, unique experiences that they can travel and and receive is gonna be critical in terms of what we have to offer for independent hoteliers, keep in mind this is our roots, right? We started our, our company was founded by Bill Heineke, who, fun fact, and I can’t remember if I’ve already told you this, but the reason we’re called Minor is that he went to go start his business at a very young age of 17. And when he was getting his his business license, they said, sorry, but you need an adult to sign with you ’cause you’re a minor. So he’s really one of those serial entrepreneurs, wicked smart, wicked great at launching businesses, but he was an independent hotelier. That’s how he got his start. So he’s still driving a lot of the vision of the company. And I could tell you coming from a larger brand company into this environment, it is incredibly entrepreneurial. And because we also own hotels, but also operate for a lot of our owners, we truly believe we have this, like this hotelier mindset. We’re more of an operator than we are a brand at this moment. And so I think that could help lend itself to independent owners who are looking for a little bit of support. And we’re here to lean in as much as they want and as little as they want, but there’s benefits to it, right? We can help save on OTA costs, we can help save on purchasing. We’ve got great technology to help with forecasting and revenue management and and so on. So there’s definitely places to tap in. And I think particularly now more than ever with our two collection brands that we launched last year, so I started telling you this, but I didn’t finish telling you the brands that we launched, but two of them that we launched last year are collections. One is minor reserve collection, which is in the luxury space. And then Colbert collection, which is more upper upscale, maybe entry luxury. And those are just such, they’re primed for independent hotels, right? That’s why they were launched. To be able to keep the heritage and the name of an independent hotel play off of it, but then get all the back support, all the things behind the scenes that consumers will really never see, but it’ll help make operations much more efficient and smooth. And so we think that’s where there’s a lot of opportunity and we’re, you know, we’re priding ourselves on that. We’re here to be a partner and not a brand that’s telling you have to do it this way. So that’s where we’re really thinking this is the opportunity for us in that space.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it says, it says a lot that, to have two collection brands dedicated to that space really shows the investment in the future of these kind of independently run or branded properties and see the opportunity there because again, looking, you mentioned the lens and view challenges about independent hotelier and brand is very different from those big brands that have the scale to kind of combat those challenges a little bit more efficiently. So, you know, independent hotels, we always talk about on this series specifically are looking for any edge or opportunity to differentiate themselves to the traveler because they are really first in line to present a one of a kind experience. If you think about it, one of those places is f&b, a trend that obviously Minor Hotels has taken and ran with, especially with converting a f&b brand to hospitality brand. How have you leveraged the f&b theme with potential owners and when you’re having these conversations with investors, as you look to bring Minor Hotels to North America?
Genna Panagopoulos:
Yeah, so, well first we have a, when I was doing my onboarding in Madrid and Amsterdam, I toured our Anantara in Amsterdam and they had just, maybe they, a couple months before they had just concluded a chef series where they brought I believe 20 or 30 Michelin rated chefs under their roof and had a food festival, which I had never seen that. Like how amazing to bring. I didn’t know that, that that many Michelin chefs would be side by side cooking for each other, right? But it’s a really special thing. And I think that shows you that Minor is very credible in this super experiential high end f&b space separate to that. And so we have the talent in-house. Separate from that, when you look at our brands and the way our Colbert brand, for example, our Colbert, I don’t even wanna call it a brand ’cause it’s a collection. It’s not really a brand the way we thread food and beverage into the guest experience, right? So each hotel is completely unique within the collection. We don’t want any two to really look alike, to be honest with you. But as part of the one ritual that you can, that you can count on as a guest at every Colbert is a food and beverage driven experience. So whether that’s a bespoke cocktail that’s mixed for you, right as you enter the door, or maybe, after you’ve checked in and you’re in your room, a bell cart is a food and beverage bell cart of sorts is delivering a special experience to your door something that ties back to the identity that the hotel has, but is very curated and special, right? Not something that’s like a here’s the, the chocolate chip cookies we made today. No. Right? We want something really beautiful, thoughtful, creative, and that shows the craft in it that either ties to the experience or the identity of the hotel. So I think that’s really important and those little things go a very long way.
Ryan Embree:
A hundred percent. And those are the little things that add up in the independent hoteliers world that can, you can have the edge, right? And I mean there’s a whole now space with food tourism. I mean, it’s got a name for it now. That’s how large this trend is. And hoteliers are looking at F&B very, very differently than they did five, 10 years ago. It was a first a place where they started to look and say, where can we cut costs? Where can we make efficiencies? Now the brands that I think are doing it right are leaning into it. They’re seeing it as a part of their guest experience and also a huge opportunity for their local markets too. I think people, you know, in locally have looked at through a different lens at what a hotel F&B experience can be. And when someone comes to town, they might not be going to that restaurant. They might be going to a hotel or a resort, and it having that experience there. So very interested to see, right.
Genna Panagopoulos:
It’s, I don’t mean to interrupt you. But I just wanna say, I was recently having the conversation because when I started in the industry, we would joke, you could, you could like blow a cannon through a hotel restaurant. Nobody wanted to go to a hotel restaurant. Back in the day, they were cool. And it was like, oh, I’m staying at this hotel, meet me at the restaurant. But for a while, you didn’t wanna go to a hotel restaurant. It was vanilla, it was boring, it had no identity. It was just an extension. It was just a restaurant within a hotel. Now it’s such an important driver of bringing people to that hotel, whether local or visiting from out of town. And so there’s such an opportunity. I just, I look back at the time that those hotel restaurants were not attractive. And now I’m like, no, it’s such a beautiful component to an experience and I’ve seen really amazing destination hotels that are operated by the operators, but have a totally unique identity that’s very strong and compatible with the hotel, but not homogenous with the hotel.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. It’s very, very cool to see that evolution. And I think it’s only, again, as the trend continues to grow, I think it’s only gonna get stronger. You’re gonna see more emphasis on that f&b experience. And I personally can’t wait. Because I love those types of experiences to kind of see that evolve. And we’re gonna learn a little bit about maybe some of your favorite f&b experiences within the portfolio here. So let’s do my favorite part of the episode. Some rapid fire to get to know you Genna and the Minor Hotel portfolio a little bit better. Let’s start with one of your, you talked about maybe future favorite views at your property, but right now what is one of the favorite views at your properties in the portfolio?
Genna Panagopoulos:
I know you’re trying to do rapid fire, but of course I’ll just story tell a little bit.
Ryan Embree:
Genna Panagopoulos:
The Avani in Amsterdam, I had the opportunity during my onboarding with Minor to go to Amsterdam for a few days. Because we have a ton of hotels in Amsterdam. And I got to stay there and I woke up, I think it was a Sunday morning, and I had one of the upper level rooms and floor to ceiling windows. And I just, I watched the city wake up. It was so cool to see the sunrise from my room, but also the canals were coming to life. People were in boats and I had this cup of coffee and they had a great lounge here. And it’s not, it’s not a fancy hotel, right? It’s an approachable lifestyle of hotel. But it was really, it was so beautiful. I had this like Minor Magazine I was reading and I read the full thing. It was so lovely. And I’m actually taking my daughter there in a few, in two weeks, because I loved it so much.
Ryan Embree:
Very cool. Yeah. And she’ll get to have that view of the, the property as well. What about favorite fact? A fun fact about one of the properties?
Genna Panagopoulos:
Okay, so one of our new Colbert collections, that I believe is open now in Florence. It’s called Port Rosa, which it translates to Red Door. And it is actually one of the oldest, it might have been the first hotel actually in Italy and one of the first hotels in Europe. So it’s just so funny ’cause here we call our historic hotels 200 years old. And, and here we have like an 800 year old hotel. So I think that’s, I don’t think I could top that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that puts it in perspective. Favorite signature dish? We talked about f&b experiences at one of the properties.
Genna Panagopoulos:
So I know I’m talking a lot about Amsterdam, but that was, it obviously left an impression on me, but at the Tivoli, which is one of our entry luxury brands, very well established in Europe, they really pride themselves on food and wine. And so culinary is a huge component of that experience. So I get to eat at the restaurant in the Tivoli called Ombre. And they really try to weave in creativity and art into the overall experience. And so they took it, they took inspiration from Rembrandt, and so Ombre is one of the 12 colors of Rembrandt’s palette. And so they, they had a beautiful way of weaving that into the food, the color of the food, the color of the menu, the names of the menu items. And it was just a beautiful, and you could watch the chef finish the food right at the entrance. And it was just, it was remarkable. It’s also on the canal. It was an evening candle lit room. It was beautiful.
Ryan Embree:
I mean the marketing team for some of these properties I’m sure has no shortage of content and storytelling. I mean, this is every hotel marketer’s dream. What about favorite guest experience or amenities at one of your properties?
Genna Panagopoulos:
That’s a good question. The, also in the Avani in Madrid, so, when I had wrapped up, I had trained in Madrid. I went to Amsterdam for a weekend, came back to Madrid to kind of give everybody my 2 cents of how the project or how the onboarding went. And I was only there for one or two nights. I was so tired. I had been gone for like two weeks. I missed my kids. But I came back and the Avani in Madrid as my welcome city had a smoothie set up. And I had never seen this, and I don’t even know if I’ll ever see this again, but they had a little, a little tiny, I think it’s called like a bullet blender, right? That I could blend in my room. They had the most beautiful, I don’t even know what fruit it was, but it was sweet. It was delicious. They had a variety of milks next to it that I could mix with the fruit, and then of course a little ice bucket and some honey. And it was just everything that I needed. I was so tired from being on the road and to come back and have this really like, cool, healthy, nutritious, it was so, it was like they were reading my mind of what I needed. And I’ve never been in a lot of amazing hotels. And again, Avani is not a luxury brand, but they totally nailed it. And then about an hour later after it, ’cause I had checked in fairly late in the day, they showed up at my door with this beautiful wind down tea set up, and it was, you know, tea can be hit or miss. Yeah, it was so beautifully floral and delicious. And I’m not even a tea drinker. And I loved every moment of it. And they had the most perfect cookie to compliment.
Ryan Embree:
It’s brilliant by the way, that smoothie, because it makes you a part of the process. It makes you feel a part of the experience. I’m sure a ton of people are sharing that on social media. They’re talking about it. I mean, how easy could it have been to just deliver a smoothie, but for you to kind of be a part of that experience, I think makes it a little bit more special. Very, very cool. I’ve never heard that either. Very cool. And then the last but not least, favorite piece of artwork at one of your properties?
Genna Panagopoulos:
Thats a tough one. Coming back to the fact that we have an NH hotel in Amsterdam called the Schiller, with tons of authentic Danish artwork. But I’ve also heard that the Tivoli Puerto Gaia has a lot of remarkable pieces. In fact, they have over 70 pieces of authentic art. One of my favorite artists is a Spanish artist…and his works are there. So I haven’t seen it in real life, but that’s on my bucket list.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I’ll tell you, this was probably the most internationally friendly rapid fire that we’ve had here. When asking these questions. You took us to Madrid, Amsterdam, Italy, all over the place. So, we’ll definitely, I can feel the hoteliers now doing some research on these hotels and planning their vacations. Let’s shift to the Independent Hotel show. It’s happening September 16th, 17th in Miami Beach. And remember Suite Spot listeners, don’t forget to use promo code Ryan26 for a complimentary registration. Genna, and I would love to see you there. Genna, you recently joined the show’s advisory board. Congratulations on that. What inspired you to get involved with this event and how do you see it supporting independent hoteliers?
Genna Panagopoulos:
First of all, thank you. And I’m really flattered to be on the advisory board. When we started our, when I was working through our development strategy as part of that, we were talking about the various conferences we wanted to attend. And we really think that we’re different from a lot of the big players that are already here, right? We’re trying to not be aligned with them, but a totally different offering. And so for us, it was really important that we find these independent hoteliers, boutique hoteliers that, again, are looking for somebody to help support them and maybe make their lives a little bit easier, but not be always watching over their shoulder. And so for us that this was perfect, I actually hadn’t come across it until they reached out to me. And it came about 48 hours after we had said, we need to find a show or a conference that has specifically this. And it just fell into our lap. And so we, it was, it was very serendipitous and we’re very excited. In fact, I hope we can continue to attend and I’ll be bringing my colleague from Mexico actually to help run the process with us while we’re there. So we’re excited. I also think that we could learn a lot of what independent hoteliers need and their challenges are and be able to help them out.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s a very, very unique event. I’ve had the privilege of being to the show since its inception a few years back. So much learning, there is something special when you put a group of independent hoteliers together in a room. The networking that goes down. It really is unlike any other event I’ve been to. So, again, hope you will join Genna and I in Miami Beach in September. We hope to see you there. As we wrap up today, we got a couple more minutes. What is your vision for the future of Minor Hotels in North America?
Genna Panagopoulos:
Listen, we don’t wanna be as big as everybody else that’s here, but we wanna have a really good foothold. I don’t think I mentioned this, but we have a little over 600 hotels worldwide, including in pipeline. And we’re really everywhere except for North America. And so it just feels like the right progression, of where we even have hotels in South America, in Mexico, right? So we’re really kind of closing in from all directions. And so we just wanna have good hotels here. Good representation on, fun fact, British and US travelers make up the majority of Anantara guests worldwide, even though we have no Anantara here in the U.S.. So, Norin England. So people want it, and I think once they’re here they will absolutely come. So we’re excited. We just want what we want. A good representation of hotels. Hopefully that’s somewhere around 20 to 30 hotels in the coming years.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you’re off to a super strong start. Congratulations again, Genna. It’s exciting to be here, kind of at the starting line of this Minor Hotel’s journey in North America. It will soon follow suit, like the rest of your brand is. So we’re excited to watch that unfold here in the upcoming years. Genna, thank you so much. We know you’re busy. You mentioned it before. We appreciate you taking your time, spending some time with us and talking about Minor Hotels and in the Independent Hotel Show. Again, we’re, we’re excited that we’ll both be attending there in Miami. And hope you will too. So Genna, thank you for your time.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Thanks for having me again.
Ryan Embree:
Alright and we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. Thank you for listening. To Join our Loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Social Success Series is back with a brand new episode featuring a very special guest and hospitality’s no-nonsense voice, Mr. Scott Eddy!
Scott Eddy joins the podcast to give audiences his perspective and insights on where the future of hospitality is headed, social media growth in hospitality, and how AI technology is the biggest innovation that the industry has ever seen.
If you are looking to stay ahead of the hospitality technology curve by getting the latest hospitality information, tune in to the episode.
Cassady Quintana:
Welcome to the Social Success Podcast, where we have conversations with top hospitality professionals about successful digital marketing strategies, emerging trends, and how to connect with today’s travelers. I’m your host, Cassady Quintana. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Social Success series. My name is Cassady Quintana and I am the brand ambassador here at Travel Media Group. And today we have an awesome guest. I am super excited, a hospitality influencer, celebrity to me. Super excited to have the no nonsense voice of hospitality. Mr. Scott Eddy, thank you so much for joining me.
Scott Eddy:
Thanks so much for having me, man.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, super excited. So, right now you’re in Spain. We talked a little bit about that, but for people that may be a little bit unfamiliar with you and your history, talk us through how you got involved in hospitality and how you got to where you are today.
Scott Eddy:
Yeah, so I actually didn’t come from a hospitality at all. I came from investment banking, which I think gives me a very different lens of the world. So I look at hospitality through psychology, positioning, ROI, branding human behavior before I even look at aesthetics, which actually means nothing. after my banking career ended, I went to Thailand on a two week trip, and after four days I called my mom. I was like, I’m never coming home. I love this place. And I ended up living in Bangkok for 11 years. So I went over there in 99, several years before social media came out. So for the next four or five years, I basically just partied my butt off all over Asia, made a lot of friends and just getting acclimated with the region. ’cause it was just, it’s like a different world over there. So then social media came out and I started the first digital agency in Asia, and we were the biggest for five years. And all my clients were hotels. So my very first client in this industry was the first Aman property on earth. Aman…, which was in Phuket. And that really taught me the whole quiet, luxury, luxury persona. Like that whole thing. It really like it was like a, like a, like a weight in my brain that is still there today. It’s really, really stuck with me and a lot of things that I learned from that project. Really, I use it every day.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. No, that’s awesome. I feel like a lot of the people I talk to and we talk to here, it’s kind of a similar story. They fall into hospitality, they don’t realize, and it happened to me too, like I was working just in normal social media marketing before I got into hospitality. And that’s kind of how it happens for a lot of people. So you live in hotels, you’re traveling constantly. A lot of people would only dream of that. I wish I could do something like that. So for you, at what point did you realize, like, this wasn’t travel anymore, but you could kind of turn that into your brand and a business for yourself?
Scott Eddy:
So, okay, so as I was doing the agency, and again, I just hired really smart people that worked at advertising agencies. And just watched them. But during that time, that’s when social media first came out. And I’m very early on every platform. I was probably first 2000 people on Twitter. And Twitter was it back then. So that’s actually where I built my brand. And I was the first American expat in every Asian country to have a million followers on Twitter, which back then got me headline news, which got me speaking gigs, which got me consulting gigs. So after a while, all my business was coming through my social media. And again, this is back when there was no term influencer, there was no term personal brand. There was no, that might have been a thing, but it wasn’t a thing. So eventually I just decided to sell the agency because it just made no sense to me to have a brick and mortar office paying 37 full-time employees when the clients are coming through my phone or my computer. Like, it just didn’t make sense. So I sold it and started traveling around. In total did 11 years in Thailand, one year in Philippines, one year in Sri Lanka, four years in Spain, one year in Portugal, and one year in London. And then I came back to the US in 2015, thereabouts. And that is when I literally blew up because that is when real budgets were starting to be applied to social media marketing. And I was approached by a PR agency as soon as I came back to be the travel host for the first video, for the first travel show that was gonna be a lifetime. And it was like a Anthony Bourdain type show. It was called Video Globetrotter. So that solidified me in the U.S. Then I just started doing just huge campaigns with F1, with Air New Zealand, with like, all these big brands. I was a brand ambassador for Lexus for two years. I mean, it was, it was very, very cool. But when I, before I came back to the States when I was in Europe, I was just looking at like what was gonna happen when I went back to the States and I was like, well, I don’t want to get a lease and like have like a normal life. I haven’t had a life for a very long time. So I ended up selling everything that I own while I was in Europe and even now. So I was born in Michigan, but I was grow, I grew up in Fort Lauderdale since I was little. I used to only have a storage unit in South Florida. So I used South Florida as a base in between all my trips. But I’m there two, three days. Like, I was just there this past weekend. I went to F1 and then I came to Europe right away. That’s awesome. So, yeah, I mean, it just happened. When did it happen? Who knows? But it just, I’ve been in the trenches of hospitality marketing for 17 years, since day one of social media. Not that we were doing social media strategies on day one. Back then it was like websites and SEO and graphic design. Remember when people paid for that?
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah.
Scott Eddy:
So the services side is very different now. But it’s fun. But it’s fun and hospitality, like it’s the greatest people in the world.
Cassady Quintana:
I couldn’t agree more. I mean, how could you not be happy with being able to travel to all these places and meet new people and stay in different hotels and you’ve experienced, a wide range of different hotels. So when you think back of all these places you’ve stayed at, for you what makes a memorable stay versus one that’s kind of forgettable?
Scott Eddy:
And I’ve had both. The difference is emotional impact. That’s it. Most luxury hotels today are physically beautiful. And emotionally empty. The industry has been become obsessed with that whole polished and everything else. But forget humanity. Guests don’t remember the sink design or the way the lobby looked. They remember how your people made them feel. And I’ll give you a perfect example, and this is not to put them down, but I just left Tulsa. I was there for eight days. I mean, you’re talking about Tulsa, Oklahoma. Like it’s not New York City, it’s not Paris, it’s not Hong Kong, it’s Tulsa. And I was at the Marriott there. And again, this is not a ultra luxury property, I’m telling you right now, I stay over 300 nights in hotels and have done so for the more than eight, nine years. This was the best employees, the best staff that I’ve ever met in my life, ever. And I’ve lived in Asia for 13 years. And Asia has, I mean, the best of the best. But I mean, it, it was crazy. Like the finance lady coming out and she’s like smiling and laughing with the staff. Have you ever seen finance person smile? Like that’s where the creativity goes to die. That’s the person who’s telling me, no, no, no, we don’t have the money for this. Like, it was unbelievable like every day I was just like pinching myself. I’m like, is this real? It was just, it was really crazy that the best experience that I’ve had ever in hospitality just happened.
Cassady Quintana:
Oh, that’s awesome. And I feel like this is something that a lot of hotels should be posting about on social media because I always say like, your hotel and the way it looks is part of the experience, but what makes it memorable or what makes it terrible for people is how the service was. So, and that can be hard to translate online. So when you are looking at a hotel, social media page for you, like what makes something make you gravitate towards it and wanna engage with it, rather than it being a promotional or sale. Like how can hotels translate that inhuman experience and how awesome their staff is and how awesome their staff makes you feel to social media so that potential guests can feel that through the phone?
Scott Eddy:
I mean, first off,I browse through social media profiles of hotels every day. I mean, I’m, I’m talking dozens and it’s, it’s honestly most of it just makes me wanna throw. It is ridiculous. We are in the most feel good, fuzzy warm feeling industry in the world. And they can’t stop taking these gorgeous pictures of rooms and dead pictures of an empty swimming pool. And like, it’s unbelievable. Most hotels, social media feels like it was approved by seven people in a boardroom and a legal department. That’s the problem. Everything is safe, polished, filtered, and emotionally flat human beings connect with people, not corporate perfection. When are you gonna wake up? Like, I don’t understand. It’s 2026. It’s almost as if they don’t have a calendar. Like show it, show the chef, show the bartender, show the housekeeper, show them, show humor. I mean, like, it’s crazy.
Cassady Quintana:
And I think that’s the thing, like when Instagram first came out, it was that opposite, right? We need the perfect photo, we need the perfect shot. We have to use the perfect filter. And now it’s, it’s kind of gone to the opposite. And maybe this is with AI becoming so pertinent in all of these things, but people want to see that real moment. Because it’s hard to imagine yourself in a perfect photo of a hotel room. Like, I wanna see someone enjoying their coffee, or like you said at the pool, things like that. So obviously you’ve followed this since it’s started and it’s changed. We’ve seen new trends. We’ve seen Instagram change its algorithm completely. So beyond that human emotion, is there anything else that you think hoteliers are still getting wrong in 2026 with their social media?
Scott Eddy:
I mean, the biggest mistake hotels are still making is thinking that content is the strategy. Content is not the strategy. Content is the vehicle. Emotional relevance is the strategy. Anybody can create content. Now, do you have a phone? You can create content, you have AI, it can create content. So the value is no longer in simply producing the content. The value is in perspective, storytelling, culture, trust, leadership, and emotional connection. That is the number one. Most hotels still have no clear voice online. What I love to ask hotels. I love to say, what is your brand personality? They don’t know how to answer. Like, how do you not know that there’s no founder visibility, there’s no staff involvement, there’s no community building. God help you if you can find a GM. They’re heading in the office. There’s no understanding of platform psychology. I was talking to a guy who is part of a group of a hotel group, and they own 11-17, they owned a bunch of hotels. And I asked him about one of the properties. So before we hopped on the call, I went on every platform to see where they are, how active they are. That way I have the ammunition. We get on the phone and I ask him, what about X, Y, Z property? I couldn’t find them on TikTok. Why aren’t they, oh, I don’t like TikTok. That wasn’t a question.
Cassady Quintana:
Right.
Scott Eddy:
And then, with me, I dive deeper. I’m like, why don’t you like it? kids dancing. Come on. That’s the way it started. I said, the average, the average age demographic that’s most active right now is 38 to 57. Luxury brands are killing it on TikTok. I love when people say can’t sell luxury on social media. What? These are the people that aren’t on their phones. Right. Come on, man.
Cassady Quintana:
No, and I love that you mentioned that because especially TikTok, it had that, that image, especially in 2020 of just being that platform where people dance. But it goes beyond that now because we’re starting to see integrations with, Booking.com on TikTok and Expedia on Instagram. Like, there the conversation of is important is long gone. Now it’s, why are you not on this? It’s kind of almost weird and embarrassing if you’re not on social media. Like, what do you mean you’re not on social media? ’cause that is, and especially my, I’m older, gen Z, but as these new demographics start to have buying power, this is where we’re searching. Likeand it, and like you said, TikTok is now that age group of 30 to 50. Like those are the people with the most buying power. So what do you mean, like that it, and it’s hard to get people to see that sometimes because when they have that preconceived notion of what social media is, to try and get them to a point of believing in it is tough. But I mean, the proof is in the pudding. We can show them how important that is. So kind of in that same world, I mean we’re seeing a lot of influencers in hospitality now. And we actually, I did an exercise last week where I was searching, hotels and the most viral videos and most of them came from influencers. So where do you see the value with influencers in hotels and maybe where do you see that continue to go?
Scott Eddy:
The problem with the whole influencer space, and I hate that word so much. Just because influencers ruined, just like marketers ruin the term marketing. Influencers have ruined the term influencers. I mean, it’s just such a egotistical. Ridiculous word. It’s just such a saturated market. So much so that I don’t even work in South Florida and I rarely work in Florida. And if I can avoid it, I rarely work in the U.S. I’d much rather work overseas. South Florida, it’s like all the big cities are just saturated. So, I mean, of course in between all my trips I get offered to do a million free things and I’m like, bro, I’ve been building my brand for 17 years. Like I’m not in the intern stage right now. Like, I already built my brand. I don’t, I don’t need your $20 meal for Instagram posts. I appreciate it though. But I mean, most hotels, they still evaluate influencers completely wrong. They obsess over follower accounts instead of trust and audience alignment. I can’t tell you how many times, so if somebody doesn’t know me, they don’t follow me on LinkedIn or a lot of other platforms and they just look from the outside looking in and they just see a big audience. So the first thing they’re gonna say, okay, this guy’s an influencer. Which I don’t mind. I still being an influencer, I hate it. But doing that is still a lot of what I do. Because yes, I travel with a video guy. They’re get and a photographer, one of the top photographers in hospitality by the way. And they both arrive here on Friday and we’re going on a cruise. So I do travel with a video guy and we do long form storytelling. We do a lot of things and we do complete photo shoots and this and that, but they always want my distribution. So like, I would never run away from that because I have a very good audience. I’m deep in the wine world. I’m deep in the finance world. I mean, my audience spends, so I know creators with massive audiences that couldn’t drive a booking if their life depended on it. Meanwhile, smaller niche creators, which strong trusts absolutely crush it because their audience actually listens to them. Listen, it’s the micro influencers that are killing it right now. Their engagement rates are in the teens, people like me, people with over a million followers, generally if you have a anywhere from one to 3% engagement rate, you’re killing it. I get very high engagement. So I mean, I just figured it out two days ago because I’m launching a new website and new media kit and whatnot. I just did my media kit or my engagement rate on Instagram so far in 2026 and I’m at 6.5%. Oh, that’s awesome. I mean, that’s like top tier, right? For somebody in my space. But I mean, most macro, most big, I think they call ’em mega like over one, two, 3 million. You’re lucky if you get one to 2%, but the numbers still work out to somebody who has 20,000 who’s getting an 11% engagement rate. Things like that. So, I mean, hotels need to stop treating creators like vending machines. Here’s a free room now, make us viral. It’s not a strategy. I can’t tell you how many hotels tell me that they want to go viral if I can help them. And I, and I asked them, I’m like, what is getting going viral gonna do for you? And they can’t answer going viral 90% of the time, does nothing. My photographer that I traveled with, he did a hyperlapse video on a river cruise that we were on of like a locks opening up and closing. It was very cool. I think it got like 12 or 15 million. I’ve never even gotten those numbers. I mean, he’s still sitting, like, he didn’t gain a hundred thousand followers. He didn’t get 10,000 brands commenting oor wanting to work with him. Viral does nothing without a proper strategy attached to it. What I mean? So the, the problem is these brands, they don’t do the research. I can’t tell you how many times I get reached out to and they’re like, Hey, we want you to do this campaign. And I’m like, this is not even my niche. Oh, sorry. It was a copy and paste email. Well, no kidding. Of course. It was like, it just, listen, over the next few years, creators are gonna evolve into, and they already are full blown media companies, production, distribution, consulting, storytelling, community building, all of it. The creator economy, let me tell you, and I’d much rather call it that than influencer space. It’s becoming one of the most powerful engines in hospitality because the bigger AI gets, and listen, a lot of these companies will go to the wayside. But AI, the technology is here. The bigger AI gets, the more valuable humans are gonna be.
Cassady Quintana:
Absolutely. We, we say that all the time, especially because AI is gonna fuel the tech. But at the heart of hospitality is the people and it will always be the people. And you can’t replace that people to people emotion. And like you said earlier in this episode about how that’s what you remember the most right. Is how the staff made you feel. And AI will never be able to do that. So I’m glad you brought up AI because we are seeing that start to shape the traveler journey. Like I mentioned with the integrations with Expedia and Instagram and their AI agents that are building these itineraries. So where do you think AI and social media and hospitality are headed now and in probably the next couple of years?
Scott Eddy:
I honestly think that most of the hospitality industry still underestimates how massive this shift is. This is bigger than social media. This is big tech, bigger than mobile phones, bigger than websites. AI is fundamentally changing how humans make decisions, right? We’re moving from search behavior to recommendation behavior. And that changes everything. Your website is no longer the front door to your brain. AI is becoming the front door. Yeah. Travelers are increasingly asking ai what hotel fits their personality, what cruise line matches their lifestyle, where they should go for a specific emotional experience. Yeah. So now your digital footprint matters more than any more than ever. Consistency matters more than ever. The brands that survive this next era are gonna be the brands that feel the most human, have the clearest voice and create the strongest emotional connection online, generic corporate garbage. You’re done.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, and we’re already in the middle of that. I feel like we know a lot of us, we don’t necessarily know how big AI is gonna be and where we’ll be this time next year. I mean, I bet in just a few weeks we could be having this conversation again and it would be something new. So course it’s definitely always changing and I recommend everyone that’s listening to this episode to follow you because this is the kind of stuff that you’re talking about and you’re following and it’s, it’s super important. Hotels are busy and a lot of the time they don’t have the time to do the research. So if they can find people like you to get that information from, it’s extremely helpful because it’s, it’s changing every single day. So if you can stay up to date and understand it and what’s going on and how you need to adjust your social strategy and your marketing strategy as a whole, you’re gonna be ahead of the pack. And so with that, thank you for all that awesome information. I kind of wanna shift gears to get to know you a little bit more Sure. With some rapid fire questions. So first thing that comes to mind that you can think of. So favorite hotel you’ve ever stayed in?
Scott Eddy:
I have a couple, but let’s say Kuda Duke in Maldives.
Cassady Quintana:
Alright. I love that.
Scott Eddy:
It’s insane. Insane.
Cassady Quintana:
Okay. And then what do you think is the most underrated destination right now?
Scott Eddy:
Right now? Sri Lanka. I lived in Colombo for a year. It’s seriously underrated. I think it’s, I mean, and it’s already bubbling, right? But I think it’s just gonna explode soon.
Cassady Quintana:
Is there a best time of year to visit there?
Scott Eddy:
Just like, you’re in Orlando, right?
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, I’m in Orlando.
Scott Eddy:
So, so just like us, winter time is their high season just like Florida.
Cassady Quintana:
Okay. Noted. Perfect. Okay. Do you have any travel habits that you swear by?
Scott Eddy:
Yeah. I, and this is a life habit. I mean, just ’cause my whole life is travel, but I wake up super early every day and I’m up for the sunrise and I go for sunrise walks. If you ever follow, especially my Instagram stories, I’d post sunrise almost every day. I think there’s no better way to start the day. I think it’s impossible to have a bad day when you start the day like that.
Cassady Quintana:
Right. That’s why they recommend you get 10 minutes of sunlight every morning. Right. There’s, there’s something to that. So definitely everyone follows Scott’s Instagram so you can get that morning motivation for your walks. Okay. One hotel that is crushing social media right now, or one that you’ve seen recently that you loved?
Scott Eddy:
Wow. That is a great question. Wow. That’s a good question.
Cassady Quintana:
That’s okay.
Scott Eddy:
I never do. ’cause that’s like the, that’s when you get the raw answers?
Cassady Quintana:
Exactly. And then you overthink it.
Scott Eddy:
Let’s go back to that. Let me think about that for a couple minutes.
Cassady Quintana:
Okay, perfect. Well that was the last rapid fire question I had. So maybe people just need to follow you and find out later..
Scott Eddy:
But let’s talk about brands as a whole. So like, I love, I love fun luxury and I guess they would call them luxury lifestyle or whatever, but I love the one hotels. Okay. All over. I really love, so if you really follow, I used to be, I used to do a lot of work with Ritz Carlton pre pandemic and now they’re just garbage. But horse, the guy who co-founded it started Capella. Capella Hotels is really cool, really fun. It’s just, I like brands that don’t take themselves too seriously. I mean, I hate the whole corporate stuffy stuff. And listen, I’m titanium bonvoy, like I stay in Marriott properties all over the world. Just so I can hit that status. Right. It’s easy because they’re large, they’re boring. The marketing is, I mean it’s, it’s so vanilla, it’s so beige. It’s so like, like it’s forgettable in 10 seconds. Never used to be, and it’s interesting. I remember when W first came out when they were Starwood. W was awesome. I mean fun, great, great, great. Like the marketing was like, just so off the chart and now they just look like any other hotel.
Cassady Quintana:
Which is so interesting. ’cause social media is like the place to be crazy and be fun because there are really no rules. And like why wouldn’t you be, especially if you were that at one time and your competitors are doing that. Why? I wanna, I wanna know like what the logic is behind that. Like are they trying to keep an image or?
Scott Eddy:
No? Well, well the ones that are that fly a big flag like Marriott and Hilton and that, they always hide behind, oh, well I can’t do that. ’cause of brain guidelines. Right? So you can’t show fun. Of course you can, right? They just hide behind the rule book and everything takes 15 approvals. So by the time you do have a good idea and you want to execute it, it’s gone.
Cassady Quintana:
It’s too late. The trend is over.
Scott Eddy:
It’s about speed.
Cassady Quintana:
Absolutely. Yeah. Well, I’ll definitely go check out those brand Instagram pages. ’cause that’s the kind of stuff I like to look at. I mean, that’s what makes me as a traveler, I don’t really have much brand loyalty. So I like to do research and look at their Instagram pages and social media, and I’m gonna pick the one that looks the most fun to me. So super important. Okay. Well as we wrap up, Scott, I’m so excited we had this conversation, but for anybody that’s listening, what are you up to next? Where can they find you? You have any campaigns or exciting things coming up?
Scott Eddy:
I mean, I’m pretty much, I mean, you’re all of this month I’m going, so the, the the top vacation club company and now they’re transforming into just hotels. Nice. But, it’s called Ante in Mexico. So they just launched their ultra luxury cruise line here in the med couple weeks ago. And we’re going out there to film and, and to shoot. That’s the cruise we’re joining on Saturday. And then I’m spending the last two weeks this month in Rome. And then next month I, I’m going to Ellie Miami the first week of June. And then I go to Sicily to speak at a conference. And yeah, so I’m going nonstop and at the same time I’m doing a whole rebrand. So in the next few days I’m launching new website, new logo, new everything. So it’s fun.
Cassady Quintana:
Well, perfect. By the time this episode comes out, you’ll have your full rebrand.
Scott Eddy:
There you go.
Cassady Quintana:
So when people listen to this and they find you, you’ll be ready. So, perfect. Well, I’m excited to, to watch your travels and of course I’m connected with you on LinkedIn and love to see everything that you’re up to. I’ll make sure to follow your Instagram too so I can get that morning inspiration for my Sunrise walks. But thank you so much for taking a little bit of your time out of your day. I know you’re super busy with travel and things going on, so I really appreciate it and I know our listeners do. So thanks for joining me.
Scott Eddy:
Thanks for having me, man.
Cassady Quintana:
All right, cool. Well, thank you everybody for listening to another episode of the Social Success Series, and we’ll see you next time. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcast so you don’t miss an episode. The Social Success Podcast is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Cassady Quintana, and we hope you enjoyed this episode.
NYU IHIF 2026 was full of insights and thought leadership from some of the best and brightest hospitality professionals in the industry.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, you will get to hear from some of the most influential and biggest names in hospitality in the exclusive interviews we were able to cover at the event.
NYU IHIF is the epicentre of hospitality brands, capital, and fast-paced dealmaking – opportunity moves fast, and so should you. This is where the rebound takes shape, where leaders uncover what’s next, and where relationships turn into real transactions.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree and VP of Marketing here at Travel Media Group.
Cassady Quintana:
And I’m Cassady Quintana, Brand Ambassador here at TMG.
Ryan Embree:
And today we are fresh back from NYU IHIF 2026. My second time in attending this incredible event. Cassady, your first, what were your thoughts?
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, I thought overall was a great event. A lot of optimism, especially as we’re heading into the summer season. So I thought, you know, the conversations that we heard on the panels and the ones that we were having with people were awesome, and a lot of you know, good things coming out of that. I feel like the biggest topics that I heard, there were three major takeaways I took from a lot of the panels and people we were talking to, but one being that K-shape economy that we’ve heard a lot about, right? We know that luxury is still outperforming while economy segments are feeling a little bit more of that pressure especially as we head into this summer season and looking at some of those trends. And then I think one of the biggest topics we have been talking about since the beginning of this year is the World Cup and how international travel we thought was gonna be booming. We were expecting a lot of busy hotels, but it’s kind of been on the softer side, and we’ve actually seen international travel dip a bit. So I think right now we’re kind of in that wait and see period of maybe you know people are waiting to see if their teams make it out of the group stages and then they’ll plan on booking a hotel. So keeping an eye on kind of that last minute travel. But the biggest topic that we were talking about a little bit last year, but the biggest one this year is AI and how hotels are using that within their systems. You know, there’s a lot of trends around using that for more personalization and being able to use it to look at your, you know, revenue optimization and how you’re performing online. So finding ways that we can use AI that doesn’t take the hospitality out of hospitality and doesn’t replace that human element. But that kind of went with that overarching theme of the entire event, which was sharpening the edge. So the thing I took from that is that the hotels that are really gonna win are the ones that are understanding their guests and using AI to further that, to further get to know their guests, to make that experience a little bit better.
Ryan Embree:
You know, and we had some incredible conversations and interviews with some professionals that we’re gonna share here in a second. But just to kind of jump on what Cassidy’s saying, we’re at a really cool inflection point in our industry right now as we go gear towards the busy travel season. So it’ll be interesting to see, you know, we had the opportunity to meet with development person from Minor hotels who’s looking to bring their brand into US and Canada, which will be very interesting. We know how they have a huge global footprint, a lot of interest early on in getting into the Americas. Uh, we then visited with AHLA and Kevin Carey and his team doing such wonderful work over there advocacy for our industry and some really cool initiatives that we were able to sit down with Kevin for a few minutes and chat about, uh, Jan Freitag from STR our hotel Data North Star and compass. They just released a revised forecast for the hospitality industry. So we went over some major points of that revised forecast and finally we got the opportunity to sit down with president and CEO Best Western Larry Cuculic. What a wonderful conversation about the best Western brand and how they are implementing, um, some of that AI and technology into their brand, and capitalizing on not only the World Cup, but also America 250. So wonderful insights that you’re only gonna find here on the sweet spot. Thank you for joining us. We hope you enjoy these exclusive interviews from NYU IHIF 2026. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Sweet Spot. We are live on location at NYU IHIF 2026 here with Genna, the VP of US and Canada Development for Minor Hotels. Genna, thank you so much for taking the time to stop and the busy big apple and talk with us today.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree:
Excited about, this show. A lot of energy, a lot of buzz. You know, when you come to an NYU talking to ownerships, a lot of capital here, what are the conversation kind of stem around, and what does a successful NYU show look like as you head back to your home base? Sure.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Successful NYU would really be finding some deals, perpetuating some deals. So hopefully advancing some opportunities and it’s really all about for right now because we’re relatively new into the region. Educating our owners and the, the broader development community. So, you know, some of, some of the players do already know us, but in the luxury space, but there’s a lot of people we gotta get out in front of and introduce Minor hotels to.
Ryan Embree:
And this is a great place and, obviously a great city to do that in. What has been kind of the feedback? I mean, you’ve been tasked with this enormous job. We have such a great brand, worldwide, you’re bringing it here to us, Canada, and North America. What have been some of those initial conversations and hearing that and initial interest and feedback from owners?
Genna Panagopoulos:
Yeah, we’ve had a lot of feedback and interest on Anantara. So some of our, you know, established luxury brands that are pretty well known when you know the luxury hotel space in a global environment. Sure. So those owners have actually come to us saying, we’re really excited about the opportunities here. So that’s one piece. Of course we have NH Hotels, NH collection, and NH, which are very well known brands, especially in Mediterranean, Europe. Yeah. And, Central and South America. So there’s excitement around that too.
Ryan Embree:
Does it help, I mean, having such an international brand, we got the World Cup here, right? In a couple months. You kind of using that as maybe some momentum as you kind of come into, and introduce this brand into the Americas.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Absolutely. There’s a lot of, you know, I’m also educating Minor of the markets we wanna be in and so that’s definitely helping as well and putting some places on the map.
Ryan Embree:
And let’s talk about that because there’s been some announced projects already right here actually in New York. Talk about that project a little bit.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Yes. Thanks for asking too. We have a Worsely Hotel that’s opening, here next year. It’s gonna be super exciting because Worsely is a restaurant brand that we are taking into the hotel space. So it’s the first of its kind and nowhere better than to start in New York comes from London. So there’s a lot of correlation between the two markets.
Ryan Embree:
One of a kind hospitality venue and a one of a kind city, so. Exactly. But another project we’re really excited about just ’cause we’re home based, obviously in Orlando right down the road, a bright line away in Miami. Talk to us a little bit about that project and how that’s different. Yeah,
Genna Panagopoulos:
It’s a high rise building built in Miami. Hasn’t started construction yet, but it’ll open in 2030. It’ll be an Anantara hotel with branded residences, both private branded residences and, um, ones that will be able to be rented to hotel guests as well. Super wellness oriented. There’s gonna be a really extensive spa. Right. Very experiential. Wonderful for the residents that are gonna be buying, the residence.
Ryan Embree:
It’s incredible. It sounds like you guys are really taking care of all of the kind of popular travel trends right now. Right. FMB has really had this resurgence in hospitality with the project here. Wellness, obviously a huge piece of what hospitality is leaning into and what travelers are looking forward to. So having that flexibility between the brands too, I’m sure is a definitely a fun place to be when having these conversations with owners. But you talked about another project in Turks and Caicos.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Turks and Caicos. So we have an Anantara in Turks and Caicos that I believe will open in 2029. So in order we’ll have one in New York next year, and then 29 on Ontario trips and Caicos 2030, Miami.
Ryan Embree:
So no shortage of news on the Minor Hotel side. Congratulations to you and your team. Thank you. As you wrap up, I mean, what’s your vision? What’s your goal? As you bring Minor Hotels into the North American region?
Genna Panagopoulos:
Yeah. Well, if I think about next year at NYU, I hope people, more people are coming towards us. Excited about us being a different brand a different mindset. So we offer, we think of ourselves a little bit differently from the parent brands that are already established here because we have, you know, ownership still of most of our portfolio or we lease most of our portfolio. Um, so I hope there’s more inbound traffic coming towards my way. I hope people generally just walking down the street know us a little bit more. Certainly. You know, white Lotus helped us with Anantara, so there’s a lot of people who Oh, yes, are are diehard Anantara fans because of that. But that’s what I’m hoping for. And eventually we’d love to have an office here. So as long as we do our, our, our work, right, we, we get a strong pipeline, we’ll be able to have an office, a regional office in, in North America.
Ryan Embree:
Incredible. Well, super exciting. Can’t wait to catch up on all the exciting projects that you have at Minor Hotels. This is the first of a couple collaborations we’ll be doing with Minor hotels, so make sure you stay tuned. Congratulations again, Genna. And thank you for taking the time to speak with us today.
Genna Panagopoulos:
Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. We are live on location, New York City at NYU IHIF. I’m here with Kevin Carey, President and CEO of the AHLA Foundation and COO of AHLA. Kevin, not your first time on the Suite Spot. Appreciate you taking some time and joining me here today.
Kevin Carey:
It’s lways a pleasure to spend time with you.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s fun.Incredible event so far. NYU obviously AHLA, AHLA Foundation Forward has a huge presence here. What does, you know, when you come to the event like this, we always talk in hospitality, these events are always going to exist no matter what. Technology comes down the pike because hospitality, we’re people, right. We like connecting. What is a successful NYU IHIF look like for you and your team?
Kevin Carey:
Well, It’s always an important period of time in the year at, as we approach midyear to check in with our members, to have that conversation about the advocacy issues we’re leading on behalf of the industry to hear how the business performance is tracking as well. And just to build enthusiasm and engagement for the events and the initiatives that we’re leading, not only in the association, but with the foundation as well.
Ryan Embree:
And none more important than the No Room for Trafficking initiative that you and your team have done some fabulous work on. I mean, we have all sorts of brands up on stage, sometimes with differing opinions here and there, but one cause that everyone in our industry has really gotten behind, and it’s the work of you and your team, is this No Room for Rrafficking? We always like to spread awareness of this. Talk to us a little about, about on that front and the progress you’re seeing and making.
Kevin Carey:
Well, this is a longstanding commitment that the industry has to human trafficking prevention and awareness. It started in 2019 with the development of the No Room For Trafficking Initiative and its focus on training and expanded in 2022 to include the Survivor Fund. So this is an area where AHLA and the foundation specifically serves as a convening entity to bring the industry together to rally around this important issue to work, to build awareness that’ll drive prevention of human trafficking, and also to gather funds to help support survivors. So this is a commitment not only on a longstanding basis, but also on a going forward basis as well.
Ryan Embree:
And such inspiring stories that you’ve told over the years. And people, you know, hoteliers and other people listening to this can really get behind and encourage people to kinda look at that initiative. Another kind of initiative that you’ve done in these events that, when we’re talking about these events is forward. We had a record breaking attendance a couple months ago in the spring. Talk to us about how that is. And you actually have some of those the forward initiatives here at NYU.
Kevin Carey:
We do within the foundation, our mission is to advance the workforce of the industry. And we do that through a focus not only on the current workforce, those over 2 million associates and colleagues who deliver hospitality day to day, but also how do we attract the future workforce to the industry. I talked about being a convening entity. The foundation brings together the industry across all segments. And there’s two areas where we believe we can make a difference. One is around human trafficking that we just spoke about, but also around the forward initiative which is geared towards, and its purposes to advance women in the hospitality industry and in leadership roles in the hospitality industry. So we were delighted to host our most recent forward conference in Atlanta, back in April. And the results were outstanding but really the momentum and the impact that that forward is having is really, which has us so enthusiastic and committed to this initiative moving forward.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s gotta be so cool to see industry leaders in hospitality raise their hands and want to be a part of this movement and really see the results from that.
Kevin Carey:
Well, it’s grown from just being a conference, that started in 2018 and had about 150 people at the first event to now over 1100 attendees. But as it as it has expanded from a conference to a leadership development curriculum. And you mentioned the forward exchange, which took place, here in New York earlier today, where it brought together over a hundred early and mid stage career and professionals of women and some men who are participating along with their peers to focus on networking and building those relationships so they can be well suited and take on roles, over time in the industry.
Ryan Embree:
Really cool to see. And again, probably some incredible stories coming from that over the years as the as the initiative matures. One thing that, that hospitality in general, really looking forward to, we got big summer, right? We’re usually really excited about summer is just ’cause of the travel season, kids being outta school. But this summer in particular, we’ve been looking forward to for a couple years. We got World Cup on the horizon, finally. We played just a couple miles from here and in America 250. What are you kind of hearing from hoteliers and how are AHLA really, gearing up for these big events, showcasing our industry?
Kevin Carey:
Well, these are really defining opportunities, for the industry to support those guests to welcome that demand, to drive the hospitality infrastructure over time. So there’s a lot of enthusiasm around the potential that that represents and as we’ve seen on stage already today the results in the first part of the year for the industry have been positive. a number of the outlooks are increasing the Revpar and ADR and other industry metrics, here with the these large events we are still waiting to see some of the demand materialize and we’re in a critical period of time right now, about 10 days out before the games to see that hopefully what’ll be a late surge in bookings, then translate into further business success for the industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Hopefully, and hopefully see that international travel continue to come back to North America, you know, a lot of hoteliers, hoping for that. Zooming in a little bit on a AHLA summertime, also time for interns, right. Come in and we’ve talked about this before. I mean, internships, mentorship in hospitality. So critical. I mean, throughout the years we’ve had these staffing shortages and we’ve talked about getting creative, our industry, getting creative on ways to fill those roles, internships being one of them. Talk about a little bit about the AHLA internship program and what these interns are are ready for this summer.
Kevin Carey:
Well, it’s not new. We’ve had a well established program from a number of years now. And, and we’re excited annually to bring a number of interns into our team across each function. we’ll have an interns in the government affairs team, in marketing, in the foundation. it’s so refreshing to engage them in our work to see their enthusiasm about their future to see them pick up valuable skills and experience of being in an office environment, learning more. And you know what? They, they have a real impact. They have some fun along the way as well and we have a wonderful session at the end where they get to present the results of some of the work in the initiatives that they’ve been working on. So it’s an annual opportunity that we look very forward to. And they’ll be starting just in about a week’s time. so it’ll be a great another repeatevent for us.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Love to see it. You know, again, any way that we can have more exposure to all sides of hospitality. Beause as we know, it’s not just, you know, the front desk. There’s so many elements to it and there’s none more demonstrated by how big our hospitality industry is than by the hospitality show that you put on. And this year is gonna be right in our backyard. In Miami, Florida. Get us a little bit excited about what we can expect at this year’s fourth annual. This is our fourth Hospitality Show, correct?
Kevin Carey:
So we started in Vegas, went to San Antonio, we’re in Denver last year. A lot of enthusiasm coming out of Denver for the content. And then what’s unique about the hospitality show is it’s really the only conference in the industry with a focus on operations and how operations is driving profitability. So there’s a terrific enthusiasm and people are looking forward to being in Miami, coming together in Q4, all segments of the industry represented. So we’ll have the brands we’ll have management companies, owners, service providers, suppliers, independent hotels also play an important role in the industry. So we’re about to open registration and that’ll really kickstart, the focus on November 2-4 in Miami.
Ryan Embree:
Well we’re looking forward to it. We’re hoping to go 4/4 on covering the hospitality show. Especially with it being right there in our backyard. Kevin, we know you’re busy. Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us today on some of these important initiatives. And hopefully we’ll see you in Miami in just a few months.
Kevin Carey:
Hopefully I have something else on.
Ryan Embree:
Alright. Appreciate it. Thanks.
Kevin Carey:
Thank you so much.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree. here live at NYU IHIF 2026 here with Jan the National Director of Hospitality Analytics at CoStar. Jan, you were just on a panel. Thanks for taking the time to jump off and speak with us.
Jan Freitag:
Absolutely.
Ryan Embree:
State of the state, love the name obviously you’re the north star of hospitality data out there. Jan, revised forecasts just came out. Talk to us a little bit about those points that you were sharing with the audience today.
Jan Freitag:
So we’re suggesting that RevPAR this year is gonna grow 2.8%, which is very different from the way we looked at the world at the ALIS Hotel Investment Conference. First quarter performance was much more stronger than we had expected than the public traded companies had expected the brands or the …. And a lot of them have revised their year end forecast up. So, you know, we followed suit. Now they, most of them just revised their forecast by the outperformance of Q1. But we’re suggesting No, no, there’s momentum. So we actually took our forecast up by a lot more to 2.8%, 2% driven by ADR and 0.8 by occupancy, which is really good to see. ’cause it implies that demand is outpacing supply. You know, so we get occupancy gains and then some pricing power.
Ryan Embree:
Love to see that. I mean we were here a year ago with Amanda who is talking about trying to decipher through the noise, a lot of noise right now. But great to see the momentum with those revisions and so important to have those revisions because the landscape can change ever so rapidly as you know. But talking about the supply, talk to us a little bit, go into a little bit more in depth and then obviously every market is different. What markets right now are running a little bit hot on supply?
Jan Freitag:
Yeah, so fational forecast for Supply goes to 0.4%, not a whole lot. Right. The long run average is 1.6, so we’re well below that. The number of rooms in construction used to be between, we know, 150,000 – 160,000. It’s now 140,000. So it’s sort of staying there. It’s just so expensive to get anything done. And interest rates are still high and could go higher. Who knows, we’re not making interest rate forecast. But you know, there’s definitely no longer this idea of how we should cut, you know, interest rates twice this year or so. I think those days are gone, you know, and so now the question is, okay, so where are people getting things done? And you can look at it by markets. So a couple of them are usual suspects. So Nashville, very strong, Dallas, Houston, Denver, Phoenix. So those are markets sort of in the smile states, sort of in the Sunbelt that still get a lot of people moving there. And you know, migration determines the economic performance. And so we’re seeing a lot more room supply growth there, but there’re just a lot of markets where it’s very, very hard to get anything done because of that higher cost of construction and of the higher interest rate. So I would single out those markets, but overall the picture is rather muted. On the supply side. So what that means then, for existing owners is the time to renovate is right now percent. Because you want to be the new kid on the block with the new hotel, there’s not a lot of new competition coming. This is time to renovate and really put your best foot forward.
Ryan Embree:
A hundred percent. And you know, one of the other topics we talked about, or you talked about rather on stage was segments right now luxury, doing very, very well leading the way. Obviously a lot of bifurcation, that K-shaped economy. What are you seeing across the segments right now?
Jan Freitag:
Yeah, I mean there are no wrong answers in luxury, right? I mean, luxury last year was the winner. This year is the winner. We’re projecting, very healthy RevPAR growth double of what we’re saying for the nation. We think the luxury class can materialize. And then what’s really nice to see is that for upscale upper midscale midscale, there’s also RevPAR growth there, which we hadn’t seen last year. And to me that speaks to the strength really of the American economy. But it sort of permeates toward all income classes. Now the exception is was and unfortunately will be likely the economy sector now even there we’re suggesting RevPAR’s growing, but it’s just, you know, 0.8% call that flat for all intent and purposes.
Ryan Embree:
International travel too, obviously World Cup on the heels of this. What are you see any interesting data points there you wanna share just right ahead of the America 250 and World Cup?
Jan Freitag:
There are two very different vibes coming from the panel that I was on. Adam Sacks prior to US presenting was talking about, oh wow, international inbound is really still quite a bit lower than it was in 2019. But the gentleman from the NTTO, the National Travel Tourism Organization was like, no, we’re projecting rock and roll, really strong growth of international inbound. The truth is probably gonna somewhere in the tween this year. World Cup is gonna drive a lot of international travelers. What I’m wondering about though is are some of those travelers basically stealing from 2025 and from 2027 and now they’re saying, oh, let’s not go in 25, let’s go in 26. And then when next year comes around, they’re like, we just went to the us you know, and not go in 27 either. So I just hope that the more positive spin from the government comes true and this and, and not that we’re just sort of packing everything into this year and then international inbound is gonna deteriorate.
Ryan Embree:
So many interesting data points. Anyone in particular you have your eyes on where, you know, obviously we love a nice rosy outlook and try to look for opportunities through all of the data that’s out there, but anyone’s that are like unexpected data points or something that you’re at least keeping an eye on right now?
Jan Freitag:
Yeah, so there are a couple, but the one that I’m really focused on is consumer price index. Everything is getting more expensive and so that means that hotels will see their cost increase. And the big question then is how much of that cost increase can they pass on to the customer? And I just told you that our ADR forecast for this year is 2% and inflation is gonna be what, 3.5 or something? I mean, it’s gonna be much more than that outpacing that. So that’s really the crux and I think that’s what we here at NYU, to talk to owners and investors and management companies have figure out, okay, so how can we keep our margins expanding even maybe how do you do that in this environment where top line growth may be not keeping pace with with inflation. So the CPI number is really something I’m keeping an eye on.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, pretty challenging time right now. when it comes to margins and hospitality that we, again, trying to suss out and figure out here, what are those maybe opportunistic data points that you’re seeing that you’re saying this, this is really good, maybe unexpected on the other end of the spectrum?
Jan Freitag:
Yeah, I think the Americans are wealthier than they ever have been. And Adam Sachs has this fascinating data point where he shows at the emerge that the middle class in America is shrinking, but part of it is because a lot more people are rich. So people are moving up the income chain and that allows ’em then to spend more money on experiences, very clear that people favor experiences over goods. And we are right in that Suite Spot.
Ryan Embree:
That continues to be the experience over stuff. We love to see that. And then you’re kind of here celebrating an anniversary/birthday of your podcast, is it? You know you’re, you’re usually, typically used to be in the host, not so much the guests, so thank you. Tell us a little bit more and maybe where our hotel audience can find the insights that you provide.
Jan Freitag:
Yeah, and thank you for having me. So we have our own podcast. My colleague Isaac Collazo from STR and myself get together once a month. It’s called Tell Me More, A Hospitality Data podcast. And three years ago at juniors across the street over cheesecake, we sort of hatched the idea. And so now we’re, I don’t know, like, you know, almost 30 episodes into it. And we get together once a month and we just sort of riff on the data and hopefully you can join us.
Ryan Embree:
I love it. That’s awesome. Well, Jan, thank you so much. Very busy time. Appreciate you stopping by and talking to us.
Jan Freitag:
My pleasure. Thank you so much.
Ryan Embree:
Alright. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. We are live at NYU IHIF 2026 here with Larry Cuculic, President and CEO of BWH Hotels. Larry, thank you so much for taking time outta your busy schedule to join us here on the Suite Spot.
Larry Cuculic:
It’s my absolute pleasure. Thank you for the invitation and for allowing me to share some thoughts with regard to the success and BWH hotels.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. We’ve got a lot to cover cause you’ve got a lot going on right now. But let’s start with this event, right? NYU IHIF, lot of major brands here what does a successful NYU look like for you and your team?
Larry Cuculic:
To us, a successful NYU is interacting with developers and investors such that they’re aware of what BWH has become. We’re now 18 brands, over 4,000 hotels in over a hundred countries and territories from premium economy up to luxury hotels. We acquired world hotels about six years ago. And so it really is continuing to educate about the possibilities of their associating with BWH hotels because we would be singularly focused on their success if they partner with us. And you’re also in a powerhouse panel tomorrow, the Executive Exchange Hospitality Performance Strategies for Success give our audience a little bit a sneak peek of what you’re gonna be talking about on stage.
Larry Cuculic:
Well, we’re gonna be talking about of course, the economy near term as well as long term projections for what that looks like. we’ll be talking about the importance of loyalty programs. We’ll be talking about the impact of really the economy and things like labor insurance and how we as brands need to focus on the success of our hotels by offering them programs to really offset that impact on net RevPAR.
Ryan Embree:
And I’m sure one of the subjects and topics that we brought up on your panel, certainly something we talk about these hospitality events is, AI and technology. And we had the privilege of having SVP and your CTO Bill Ryan on at the Hospitality Show a couple months in October, gave us a little bit of lay of the land when it came to AI and technology. How do you feel personally that this technology is really changing the way that travelers choose hotels, but also how they have their hotel experience, their guest experience?
Larry Cuculic:
Sure. So the first thing we’re doing is we’re reinvesting in our .com as well as our app. And we want them to be easy to use intuitive, but we also wanna make sure they have content that convinces guests when they’re shopping that our hotels will provide them kind of that customization and personalization. ’cause it’s not about a commodity, a hotel room, it’s about all those things that we can offer. By way of example we’re partnering with an AI agency to kind of harvest content with regard to where our hotels are located in those communities. At the same time, we’ll take that harvested content and we’ll filter it through our hoteliers who live in those communities and create the content that will be the AI answer when somebody’s looking for a place to stay. And they’ll know that we want them to have the best possible time while we’re in that community, not just staying with us as a hotel, that we recognize that people don’t want just to stay, they want really a journey.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Something that we aspire in hospitality to provide that not just a hotel stay, but an experience. And we talked to Joelle Park about the power of storytelling and how that can play a component in one of the best stories, obviously that you just had a really exciting announcement with is America 250 and the story of this great nation. So talk to us a little bit about that partnership and what BWH Hotels is doing with America 250.
Larry Cuculic:
Well, we are a sponsor of America 250, and we’re encouraging our hoteliers to embrace the 250th anniversary of the birth of our nation. And part of that is not just USA 250, we also have the 100th anniversary of Route 66. We have hotels that have been with us, believe it or not, we have a hotel that’s been with us 75 years. And it speaks to the heritage of our brand. So we’ll be leaning into the history of this great country. At the same time we’ll be leaning into the history of our great brand and encouraging people to travel and see the United States and all that it has to offer no matter where you go. And the beauty of our hotels we have 2200 of them in North America and wherever they’re going to go, we want them to know that we have a hotel that will meet their travel leads such that they can experience really the 250th anniversary of USA.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s a really exciting partnership right in at an inflection point with the World Cup as well. So introducing maybe some international travel also to the brand and the nation. You know, you’re a great following on LinkedIn. I encourage our audience, if you haven’t, make sure you follow Larry, but one of the things you’re reflecting on your North American regional conferences that you’ve done up to this point in 2026 and you quoted to say that you want BWH hotels to become the most welcoming brand in the world. What does that mean to you and how is your team working to achieve that?
Larry Cuculic:
Well, welcoming means that we’re gracious hosts, but it also means that we’re, I’ll call it easy to do business with understanding, being flexible and recognizing that we are somebody you’d want to be partners with. Whenever anyone walks into a hotel we should tell them, you know, welcome, we’re glad you’re here by way of example. But I used to think of it that way in terms of being gracious host and everything that happens at the hotel, but when I think of welcoming, I also want to think about our new.com and app. Again, it’s that ease of use and personalization so that when you go there, we know it’s you and we want to help you make good decisions with regard to travel. So welcoming is about ease of.com, the app we’re redoing our loyalty program. I think Joel probably talked to you about that. And we want the loyalty program to be welcoming as well. Well, what does that mean? Well, that means that when you interact with us, you’ll know how many points you have. You’ll know they never expire. You’ll know that you can use them to buy down the price of a room at any point. That you don’t have to, to have as many points for a full stay to leverage those points. It’s a value of the program. And of course welcoming. I always lean into the importance of being not just a gracious host, but somebody that appreciates our guests. To me, that’s welcoming because you have to recognize that people, they’re traveling with their families, it’s something that you wanna leave a terrific impression on them and their family. And you also want them to know that we appreciate that they’ve spent their hard-earned money staying with us. To me, that’s being appreciative gracious hosts. And that’s part of the welcoming. It’s not, the welcoming doesn’t just happen when they enter. Welcoming has to be entire stay.
Ryan Embree:
So key. And the brands that kind of make that connection with their travelers, especially in a time where, I mean, we just talked about in this interview AI technology, there’s way more places become disconnected, to find that connection, that human to human connection. Very important right now. So as we wrap up the interview, obviously at these events we’re always, whether it’s the hospitality data we’re looking into, whether it’s a conversation, we’re always trying to take a glimpse into the future, trying to predict that future. Larry what do you see, what’s your vision for the future of BWH Hotels.
Larry Cuculic:
People will always wanna travel. And for us, if we can become that welcoming brand that appreciates our guests, we will build that loyalty. When we build that loyalty, that program will grow. Our revenue delivery brand direct will grow which is the lowest cost for us in terms of that reservation for our hoteliers but what I think I would also offer to you is we’re also very focused on thoughtful growth. And what that means is if you grow your loyalty program, you also wanna make sure you have hotels that are in locations where guests want to go. Be it London, be it Rome, be it Frankfurt, be it Bangkok, no matter where it is around the world. And so, you know, we have a, a focus goal of 5,000 hotels, which means we will grow thoughtfully, but with our guests in mind. And because when we have a hotel join us, our sole focus is the success of that hotel as well as having a quality hotel where guests want to go.
Ryan Embree:
That’s awesome. Well, we wish you nothing but success. Hopefully maybe can join the Suite Spot when that 5,000 hotel opens and we can celebrate that together. But in the meantime, thank you, Larry, for taking the time out of your day to join us here on the Suite spot.
Larry Cuculic:
Well, thank you. Thank you for the opportunity. Very much appreciate it.
Speaker 2:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this celebratory episode, The Suite Spot hosts two TMG veterans, Director of Product – Respond and Resolve™, Jackie Avery, and Chief Technology Officer, Jason Lee, on the podcast to commemorate the 10 year anniversary of the Respond and Resolve™ digital solution.
Jackie Avery discusses what the milestone means to her and her team, and how responding to reviews is the foundation for connecting to guests and why it’s critical for hoteliers to give authentic responses to their guests. Jason joins the podcast to share the history and evolution of the Respond and Resolve™ digital solution and how it has become the industry solution service it is today.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot, a celebration, my favorite type of episodes we have on the Suite Spot. Very excited to share a milestone and achievement, a celebration, like I said, a 10 year anniversary of our award-winning, industry leading Respond and Resolve™, review response solution. Here with the Product Director of Respond and Resolve™, Jackie Avery. Jackie, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jackie Avery:
Thank you. I’m so happy to be here. I’m so excited to talk about this too.
Ryan Embree:
Congratulations, what a feat. 10 years of responding to reviews. We are gonna have the opportunity to speak with Jason Lee, our Chief Technology Officer, and we’re gonna talk to him about really the history and evolution of this solution, and really guest feedback management in general, how that’s evolved over time. But with you, I thought we’d start with talking about present today and this solution respond and resolve, again, responding to guest, hotel, guest reviews. What makes this so special? What is the secret sauce? Why has it seen such an explosion of growth from our hotel partners, and what do people love about it?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, so I’d say everyone on my team probably has a different answer to this, but for me, it really comes down to passion, time, and flexibility. So we’re really passionate about that connection making, you know, that moment with the guest truly matter. Taking the time to really connect in that way with them. And I’d say, I guess right, others might say, well, you know, these other people within the industry or at the hotel also have that passion and, and care about that connection. So, I think we all agree that that’s really important. But then you come to also adding in time. So someone might be able to dedicate an hour to responding to their guest reviews, or maybe even a few hours a week, and they feel really good about that. But like for us, right? This is day in, day out. This is what we do all day long. We really have the time to not only have the passion for that connection with the guest, but take the time to think about what they wrote and how they wrote it. And so, and there are gonna be people who have the passion and have the time, and I absolutely do not wanna diminish that. I’m so happy that they do. I’d say the third, and just as equally important aspect though, is flexibility. So this is an ever changing landscape, right? One moment. The M dash in writing makes you sound human. It’s casual. This is how you connect. The very next day, that’s an indicator of AI. If you’re using that, no one thinks you’re you. So in the past, right, you would start writing a response and you just wanna make sure you’re not sounding defensive, you’re not being dismissive of, whatever their concern is. And that’s still important, but that’s not where you start anymore. You start by convincing someone that you’re a person, you’re sitting at a computer taking away from all of these other aspects of your job, and you’re like, my first step is showing everyone that I’m me and I’m real. So, on top of all of that, right now, you’ve got that going on. Maybe, you know, you feel like you’ve got a handle on it. There is a very intense, again, ever changing landscape when you’re thinking about the political climate, the economic climate, and those impacts the guests and travel. We all know that. And so it’s really hard to meet a guest where they’re at. If you’re not keeping up to date with everything going on. You have to be aware of those shifts that are happening all the time to everyone.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s ever changing, especially over the course of a decade, which has obviously been the timeline of this solution here. And you’re absolutely right. I mean, that authenticity is so key to show the guest that you actually care about what you wrote. And you’re right, there’s a challenge now to almost convince that guest that I am real. I am listening to you and I’m connecting. And there’s a reason why in this age of technological advancement and AI, we were talking about it every single day. We’re at the peak of technological advancement. Every single day we move forward, there are still hotels that come to us and say, we want to maintain a human to human connection. We don’t want AI to be responding or generating responses that are going straight to our guests. Why do you feel like that is, and and what are the feedback you’re hearing for these hotel partners?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, so when you zoom out, right? Guests are the entire reason that hotels exist. So when you’re considering reviews and checking reviews before you stay somewhere or leaving a review, after you’ve departed, these are really important aspects of the guest journey. They’re a part of your guest experience. So when you are a property who is fully invested in your guests having a great experience at your hotel, you want them to be surprised when they come in the best ways. You want them to leave with the best memories and spread that by word of mouth and online, you understand that you have to continue that real connection the same way you want to at the front desk in those points online. You have to connect with them human to human in that review response.
Ryan Embree:
You know, Jackie, one of the things that I think makes the solution so special, and something you’ve done a great job of is curating this team of professional writers where a lot of these writers here went to school for writing and communication. You know, these are degrees that are their specialty. They have a passion for this, right? And you talk to a general manager nowadays maybe they didn’t, maybe they don’t have a passion in writing, right? Like, that wasn’t why they got into hospitality to say, I wanna be a writer. But, you know, you created this team that also understands the nuances of the hotel world. It’s the only vertical that we work with in hospitality. And there’s so many of those little nuances that you have to teach and you have to incorporate in your messaging and in your review response writing to make sure that is articulated so clearly to your guests, or really it undermines your reputation as a whole. Talk to us a little bit about some of those nuances, maybe some examples and how you’ve been able to generate just this team of, again, just incredible writers.
Jackie Avery:
So, I’m fortunate because we’re doing this episode to celebrate 10 years. So we know what we’re looking for and we have experience in how to train specifically writing for hospitality and guest reviews. So fortunately, you have these degrees where people come in, they’re educated, they know how to write well, and then you have this training based on real world experience. And having seen the evolution of guest reviews. You used to get it where guests only left reviews when they’re angry. That’s not the case anymore. Guests go, they love the praise of feeling rewarded for leaving a good review. They wanna leave a good review. And having written so many, right? Each individual learns something and takes it back to the team. So it’s consistent workshops, it’s creative workshops, it’s adjusting to the new landscape, right? Being aware of what is seen as AI and what is AI. Being able to identify a review where a guest used AI to leave it, maybe. Or also being able to take a moment and pause and know the best way to reach another human when they’re being skeptical. So where as someone on property, right? They’re so focused maybe on, well, I wanna let this guest know that’s not how we do things, or that’s not really what happened here. And this professional writer on the team realizes the first line of this review was, and I bet a bot is gonna answer this. You have to cross that bridge first. You have to tackle that first. And if you don’t know how, it’s gonna be really hard to get your actual message across to this person that you really want to. So, we’re always building on what we know, because we realize what we know today can’t be what we rely on forever. Everything is gonna be different in three months. Everything will be different in one year. And when you’re set up to be able to make those adjustments, and you’re excited about that, when you love writing, when you love being able to write in a different way and connect with someone, and this is your passion, you know, you thrive in that landscape, it’s not a challenge that you don’t wanna take on. You look forward to it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And you’re absolutely right about the landscape. Completely changing. Sometimes, even though over the course of 10 years, I mean, booking has their pros and cons. They actually essentially solicit some of the negative feedback so that you can address that character count, right? With a TripAdvisor and maybe now going into reviews with no content at all, and responding to those PPI and personal information using people’s names in those responses. Is that something that a site allows or not? All of these are things that you wouldn’t really think through in responding to reviews, but it’s so critical and so important because, again, it’s an underlying foundation of your reputation management. And why do we respond to reviews to show we care? So if that care isn’t being shown, it really undermines your reputation. So, anything that lasts for 10 years obviously, means that it’s a success. I’m sure you’ve heard over the years some really, really rewarding pieces of feedback from our hotel partners. Can you share, we love a good story here on the Suite Spot in the podcast. Can you share any examples, maybe just one or two of some special moments or conversations with some of our Respond and Resolve™ clients?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. Thinking back, because it feels really relevant this year, because it does seem to be happening more frequently, I think back to an email I got from a client, and they were going through it, their property started receiving hundreds of reviews within an hour to, because of something happening within the city, it was something going on. That was happening citywide and really had nothing to do with their hotel. And you can imagine in that moment, they’re fielding calls at the front desk from guests who haven’t arrived yet. They’re trying to ease concerns from guests in house, and their online listings are just being flooded from people who aren’t there and are just saying stuff. And really, it’s just because of the city they’re in and something that the property has nothing to do with. So in those moments, I’m so grateful that we can help. I got this email from this hotel, and they were just like, thank you. I had so much on my shoulders, and I know I have this support and this, and I put out these things, you know, to these other people at the property who help us. But in that moment, I knew, I knew you guys were there. Yeah. And I knew that you could give advice on what to do. You’ve seen it before. You helped guide my steps. And I’m so grateful for that, that our years of experience mean that in the moment a guest can be served face to face, and we can be assisting, you know, with things happening outside of this property’s control.
Ryan Embree:
And what a line to tiptoe too, if AI is involved, right? And that, and the messaging is not communicated the right way there, it could mean so much more than just a one star review. It could mean detrimental damage to your reputation, especially in those moments of crisis.
Jackie Avery:
Absolutely. And some sites let you edit what you post back and some don’t. So the stakes are high. And it’s happening fast.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Very fast. And so, as we wrap up our conversation here, and again, congratulations. As Product Director, you look at this, what do you look at this 10 year milestone? What does it mean to you and what’s your vision for the future of this solution?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, this milestone, I feel it, I feel it personally. Not just for me but my entire team. When you genuinely care about connecting with other people and helping and being support in this way, it’s really easy to feel the joy in what you’re doing. So this milestone, to me, is just something that I am reflecting on that I’m so grateful, I’m so grateful to be able to work with clients across the country and help people out there connect in a space where they’re expecting not to have that opportunity. More often than not, people are expecting not to hear back, or they don’t wanna get their hopes up that they will hear back, but they do. Yeah. And it feels great. And I love that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. The stakes can’t be any higher right now when it comes to that. And hotels are getting creative with trying to figure out ways to connect with guests in a world where, you know, you don’t have to visit the front desk anymore. You can, you don’t have to interact with hotel staff anymore. So hotels are trying to figure out ways that they can keep a constant line of communication. And this is always gonna be a place where guests are, are gonna be, do not make it a one-way conversation. They’re gonna continue to leave feedback. Are you genuinely listening? Are you authentically responding? And we’re so grateful to have you on this podcast to celebrate this milestone. Thank you, Jackie. And congratulations again to you and your team.
Jackie Avery:
Ah, thanks so much. It was great to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Next wee’re gonna be talking with Jason Lee, Chief Technology Officer at Travel Media Group, where we’ll talk a little bit about the history and evolution of this Respond and R™esolve solution, which just turned 10 years old.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Welcome to part two of our 10 year celebration of TMGs Respond and Resolve™ review response solution. I am here with one of the architects, CTO, Jason Lee, congratulations to you and your team 10 years. Jason, you know, we love a good origin story. Talk to us, bring us back 10 years ago when you started, maybe it was even before 10 years. But tell us a little bit about how Respond and Resolve™ came to be and kind of the evolution of the solution that now turns 10 years old.
Jason Lee:
I mean, I think we at that time, we had been kind of doing reputation for hotels for a little bit, mostly in post-day engagement. And then also monitoring reputation scores and reputation flow. And we were getting questions like, hey, can you handle review response? And so we sat down and we were like, we’re getting this more and more. And we had salespeople that were saying the same thing, like, hey, I just got the phone with this guy, and he said he would buy except if we had this product. And so we sat down and we started thinking about like, what is it gonna take to, to get this done? And we had, we happened to have a tech summit during that same time, and we all sat down. So at that time, it was all the tech leaders we had and our tech team as well. And we really just kind of mapped out, like, what would it take to, to do this? Yeah. And at the time I was like, listen, the only way this is gonna work, anybody will even buy this, is if they can ensure that whoever is providing them the response is gonna do it in their voice is gonna be able to do it in a way that they would do it. Speak to their guests in the way that they would wanna be spoken to. And so we sat down and we put together what was kind of the building blocks of what is today’s, Respond and Resolve™, Travel Media Group. But at the time was even more complicated. It had multiple touch points. So it had a single, it had a touchpoint of the review coming in. It had a touchpoint, after the response where we would audit the response before the response went to the hotel, the hotel would then approve the response. And then once the hotel approved this approved the response or edited the response, it would come back to us and we would touch it one more time before we would then publish that response. So we had this, like, we had a three touch internal, like four touch, if you include the hotelier system. And, you know, and of course, you know, anybody who’s done any kind of product work or anything would think like, that’s an insane amount of touches, that’s a crazy amount of scaling. And so then our secondary thing was like, how do we do this based on the number of reviews or whatever? And we weren’t even thinking that way. We’re like, because there’s an unknown number of reviews, how do we even do this? So we started the product out with, with that kind of cadence, with 20 reviews being kind of the core. So you get 20 reviews a month, and it was TripAdvisor only. Yeah. And you had this one critical response. So we would like, you know, if there was a, something that really, that happened that was really bad, we would write this like very specific kind of PR version of a response. And that was the original product. So we put it all together, we put our price point out, and, and I believe you were the first person to sell one to a hotel. So, so as we got that going, then it was, you know, then, then we went through the rest of kind of like the evolution of the product. But at that time, it was something I think one other company was doing, but we, you know, we didn’t really know what they were doing or how they were doing it. So we kind of took our own path in how we created it.
Ryan Embree:
And we were talking off camera about, you know, some of the challenges. And maybe I think it’s through some of the unexpected. ’cause you think about, all right, you know, if tomorrow, you know, someone was like, let’s, let’s create a company that responds to reviews, and then all of a sudden you start building that and you come across these challenges, these, these issues, these problems that you’re like, well, I didn’t think about that. I just kind of thought about the output and input. What were some of those kind of learning lessons along the way, and how did you kind of adapt to that, whether using efficiencies technology, because it’s a lot more difficult than just saying, Hey, we’re just gonna respond to your reviews. I think the biggest challenge and where we had our biggest evolution in the solution was in when we converted what we were doing. So at the time when we started it, we were using third party data. And we were pulling some stuff, but some stuff was being pulled through a third party vendor. And it wasn’t until we launched one view where we controlled the entirety of the dataset. And not just the entire, not just the entirety of the dataset, but the frequency of the dataset, which was insanely important. So this has to do with when it is received from the time that it was published live. And so that in itself sort of opened up this new lane, but in doing so, it also opened up our eyes to this really one like incredible flaw to our system, which was how we were pricing it. But that has to do with how we sort of viewed the, the universe of reviews for a single property. So when we started, we had that 20 Right. The next little jump was, well, maybe we’ll start charging by the room. And this was something we had heard other other vendors doing, and we’re like, oh, this is a good idea. We’ll start charging by the room. What we found immediately was that we were massively overcharging some hotels. And way undercharging other hotels. So a destination 80 room hotel could be doing three or four times the review volume that a 250 room corporate hotel was doing. Like, that’s straight up like extortion on one side and then just us just like..
Ryan Embree:
And extended stay sometimes, you don’t have the frequency.
Jason Lee:
Completely, completely. So, so I think pricing, getting that pricing down. So once we then controlled the universe of reviews, we then, so at, at the time we launched OneView, we had a 360 view of a 365 to be exact, day view of a properties reputation. So we could sort of forecast their total quantity of reviews over a year and then, and then, and then sort of amortize that out to create pricing around review flow. So I believe we were one of the first to do review flow, and I think we might still be one of the only companies that prices that way, where we actually look at quantity of reviews and surveys that a property gets. And then we price knowing exactly what we’re going, what we’re up against, including the 35% ish increase over the summer months that that happens just based on review flow. You know, guest flow. So, so I think those were those big things, kind of those big hurdles, like, internally pricing it the right way, doing it in a way where we could, we could ensure that whatever we said we were going to do, we could 100% do. We had the staff to do it, we had the technology do it, and all the pieces in play. And then I think from there, it was then understanding the sort of undulation of the acquisition of review data. And that is a crazy space because, if you’re scraping the data directly from a site, then you’ve got that whole thing that that’s going on where sites are continually sort of trying to thwart that. You have the API side of that where you can get API but that requires you to get these relationships with these various sites. And so, so our, we were just like, just, just dogged determination To like secure better and better and better and better data sets. And we did that through, eventually through getting partnerships with the major review providers like Expedia, Booking.com and Google. And so inside of doing that, we were able to really secure a data set that then allowed us to respond in a timely manner and efficient manner, and in a way that, you know, could completely solve this issue for a hotel.
Ryan Embree:
I think some of the biggest learnings or we’ve had is through those challenges, but also through the close relationships that we’ve had with our hotel. Partners and those hotels that we say it all the time when it comes to reputation. I mean, feedback, you want feedback, right? Whether it be from your partners who who travel media group are working with, whether it be from your guests, and you’re a hotelier, you want that feedback. Because that means it’s striking some kind of cord, whether it’s good or bad. ’cause then you can make adjustments. So, the actually hearing what our hoteliers had to, to, to say about our, our reviews and our I’m sorry, what they had to say about our responses helped us. Collaborate or calibrate rather their voice and tone and everything that to kind of get us right in harmony with how they wanted responses. And I think for me at least, it was very surprising to see the spectrum at which people wanted, how they wanted their responses handled. Whether it’s, you know, we don’t want an apology ever to be heard on our responses or, you know, we, we always apologize whether it’s our fault or not. We’re always going to say the customer is always right. And there’s everything in between. We want our voice a little bit more laid back. We want it more of a professional tone. You know, you’ve gone through these patterns and trends of try to use keywords in every single one of your review responses. Aside from the challenges, what have you learned? Maybe talking to hotel partners or hearing them, seeing some of that feedback that comes in about our responses. ’cause I know, although you’re the CTO, you’re very close to that feedback and are in there and seeing what our hotel partners are saying every day about our responses.
Jason Lee:
That’s a great question. And I think it hits at the evolution of the benefits of this need. And I think that’s what’s so interesting about, about doing this for this length of time. So in the very beginning, I talked about that very complicated setup that we had where we were like approving the response before we sent it to the hotelier, and then we had the hotelier approve the response and edit the response, and then we publish the response. We kept a bunch of that together. So we kept the right approved by the hotelier edit and resolve or audit and resolve, process on our side. And so in doing that, even though it was overkill in the beginning, we had people saying, we don’t wanna approve it. We don’t wanna approve it because we’re, because we’re like, this takes too much time. And because I’m not around on the weekend or whatever. And, but what ended up happening is that as the sort of understanding of what review response was doing, so the review response kind of needs sometimes is hinges on what is the downward pressure to get this done? So is this coming from my management company? Is it coming from the brand? Is it coming from an OTA that says I’ll get better placement if I do this this way? So this becomes this becomes thing. Or like you said oh, I heard that I get better SEO get better placement if I use keywords in my responses. So this becomes this sort of meta benefit. And I think through the through line that we took from the very beginning and way before, I feel like a hoteliers wanted us to do it that way. And maybe today there’s still a few hoteliers that are just like, whatever, man, just get it done. You know, is that we really wanted to communicate with the guest who wrote the review. And we wanted to make sure that whatever we were writing in our response, that that communication was clear. It was clear in gratitude on five stars. It was clear in empathy and resolution in one star reviews. And it was, it was really trying to find that balance when there was no feedback. Even if the get, even if the hotel didn’t care maybe as much about the content of the response that they trusted us to make that response. But what we find is like now, 10 years later, that where, where we have had a complete shift in our property profile at Travel Media Group, where I think we started with a lot of economy properties and select service properties where we’ve, we’ve reached into these incredibly large resorts luxury properties. Some of the nicest properties in the United States are our clients. And I think it’s because we’ve stuck with that. So you talk to the hotelier that has a $200 or $300 a night guest, or even a $1,200 a night guest, in some cases, their feeling about the retention of that guest is very different than a select service, than a select service. But they’re, but they’re also their version of, like, that this activity promotes acquisition of guests. And so the stakes are high. In this space. And I think we’re reaching into like a whole new era where this information, the review and the response are affecting generative search. And we’re reaching a whole new era of economizing the search time with massive amounts of review data. In an individual research session for a guest is really changing the importance of this activity together. So I think, I know I kind of took a windy road on that, but I think the biggest thing is that the evolution of expectation from the guest, but also then from the hotel has changed. And we’ve stayed close to it this entire time. And like, like everything that we do at Travel Media Group, we are sort of singularly focused. So we’re so focused on this as this. We probably, when I talk to hotels sometimes, they’re like, man, you are really exaggerating the importance of this activity. And I’m like, no, it’s everything. This is like, this is about you securing the relationship with this guest. This is everything. But hopefully you want a partner like that has that sort of dogged determination to make sure that it’s done correctly. But I feel like, so to kind of wrap this up, I do feel like that that is what we’ve done, that’s been the through line is like focusing on the need and like you said, focusing on the voice make, altering account by account. So now you’re talking about a few thousand hotels. That we’re scaling, you know, we’re where we’re like in the off months, we’re doing somewhere, you know, around 20,000 – 25,000 reviews. And we’re able to then inside of that still create personalization, still create a voice of a hotel. Still be able to hit the right kind of policies, the right kind of renovation details, the right kind of care to each individual review, or each individual guest as we see that to make this thing work.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, every hotel we have found out is so drastically different from the way they want thing hand handled, but also, just their properties are different, right? Their locations, their markets, occupancy drivers, the type of traveler that they bring in that they want to attract. There’s so many different elements. That speak to that. And it’s with the, Jackie and her team do a fantastic job to the point to the precision, we want to be completely aligned with that hotel partner. And what you were talking about was some of the newer luxury properties that we’re now partnering with. I mean, the stakes are high in the sense of they’ve had decades long reputation. They have built that. And it is no longer a negotiable for them to make sure that that reputation is protected. And a solution like this, like respond and resolve, really can help solidify that and also just serve as such a foundation and a security blanket in case some of these, Jackie had a couple examples of these things right now that can go wrong at a property. We hate to see it, but it happens every single day in a trusted partner like Travel Media Group and Respond & Resolve™ team behind you can really help give you a little bit of peace of mind for a hotelier. And you’re absolutely right. Obsessed is a great word to put it and passionate about review response. I mean, this is something that we’ve done for 10 years, but I think it’s been a little bit longer that we’ve been in the reputation game. And you know, you can’t, in 2026, you know, we, I had a podcast episode, late last year where it was actually with the co-founders of ILHA and they were talking about how you cannot in 2026 cannot be a complete expert at every aspect of hospitality. You just can’t. It’s just, it’s one of those unique industries where you can’t know everything about everything. You will never be the expert of chemicals for your hotel pool. But it’s important to know those things, and it’s important and critical to have a valuable partner that knows those things. So you think about that as one element, chemicals in a pool, curtains, flooring, review response is a very important element to your digital and online reputation there. And we talked with Jackie about, you know, obviously AI and how that has certainly changed in the last 10 years. And it’s how it’s come in, talk to us, because I think a lot of times people might hear us and think that we are anti AI or anti-technology, and it’s actually the exact opposite. It’s an incredible piece of technology that we can use in elements of reputation, but not necessarily for the actual response. So how are you kind of using AI? And we do have an AI solution, not 10 years old yet. We’ll be doing that in in several years. But talk to us about how you’ve used technology and AI kind of hand in hand with Respond and R™esolve for the past 10 years.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. I mean, I would say in the last 18 months we have evolved our core platform probably more than we did maybe in four years. So we’ve done a lot recently. And a lot of it is that a, like a whole new world of data analytics has been opened up. By this, so something that I would needed maybe two or three data scientists to help me with. I can do, can do with, with an API through anthropic, or through Open AI. And working with members of my team and putting some data together, we’re able to find like really interesting insights. And so the first thing we launched last year was the guest experience snapshot. And that was an a completely AI driven report. And the sort of origin of that was to show the hotel the top things that was that a guest was experiencing great. And then the top things that they, that was going wrong, and some of that was to show them multiples of the things that we were responding to. So the things that, so using this data to kind of, to shine a little light on like, Hey, we can only say sorry for this so many times. You know, but also to show them the other side of it where it’s like, Hey, this is where you guys are winning. You guys are winning in these very, in these areas. And this feedback isn’t always a negative. There’s a bunch of great stuff in here. And I think, so we’ve then continued that by continuing to analyze trends to continue to analyze, review flow, to analyze the sentiment data. And it just continues and continues and continues, as we sort of unlock the use cases of these tools. But for us, I think like the big pieces of the tools that are really exciting coming forward are the ways that we can scale personalization, in a way that we couldn’t do without major data science. And, and so we’re able to scale personalization, so taking the personalization that a hotelier gives us about very specific things about their property, and not writing the response based on that, but sort of confirming the response against the voice. So I can take a response and confirm then the voice, you know, and it says, yeah, this, this matches what they’re, what they asked us to do. And so that can get very, that in our world, that’s probably one of the more complicated pieces of it, especially where you have a very lengthy voice note, you have a massive policy note. You have a massive amenity amenity note. So these are these these spaces where a writer could get turned around on something. But where this could verify, hey, the response you just wrote is missing this one piece.
Ryan Embree:
Notes are changing seasonally based on restaurant menus, based on programming that the resort is conducting out. And its amenities classes that it has timing. I mean, all of those elements are notes that that can be provided and are so important. I mean, we think of it as oh, well, if we get a date wrong or if we get an item wrong, I mean, that has a pure, such a big impact on the guest experience and their impression of your hotel. And the care that you’re taking, so it’s just one of those elements, again, we talked about it with Jackie of, you have to prove essentially at this time that you’re not AI and that you do care and that, it’s so important to these guests and hoteliers, all this.
Jason Lee:
I think that’s where it all boils down to is that when I get that email from Booking.com as a guest that’s from the hotel, and I open that up and I read the response to the review that I wrote, does it feel authentic? Does it feel like it came from them? Does it mean anything to me? Is there any kind of meaning to that at all? Or is this like, or does this intensify, does this intensify my advocacy of this property, or does this intensify my anger? And you or does this turn me around? Does this make me wanna and I think these are these opportunities you have in this space that does make a huge difference. And I think AI will help us enhance the personalization of our individual properties and help help us, like put that really, like that perfect response together that helps the guests know that they’re cared for.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a feeling. I mean, Jackie talked about it getting that feedback from our partners about, this was a repeat guest, this is someone that stayed with us and they talked about our response back to them. They thanked us. And those are the moments that we strive here at Travel Media Group for, and we’ve seen so many over the last decade of doing this review response. And here we are at 10 years as you look towards the future, the landscape ever changing, you know, what do you see kind of for the future of Respond and Resolve™? And maybe we can open it up just to guest feedback management. I mean, were really at a inflection point I feel like right now.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. I mean, I think, I think it’s kind of more of the same in terms of what this has been about all the all along, which is the guest experience. And how do we react to the guest experience react to the specific experience the guest is giving us in a response, but act then multiple guest having similar experiences. How do we react to that? How do we improve the guest experience over time? And I think that that’s where the opportunity is right now, is that there are so many tools available to us to understand this in a much more granular level, in a much more specific level. So the old way of, of asking questions, I think of guests, I think is gonna go away at some point us sort of like, asking guests the same questions over and over again. You know, would you recommend, how clean was your room? What was the breakfast like? You know, rate that, I think we’re gonna get to a spot where we sort of understand these elements, but we can take broader textural, data points and start to really dial in to, so what does a 3 in breakfast mean? What does, what does it mean when somebody says that they would recommend at a 7? Or a thumbs up or a thumbs up or a thumbs down. I think this is where, you know, this is where these kinds of scales get a little funky. And so AI could help a guest actually articulate themselves in a response in a survey, for example. AI could also obviously take this data and take patterns of data and help a hotel understand the fail points of their service. And I think those are these really amazing opportunities for hotels that want to engage there. And, but all of this together is also doing something really interesting in the generative search world. So, we’re seeing people flock generative search more and more and more because it economizes that effort. I can read hundreds of reviews, I can have hundreds of reviews read for me and summarized, based on a very specific question. So I can ask about the breakfast, for example. And I get this summary. So none of that is gonna come through a three on a guest experience survey a guest satisfaction survey is not gonna affect that. But the 25 Expedia reviews that you’ve gotten in the last 90 days will. And I think those are those things that start to inform the traveler are going to be the quantity of signals. Whether they’re positive or negative and then the sort of inference of that signal, it’s not binary, it’s not good or bad, it is this other thing. Which is sort of the feeling of a guest. And I think a AI is getting better and better and better, and is getting to a point where it can sort of relay the feeling that multiples of guests have had about your property to a prospective guest. And that either should thrill you or it should scare you. Because this part of technology that I think get that we are all enjoying in some ways, right? Because it’s saving us time, it’s saving us effort, but in other ways, there is no place to hide. So you can’t hide behind, the first 200 reviews that you received at your hotel anymore. Where you got that, the first 200 reviews, you netted out a 4.4, and you’ve sort of been riding on that for the last like five, six years, more and more. That’s score is going to be irrelevant.
Ryan Embree:
That’s what I was gonna say, that I think the historical data is just gonna become less and less vital and critical. And it’s gonna be a moving type. It’s what you want. It’s absolutely something in the now what is the guest doesn’t care about what your hotel was like five years ago. When somebody at the front desk had a great, was really personable and friendly to them. They want to know what that front desk agent is doing today. What that room looks like today. So it’s going to be this living almost a living reputation.
Jason Lee:
And it is today. Yeah, it is now. But it’s different because, because a guest won’t research that deeply. It is today, I think it’s living today. And I think the hotels that are winning today will continue to win. Because it means that you’re doing the right thing by your guest. And I think that continues this cycle of sort of looking at the guest experience and finding your fail points and fixing ’em, finding ’em, fixing, finding and fixing is the real key. But it’s also empowering your front desk. It’s, it’s making sure that nobody leaves your property upset. It’s all of the things that we should be doing anyway that affect thhis. This is true hospitality. At its core but I think, what’s interesting about what AI is doing is it’s kind of shining a light into the, I guess, residual needs here. But I think this also gives you an unprecedented opportunity at your hotel to share this information with your staff, to, to take this back and, and really like, like dig in and make it work. The other thing I was gonna say, the other thing I was say on that, what I think on the future of guest feedback management will be the number of companies coming in an AI play today is crazy. There’s a lot of new companies that are coming in there, and there’s, and then there’s like long-term companies like Medallia, and Qualtrics and other companies that are offering AI responses inside of their platforms. And I think this all economizes that activity, but it does not remove our obligation to have authentic voice at our property and to communicate with guests that need to be communicated with. And the guests that needs to be communicated with. If you communicate well there, and I’ve said this over and over and over, if you communicate with the guest who wrote the review, well that will impact guest acquisition a hundred percent.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely.
Jason Lee:
So the authentic voice is gonna be at a premium. The canned voice, the canned templated voice of AI, I think will end up, will end up being able to spot it. I mean, I think in some ways it, nothing changes, right. In other ways, everything changes.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Yeah. I absolutely agree with you on that, Jason. I think it is going to be a priority for hotels that truly care to rise above the sea of sameness. And as your response and the templates, you know, that was kind of that first tide, was that the templates you wanted to show your guests that you actually cared, write something that looked better than a template. Better than a thank you for your feedback. ’cause that’s what all you were getting. Now, the, the reputation response ecosystem is even more ingrained because more and more people are coming in and using AI to respond. You’re going, it’s going to be a premium to show that you’re going to be looking for those edges and places that you can show guests that you care differently from the hotel next to you. And authentic review response, caring review response is gonna be one of those.
Jason Lee:
But authenticity all the way around, I mean I saw this I saw a video of the CEO of Marriott talking about specifically saying, use this technology to give yourself more time with the guest. Give yourself a few extra minutes with the guest to create relationship to create authenticity in person.
Ryan Embree:
The general manager of the future might look closer to the general manager of the past than it does right now. Interesting times. Here to celebrate, again, 10 years of Respond and Resolve™. Congratulations, another milestone, another chapter. Congrats to you and your team, and thanks for celebrating with us here on the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee:
Thanks, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell, with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot Road Trip is back! Tune in to the latest episode to hear from hospitality leaders from Choice Hotels and Newport Hospitality Group, as they celebrate the ribbon cutting ceremony for the Comfort Inn & Suites Orlando Sanford Airport.
Check out the exclusive interviews with Andre Hickman, Wayne West III, Adam Hill, & Dena Hansen, only on the Suite Spot.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embry, here for a special edition of the TMG Suite Spot Road Trip Series right down the road in our backyard in beautiful Sanford, Florida to visit the grand opening and Ribbon cutting event at the Comfort Inn and Suites Orlando Sanford Airport. We were invited to cover this celebratory event and talk to some of the instrumental individuals that made this property happen. Andre Hickman, the owner of the property, Wayne West III, president at Newport Hospitality. Adam Hill, VP of Operations at Newport Hospitality. And finally, Dena Hansen, Director of Sales at this beautiful, gorgeous new property opened up here. We had the privilege to cover it, bringing it to you in this episode in a busy hotel lobby celebrating the grand opening of this property. We hope you enjoy.
Wayne West III:
Well, welcome and thank you for coming to the celebration of the opening of this great hotel, the Comfort Inn and Suites. So make sure I get it right. Between Orlando Sanford Airport. Thank you very much. This hotel is a great example of what happens when you put a lot of smart people together and visionary people in a growing market like the Sanford Airport area. So thank you again, we’re, it’s great being here. Uh, my name is Wayne List. I’m the president of Newport Hospitality. We are honored that we get to operate a couple hotels for Andre Hickman, who I’ll reduce introduce in a little while. You’ll hear me use a couple, you’ll hear me overuse a couple words as I talk to you tonight. Really, really proud of the Hickman family. When you walk through the hotel and you see the amenities that he’s put here, how thoughtful he was and how intentional every decision was to be successful, and not just successful for him, but to make sure that all the guests are well taken care of at every touch point in the hotel, whether it’s the guest laundry or the cabana, or the pool or the exercise room. He was very, very thoughtful. I’ve, I’ve been blessed over the years and I’m trying to find my partner. Mike. Mike, I know you’re here, Mike. Yes, the tall one over here. Mike and I have opened up a lot of hotels in our years. Uh, I’m not sure we’ve opened up one Mike, that the owner was as thoughtful about every step along the way and cautious and careful and trying to do it just right for the long-term legacy of this hotel. So I’ll have to thank the Hickman family for that. If you look at the design, the finishes, the touch and the construction, the touch points are just incredible for a hotel. So the Hickman family, if you would kind of raise your hand, Andre and the Hickman family, a lot of them are over here. We want to thank you personally. I want to, I wanna talk a little bit about businesses in the area. Um, the airport obviously is, is booming. Uh, Boomba, which I know has been here a few years, but needed a desperately needed a hotel in the market. I spoke to someone the other day that was so excited. We had, they had a hotel in the market to use Go Port, one of our biggest clients here. Uh, really want to thank the community, the leadership of the community, the chamber, the folks that have joined us, um, the lending and financial partners, which really is a testament to, to Andre and his team and his legacy of all the development that he’s done. Uh, the folks from Choice Hotels are here. If they would raise their hand, I’ll lose you in the back. We have Joe, who is the leader of the Choice Hotel, sys the choice, comfort in hotels system. So great to have you with us. Uh, I wanna thank some people particularly too personally here. You’ve met Mike Clinger. He raised his hand. We have a lot of our people here that worked really, really hard with Andre to get this right. Andre did the hard work. We came in behind him and tried to fill in where our responsibility of opening up a great hotel. But I’ve got Sandra Lucas here. I saw Sandra and her husband, Sandra’s in charge of revenue for about two thirds or a third of our portfolio of 36 hotels. Uh, Adam, Adam, where are you? Adam Hill. Adam is the back. Adam is the vice President of operation for this hotel. Reports to Andre about the hotel. Uh, Whitney Ties is Whitney is in the back. Whitney’s our, our chief commercial officer and senior vice president, also an owner along with Mike and I, Mike Pinger. You’ve met, uh, Matthew Hoffman, who I hope all of y’all have met, is the general manager of this great hotel, the back, Dina Hansen, who everybody needs to beat tonight because we want her to book business with you. She’s our director of sales of both of our hotels. And part of the remarks I’ll make is about, you know, why Sandford, we’re the first hotel, I guess this close to the airport anyway. I know there’s a couple of other hotels in the market, but we don’t pay a lot of attention to those. I’m sorry if I’m offending some of the owners and general managers that are here, but that’s the truth. Uh, the airport’s booming. Andre’s had this in his line of sight for a long time and waited for the time to be right. Uh, it’s always difficult building a hotel. It’s always difficult putting a great amount of equity down and then a year, a year and a half of, of painful getting it to the birth thing, right? Yeah. Not nine months, but a true year and a half. So we thank you for that. We thank all of our partners that are here. Thank you very much for showing up. This hotel I mentioned a little earlier, has a lot of amenities, whether it’s our shuttle to the airport, whether it’s the outdoor pool, the cabana, um, the, if you haven’t seen the exercise room, we have 36 hotels. Many of them are larger than this. None of them has an exercise room that has the quality touches and is as large as that. We’re gonna be super attracted to sporting groups that are going to Baba. We’re excited about joining and, and partnering with them. I, I will tell you, as Andre built this hotel, it was all about the messaging of getting it right for his family, our guests, and our team members. So it wasn’t just about Andre. He really made the decisions based on what, how he’s gonna be successful here is taking great care of our guests and great care of our team members. I hope you all will come back. Join us lots and lots in your relatives here, your colleagues here, your weddings, events here. So thank you very much. It is really my honor. Now to introduce you to Andre Hickman, who is the developer of this property. Probably many of you know Andre. He, he’s done several other ventures in this market. We have another great hotel. We operate him for him in Sanford. But it really is just an honor and a pleasure to be here with y’all to do this grand opening. Uh, again, it was so thoughtful and so intentional. When you walk around, those things don’t happen by accident. Those things happen because this gentleman here was thoughtful about it and really tried to produce the best hotel he could in this market. So thank you very much. It was great talking to a lot of y’all. Tonight I’ll let Andre take takeover.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot live at the grand opening of the Comfort Inn & Suites, Orlando Sanford Airport here with the owner Andre. Andre, passion project, multi-year project. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears coming. We’re here finally at the grand opening, the ribbing front. How are you feeling right now?
Andre Hickman:
I’m ecstatic. Yeah, it’s been a long time in the making from the first phone call to finding the property and signing the franchise and, and, uh, just very blessed to be here today.
Ryan Embree:
A lot of choice representation, because this is really a star property for the comfort brand. Talk to us about the words I keep hearing is intentionality, very deliberate on all the amenities where even things you were talking about in your speech over here about even where parking spaces were. Talk to us about, you know, the passion behind this project and why you wanted to make it so intentional and so deliberate.
Andre Hickman:
Well, it was a labor of love a lot of years in the making. Yeah. Uh, we’re near the airport and so we did a little bit of theming with the, the metal and the, and the airplane wings and the, the portico. Uh, we did a lot of extra features. We, we had another com We have another comfort in in Sanford, and I wanted to do things a little different. Yeah. And so I went bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger. So bigger pool, bigger deck, barbecue grill area, bigger lobby, taller ceilings, bigger rooms, bigger bathrooms. Um, we wanted to do a walk-in shower. I really don’t like curtains and, and glass doors. And I said, you know, if we can make a, a walk-in shower and a comfort in, that’d be quite a feat. And so a lot of design work, and we’re really pleased with how it came out.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I love doing these types of episodes and grand openings and talking to owners like yourself because you don’t get these stories sometimes in the background of the labor of love, like you speak of in the background. Now I’m a resident of Seminole County, here in Oviedo, but we’re here in Sanford, just right up the road, yet a couple Sanford City officials here, also welcoming this new business. Talk about, uh, the special place in your heart and location. Just, just a couple miles from the airport closest actually to the airport right now.
Andre Hickman:
We’re very fortunate to have county and city commissioners here today. Several choice representatives. Flew in to see the new hotel. Uh, we’re here by the airport. We had some airport folks here. It’s, uh, quite a, quite a unique spot because we’re located almost halfway between the Sanford Airport entrance as well as the Boomba Sports Complex. Yeah. And I think we’re in a unique spot to, to hopefully capture, uh, visitors from both those markets.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. That’s what you want. And it is the, uh, be able to attract all in every segment. Um, congratulations here on this project, Andre. Again, labor of love. It turned out perfect. We’ll let you get back to your grand opening party. Thank you so much for visiting with us.
Andre Hickman:
Thank you.
Speaker 4:
Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. We are here at the grand opening at the Comfort Inn and Suites, Orlando Sanford Airport here with Wayne West, the third. Wayne, we saw you out in Hunter a couple years, uh, weeks, months ago. In Atlanta. Here we are in Sanford, Florida. Beautiful property opening up here. Tell us a little bit about this project.
Wayne West III:
Well, this is the second project for this owner we’ve operated for, for 25 years. Great owner. Takes great care of the guest, take great care of my team members, and obviously build a beautiful hotel. And the word I will use for Andre Hickman, the owner developer, is that it was so thoughtful about this property and every little nuance of it is intentional to take great care of the guest. Whether it’s a sports team coming into the boom by complex, or whether it’s distressed gas staying at the airport, which is only quarter of a mile away, the airport entrance. He was just so intentional and so thoughtful about every aspect of the property at his own expense. Yeah. He really put a lot more into this than the typical choice hotel.
Ryan Embree:
We talked right now, we talked at Hunter about, right now it’s about strategic growth for Newport and it needs to be the right partner.
Wayne West III:
Yeah.
Ryan Embree:
Why was this project and this owner the right project for you at Newport?
Wayne West III:
Well, actually we’ve been blessed enough to, to work for Andre for 25 years. When he started talking about this three years ago, he involved us from the very beginning. He was, he would come out to the site and look at it. He would talk about what the drivers were going to be, what he wanted to do to take care of those drivers. And frankly, he needed to be financially successful, but he’s put a tremendous amount of equity time and energy and effort into this to get to this product. Yeah. So he is a perfect partner for us. He’s a perfect partner for Seminole County. He’s a perfect partner for all the business around him.
Ryan Embree:
It’s absolutely beautiful property. Very unique. Like I said in his speech, he was actually talking about, you know, using some dry erase on some parking lots. That’s how, you know, how intentional and deliberate each decision there. We love that in hospitality, right. ’cause sometimes now they get accused of just the big box hotel. This certainly doesn’t fit that bill.
Wayne West III:
No. And I think if you would talk to the choice people, this is the showcase for them though. This is an example of an owner that did it right.And in some cases, what above and beyond their brand standards, just to make sure the guests are taken great care of.
Ryan Embree:
Love to see it, continue to see those guest expectations elevated and love to see. Can’t wait to see the feedback that everyone gets. Appreciate you taking the time to spend some time.
Wayne West III:
Great to do that. Thank you again. Good being with you.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot at the Comfort Inn & Suites Orlando Sanford Airport here with Adam. Adam, thank you so much for taking the time. Wonderful project, beautiful property. Just spoke to Wayne about really the high level relationship between ownership and Newport Hospitality Group. You’re the boots on the ground. You’re a little bit closer to the project. Talk to us a little bit about the story. ’cause it, you know, it didn’t just spread out of the ground. That’s a labor of love, right?
Adam Hill:
This project is probably 10 plus years in the making. I mean, the Hickman family, started one of the drawing board literally over 10 plus years ago. It’s one of our longest standing partners. They’ve been with Newport for almost 30 years. So for them to take this and do it, I mean, Andre painstakingly worked over the plans. They were written. I came on board about three years ago. And I was like, we’re never gonna get this over the finish line. So then we went from the site and we started with moving some dirt excavating, getting the walls up, moving it. And I mean, the project has just come to life in the last two and a half years. It’s ridiculous. But I mean, just to see all the love and hard work that the Hickman family have put into it is just amazing. This is probably the best choice product out there. You’re not gonna see a Comfort Inn like this. It’s very unique for 107 rooms, all the square footage, every room is meticulously designed to be exceptional.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely an incredible story. A beautiful property here. 10 plus years in a challenging environment. Right now for hospitality. Talk to us about, you know, having that communication with ownership with the contractors, making sure even the GM, the agent, the director of sales, who’s probably planning these rooms before the hotel’s even open, trying to get some groups in here. So talk us through a little bit about that process and how that communication is key to.
Adam Hill:
So I think we’re very fortunate in this market. I mean, like I said, we’ve been here almost 30 years. We’ve established great grounds, great roots with the businesses that are here. We knew that the businesses were gonna grow. Even during COVID, this hotel did not suffer. I mean, this hotel did extremely well. And they’re talking about our sister hotel in the market. But, so when we knew when this room was gonna be built, we knew with Boomba right here, the airport growing, there was an opportunity. We seized that opportunity. I know there’s several other hotel projects that were planned. They’ve never got off the ground. We got this off the ground and I mean, we were able to get the financing behind it. We were able to get a solid GC that had never built a hotel before. And I mean, this is a hotel that a GC did not ever built. So I mean, it was a very, like, the stars aligned. We got a perfect team. So just tremendously happy with how it happened.
Ryan Embree:
The excitement was matched. We had a couple representatives from the city of Sanford talking about this property and it was equally matched because they’re excited about the airport being right here. And that’s gotta be great for the location. How is that kind of working with the city in tandem with them to help a project like this move across the finish line?
Adam Hill:
So I, again, our partnership extends beyond just the Newport team. So Dena serves on the Seminole County Chamber of Commerce board of Directors. We have Andre who serves on the sports district for Seminole County, so forth. So we’re very connected. We’re a very community partner. We make sure that we’re very active in our community by giving back. So, I mean, that’s opened a lot of doors for us too, where we don’t really have a major challenge of getting our head in with city leaders. ’cause we give back at the communities that we work in.
Ryan Embree:
Love that. That’s hospitality at its core, right? So, Adam, appreciate it. Congratulations on the property. Congratulations on the project. Biggest celebration for you as well. We’ll let you get back to it. Thank you so much for joining us.
Adam Hill:
Thank you. I appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot at the beautiful Comfort Inn and Suites Orlando Sanford Airport here with Dena, Director of Sales. You have now become the envy of every director of sales in this area. ’cause you have the nicest, most beautiful property here. Thank you for having us at your grand opening and ribbon cutting. Talk to us about this passion project. It’s just absolutely gorgeous here. Here we are in the lobby.
Dena Hansen:
Thank you. Well, thank you for coming and celebrating with us. Our property has really been built and created by design for those travelers coming in, not only for cruises, but the sports teams that are traveling in. We are about a mile from Boombah Sports Complex, and they have a lot of different tournaments, whether it’s baseball, lacrosse, field hockey, so lots of comfort here. We have 107 rooms. Most of them are double queens. Again, thinking of those families coming in, and I like to say it’s like Texas over here. Everything’s bigger. The pool is bigger, the deck is bigger. There’s a cabana with some lounge seating. There are two barbecue grills with patio seats as well. So if you don’t wanna go out and spend that money on food at a restaurant, uh, you’re welcome to go to Publix, which is two miles down the road, grab some food and just grill it up and have a good time.
Ryan Embree:
What type of traveler segment are you really getting interest from and like, inquiries for groups?
Dena Hansen:
Yeah. So in the beginning, a lot of wedding blocks, a lot of reunions, obviously a lot of sports blocks coming in for boombah but most recently the word has gotten out from corporate companies and they’re wanting some corporate rates. They wanna utilize our meeting space. So it’s, it’s kind of ebbs and ebb and flows a little bit. But very exciting.
Ryan Embree:
This location has really been starved for something here. We had a couple of city officials here that were talking about this and so happy they were equally as excited to be opening this up because the airport is growing so much. What is some of the feedback that you’ve been hearing? You’ve already have some guests in here we’ve seen coming in and out of the lobby doors. What is some of the feedback that you’ve been hearing so far from maybe the individual travelers and then maybe some of the groups that you’ve hosted here as well?
Dena Hansen:
Yeah. So positive feedback all around. I don’t think I’ve heard one negative thing about the hotel. They enjoy the space. They love the pool area, especially for families that have littles. There’s a sun shelf on the pool. So it’s easier for them to watch the kids. Just the extra space and how wide and open and comforting everything is is amazing. Somebody actually said they love our sheets.
Ryan Embree:
Okay. Yeah. That’s a new one too. Awesome. Well, I wanna wrap up by just talking about maybe the relationship that as a DOS you gotta have really good relationships and connections with local businesses. Obviously the community. Seminole County, I’m a resident of Seminole County, right down the road. So, talk to us a little bit about how you’ve been able to build those and give back to the community and how they’ve supported you, and vice versa.
Dena Hansen:
Yeah. So, not only are we a part of both Seminole County Chamber and the Sanford Chamber. I’m on the board of Directors for the Sanford Chamber as well. And doing that it is really all about building the relationships, maintaining contact and just helping each other out and partnering together. That’s really what it’s about. So if, if they need a meeting space, we actually house the Sanford Chamber breakfast, weekly breakfast meetings for Q3. We’ll be here every Wednesday from 7:30AM – 9:00AM. Shameless plug. But yeah, relationship building, it’s mandatory. Nobody wants to do business with somebody you don’t know. You wanna know that you’re gonna be taken care of. And when you walk through those doors, I guarantee you from the moment you step through to the moment you leave, we have you.
Ryan Embree:
That’s hospitality.
Dena Hansen:
Living hospitality at its best at Comfort Inn & Suites Orlando Sanford Airport.
Ryan Embree:
Dena, thank you so much. Thank you. Congratulations. We’ll let you get back to the party here. Thank you. And celebrate this incredible property.
Dena Hansen:
Thank you very much.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The next stop on the Suite Spot Road Trip takes travelers to Delray Beach, Florida, to visit the newly re-imagined property, Hyatt Place Delray Beach, with special guest and General Manager of the hotel, Taylor Wauhob.
This recently renovated property boasts incredible ocean views, robust F&B, newly designed interiors, and an attractive location that supplies plentiful fun for the whole family.
Tune in now to hear the full episode and why Hyatt Place Delray Beach should be your next vacation destination.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, here for another edition of the Suite Spot Road Trip. We are here down south, just a bright line trip away from our TMG headquarters at the Hyatt Place, Delray Beach, a beautiful property, which I’m so excited to talk about and showcase today, with the general manager, Taylor. Taylor, thank you so much for hosting us here at your Hyatt Place.
Taylor Wauhob:
Thank you so much for having me. It’s such an honor to be on the show and really excited to tell you about Delray and show off our property.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a beautiful property. It’s an incredible location. I can’t wait to get all into it, but in hospitality, we love a good story, right? We love talking about experiences. We come from different brands. Sometimes we fall into the industry, sometimes we went to school for it. So share a little bit us about your professional journey and the hospitality career that brought you here to the Hyatt Place.
Taylor Wauhob:
Absolutely. My journey into hospitality was certainly unexpected. I got a job at a front desk during college, just needed something to do in the downtime.
Ryan Embree:
Heard that before.
Taylor Wauhob:
Yeah, it’s something to keep me doing the right thing. And I fell in love with it. I was really nervous stepping into it. It’s a lot of guest interaction and I was a little shy at the time, so I wasn’t sure how it would go, but I really loved it. And I didn’t know what life after college was gonna look like for me. So I decided to just invest fully in that role and see where it took me. And thankfully I worked for a management company that really invested in internal growth. And so just a few weeks before graduation, I was offered a role as a manager in training. And I was excited to have an idea of what my future would look like. So I pursued that and I’ve moved all around the country I had with that company, and it eventually brought me to Florida where I finally felt like, all right, this is a good spot to put down some roots. I found Kolter Hospitality, which has such a beautiful portfolio, so I really liked the opportunity to grow within a company without having to leave the state of Florida. So I started here two years ago and this is where we’re at now.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s incredible and a true reflection on the transferable skills of hospitality. You really can go wherever across the country, and then you end up at a beautiful property like this. Well, congratulations. The property recently underwent a complete renovation, a complete design reimagination. Obviously those story, there’s always a story with those, right? Sometimes headaches, but they’re passion projects that end up looking like this, like we have here. Tell us a little bit about the renovations, what guests love about it, and then maybe personally what you love about it.
Taylor Wauhob:
Yeah, absolutely. I think I started at the perfect time. I came into the property about three months before the renovation was gonna start. So I got to see peak season at this property pre-renovation which was certainly a challenge. It was an older hotel. There was some condition challenges that we were facing, but I also got to see the guests who still loved this property, even despite that. So it was great to interact with that clientele and then be here through the whole process. And I’m really thankful that I still have over 50% of my team from pre-renovation.
Ryan Embree:
That’s amazing.
Taylor Wauhob:
Yeah. It is, it is no easy feat. Anybody who’s been through it knows that you hope to never do it again, but it was certainly worth it. So it was really cool to see this all come together. I think it’s really easy to look at the individual items and kind of think how is this gonna come together as a design. But the designer did an incredible job. It’s got a really coastal feel now, and I love that it really fits Delray Beach. There’s no other Hyatt place that you’re gonna walk into and have this design or feel this kind of property way. So it’s been really nice to see our guests come in and be so pleasantly surprised at the changes and just how much it fits the area now.
Ryan Embree:
Any elements that you particularly like?
Taylor Wauhob:
It’s bright and it’s airy, which I absolutely love. But my favorite is our bar. We’ve got such a beautiful light fixture over that bar. With big open windows, so you can see everybody walking around downtown. And it’s just a really great draw right there.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a unique property for a unique location. And I had the opportunity yesterday evening to walk around. We were talking about, you wouldn’t even known it was a Tuesday night. It felt the energy, the vibe, the feel felt like a weekend. There were kids playing in the green areas and families, there was nightlife going on. I think I walked by a couple live bands that we’re playing as well. Paint a picture for those who aren’t familiar with Delray Beach about the location of this property because you’re steps away from a lot of of great, just nightlife and food and beverage, everything.
Taylor Wauhob:
Well, you summed it up really well. You can go for a stroll, you wouldn’t know what day of the week it was, and you wouldn’t know who lives in the area. Really, it’s a little bit of everything. It’s such a great draw for families, for college students, for retirees. If you just walk from here to the beach, it’s a mile away in that walk. You’re gonna hit every kind of cuisine you could imagine. The best seafood, of course, you’re gonna hit great bars that have patios, live music, outdoor games or rooftops with coastal views. You’re gonna pass by all kinds of different events. There’s comedy shows, there’s concerts, there’s the retro arcade where kids and families can hang out, but you can still grab a drink and hang out for the day. Great boutique clothing stores, every kind of gelato and ice cream you can imagine. So just so much lively stuff going on. It’s really great.
Ryan Embree:
Very cool. And obviously nightlife, food and beverage, big draws to this area, but great for events as well. When people are coming in. Groups that come in behind us here is the front desk. I’m sure one of the most common questions is come in and you’re like, Hey, where’s the best place to eat? What is some of your staff saying? And then maybe, what are some of the food and beverage options you mentioned the bar before that you offer here on site for guests?
Taylor Wauhob:
Well, we always try to make sure that we’ve got something for our guests who come in and they just wanna be able to unwind here and not have to step out. As much as we love Delray, we also want them to be comfortable just on property. So we do have a really great small menu, but it caters to a little bit of everything. We’ve got some good chicken caesar salads, some sandwich options, flatbreads, wings, you know, all the necessities. And some of those items are available 24/7, so if you’re coming in off a late flight, we’ve still got you covered. And then we’ve got our grab and go market, which has some great options as well. Fresh pressed juices and sandwiches and things like that. But outside of the property, there’s really too many options to count. But some of my favorites, we’ve got Geronimo’s that just opened up. It’s a new tequila grilling bar, a beautiful patio and awesome spot to hang out. We’ve got Gabriela’s, which is an amazing modern Italian restaurant. And then right next to that is Hyde Park Steakhouse, which is a little bit more elevated. They’ve got a live piano player in the evening sometimes. It’s a really cool environment.
Ryan Embree:
Oh, awesome. And again, just steps away from the properties location, which makes it really nice. Local events, obviously big occupancy drivers for the hotel as well. What are some of those bigger draws that get your guests and travelers here? And then maybe some of those events, local events that you might not know about those secret finds?
Taylor Wauhob:
Absolutely. So our biggest one of course, is gonna be the Delray Beach Tennis Open. Happens for two weeks every February. We are the premier location for that. We’re the closest in walking distance. Just a block away from here and even if you don’t like tennis or don’t know anything about it, as I don’t, it is so much fun to attend these events. This past year, this city of Delray actually started a window decorating contest. So all of the local businesses participate, and we set up these huge window displays. We didn’t win this year. We’ve got a little chip on our shoulder about it, so we’re coming back strong next year. But it’s really fun for everyone to participate and vote.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. And any kind of smaller local events that people might not know about?
Taylor Wauhob:
Yeah, absolutely. Again, we’re the best location for that too. Right across the street from us is the Arts Garage and Old School Square. So the Arts Garage is a really cool venue that offers comedy shows, live musicians, plays all kinds of different performances. It’s a really intimate venue that offers, you know, drinks. So you can hang out for a little bit before and after. And then Old School Square has an outdoor amphitheater, and then that huge lawn. One of my favorites is during Christmas time, they set up the 120 foot Christmas tree. And inside of it is Santa’s workshop, so it’s really fun for everybody to hang out and take pictures. It’s a good event.
Ryan Embree:
That’s awesome. People taking pictures, obviously sharing a lot of that on social media. You and your team done a great job on Facebook, Instagram, make sure you follow the Hyatt Place, Delray Beach there, social media presence. We talk about it all the time on this particular podcast about how important it is. Why do you think as a hotelier, who has managed multiple hotels. Why do you think it’s important for hoteliers to have a strong social media presence today? And how are guests kind of using this local area in their own social media feeds and maybe even the property?
Taylor Wauhob:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, it’s no secret that the new generation of travelers is looking more at things like social media, and they care more about that. And with things the way they are today, everything’s so expensive. If people are gonna take the time to invest in traveling, they’re no longer looking for just a hotel to stay at. And then to get out and experience the city. They want every aspect of their stay to be part of the experience. And so I think that’s where Instagram and all of social media becomes so important. They wanna see is the property gonna provide some sort of unique experience while I’m there in the evenings? And for our property specifically, I mean, it’s so easy to make it look good on social media. It’s just really beautiful property. And so it’s done a great job of highlighting all of the things that people can do. Even when they’re not in Delray, they can grab a drink at our bar and hang out in all of these really beautiful spaces and make the most of it. We’ve got a great second floor outdoor pool that has a really resort vibe to it. And so I think our guests see that. And a recent example, we had some girls stay here actually, and they put together a really cute video of them going through the hotel and unpacking and, and then their time throughout Delray. And it was cool to see them highlight and tag us in in that love
Ryan Embree:
That, I mean, that’s every marketer’s dream, right? They’re telling your story for you. For hoteliers that aren’t on that platform or aren’t kind of social listening, so to speak, they miss out on that opportunity. So it’s so important. And because again, your guests, when you have a property like this, your guests are engaging with you and they might be doing a great job of telling your story. And other travelers want to hear guest experiences too. You know, of course we love to take our pictures of our properties that look the best it’s ever looked right and our nicest meals. But that real authentic, I know that’s a term we throw around a lot, but to get that real world authentic experience,
Taylor Wauhob:
And they’re always gonna see it differently than we see it.
Ryan Embree:
A hundred percent.
Taylor Wauhob:
So, you know, my favorite part of the hotel might not be what the guests are loving the most. So it’s really cool to see what they’re experiencing and loving about our property.
Ryan Embree:
And that learning can translate to other things, right. You start to see that there’s a particular area of the hotel being showcased a lot on social media. Maybe you add something there. Maybe there’s a programming or an element that you add there to even amplify that even more. So I’ve heard some incredible stories. That was a great example that you had there. I saw on your Instagram recently that the properties Instagram recently, I wanna get this right, that you guys received the Hyatt 2025 Commercial Team of the Year Essentials Awards. Congratulations to you and your team.
Taylor Wauhob:
Thank you so much.
Ryan Embree:
Talk to us a little bit about that award and what it means to you as general manager.
Taylor Wauhob:
Oh gosh. Coming off of a renovation year. It means so much to get that award. I mean, this team just, went through a lot with the renovation. It’s incredibly difficult. So renovation was 2024. We received this award for the 2025 year, which our first year outta renovation coming outta that reno, the market didn’t know who we were. We were essentially a brand new property. We didn’t know who we were or how we wanted to establish ourselves. So we really had to come together as a team and decide what do we wanna be in this market? And so we put in a great deal of effort to make sure that we were the friendliest hotel in the market. So, you can stay anywhere. You can pay for a clean room, you can pick any hotel within walking distance of this area. But what sets us apart is our team and the effort that they put in. So to kind of rebuild our reputation, earn back the market share that we had lost during renovation, and prove to the market once again that we are a premier destination to receive this ward was just showing us that all of our efforts did not go unseen. So it was really great to be able to celebrate what that meant with the team and feel like we earned it.
Ryan Embree:
It’s amazing. And shown through your leadership with the retention of the employees too, to see through that, obviously challenging time, but to be on the other side of it and then to reap the rewards of that award. So congratulations on that. But to speak to your point, and I think, you know, it’s a great lesson for hoteliers to kind of find that north star and encompass of who you are. And even if it’s to the detail of we want to be the friendliest, that might not be an award necessarily that you’re, that you’re winning, in a market like Friendliest Hotel. But if you get buy-in from your team on that can really, again, act as kind of a compass or North Star.
Taylor Wauhob:
Absolutely. I mean, I can’t be here every day. I can’t interact with every single guest. So knowing that my team is carrying out that vision, and still moving forward in that direction, even when I’m not here, it just, it makes a world of difference and they really earned it.
Ryan Embree:
So cool to see. So we always like to wrap up with a few fun, like rapid fire questions. So get to get to know you, get to know the property location a little bit better. So you mentioned it. Favorite view at the property?
Taylor Wauhob:
Oh, favorite view. Room 413.
Ryan Embree:
Okay, we got the room. The first room number that I’ve heard on this question.
Taylor Wauhob:
It’s got beautiful floor to ceiling windows in a curved wall in the living room that looks out, out in all of downtown Delray Beach. And you can see beautiful sunrises from that room. It’s amazing. Great for bridal parties.
Ryan Embree:
I like it. 413, remember that. It’s a little tip, but a note. Favorite signature drink or dish, either at a local spot or here at the property?
Taylor Wauhob:
Okay, well I’ve got two then. So if you’re on property right now, we’ve got our spring collection. Cocktails and mocktails. My favorite right now is the lavender lush mocktail. It’s actually great. Really refreshing. And then Rocka Hula is a new restaurant in town. They have the coolest custom cocktails. I mean, shock and Instagramable. This is the place to go. It’s really great.
Ryan Embree:
Okay. We’ll have to check that out. Favorite piece of art or design? At the property or around Delray Beach?
Taylor Wauhob:
I would say our elevator landing. We’ve got a really cool octopus mural. It’s beautiful. Everybody loves to take pictures right there. It’s my favorite.
Ryan Embree:
See, that’s one of those places you could see on Instagram. Probably. Favorite fun fact about the property. I always like asking this question ’cause there’s just so much. I always get some really unique answers that if you never ask you’ll never find out.
Taylor Wauhob:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So everybody thinks the big draw for Delray is Atlantic Avenue, which is one of them. But we are also located right here on Pineapple Grove. Which is a historic arts district, but back in the 1900’s it actually used to be Pineapple Farms. And it was second only to Hawaii in production. And so now it’s famous for that. There’s a sign on both ends that says Pineapple Grove.
Ryan Embree:
I saw that.
Taylor Wauhob:
Yeah. Yeah. There’s all the lights on the streets, so it’s really beautiful.
Ryan Embree:
Very cool. Okay. See the fun fact learning stuff. So as we wrap up today, you know, I ask you as general manager, newly renovated property, just got that award. You spoke a little bit about to it, but what, what’s the lasting impression as people kinda walk out through this lobby that you hope to impart on departing guests and what they remember about their experience here?
Taylor Wauhob:
I think it coincides really well with Delray Beach. People come to Delray, who have never been here before, and they’re very surprised by it because, you know what to expect from Fort Lauderdale or West Palm, but you come here and it’s got all of the nightlife and activity that you would want from a big city while still having this really small town charm to it and they call it The Village by the Sea, and it really lives up to that. So I love that guests leave Delray feeling pleasantly surprised and they feel the same way from our property as well. And that’s always my goal at least. But they really come in expecting a standard Hyatt place. Tons of people have stayed at a Hyatt place. But we’re very different than that. And so people show up and they’re excited at something new and then they get that same experience from Delray and they walk away just feeling like they got so much more than they ever expected. So that’s always our goal to impart on our guests when they leave.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, really appreciate you hosting us. You’ve got a beautiful property. Thank you. Incredible location. You know, again, you and your team are are knocking it out of the park here.
Taylor Wauhob:
Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
We hope to be back soon. Thank you so much, Taylor for taking some time with us.
Taylor Wauhob:
Absolutely. We’d love to have you again for a little vacation.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks for joining us on the Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
On May 31 – June 2, in NYC, the industry-defining NYU International Hospitality Industry Investment Conference is taking place. In this Suite Spot episode we are pulling back the curtain on what to expect at this year’s landmark event. Joining us on the Suite Spot is Alexi Khajavi, President of Hospitality, Travel, and Real Estate at Questex.
In this exclusive preview, Alexi breaks down the 2026 NYU IHIF agenda and shares why this year’s gathering is more critical than ever for hospitality leaders, hoteliers, and investors.
Tune in now.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree here with another hospitality event preview with a very familiar guest, very excited about this conversation. It’s spring, so right around the corner, we know what’s next, one of the premier events of the hospitality event calendar. Here to talk with me, a frequent guest, Alexi Khajavi, Questex, President, Hospitality and Real Estate. Alexi, thank you so much for joining me again here on the Suite Spot.
Alexi Khajavi:
Ryan, great to see you. Great to be back.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, it has been too long since we last spoke. We were out in Denver together at the Hospitality Show there on stage. Alexi, you were talking about everything that happened over the course of an entire year. I feel like from October to where we sit right now, in the middle of spring, it’s felt like a complete change. Whirlwind. I’m not even sure if when this episode’s released how much there could be even more change, but since then, so ground us. Give us a little sense of the state of hospitality and the sentence EE everything that you’re feeling right now.
Alexi Khajavi:
What we saw each other end of October in Denver, just at the conclusion of the hospitality show. And I guess, yeah, to your point, every day is, like an like a year or or seven years for that matter. So, six months on I mean, some consistencies, and I suppose the consistency is the volatility just in the geopolitics, macroeconomics, local state of affairs. And that does have a knock on effect on, on tourism and hospitality certainly. But some of the themes are consistent and that is that it is a, a continued challenging operational environment. rev pars have which we talked about rev pars, we were starting to see some normalization after they had been really on a only an up into the right performance for the prior three years. We started seeing that slowing down in Q3, Q4 of last year. And that has continued. One of the, the aspects, and a lot of people are talking about it, is a Ks shaped economy. And so you’re still seeing some, some interesting and pretty exciting, RevPAR ADR growth on the luxury side of that upper part of the K, if you will. And in the lower K of the market, you’re, you’re seeing increasing and continued challenges. Right? And I think everyone is sort of asking two questions around that, which is one is how much more runway of growth does the luxury market have? And then in on, on the sort of upper upscale midscale and economy, is the economic conditions going to encourage a trading down of the consumer. Speaking to David Pepper, for example, from Choice yesterday, they are seeing some positive RevPAR growth in that upper upscale, which, they’ve got a lot of hotel stock in. So I think the question is and we’re seeing some data that the customer is still traveling. They still see both on the leisure sh leisure side from the experience economy, travel as not being discretionary and not being something that they’re willing to give up, but something that they may trade down for make it more economical, domestic tourism, and drive to staycations those types of things versus the international travel, which certainly was in demand for the last three years. Corporate travel, I think that’s, that’s directly tied to GDP and the economy. But again, corporate travel has actually been coming back. It lagged leisure tourism recovery. So that’s been, performing quite well. Again, business is done face to face. It’s why we do live events in the, in, in, in the sectors in which we serve. So, continued operational challenge, questions around demand, a lot of impact from AI on demand, and how that demand is coming to your brand.com or to your property website, how they’re searching. SEO is in massive disruption. So, it’s not a typical recovery at this point. It’s, it’s fragmented, it’s bifurcated. It depends what part of the market you are in. There’s divergent recovery that’s sort of replacing that, that high tide lifts all boats. That uneven demand is translating into really kind of diversity of performance. And so it depends what markets you’re in. So the operating side is, is is tough. It is becoming harder and it is becoming more expensive. And yet there are some tools out there, AI and others, and technology generally that’s offering a lot of opportunity for optimization, efficiency, productivity in those areas, which will flow through to the bottom line. And then we’re also seeing, kind of a bifurcation in the capital markets. On, on, on the big side, there is a ton of capital that is chasing hospitality, moving from other asset classes whether it be office or retail or industrial. And they’re moving into hospitality for all the reasons that it’s operational real estate. It’s a tailwind market from the experience economy, despite the fact that we are cyclical, right? It goes up and down, but there’s a ton of liquidity. There’s a, there’s a wall of money that’s chasing, the asset class ranging from your owner operator franchisee, which is looking to grow from three properties to 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, whatever it may be, to institutional capital, which really never looked at a hospitality in general. So that’s creating more diversity in the type of investors which is coming into the market. So again, all of that challenge could unlock the transaction market. And then with those transactions, we see this regeneration of capital CapEx is deployed, and that’s really good for the industry. I mean, nobody likes to see falling net operating incomes, in running hotels. But that being said, it means that people have to be hyper-focused on how to run those hotels more efficiently. Why we run the hospitality show. And at the same time, NYU coming up, a lot of new capital coming into the market, a lot of capital chasing that, trying to figure out where the deals are, where to deploy that capital. And again, that’s why we have events like IHIF EMEA in Berlin, which was a few weeks ago. And to your point, NYU IHIF coming up in five weeks.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so many storylines in our industry right now that we’re chasing. We’d even touch on the upcoming summer, summer World Cup and events like the Olympics here in a couple years that are also gonna have a massive shift in international travel, which has been down. So again, so many challenges, but also think opportunistic time right now in hospitality and being at a spot like NYU is one of those places to capture those opportunities, to learn more about that from your peers, to have those conversations. Networking, I mean, I’ll, I’ll turn our attention there with some impressive numbers from the event. 2200 delegates, 450 plus C-suite executives, 400 plus investors, and $132 billion in assets under management there. So it’s impressive, like I said, impressive feat and number that you have all gathered in, one of the hospitality meccas of the world, which is New York City. What makes this event different from other hospitality events, and why is it a really a can’t miss for, for hoteliers investors this year?
Alexi Khajavi:
Yeah, I would say it’s a couple of things. One which you touched upon, which is, New York City financial capital of the world, it is the gateway city for the us it is, a hospitality driven economy. But it’s also one of the most thriving, financial market economies, in the US and certainly the world as well. So, that if you were to think, where do you hold an investment forum in any sector, but for that matter, in hospitality, New York, no better place, right? The money is there, the banks are there, the professional services are there, the brokers are there and many of the, the top brands are on the Eastern Shore board from DC and Maryland, up to the city here. So, it is just simply having it in New York. Second, it’s got a 40 year history associated with the New York University and the School of Hospitality and the John Tisch Center of Hospitality. It’s the only event where a portion of every dollar and revenue spent there goes towards supporting the next generation of hospitality professionals. So, we continue to partner with NYU and the School of Professional Studies. There, it’s an incredible partnership, which we’re just privileged and delighted to continue. And the fact that labor and talent is a massive challenge for the industry that, that you’re, you’re supporting a school which is turning out some of the most talented future hospitality professionals in the world by attending or sponsoring that’s goodwill. And, and we’re just delighted to be able to support that. So, that, again, I think is another anchor for why NYU is just such a special event and is different from a lot of the other good events that are, that are out there. And then lastly, NYU is part of a global portfolio of hospitality investment forums. And so, we have our event in Berlin. We have an event in Manchester, UK. We have an event in Athens, Greece, which is focused on the branded resi and the resort, segment, which is international and frankly, one of the fastest growing segments in hospitality. And then we have our Asia event in Hong Kong. So, we’re able to still bring in that global capital, those global operators that want to do business, want to bring their brands, want to deploy capital, want to invest in the us. So it’s not just a New York show, it’s not just a US focused show, but it’s a North America event where how do operators, how do investors, and how does the ecosystem of professional services come in and facilitate and drive deals to invest in the US and North American hotel market and all those things coming together, make it vibrant, make it diverse, make it one of the most active deal making conferences in the circuit. It really is for the investors to connect, with each other, but also the rest of the segments and the stakeholders, as it’s very diverse and fragmented industry. So deals get done. I mean, it was just on a in a conversation, a few weeks ago talking about a deal that’s been, announced since then. But they met in New York last June and really kicked off those conversations there at New York. And that ultimately consummated in a deal, in the fourth quarter of, of, of last year. We know that that’s what our value proposition is, and we know that’s why people spend their time with us and invest in, in NYU and we expect it to be even more vibrant and active on the deal making side, this June. So it should be should be a good event.
Ryan Embree:
That’s why I was gonna say, I had the privilege of attending for the first time last year, and I think the biggest difference for me was just the energy and the buzzing, and it just, it felt like what you said, it felt like deals were moving forward, whether that was the first time someone was connecting and networking, or whether it was something where these, these deals are not done in a vacuum or a silo that they take time, they take effort, and they take meetings like this, right? This connection, sometimes it’s, especially in a challenging market, can be the thing that brings a deal across the finish line. So it was palpable in the air when we were at that event last year. And it was a, it was a who’s who in hospitality too. You turned one way as a brand leader over here. Next is a president of asset management company. It really was an an extremely impressive event. I wanna get your thoughts, Alexi. You mentioned the sister events, the IHIF emea, which just wrapped up here at the end of March, obviously completely different markets that we’re talking about, but I still think holistically, there’s probably some lessons, feedback and sentiment that you could probably share that will translate into NYU, right? And some of those themes that are gonna make it there. What was your kind of, I guess, overall sentiment about the event and how just the energy and hotelier’s feeling was around that event?
Alexi Khajavi:
Yeah, I mean to go back to the start of the podcast, every day, there’s been something else. There’s been a, a ton of volatility in the market, a lot of uncertainty in, in the world. We still have a, a conflict, going on in, in Europe with, Ukraine and Russia. We now have a conflict happening in the Middle East. You’ve got macroeconomic conditions of still tariffs and the inflation that is causing interest rates still remain elevated, albeit they’ve, they’ve come down, over the last sort of 12 months. Elevated however, to historical, all of that creates uncertainty in the market. And as an investor said in, in Berlin, we can, we’re very good at penciling in risk and quantifying, the impact of that risk on both present day valuation. And a 20 year IRR, what is harder to pencil in is volatility and uncertainty. The certainty of risk is fine because you can quantify, the impact that that risk will have on the business. What you can’t is the uncertainty. And so with that, what we saw in Berlin, however, is that really is driving a lot of engagement around the expertise and the speakers and the sessions. We really pride ourselves on not having the same speakers every year saying the same things. We always leave a portion of our programs sort of unfinished, if you will, or, started but un unfinished because, because of that volatility in the market. So we saw a huge amount of engagement with people in the, in the sessions, in the rooms, which is interesting because at the end of the day, it is a deal making conference. And people are in meeting rooms, they’re up in suites they’re in the lobby and they’re, they’re engaging with each other, they’re there to do business. But we saw a lot of engagement, increased engagement with the sessions that we had. We then saw those individuals that were in a session often go out of the session and engage with each other and engage with speakers. And so one of the things that we’re doing is creating content fueled networking. So, a session will then lead to a round table where the speakers will stick around and the delegates or the folks that were in that session as an audience are able to then continue that conversation and go deeper and get into an actual conversation rather than just sort of a q and a that’s, that’s tagged on at the end. So it really created a, I think, a huge amount of engagement and peer-to-peer conversations. And really, I think people seeking a perspective. When, when you’re in a volatile market, really the most important thing you can do is to, to talk to your peers, to talk to your competitors, to talk to your mentors and get different perspectives to try and create some fidelity of what didn’t work or what has working, or what are the things that you’re trying out that’s really exciting. I mean, we really love that because, an open market, a transparent market, and an engaged market on the buy side and the sell side is a more informed market. Everybody needs that, right? It just makes markets more efficient. It make every, makes everybody better operators, and it creates a transparency as to where those opportunities are. And that’s, that is a, a tide that does lift all boats. The other thing I would say, Ryan, is, is that there’s always this question in an, an investment forum, like IHIF, like NYU as to what the sentiment is. And we’ve been tracking investor sentiment for the last five years now, since, January of 2020, which was an interesting time to first sentiment. Yeah. And it’s interesting because it certainly went down during COVID, no news flash there. It quickly rose up from 22 to 21 to 24, and then it’s leveled off since then. And it’s kind of just, a few index points gone, gone up or down depending on all of this volatility Liberation day last year, which was the first day of April, if I’m not mistaken, which was actually right during IHIF was created a lot of pessimism. It, however, was replaced with some optimism as interest rates fell down. So the sentiment to that question was, was actually quite positive. I think maybe through just the density of volatility or the consistency of volatility. People are somewhat getting used to it and separating noise from substance. And, and really there are the, there are more deals coming to market. We are seeing a diversification of capital coming into the market, lot of high net worth, lot of family office, a lot of institutional capital, sovereign wealth pension funds. And what that’s creating is more demand. So you’re starting, when we talk to the brokers, you’re starting to see a number of underbids in terms of a mandate comes to the market. A transaction occurred, but there was 6, 7, 8 under bidders in that transaction that shows interest, it shows appetite and it shows that the bid ask gap to a certain extent is narrowing. Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean in all cases that valuations have come down. I think buyers would like them to, but at the end of the day, I think capital, and we’re seeing capital become more confident and have more conviction in the market, but that also there are regeneration opportunities through CapEx deployment, through repositioning and through other levers that they have to pull, that they can take an asset that is performing at x and through CapEx and better operations and better plans, better brand, make it X plus y. And that was really the sentiment coming out of Berlin that the market is opening up, that there is a diversity of capital coming into it that’s creating a lot more demand and through a number of different sort of challenges, or let’s just say realities on the operator side, you are seeing a higher interest in selling. And I think that that will start to, to narrow the bid ask gap and look the unlocking of the market. We’ve been waiting for it for two, three years. It’s been a challenging market, but I think everyone’s seeing some optimism. I think the wishlist is, is that we reduce the amount of volatility in the market, but that’s an uncontrollable from your and and my perspective, we don’t have much control of that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. But I think the industry’s skin is, is thickening to that, right? And we’ve talked about that, how it’s our new normal is the constant state of change. And I also think it’s something, I’m not sure if we’ve talked about or thought about this too much, but we really saw worst case scenario just six years ago of being like, where everything dropped to none. When we’re assessing risk, we’re a lot more battle test. This industry is a lot more battle tested than maybe previous than it had previously. So some of these uncontrollables, like you mentioned, that yes, they are headwinds, yes, they are challenges, but it’s those investors right now that see opportunities that assess that risk and say there could be some really, really great upside at a at a time right now. And one of the places also where there is a lot of uncertainty, but I would, I would almost phrase it in the sense of a, of a positive uncertainty is the impact that AI is gonna have on our business in the future. And the gains and dividends that we can yield from those have really just scratch the surface. And we talked about this, and I wanna bring that into the conversation ’cause it’s hard to not talk about it anymore, right? It, I think we don’t go a, a podcast episode without bringing it up and people filling out their bingo cards on AI and technology. But I want, I wanna take us back to where we were a year ago, and maybe we can do this an exercise. Alexi, what would you grade right now, our industry, which historically has been maybe on the lighter end of the spectrum of a technology adoption, but what would you, what grade would you give it? Because I think we’re at this weird inflection point where hoteliers and brands and management companies and really everybody’s starting to look and saying, alright, we’ve implemented some ai. Where are the dividends? Where are the results? How do I measure these successes? What, what grade would you give and how do you think we can improve there?
Alexi Khajavi:
You know, that’s a, that’s a great question because it’s not an easy one to answer. Sure and not to cop out of giving you a specific answer, I would give it a a non-applicable, because the reality is, is that technology as a whole, in terms of using technology as a tool to optimize the hospitality market, I would certainly give ourselves a c plus. I think that’s historically been where we have failed for many reasons, which we can we don’t need to go into right
Ryan Embree:
I one hundred percent agree with you. I think that’s where a lot of the hunger and the appetite and thirst for knowledge right now of why maybe there’s more engagement in those sessions than you’ve seen before, is because I think people are starting to, if they haven’t already started to understand the gravity of where we’re at in this inflection point and the massive disruption that this is going to cause and do not want to be left behind. And I think you’re right. There was a fascinating point you made in there about the GM and their role, and we all, the big fears around AI are, are AI replacing jobs? And I would say when it comes to hospitality, it could really upend what the, the role of a job, right? Your GM might start looking a lot more like the GM of 40 years ago when you first got into hospitality, or where you weren’t having to do those tasks. And we almost have to learn this new job. It might be the same title as general manager, but you’re doing completely different things, which is a fascinating topic to talk about because we’ve been training these young hospitality professionals in the way of what a GM is today. That role could look completely different here in the next three to five based on the, on the speed and acceleration of these, of AI tasks that they’re doing. So it, I could talk about it all the time. We do talk about it all the time, I feel like, but it’ll be very interesting to see that impact that it’s making. I wanna switch back to NYU, and this is one of my favorite questions because there’s so much intention in these, in these shows, and that’s why I love doing these episode, these preview episodes, because you get to, to learn all the work that goes in, you’ve told me before you start on these events, day after, sometimes even now hours after that first one ended. So this year’s theme sharpening the edge. Talk to us a little bit about how the team settled on this and, and the story behind it and how you’ve incorporated it into the programming a little bit.
Alexi Khajavi:
Yeah, I mean, sharpening the edge is, an ode to the investment, nature of the event. It’s a deal making conference and it’s in New York. And so it’s a very sort of public market Wall Street saying, where do you find your edge or where do you find your alpha compared to another investor? If all you’re doing is chasing, the broad returns of a market or an asset class for that much, or for that matter, then you’re, you’re gonna be, at the whipping end of the overall broader market. It’s not a good place to be in a volatile market like this. And it doesn’t drive the outsized returns that investors are looking for. So it really is a tip of the, the cap to where we are. We’re in New York, we have a lot of Wall Street, public Market, New York Stock Exchange, synergies there, Sarah Eisen from CNBC, comes up and moderates the CEO panel. Most of the CEOs head down for interviews, on Wall Street and CNBC and Squawk Box and so forth. And we have that partnership still with CNBC this year. So, but as you shift it to what’s happening in the capital markets as it relates to real estate and more specifically to hospitality, private equity has been the dominant capital type in hotel investment. And that’s been the case for the last decade. And today that’s really no longer the case. It’s PE is still extremely active, but it’s more diversified in terms of across investor types. So we’re seeing, again, as I said, family offices, high net worth, a lot of sovereign, a lot of institutional capital that is growing materially, that is looking to hospitality to, to deploy capital. And with that, you’re seeing a lot of opportunities around value add. PE is really your value add investor, right? They’re looking for an underperforming asset or an asset that has the ability to perform at a higher level that’s sharpening the edge, that’s driving alpha. And so PE is really looking at this as a great opportunity as institutional capital comes in and is looking for stable, more stable returns, securitized assets, and an annuity like return over a longer hold period. It’s a great opportunity for private equity to exit in a market in which it’s been tough to exit. That being said, global hotel and fund allocations in hospitality and real estate has been tough, but it’s growing and it’s coming back. And so you’ve got a lot more money coming back into the market. And, and that’s really, a positive thing. We having events across Asia, Europe, and the us it allows for us to drive that cross-border capital. US capital has been less active, but despite all the challenges, we still see a lot of, international capital, which wants to invest in the us. So that kind of diversification of capital is a real, real positive for the market. It, it means more liquidity, it means more exit opportunities to get off, on the off ramp for PE or any other investor. As more capital comes in, it offers more opportunities to exit. It provides or, or enables less sort of seasonality, if you will, in the marketplace, right? There’s less of that volatility in the marketplace as all as well. So really the sharpening the edge is about having the education, the networking, and the quality of people in the room that have the money are looking to deploy and know how to create alpha. Getting those individuals together to hear from each other, engage with one another, and ultimately, build relationships with the ecosystem that helps a deal get done, transact that transacts, underwrites that deal, and then drives that alpha from an operating value creation perspective. Those are the folks that are in the room at NYU.
Ryan Embree:
And you’re right in the middle of it. I mean, I remember waking up at the, the marquee and seeing Chris Nasetta on CNBC and a few hours later seeing him just a couple hundred feet up on stage in front of me. I mean, that’s the possibilities right there.
Alexi Khajavi:
And talking to people, right? I mean, this is the beauty of the hospitality industry is there’s really good people, right? They’re just, at the end of the day, you may be running a public company, and on TV, you’re sitting there talking to a franchisee of a Hampton that wants to meet the CEO. So it really kind of creates this very magical engagement where the fifth floor, sixth floor, seventh floor, eighth floor of the marquee are just a hive of activity with the best and the brightest from a franchisee to Chris Nasetta, to your point, there’s not many places that create that access and that transparency and cross engagement from such a diverse, but focused, sector, as NYU. So it’s a real, real special place to be.
Ryan Embree:
A thousand percent. And last year you used this forum to really get us fired up for some of the sessions in educations. And now you’re talking about, especially with your experience here earlier in the year, people being more open to that, being more thirsty and, and hungry for that information, looking up and down the programming. Because we know you spoke to last year the detail and depth that your team goes to create these panels, and sometimes even putting on stage opinions that differ, that go head to head to one another, to try to get that friction to try to get a rise out of that engagement. Looking up and down the agenda this year, which sessions, if you had to pick a few, do you have your eyes on?
Alexi Khajavi:
Well, there’s some, some obvious ones, but always at NYU, we’ve got some, some exciting ones as well. And the first one, our first session actually Monday morning, Anthony Scaramucci, the Mooch, who is an investor himself actually owns a restaurant as well, but certainly, podcaster and just an expert, on the economy, politics, the Trump administration having worked, I think 10 days, there, if I’m not mistaken. So, he’s gonna kick us off. We always have a marquee name that’s relevant to the industry, but he really has his finger on the pulse as to, one, what are all the geopolitics and the macroeconomics, in the overall state of the economy and the country, what impact is that having on the investment markets on where the opportunities are?
Alexi Khajavi:
And as he runs a restaurant what is he seeing? What does he think specifically of the hotel space? So I think that’s, again, that’s, that’s just not something that you get at any of the other hotel investment forums, but you get that and you’ll get it right, served with breakfast on Monday morning. So we kick off big and we kick off bold on Monday. Obviously Monday has, is a great day. We have the CEO council on Monday as well. Or sorry, the CEO panel that’s the five top brands, again, interviewed by Sarah Eisen, which they have a great rapport with. And that really does set the tone for what they’re seeing as the opportunities. Clearly they are on top of demand and where RevPAR and ADRs and occupancies are going, how they’re performing and what the differences are by chain scale. There will be a lot of conversation around how much gas in the tank does luxury have I’m sure you’ll hear differing views on that. And then are we gonna see a return to some of the midscale and upper upscale, as potentially people trade down but still travel and where’s economy, where’s extended stay? We’ve also seen these brands make some interesting investments in new concepts, graduate hotels, which is last year, yo hotels glamping and branded resi. That’s a big day. In fact, we’ve got a full day of content on branded resi with active developers developing properties right now that are branded resi mix of hotel, mixed use, retail, hospitality and so forth. And then capital markets. Capital markets our Cap Talks session is probably one of our most popular, and that’ll be a mix of both active US investors as well as foreign capital, international capital investors, sovereign Wealth, as well as private equity, which continue to look to deploy capital in the US.
Alexi Khajavi:
We then have Danny Meyer, who’s the founder, and CEO of Union Square Hospitality, Shake Shack. And obviously a number of other incredible Union Square restaurants in the city here. But and then you’ve got your breakouts where you will be focusing a lot on the investment development market. Asset management is a key thing, how do you drive Alpha through the operations of these hotels? So there’s a ton of content. We’ve left a lot of time for networking. We know that’s where the deal making is the eighth floor, which is the lobby level. We’ve extended the event to include the Broadway Lounge, which is this beautiful lounge overlooking Times Square. We’ll have, food and beverage in there throughout the days. Great space to network amongst all the delegates, including the ninth floor where we’ve got Marriott and Hilton taking that space. So it’s just a ton going on. And the program’s out, it’s 90% there. We still got a few couple of marquee names that we’re going to announce over the next few weeks. But really, if you’re gonna be, if you’re in hospitality, investment development and operations where you’re driving Alpha, there really is no other place to be on the first and 2nd of June. You’ve gotta be there.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I can attest to it again, first time last year have the privilege of attending officially announcing the Suite Spot will be back at NYU this year. We can’t wait. Our associate producer’s gonna be traveling with me this time. This is her first time. And there is even a first timers meet and greet that you do as well at the event, which I had the privilege of partaking in networking last year. What type of tips for any hoteliers investors that might be considering or even attending the first time, what, what one piece of advice would you drill down for this event as the best piece?
Ryan Embree:
I would definitely get on the app. I know that the serendipitous meeting, which to your point, you bump into the CEO of Hilton or Marriott for that matter, is great. And that’s, there’s good value in that, but we have about 70, almost 80% of all delegates are on the app. That’s great. And that’s a great place to find people and to be found and it also gives you all the other information as the agenda speaker bios, but it allows for you to reach out to other delegates. So I would definitely do, that’s, something that can be sometimes just overlooked or just not not done. And then I would go to the Sunday evening reception if it’s your first time that’s at the marquee, six o’clock, we get about 500 people there. A good mix of veterans and, and first timers. I would certainly do that. I would try and plan out your days ahead. It’s amazing how with all that, with all everything that’s going on, you can easily kind of get sidetracked. So if there are some sessions that you wanna see, you can bookmark them in the app and make sure that you, you don’t miss those. But, I would, get some sleep, stay hydrated and be prepared to have some full days of education, networking and just a whole lot of fun.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And some of the receptions that are after hours at the end of the day, are absolutely amazing too. And I know you have sponsors that kind of do that, sometimes onsite, sometimes offsite, encourage, those to attend that in full force as well. Hospitality, we definitely know how to, to host a party, that’s for sure. So Alexi, we appreciate you hosting us here on the Suite Spot and previewing this year’s 2026 NYU. We are counting down the days until June. Thank you again to my audience to learn more information. Obviously visit the website, make sure you register. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today, Alexi?
Alexi Khajavi:
No, just very much looking forward to seeing you there and the other 2400 people that will be joining us. So, looking very much forward to it. And appreciate your time.
Ryan Embree:
All right, thank you, Alexi. Thank you for listening to The Suite Spot and hope to see you at NYU in June in New York City. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell, with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this episode of the Suite Spot podcast, we’re heading to the prestigious Cecil B. Day School of Hospitality Administration at Georgia State University. We sat down with the school’s Director, Dr. Benjamin Lawrence, to go behind the scenes of one of the country’s top hospitality programs.
In this video, we explore:
- How Georgia State is shaping the next generation of industry leaders.
- The innovative curriculum driving modern hospitality education.
- Insights into the future of the hospitality profession.
Whether you’re a student, a professional, or just passionate about the industry, you won’t want to miss this deep dive into hospitality excellence!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot for another edition of our TMG Campus Crawl Series. We are here in the heart of downtown Atlanta at Georgia State with Dr. Ben Lawrence, Director of the Day School of Hospitality Administration. Thank you so much for hosting us and being a hospitable guest.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
Happy to have you down here. Go Panthers!
Ryan Embree:
Well, we’re excited about this. You know, we’re here in Atlanta. We’re gonna talk about the location. But before we get rolling with this episode, Dr. Lawrence, this is your first time on the podcast. We would love to hear. Hospitality is all about collection of stories, right. Of individuals. Share a little bit about your hospitality journey and how you came here to the Georgia State, Day School of Hospitality.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
So, people sometimes are surprised about my past because I was born in Singapore and I grew up in Indonesia, and I came to the States when I was 18, and I came to the States because I wanted to go to the best hotel school in the world. And so, when I was 17, I went to one of those high school, like, what are you gonna be when you grow up? And this Swiss hotelier said, you wanna go to hotel school? Go to Cornell. So, I applied to Cornell and I arrived in the States when I was 18, and I went to Cornell. And so, I went to hotel school there met my wife at, she was a hotelier at Cornell. After I graduated, we ran an inn in upstate New York, historic inn, went back to get my MBA, then worked, in a couple of different industries for a while. Went back to Indonesia to help my family and their business, and then came back to the States. Then I worked in a community college, a couple of community colleges, teaching hospitality. Then I went back and got my PhD at Boston University and my PhD, focus was in franchising. And I know we’ll talk a little more about franchising in a minute. But, franchising is the primary form of distribution of our product. After I graduated from Boston University, I got a job back at Cornell. So I went back there and I was a food and beverage professor. People always laugh. What was your professor? Food and Beverage? So I taught the most of the freshman students at Cornell, Food and Beverage Management. And I also taught, a multi unit franchising course there. And then this position at Georgia State opened up and a benefactor of ours gave money for an inapt professor in franchising. And there’s nothing better as an academic to get inapt professorship in the area that you study. And the weather in Atlanta is a lot better than the weather in Ithaca.
Ryan Embree:
I don’t know this week my, uh, my…
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
True. We’ve been cold, but it’s gonna be 80 degrees. 80 degrees this weekend. So when my kids moved down here from Ithaca, they were like, oh my Lord, you can play soccer in January, and we have a pool. So, I really loved working here in Atlanta. Georgia State is a very dynamic place. It’s a large state university, so very different from Cornell, but we really transformed the lives of our students here. So I’ve been here, I was here for seven years as a faculty member, and then just last July I became the director of the the Day School of Hospitality. So, we’re working on a lot of interesting stuff here. I’m excited about the position and excited about the potential of Georgia State and Atlanta.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Excited to share it with our audience and your story. Dr. Lawrence is a true indication of what hospitality is international. Right? We say that all the time. Hospitality is the language spoken all over the world. Your journey is certainly a reflection of that across the globe and, and now across the country here. So, share a little bit about the school’s history, Georgia State’s history, and where you think that this program is unique based on maybe others across the country.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
So Georgia State was founded, the university was founded in 1913 as the kind of nighttime business school of Georgia Tech. And that has evolved over time. We’re a very large university. We are over 50,000 students here. And we’re a very diverse university. So we graduate more African Americans at Georgia State than any other university in the states. So we are a majority minority institution and a research one institution, so an R1 institution. So, we are not only a research powerhouse, but we also transformed the lives of our students. So we are the Day School of Hospitality, was founded in 1973, as a school of Hospitality, and was named in the eighties by the founder of Days Inn, Cecil B Day. So that really ties back into the franchising story, into the entrepreneur story. You had a local Georgian building, a brand that became worldwide brand, which is amazing. We joined the College of Business, and now we’re a school embedded in a business school. So there’s two forms of hospitality programs. There’s hospitality programs like UNLV or University of Houston. They’re standard loan colleges. And then there’s schools like ours that are embedded in a business school. So those are two basic models. There’s advantages and disadvantages to both. One of the advantages that we have is that we are in a college of business that allows our students to take many different courses from marketing department to computer information systems. One of the disadvantages is that we tend to be fairly small. So cost guide programs in business schools tend to be smaller, than standalone colleges. I took over the program in July, and we’re working on our strategic plan right now to grow the school to get more students. Because industry’s always looking for great hospitality students. And also looking to expose hospitality to students in other disciplines. And so if you’re a real estate student, if you’re a finance student, if you’re a student, a psychology student, right? So getting those students among all university students interested in hospitality. And I think that’s, that’s a model in which, will help grow enrollment. Well, only our majors and our minors, but also students just interested in hospitality. Many of our students are working in hospitality, right? They’re working as waiters or they’re working at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. So, they’re exposed to the industry especially being here in Atlanta.
Ryan Embree:
Even if they’re not in hospitality jobs, you could still be using hospitality skills within those jobs. Which is very important to share because, I think there’s that common misconception of, you think of a hospitality or a hotel worker, you think of all the disadvantages sometimes, right? Of like the holidays, the long hours. It’s a 24 hour business. But at the same time, there’s these different departments, whether it’s accounting, marketing, all the HR, these different avenues within hospitality, that you can be exposed to franchising. And being, which we’re gonna talk about. But one of the things is you look for that strategic plan, I think is a huge advantage, is obviously your location. Right? You’re in the heart of downtown Atlanta. It’s massive headquarters for global brands, sports venues, I mean, state of the art sports venue. You got World Cup coming here this summer. Talk to us about how you’ve used this location to your benefit for the students and prospective students.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
Yeah. I mean, we have people on campus all the time. We have headquarters for ISG is here. We have, you know, we can walk from our campus to Mercedes-Benz Stadium, state Farm. We have the World Congress Center here, which is one of the largest convention centers at the day school. We don’t really have that many physical facilities. We don’t have a restaurant, we don’t have a hotel, but we don’t need to because we have Atlanta. Right. So that is a huge advantage for us. When we want people to come to campus to speak, they just need to just turn the corner and they’re here. And so we get great speakers to come to campus. Our students are engaged with the local industries here. Atlanta is the capital of franchising in the us Right? So if you think about the brands that we have here, Chick-fil-A, inspire brands, Rourke Capital. Rourke Capital, which is one of the largest private equity companies that owns Inspire and go-to Foods and over 50 franchise brands. And Atlanta’s growing. Right? And so if you’re a student and you come here, you can stay here afterwards, right? So if you’re a student at Cornell and you go to Ithaca, you’re probably not staying in Ithaca, right. Because there’s not much there. People have to get on a plane and they gotta fly to Ithaca to be in class. And so that is a huge advantage for us, right? Absolutely. For universities that are based in cities where people wanna work, that is a huge advantage for us, not only for our students to get internships, but afterwards to be able to live and work with, within the community.
Ryan Embree:
A hundred percent. And some of the schools and programs that we’ve visited, have laboratories and incubators that they use. Your lab and incubators are right outside these walls, right? So it’s almost like your classroom is the city of Atlanta and, and ’cause so much hospitality is going on every single day in those moments. So, incredible advantage that the students have here and the alumni network, which we’re gonna talk about here in a minute. But, you know, you talked about your, your strong background and franchising and entrepreneurship. Obviously you have a passion there. It’s, it’s kind of your strength and background share with us how you kind of incorporated that into the curriculum, into the day school hospitality. Sure.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
So when I came here to Georgia State, one of the things that my endow professorship they wanted me to do was basically talk about franchising for students overall. So I teach an undergraduate franchising course. And in that course, even though franchising obviously is central to the distribution of hotels and restaurants, franchising is everywhere. Everything in a strip mall is franchised. And students don’t understand that, right? Students don’t realize that. The other thing that we have here in Georgia State is we have an entrepreneurship innovation center. And so I have a joint appointment with them, and one of my passions is to get entrepreneurship students to think about franchising as one route to entrepreneurship. We have all these headquarters here. Even if you’re not gonna become a franchisee, you might go work for a franchising company Sure. As accountant, as somebody in marketing or in sales. These are large companies. Or you go, might go work for a franchisee. You know, one of the pathways to franchising is ownership. Now that can be difficult for students, and that’s one of the things that we’re gonna be working on in our strategic plan, is figuring out how do we get students in ownership positions, right? So we are a public university that, 40% of our students are Pell Grant eligible. Right? So they don’t come from money. It’s figuring out how we can change the trajectory of our students’ lives and transform their lives is something that is, one of one of our goals and franchising is a wealth creator, right? Some of the wealthiest people I know are franchisees, right? If you own 20 Dunking Donuts, you’re doing pretty well. You probably have a license plate that has donut on it, right? So, I’m very passionate about franchising. Now there’s good franchising and there’s bad franchising, right? So, there are some franchise brands that I don’t suggest students invest in. And part of that is kind of understanding what franchising is about, right? It’s a partnership. So in the class we talk a lot about, you know, these are two options. These are two options for that you might wanna pick as a franchise, which one would you pick? And understanding kind of the owner who owns a franchise brand, what are the parameters of the contract? And exposing students to that pathway. There’s not that many programs in the US that focus on franchising, and there’s very few endowed professorships in franchising. And so one of our goals going forward is to work more on exposing more students to franchising in general.
Ryan Embree:
It’s such a great opportunity. I mean, I think all of those success stories where franchises were sometimes built from these schools and now are such job creators of what you’re talking about. So to kind of arm your students with that knowledge, whether again, they’re looking to start their own franchise, become a part of a franchise, or work for a franchisee. Incredibly wealth of knowledge there. So really, really cool work that you’re doing there. The school has really deep roots in the business community. You mentioned some of the major brands. How have you seen this kind of fast track students hospitality careers or even like through internships that you’re doing at the on on school?
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
So we, so one of the things we tell students is get internships right away. So, start with doing internships and get into those businesses and start working. ’cause once it’s the best way for them to kind of feel out the company and know if it’s the right fit for them as well as the company filling them out. So we, we have, we have more internship opportunities for our students than we can fulfill, right. Everything from going to the masters or engaging with Mercedes-Benz Stadium or working at State Farm Arena, working local hotels. We could have double the number of students and we still have opportunity for them. I think, you know, Atlanta’s a growing city, right? We’re continually growing. We have a great ecosystem of universities here in Atlanta, not only Georgia State, but Kennesaw State, Georgia Tech, university of Georgia’s not that far away. Georgia Southern. So we have a great ecosystem of universities here, and that helps to kind of feed the need for the businesses, and especially in the hospitality business. Where, we’re building one of the largest entertainment centers here in Atlanta. $5 billion is going to create, create this Centennial Yards, which is this transformation of downtown. So it’s a really exciting place to be. And businesses want our students, our students tend to be the way we describe Georgia State. Students are students with grit. Many of our students are working while they’re going to school.They can’t afford not to work. Luckily in the state of Georgia, we have Hope Scholarship. So most of our students are going, are getting their education covered. And at the day school, we provide a lot of scholarship money. So if you’re a Georgia State Day School student and you don’t get a scholarship, I’m saying, why aren’t you getting a scholarship? You should be applying for one. We have a lot of good, you know, we have Hunter Scholarship for the Hunter family. We have lots of industry partners that understand the benefit of providing our students with scholarship money and offering paid internships that get them, get them engaged and working, in the industry. And we have FIFA coming. So what a great opportunity for students to get a front seat to an amazing event, is to work a FIFA event.
Ryan Embree:
It’s wonderful advice. And would encourage, students that might be finding this, if you have required internships, would you even I had them when I went to school, get eclectic with it. Like, expose yourself to as many things as possible, because this industry has so much to offer. And this is like a first time glance at what you might wanna do in your career. A lot of the hospitality professionals I’ve talked to have fallen into these types of careers where you could have a fast track of being like, I know exactly what I wanna do. ’cause I had the experience of this internship. So it’s great that you continue to put your, your students in positions like that. And the learning from it will last you here until the end of your career and until their alumni, which we’ll, we’ll talk about, right?
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
And then also study abroad, right. We have two study abroad programs that we do. One is fully funded, so we pay for everything for the students. Unfortunately, location, it was Dubai in Abu Dhabi, so we had to, we’re gonna have to retool that for this year. But we pay for everything for our students to have an experience that is just out of this world. And we also have a European study abroad experience. So I’ll say, you know, the getting, taking advantage of those experiences and trying different things, right. Don’t go to the same company for four years. Try something else. Try something new. And when you’re in Atlanta, you can do that. You don’t have to go anywhere else to go work at State Farm and then figure out like, I wanna go to Mercedes-Benz or gonna work at Inspire Brands. It’s all here.
Ryan Embree:
It really is. And a lot of, obviously, alumni have come and worked at those organizations. Talk to us about, you know, the alumni network, how you continue and your role to try to foster that. Because if you can show a student, Hey, this is the path you can take and this is where you can get to, and the opportunities that kind of expand and open up to you when you graduate from here it’s a powerful thing and, and powerful way to get people through the doors.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
Yeah, absolutely. We are a large university, so we have over 300,000 alums. And if you think about it, students who go to Georgia State are probably most likely gonna be living in Atlanta or somewhere else. We’re a large city and we have lots of opportunity. So vicinity wise, you have a lot of alums living in this area. And because we have, we’re such a large school. If you ask someone, do you know anybody from they went to school at Georgia State, probably they did, or they, they got a master’s degree at Georgia State. Or you know, their, their, their sister did. So everyone’s always willing to help too. Right. So this feeling of like, you know, the idea that, you know, you’ve come from a certain background and, and you’ve achieved, graduated from Georgia State. There’s always people willing to help. And I’ll say the hospitality industry is, this is an a industry of opportunity. So there’s people that work, start working in as a waiter and then become CEO of the company. That trajectory happens. It might take some time, but this is an industry that values hard work, grit, personal attention to customer satisfaction. But it’s doable. And so that’s what inspires, that’s what inspires me about Georgia State, is that I can see our students grow over time, and I can see those students in management positions in the future, and that’s gonna change the trajectory of their life. Or they might own a franchise, or they might start a franchise. If you think about a company like Zaxby’s, right? It’s was started by students, you know, it was started at Georgia Southern. And those two founders are now worth billions. So the idea that we can change the life of students and, and we can do that here in Atlanta, is something that I’m really passionate about.
Ryan Embree:
And, you know, so we kind of spoke to the students now, the hospitality professionals that might be listening to that be open to being a mentor for these younger students. Because, I sit across the table. I had the privilege and honor of sitting across the table for some incredible hospitality leaders. And every single time I ask them about their hospitality journey, there’s typically always a name in there that they attribute a lot of their success as a jumping off point or a starting point for their career. So be on either side of that, right. To be the person that helps someone, or be the person that reach out to someone for help. It’s hospitality. It’s a people serving people industry. That’s why we love it. That’s why we’re in it. So definitely recommend doing that as well. You know, the success of the program has been recognized as Top Hospitality School across the country, multiple accolades. You talked about the research at the top of the episode. Talk to us a little bit about, you know, that what the accolades mean to you and kind of how it’s helped prospective students kind of recognize Georgia State as one of the top hospitality programs.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
Absolutely. The, you know, one thing is we’ve been around a while, right? So we’ve been around over 50 years, and I think being embedded in a business school helps us as well. Our students have a very strong business background. They have to pass accounting and finance courses. They have that strong kind of analytical background. And then they take their hospitality courses. We have a lot of students that are, we’re known for students with grit. That don’t get their hands dirty and are willing to like, do the, do the operations type jobs. I’ll say that, you know, operations jobs are the foundation of kind of understanding the business, right? You might wanna be a revenue manager, but you don’t really understand what revenue management is about until you work the front desk and understand that business. Absolutely. So, you know, for a long time, we’ve, you know, we’re at a top business school. We’re at a large state university for a long time. We’ve put students into the ecosystem. So when people think about us, they think about those students, and we’re gonna build upon that going forward. So, we we’re working on a strategic plan to kinda strengthen those fundamentals as well as specialize in and expand our portfolio to things like entertainment and sports, which is all about hospitality, right? Absolutely. Because students today, they really passionate about live events and sports and entertainment. And that’s all part of that hospitality ecosystem, right? Hospitality is part of most things we do. It’s like we’re in a service economy. We’re in experience economy. Most of the qualities you learn in a hospitality degree, you can apply in any type of business. So I’m very proud of the fact that we are at, we’re an ACSB accredited school, so we have that business foundation. At the same time we have specialized interest in things that are really important to hospitality. So franchising is one of those that I think we can build upon going forward.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, you talk about that younger generation loving live events. I mean, look on social media and you also see, them standing in line for food and beverage item. Like that there’s such passion, and that younger generation that they can bring to hospitality and we get the privilege of serving them. So, one of the places where you have a strong alumni presence and even student presence. And the reason we’re here is covering the Hunter Conference 2026 over at the brand new beautiful Signia Hilton, Atlanta. Like I said, a lot of, Georgia State involvement there. Special relationship between the two organizations. Give us some history there and how that’s evolved over the last couple decades.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
Absolutely. So it’s a very special relationship. We are one of the co-founders of the Hunter Conference, starting in 1989, with less than a hundred people. And now we have 2000 industry professionals coming to Atlanta from one of the largest hospitality real estate conferences, in the U.S. So obviously the Hunters have a scholarship. We have students, our students run the conference, right? So Sarah [Moss] is the Chief of Staff, is one of our former students. Maddie [Thibodeaux] runs a conference, is one of our former students, previously an intern. So we have an internship program, that we run where this year, Heather was the, the intern there, really helps us to get those students start working in, you know, an amazing event and expose those students and all our students have access to the Hunter Conference. So regardless if you’re a real estate student or a finance student, a hospitality student, psychology student, you can access the conference. We also, Mitch Shaw, endowed the Bradshaw Speaker series, in honor of his father. And every year, we have amazing, amazing person from industry come and talk about their life journey. And so Tony Ressler was the speaker this year, transformer of the Centennial Yards, investing in the owner of the Hawks, and exposes our students to those industry professionals. And so I look forward to every year for us to have that event. It’s very special relationship that benefits our students and benefits our faculty. Getting access to that. And it’s less than a mile from here. Right. So we, I can walk from my office down to the Signia Hotel, look at all the development down there, engage our students with amazing content.
Ryan Embree:
What, what an opportunity for your students to be involved in that event. And, you know, we just talked about the power of mentors, right? And there could be, your mentor is sitting right there. I mean, it, it’s an incredible conference. We have the privilege of covering it over the past couple years. Now, as it enters its new chapter at the Signia, it continues to just grow and grow and really appreciate the relationship that Georgia State has there. And it’s so cool to see those students, we’ve seen students at that conference from, from all over the country, love to see that. Because again, those are those opportunities that we talked about where it’s like, you gotta take advantage of that and you have it less than a mile, you know, away from your campus.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
Yeah. And the thing is that when you talk about mentors is that, you know, many of our students, their parents, they’re first generation college students. They’re first generation college graduates. Like, I’m a first generation college graduate immigrant to the U.S. Your parents really don’t know how to help you in that. So, especially for our students and other students, they’re first generation graduates, they need those mentors to help them. So they don’t have parents that are working in the corporate environment that are telling them to get this internship. And so I would say, you know, if you’re if you’re opportunity to mentor a student, you can change the trajectory of their lives. And that is gonna pay dividends in the future. There’s nothing more rewarding than looking at a student and seeing their, their change over time and their position in an industry.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a great segue ’cause we’re gonna give some advice here to a couple exciting chapters and young professionals lives. What advice would you give to hospitality students right now? Because right now, you know, I pose this question by always saying, if I were, going into hospitality, there’s a lot of noise outside of our industry right now about AI and technology taking jobs. And we’ve talked about this where it might kind of be an opportunity for hospitality right now. So what advice would you share with them kind of hearing this?
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
I tell all the marketing students and the finance students, the CIS students come to hospitality. We got jobs. AI is gonna impact our industry, right. But we’re always gonna need that personal touch. We’re always gonna have to have that touch with the customer and have those personal relationships. And so understanding how AI is gonna impact the industry is important. We’re even changing some of our courses to better understand how we can use these tools to improve performance, to improve customer satisfaction, to reduce wait times. But at the end of the day, we’re in a human business, right? We’re about human experiences and people crave human experiences, right? So, you know, the live events, the reason why we love live events is because we live in the digital world a lot. And so this is the, this is I think a turning point for hospitality for us to really become central to people’s lives. Post pandemic, people want to connect with other people. We are in the business of creating amazing experiences. And if we can create American amazing experiences and bring people together, that’s what hospitality is about. So I would tell students, students that are graduating, this is an amazing opportunity for you. Go out there, find a company that you are passionate about and work hard and work in operations, understand the business. This is your opportunity to, people say, I don’t wanna work in operations. I understand the business. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you. Who knows what’s gonna happen in the future. But I’ll say, we have jobs and we will have jobs in the future.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And when you said that operations point, I love it. ’cause you’d be surprised how many front desk agents, bellmans, I’ve talked to across the, across the table that are now in corporate America because, but that’s where they had their start, and they attribute a lot of their success to saying, I was on the front line doing these jobs, doing these work. That’s where again, whether it’s a first job, entry-level job or whether it’s an internship can be so formative and foundational for your career. Now, let’s turn our attention to maybe incoming freshmen, right? They got the next four years daunting before they graduate and get out into the, to the world. What advice would you give them coming to Georgia State and the Day Hospitality School?
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
I would say take advantage of that time, right? So these are four years in which you can do anything you want. So have some fun, right. Go to events, post pandemic. You know, we we’re somewhat of a commuter school. We have dorms on campus, but a lot of our students are still living at home. So it may take some effort to get in a car drive downtown and meet up with an industry professional, but that’s where the value is. That’s why you’re in Atlanta, right? That’s where the school is about network. Meeting people, learning about other people, creating that network. And I would say get an internship from day one, look for an internship every year, get an internship. That summertime is a time in which you can invest in yourself. And classes are one thing, but really college is a lot about trying to figure out what you wanna do besides just the classes. Select your classes you want to take, and then engage in clubs and go do study abroad. Both my kids are Georgia State. Were Georgia State students, and go do study abroad. Go do whatever you want. This is a time in your life to explore. And you don’t have a mortgage. You might not have a car. You can do anything you want. And we’re there to support you. If you want an internship in Atlanta and you’re a Georgia State student, we can find you one. So, I mean, that to me is like, just be excited about that time of your life and AI, you know, AI is gonna impact our industry, but it’s not gonna take our jobs.
Ryan Embree:
And, and raise your hand and volunteer. I mean, this you got the World Cup. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to be involved in something in this amazing city. I mean, there was only a select number of cities, Atlanta being one of them. What an opportunity to be involved in an event that is gonna span maybe something you look back on, where people are coming from all over the world, to be here in Atlanta. So I love that advice, especially for those younger freshmen, just starting their journey. Well, so now we’re gonna, now we’re gonna share a little bit about your vision. So as we wrap up today, you talked about the strategic plan. What’s your vision as you look at the second half of the 2020s for the school here?
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence :
So we’re really focused on broadening, hospitality past hotels and restaurants and focusing on experiences. And so we really want to be the school that drives and understands how people wanna live their lives through experiences. And so focusing on, on entertainment, focusing on sports focusing on live events, focusing on hotels and restaurants. But people go to restaurants for, for different reasons, right? The transactional component of a restaurant, ordering online and Uber, that’s important. But the other side of going to restaurant is celebrating, right? Sure. And engaging with the people. And like, and you gotta understand where you are. Are you providing a transactional type approach where you’re just giving a meal or you are providing an experience. And we feel that the, there’s lots of value in creating those experiences. And so when you think about hospitality as creating memorable experiences, really broadens the perspective. Every time of service is about creating an experience. And so our plan is to focus on experiences generally, and then also to invite students that aren’t hospitality students to understand the business. So, you know, hospitality programs and business schools are never gonna be huge, right? You have other departments, but what we can do is we can get a marketing student say, listen, come to Hunter and you realize that like they may be maybe 20% of people in that pool are marketing people, right? Sales and marketing. Or accounting. So exposing hospitality to a broad set of students to show them the opportunities, right? We have a lot of opportunity for students. The trajectory of those students that are hardworking, that wanna it is, is very steep. And so that is our strategic plan going forward to figure out how do we can expose hospitality generally to the whole university, not just the school of business. And then to focus on being experts in creating memorable experiences. And I’m excited about the future. We’re in Atlanta, we’re at Georgia State. We have so many positive attributes. We’re investing $80 million in our campus downtown. If you haven’t had an opportunity to come downtown Atlanta, let me know. Send me an email, because we are transforming, downtown Atlanta, and it’s a place that people want to work, play, and stay. And, that’s just gonna improve as we invest in Centennial Yards and the stadium complex.
Ryan Embree:
One of the advice I always received was talking about the investment behind a school. If you see that it’s growing, it’s a growing university, there’s investment into it, it’s a place that you want to be so, certainly reflected here at Georgia State. Those experiences that you talked about so important. I mean, think about when you were in hospitality school, even when I was in hospitality school. Now the, the lanes of hospitality and specialties that you can get your degrees in because it encompasses just so much right now and it continues to grow. And as far as exposing more and more people to hospitality and its opportunities, it’s exactly what we’re here to do on the TMG campus cross. So we are so happy that you had us here and, sat down with us and, and took some time outta your day to do this with us.
Dr. Benjamin Lawrence:
Thank you so much. You’re doing important work. And go Panthers!
Ryan Embree:
Alright. Thank you so much. We’ll talk to you next time on the SuiteSpot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Celebrating 200 episodes of the Suite Spot! 🎉✨
The hospitality landscape has undergone a radical transformation since our first episode. In this milestone celebration, host Ryan Embree takes a retrospective look at the Suite Spot’s journey from Episode 1 to Episode 200. The conversation dives deep into the accelerating pace of technology adoption and the digital transformation that has redefined the guest experience over the last several years in hospitality.
Whether you’ve been with us since the beginning or are just joining the journey, tune in to hear what Ryan is most looking forward to as the Suite Spot embarks on its next 100 episodes.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree.
Cassady Quintana:
Hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Suite Spot. My name is Cassady Quintana and I’m the brand ambassador at Travel Media Group. Today’s episode is a little bit different, but very special as we celebrate our 200th episode. We’re flipping the script a little bit. Instead, our usual host, Ryan Embree, is stepping into the guest spot. Over the past 200 episodes, Ryan has led countless conversations with industry experts, leaders, and tons of insights. But today we are turning the spotlight on him. So whether this is your first episode with us or your 200th, we’re super excited you’re here. And Ryan, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you. Thank you. It’s, it’s a bit odd to be on the side of the mic, but I like it. Let’s do this.
Cassady Quintana:
I’m super excited. I feel like, you know, you’ve led countless conversations and, but not many people may know much about your story. So, before we jump into a little bit deeper conversation, tell us a little bit about your hospitality journey and what led you to this spot.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, so, you know, I’ve had the, the privilege and opportunity to start my hospitality journey and career, to be honest with you, like a lot of our guests have, which is right on the front line of hospitality. And I started as a kind of a pool bar server out at the Gaylord Texan, a beautiful, beautiful property out there in Grapevine, Texas, which I still visit to this day as a guest. And then had the opportunity to work at some incredible, resorts out here in Orlando where I, where I’m based point Orlando, where I was a bellman, and then eventually a front desk agent. And then the Grand Bohemian, which is a downtown property, very different from the resort property that you see in Orlando. Gave me a completely different type of experience traveler segment. Again, started there as a bellman, but also, moved through operations to the front desk as well. It was some great experience that kind of got me there. I took a pause from hospitality and went into kinda, apartments and residential for a couple years up in Atlanta, but always had a passion for being in hospitality and eventually got the opportunity to come back down here to Travel Media Group, here where we partner with so many hotels and resorts across the globe. And then kind of led to this podcast, which we’re gonna talk about today, which is, which is all of the subject matter today.
Cassady Quintana:
Yes, absolutely. It’s awesome hearing your history. Because like you said, it’s similar to a lot of the guests that you have on the podcast. You know, you kind of maybe don’t know if that’s gonna be your passion, but you get into it and then you end up never leaving it. So, as you stepped into this role at Travel Media Group, you started on one side and you ended up in marketing. What was kind of the inspiration behind the Suite Spot and how, how did that come to fruition?
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, honestly, it was inspired by just trying to educate hoteliers and hospitality about digital marketing a a topic and a subject that changes so frequently and so often, right? I mean, I think some of the episodes that we did at the very beginning of this podcast aren’t even relevant today because of the amount of change and transformation that has happened in this industry. And it makes for an extremely exciting and compelling subject matter to talk to those who are on the front lines and who are experiencing it from day to day. So it always keeps me on my toes about the subjects and topics that we talk about. But, you know, a lot of the series came from inspiration based on the conversations that we’re having every single day. You know, some of those leaders that I talked to, so many of their stories started on the front lines and, and they kind of fell into the career, like you were saying, Cassady. And what I wanted to do is see, you know, we have such amazing hospitality schools over the, the entire country, especially right here in Florida. One of the main inspirations of our TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl was to showcase that, to show young hospitality professionals that this doesn’t just need to be a summer job that you fall into and are there for a 30 year career. There’s career paths, there’s growth here, and it’s such an exciting industry. So a lot of the inspiration for some of the series and subject matter that we do know, another one with our Spotlight series where I’ve had the privilege and opportunity to showcase some of the most incredible hotels are based on the fact that at Travel Media Group, we work and we partner with those hotels and resorts. Whether it’s managing their guest feedback or whether it’s managing their social media and creating a unique and content for them, whether it’s video or social content, and to be able to showcase some of those properties has just been such an amazing experience. And something, you know, I learn something every single day.
Cassady Quintana:
Oh, yeah, me too. And I’m glad you brought up this series that we do on the podcast, because that kind of leads me into my next question. If you had to take everything you’ve been able to do over the last 200 episodes, what would be your favorite part about hosting the Suite Spot?
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I think we’re gonna talk about it here in a minute, but I think it’s about just the, the transformation that has happened since the beginning of this podcast. You know, Suite Spot episode one, which I encourage any of my listeners. Do not go back and listen to that. It was my first time doing this two, here we are at Suite Spot 200, 8 years later, and how much has changed? I love kind of leaning into that and seeing, just in the, something that I remember in Hospitality school, my professors and teachers telling me that hospitality is literally the oldest profession out there for sure. It was the first thing hosting people and how much has changed just in an eight year span in 200 episodes, but also learning about people’s journeys and stories. I know I shared a little bit about mine, but it truly is one of my favorite questions to open up the podcast with talking about people and their journey because it is such a melting pot of experience that we have in hospitality. It makes for some really compelling content. And you’ll find that a lot of the guests that I have have a particular mentor or an experience that really opens up their eyes, Cassady, and changes and transforms the way that they view their career. Whether, and that’s why I always encourage, whether you’re a young hospitality professional or a more seasoned one, look for those opportunities to connect with someone there, because so many of those stories have someone that’s been meant so much to them, right. Has been kind of the guide to them, their Sherpa, so to speak, on their hospitality journey, and has led them to a place that they have just this incredible passion and love for our industry, which, so I love to hear that. And just again, the melting pot of brands. You know, when someone says, I worked at Hilton for 10 years and then moved to IHG or Marriott and, and I was, you know, an independent hotelier, and then I moved to a more branded hotel. I worked at a small, independent, or a major convention resort. All of those experiences shape who you are as a hospitality professional. It gives you lessons. So it kind of like makes this skillset that’s so unique that no two hospitality professionals are the same. And I find it absolutely fascinating to dig into that.
Cassady Quintana:
No, I love that because every conversation you’ve had listening to it, it’s, you know, the principles of hospitality stay the same, but their stories are completely different, like you said. And even one person story that at a boutique hotel is completely different than their experience at a branded hotel. So how much, you know, again, those principles stay the same, but how diverse your career and hospitality can be in the multiple different departments you can even be in with one hotel. So, you know, you mentioned how much hospitality has changed since you started the Suite Spot. What’s kind of the biggest change that you’ve seen either in digital marketing or hospitality in general since episode one to now episode 200?
Ryan Embree:
I think it is the digital marketing aspect of it and the technology. I mean, I don’t think we can do a Suite Spot episode now without talking about AI and technology. Right? And you are spot on Cassady with the, the premise of the principles of hospitality have stayed the same, but the way that we engage with it, the way that our travelers engage with technology or the expectations of technology have completely flipped upside down. And like I mentioned before, I think some of the episodes that I did early on educating some of these hoteliers, I mean, we had episodes very early on, Cassady, that we’re talking about the importance of having managing your reputation on review sites, the importance of posting on social media. You know, some of those tips and tricks that I was sharing then would be just second nature to a seasoned hospitality professional. They would be like, why are you educating me on this? I know, I know how much of an impact it makes. But that’s so cool to see that transformation of one time. You know, the inspiration being of, to educate hoteliers on the importance of these things to now being like, now we’re more in depth conversations. Now we’re sharing actionable insights with our hoteliers on how to respond to guest feedback, how AI search is playing into, is playing into some of this content. It’s very, very exciting to be, but that, that is probably one of the biggest changes that I’ve seen since, since starting. This is the receptiveness to digital marketing and technology. And it’s really just become now such a foundational piece to success to any hotel or portfolio.
Cassady Quintana:
I couldn’t agree more. And one of my favorite things about the Suite Spot is when you always ask your guests to kind of look in that crystal ball into the future of hospitality. So I’m gonna do the opposite with you. If you could go back eight years to younger Ryan, what’s one piece of advice you would give him before starting this, this podcast?
Ryan Embree:
Great question. I think, listen, very early on we kind of didn’t know what we had with this Suite Spot. We had a lot of conversations about, I remember back in the episodes 40 to 80 about seeing if, if there was an appetite for this out there. And, we started getting more and more guests and, and started to get more and more people reach out to us wanting to be and share their insights. Which I just, again, so privileged for that opportunity, but just to listen and, and ask more questions. Yeah. I mean, I think you can never, the experience that we have, we live sometimes entire, just based on our business, that being open 365 24/7, we can live almost an entire life in the span of six months. Right? I mean, you think about some of the fires that you have to put out, some of the incredible experiences that you’re able to share or been through in six months, that time sometimes spans an entire career for people outside of hospitality because of the nature of our industry. So you cannot get enough insights experience. There’s been an experience, it’s happened before at a hotel. You know, someone has put their laundry on a fire sprinkler, and they’ve seen that kind of bust open an entire floor. We’ve had elevators go down where guests are stuck. There’s always a story for something. There’s always a solution for something. There’s also a special moment. You know, I know I tend, we tend to sometimes think about those as, oh man, this was the worst case scenario. But you really think about some of the incredible special moments that happen in our industry. It’s so unique. People getting married when loved ones are sick, and we’re hosting them at our hotel hospitality. We are there for travelers and guests at sometimes the most critical points and pieces of their life. And we get to be a part of that. There’s not a lot of injuries, industries that can say that. So, listen and ask questions. That’s what I would say.
Cassady Quintana:
Oh, I love that. I think that’s great advice. So, you just talked about all these experiences and stories you’ve heard. Are there any episodes or particular guests that really stand out as your favorite or one that’s really memorable to you?
Ryan Embree:
Again, another great question. You know, I think for me, the most memorable episodes, are the ones that I’ve recently been able to do where we’re covering hospitality events. I mention this on the podcast a lot. There’s something special that happens when hospitality professionals are in the same room together. They share the same challenges and struggles. They’re seeing the same trends. Even though the markets and segments are completely different, a lot of times you’re seeing the same trends. Sometimes those conversations at those events that we have are very therapeutic for a lot of hospitality professionals that I talk to. Of like, oh my goodness, I’m sharing in the struggle or challenge with someone else. They understand where I’m coming from here. But it also could set the foundation for fundamental change in the hospitality industry, which I think is so important. And, you know, one of the things, we obviously had to do this podcast through the pandemic right? In 2020. And there were those conversations that I would have with professionals, and I’d ask them, I mean, you’d flat out, do you think we’ll ever be traveling again to conventions or will business travel ever come back? Right. I think that’s the way I specifically phrased it. And a lot of them were like, yes. And, and predicted, you know, looked into that crystal ball and said, absolutely, there’s something special that happens. I hundred percent agree with it. It was something that was missed. We talk about that term revenge travel that carried us through those, the early 2020s. But I think that there’s like this revenge connection that happened at those events where you come and, and I think you go to those events after losing it for a couple years with a different mindset that you had before. I think people genuinely connect differently now than they did prior to the pandemic, right. Because it was taken away from them. So those are the most special moments is to be able to connect with hospitality professionals at those events. And we’ve had the privilege of covering quite a few of them. And hope we get the opportunities to do more. So we’ve got some new ones on the horizon, by the way, so stay tuned for that.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, for sure. Well, I love that story about the Pandemic, because especially now too, we’re in such a digital first world that even going to those conferences now, you know, we’re a few years past the pandemic, but it’s still special because we are so digital first, and we don’t get to meet people outside of our hotel or our management group that often. So being able to hear, and like you said earlier, the stories and we’re going through the same struggles or we’re celebrating the same things, or we get to learn new techniques or a way that another property is doing something that we would have never thought of on our own. So, super exciting and yeah, I’m super excited for the conferences and shows that we’re gonna get to go to in the future. So speaking of the future, looking into that crystal ball, like you like to say, what’s next for the Suite Spot after episode 200?
Ryan Embree:
Hopefully it’s a lot more episodes and we’ve had some incredible guests over the last 200 episodes. I’m not sure if going back in time talking to myself, giving him that advice to listen and ask questions. I’m not sure if I could have predicted that we’d be here at 200 episodes. So it’s such a cool accomplishment. But what I look forward to growing the podcast in different ways, I have shared this before. I’m a UCF Rosen grad. So the Hospitality school and TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl was something very near and dear to my heart when we launched it. And sitting on stage with Dr. Mejia at UCF, where at my alma mater where I went to school, it was a dream come true for me. And the experience of being able to go to UNLV and FIU and FAU Georgia State now and seeing those series grow has been just been so fortunate.
Ryan Embree:
But what I’m most excited about are some of the other pathways and opportunity that, that it’s creating because it’s not slowing down, which is, which I love, right? The appetite, which we’re always so nervous about early on in our industry just continues to grow. I mean, every day we’re getting more and more interest or people reaching out, being like, I wanna share this about my brand. We’ve got so many things to celebrate in hospitality. And one of the things is you Cassady and, and your new, Social Success Series, which again, the appetite for that has just been absolutely incredible, the work you’re doing and the hospitality professionals that you’re talking to. So I’m very excited for the work that you’re doing, Cassady, and, and how you’re going to help grow the Suite Spot. But it’s just been, it’s been a wild, crazy ride. And we’re just going really where the current takes us at this point. And it’s up to this point, has led to some really, really cool opportunities.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. Well, I’m super excited to have been able to join this podcast with you and maybe take a little bit of a different avenue with the social media and social success in that, in that regard. So definitely, you know, we’re kind of covering all grounds in hospitality now. I feel like we’re, we’re hitting on all cylinders. So how do you kind of hope that the Suite Spot continues to support and influence the hospitality industry moving forward?
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you know, I, again, I hope that the appetite remains really, really high for this type of information. And I think it has, I mean, we have that I talked about that genuine connection that happens at conferences and hospitality events. I can feel that when we do episodes and panels, which we’re hoping to introduce to the Suite Spot in the future as well, to get multiple point of views, because you’re absolutely right, Cassady, what you’re talking about is a completely different lane. It’s very fast changing, very fast paced. Hotels are trying to navigate these waters of social media and how they’re changing. They’re trying to get a leg up on the algorithm. Again, I think early on we did an entire episode based on Instagram reels introducing it. And now there’s a whole strategy probably just dedicated Instagram reels and Facebook reels and, and how that changes. I mean, some of the, with social media, I mean, we look at platforms that a lot of people look at and say, you know, younger kids are saying, I, I’m not gonna be on a Facebook that’s an old person’s social media. I mean, that is the type of transition that we’re, that that transformation that we’re talking about today. So I hope to again, continue to educate and be able to share these hospitality leaders insights and what they’re hearing, what they’re seeing, so that hospitality can grow together. Because I think, I know they’re, obviously, we have a competitive space here and everyone’s fighting for occupancy and ADR but at the end of the day, our industry moves the fastest when, when we’re all on the same team, when we’re sharing these insights and we’re not in these silos and we’re in this really cool time right now where we have so much data, so much opportunity to use that data in a variety of different ways. I hope to be able to share some of those insights and use the podcast as a medium so that we can bridge some of these gaps that we’re seeing to hopefully just continue to enhance the guest experience.
Cassady Quintana:
Well, I think you’ll have no problem doing that because every episode you put out, I learned something new. There’s always something new to talk about, a new platform, a new strategy. So I think that’s the beauty of hospitality and what you’re doing at the Suite Spot is there’s never gonna be something we can’t talk about. We’re not gonna run out of things to talk about. Like some other industries that stay a little bit the same, right? Technology’s always advancing, especially with AI. So the subjects are endless and I think the Suite Spot, maybe we’ll be sitting here in a few years hitting episode 400, who knows? But yeah. So as we kind of wrap up here, is there anything else you would like to say to your listeners maybe that have been with you since the beginning? Or anybody that’s, you know, starting to listen this year?
Ryan Embree:
I think, you know, my biggest message to them and and to everyone is, is thank you. I remember doing this podcast and, and it was a solo episode on episode 100, where we talked about some of our most popular episodes and we got to 200 very, very quickly. I feel like that was just like last week, right? But I wanna say thank you to all of our guests that kind of made this possible, but also to everyone that has helped make the podcast what it is. So Brandon Bell, who edits all of our, our podcast, Bary Gordon, who does the, the graphic design and, and makes all of our clips look so amazing and beautiful, Cassady, you, our brand ambassador, taking, taking the lead on a new series for the podcast and helping grow that, my entire marketing team, the marketing coordinators that we’ve had in the past, I mean, you do something 200 times, there’s so many hands that play a part in that.
Ryan Embree:
So I’m just so grateful for that, grateful for my old marketing director, Anne Sandoval, who came to me with this idea to start a podcast, to my leadership team here at Travel Media Group, Dana Singer, our president, who has believed in me through all of this. So there’s so many people I can thank, but I just, I look at the 200 episodes as just with immense gratitude and appreciation for the journey that’s led me here. And it’s a cool, exciting milestone and chapter. It’s a number, but, you know, I think the work is not done. I want continue to grow our audience, grow the insights and anything that we can do to push our industry forward. So thank you all. Thank all of our listeners for this to make this milestone so special.
Cassady Quintana:
Well, absolutely. Well thank you to you, Ryan, as well, for going to all these events and these campuses and these locations to bring us this awesome content. Because without you there would be no Suite Spot. You know, you’re the brains behind it and you are the vision. So thank you for, you know, sacrificing some of your personal time to go to these different places and bring us these episodes. Because like I said, we’re learning something new every single time. So I’m excited to be a part of the journey and see, you know, just how far we can continue the Suite Spot. And there is no ceiling for us right now. So I’m super excited to continue that with you. But thank you and thank you to all of our listeners for listening to this episode of The Suite Spot, and we will see you on the next one.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell, with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this special episode of the Social Success Series Podcast, host and Travel Media Group Brand Ambassador, Cassady Quintana, sits down with the Brand Social Media Manager at Arlo Hotels, Dino Jevric, so discuss the ever shifting landscape of social media and how hoteliers can optimize their digital presence on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and booking sites.
Cassady Quintana:
Welcome to the Social Success Podcast, where we have conversations with top hospitality professionals about successful digital marketing strategies, emerging trends, and how to connect with today’s travelers. I’m your host, Cassady Quintana. Hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Social Success Podcast, a Suite Spot Podcast powered by Travel Media Group. I’m your host, Cassady Quintana, and today we’re gonna be talking about the importance of having an authentic social media strategy. Joining me today is Dino Jevric, Social Media Manager at Arlo Hotels. Dino, thank you for joining me.
Dino Jevric:
Thank you for having me. So excited.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, me too. So, to start, tell us a little bit about your role, maybe some of your history and how you got involved at Arlo Hotels.
Dino Jevric:
Yeah, so, I’m the social media manager at Arlo, so I lead social media brand wide, across multiple properties and outlets. And basically my role sits at the intersection of brand content and performance. So, from day to day, as you probably know in social, it’s a different challenge every day. There are some days where I’m working on the production side of things. Some days I’m working on planning performance on other days. So it’s a constant mix of creative and analytical work. And I think ultimately in my role, I’m not just focused on making things look good, I’m focused on how our content actually influences our guests journey. And that’s all the way from discovery to conversion. And kind of how social plays a role in every step of that process. So that’s basically my role at large. And yeah, that kind of sums it all up.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, no, totally. That’s awesome. And kind of, we’re seeing this evolution of social media. So in your experience, how are you seeing how people are discovering hotels through social media now versus maybe how we used to through Google or OTAs?
Dino Jevric:
I think that there’s definitely a very, very big shift of how people have been discovering hotels, especially in recent times. You know, historically people have always gone to, you know, straight to Google and asked, you know, best hotels in X area, right? Or they go straight to the OTAs, like TripAdvisor and stuff to find out what people are saying and, you know, different reviewers and stuff. But I think that now what we’re really seeing is that people are using social media in its place, and they’re using social media as a search engine, and people are turning to platforms like TikTok or Instagram to, you know, examine their options and see what hotels look like in real life and hear experiences of what it’s like to stay there. And not only are we like, and that’s only from, you know, the top of the funnel, what we’re really used to seeing, but we’re now actually seeing it move down further into the funnel into actual booking behavior. So with platforms like TikTok where they recently integrated booking.com and Expedia directly into the app, it’s allowing viewers to book without ever having to leave the platform. So they’re discovering hotels there, they’re seeing what the hotel stay is like, but then they’re also now a lot of the opportunity to book through these apps. And on top of that like we’re seeing this gap between OTAs and social media really closing, Expedia did a report recently where they found that 80% of travelers still use OTAs,at some point in the booking journey. However, social media isn’t falling far behind with nearly 60% of travelers also using social media in their path. So I think that we’re really starting to see that gap shorten, and yeah, that’s kind of what the future of social media with the travel industry is where it’s going.
Cassady Quintana:
And it’s kind of crazy to see because those integrations, like you mentioned with Expedia on Instagram, booking.com, on TikTok, like how quickly that happened and how quickly it’s gonna continue to happen. So I always think about hotels that aren’t on social media all, or still haven’t bought into how important social media is, and like how far they’re falling behind, and it’s just gonna continue to get worse. So as we see that kind of shift happening, what do you think hotels should be thinking about the most when they’re starting to plan their social media content for the upcoming month? Like, what’s really important and what should they keep in the front of their minds?
Dino Jevric:
I think ultimately hotels need to realize that social media is more than just a marketing channel. I think, you know, historically social media has just been a place for hotels to kind of post pretty photos and, you know, showcase the spaces in their hotels. But I think that content is now moving away from being aspirational. And it needs to, now, because of this introduction of being able to book on these platforms, it needs to now be way more informative and decision driving. So, you know, instead of those static, you know, luxe polish content and photos, hotels need to invest in reality. And that’s a really big thing that we’ve been doing at Arlo, is really showcasing the hotel from a real standpoint and really showcasing the experience that you get before you even step onto property. So yeah, in the end, the hotels that are really gonna win are the ones that are treating social as a bridge between inspiration and conversion, rather than just a place to post content.
Cassady Quintana:
Absolutely. I agree. And I kind of like this shift in Instagram, right? When Instagram first came out, it was super, you gotta add a filter, it’s gotta be the perfect shot. Like it needs to look its best. And now it’s the total opposite because of AI and because of all this fake things we’re being fed, Instagram’s kind of reverting back to, well, no, we wanna see real people. We wanna see real events, we wanna be able to see ourselves in those experiences. So kind of what type of content do you think is performing best when people are in that discovery phase or when they’re actively looking for somewhere to stay?
Dino Jevric:
I mean, the answer is very, very obvious. I think it needs to feel real. The type of content that you need to be showcasing is stuff that feels real. You know, no one really wants to see another photo of, you know, a perfectly made bed. No one wants to see, you know, those still life images of, you know, your lobby. People really want to know what the experience actually looks like rather than just a polished version of it. And I think targeting concepts like a day in the life, or even like taking people around the neighborhood are different ways that people can showcase that and that brands can really capitalize on these things. We’ve implemented this a lot at Arlo and we’ve seen like very sizable results from it. So yeah, I think that that’s really the key is kind of just showcasing the real side of hotel content.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, it’s interesting ’cause some of the properties we work with here at TMG, it’s like they have these wonderful photos that are, you can definitely tell they had a photographer come and take these photos, right? And we’re like, that is so great for your website, but this is not gonna move the needle on social media, right? This, there’s nobody in this photo that’s, it’s empty, it’s an empty room, it’s an empty lobby. Like that’s not how your hotel feels on a regular basis. So how can we make that feel better? And, you know, sometimes we’re implementing AI, Hey, can you add a person at the front desk? Or we’re finding ways to make it feel a little bit more real. So I wanna shift gears a little bit, and you know, another part of your role is you’re managing multiple properties within one brand. So what do you think is like the biggest challenge for people that are in that kind of position?
Dino Jevric:
I think personally the biggest challenge for me, I mean, managing the social for all these different properties is a challenge within itself. But I think that personally the biggest challenge for me has always been balancing those different voices and personalities. For those who are not familiar with the Arlo brand, we are lifestyle hotel brand with seven properties in the United States. We have four in New York, we have a Chicago location, Miami and DC which is newly opened. And all these properties really shine in their own way. Williamsburg is known for its nightlife, Miami, it’s known for its leisure and laid back vibe. DC is known for his its historical perspective. So we really wanted to find a way to make all of these brands unify under this umbrella social media account, but then also just showcasing what makes each property unique. And that was a really big focus for me when I joined Arlo was kind of trying to build that consistent brand voice. And I think that’s where a lot of hotels, especially hotels that are managing more than one property, tend to struggle a lot, is kind of protecting the individuality of each location and really making location shine. And there are some brands that, you know, venture in the way in the path of creating different accounts for different locations. And I think that for us, the number one thing was, you know, Arlo is a brand, Arlo is a community at its highest point Arlo is, it’s more than just separating properties. It’s all about Arlo as a brand. And I think that’s something that each property does withhold, but they each showcase it in their own way. So yeah, I just, I wanted everything to feel cohesive and not copy and pasted. So yeah that would be the biggest challenge. And I think that we’ve definitely succeeded in that.
Cassady Quintana:
Well, I don’t wanna make you give away any of your secrets at Arlo, but how do you find that balance between the brand voice, but also letting each property still show some of their personality?
Dino Jevric:
I think, and I think the number one thing that people would think about is, you know, that there has to be some sort of like guideline. There has to be like this of rules that we have. You know, you can’t talk about this about in regards to this hotel, you can’t do this in regards to this hotel. And I think that it’s not, it’s less about strict, a strict set of rules and it’s more about a framework. There are things that stay consistent across the board. You know, when we’re talking about a brand, like, the service that we provide is consistent. The community that we cater to is consistent. And there are things that do change each property, like I mentioned, like we have Williamsburg that is very historically known for its rooftop parties, for its nightlife. And we’d like to cater to that. However, when we have a property like Miami who also does activate and does have these nightlife events and stuff, we find that we’d like to talk about that and we’d like to, to capitalize on that, but we gotta do that in another, in a different way because of the difference in personality. So the consistency comes from the foundation, but the personality comes from the location. So that’s kind of what that balance is and what makes the content feel both cohesive and still authentic in each space.
Cassady Quintana:
Oh, I love that. That’s awesome. And I feel like a lot of hotels, ones that we’ve talked to, they understand the importance of social media, but a lot of the time they get stuck because they feel like they’ve already talked about every single, every single thing there is to talk about their property, right? We’ve already posted about our rooms, we’ve already posted about our pool, we’ve already posted about our events, but I feel like a lot of the time hotels forget that their hotel is just one small part of a person’s trip where their experience and there’s a lot of things happening around the hotel, right? So do you guys ever tailor content differently depending on the location, which you touched on a little bit, or the audience for that specific property?
Dino Jevric:
Yeah, I mean, we do it all the time. I think that’s a really big part of our strategy. Like I said, each location has a different audience. It different expectations, different reasons people are staying there. In Midtown we probably have a lot of people who are staying, it’s their first visit to New York, it’s in a very central location. You’re, you know, minutes away from 42nd street or minutes away from Madison Square Garden. So that could be a reason that people are staying in Midtown. But then when we have, you know, our other New York City property, Williamsburg, people say there are a lot for leisure, people say there are a lot to experience the nightlife aspects. So there are lots of different demographics that we’re targeting and different reasons that people are staying there. So our content needs to reflect that while the brand does remain consistent, the way we’re bringing it to life on our social media is really tailored to the audience that we’re trying to reach. So yeah, we’ve done this in a different, in different ways of showcasing the different locations on our property, on our social media accounts. And I think that we’re doing a great job in that.
Cassady Quintana:
And I think even beyond just the location, there’s a lot of opportunity for hotels to partner with other local businesses or the culture that’s in that area. So for you and for Arlo Hotels, how important is it to highlight that local neighborhood or that culture in the social media content?
Dino Jevric:
I mean, Arlo is always culture first. I think that for us, it’s really, if you go on our social media, you’ll understand what I’m talking about. We really do put culture and the community at the forefront of everything that we do. And I think that it’s an essential part of our social strategy there. People aren’t just booking a room, people aren’t, I always say Arlo isn’t just a place that you rest your head at the end of the day. It’s not just a place that you come to crash and stuff like that. You know, we have so many activations, we have so many cultural moments happening on property. So ultimately people are booking our locations for an experience. And if you aren’t showcasing the neighborhood and culture, you’re really leaving out a huge part of that decision making process. So to kind of work on that and to kind of capitalize on that, we developed a series that we do on our social media called ,Know the Neighborhood. And that’s our way of bringing that concept to life. So we basically take our followers throughout the neighborhood of our different properties, and we showcase boutiques in the area, monuments in the areas, sightseeing, attractions in the area, and try to really highlight these different neighborhood gems and, and spotlights so that people can actually picture what their stay would look like beyond the hotel itself. So at the end of the day, like as much as we’d love to just showcase the hotel, I think that the neighborhood does really add a different element to that. And I think that a lot of brands need to really be focusing on that as well.
Cassady Quintana:
I absolutely agree. I feel like that’s something hotels forget a lot about. Again, like you said, it’s not just a place you’re laying your head at night. That’s just a small piece of your experience and it’s even important for people that may be from that area. I love that. Know Your Neighborhood series you guys are doing, because I live in Florida, I haven’t been to your property in Miami, but I would love to watch and I’d love to learn more about the area, especially if I ever do go down there and visit. Like now I feel like I know what to expect and I don’t feel as nervous. And it’s comforting to feel like you know, what the property’s gonna be like and the area too, because it can be overwhelming, especially you guys in New York, like those properties, that’s a lot. New York is a lot. So if you can feel a connection to the property, connection to the area before you even go, you’re already, you know, five steps ahead. So shifting gears a little bit, are there any trends right now? I love to talk about trends in social media because I feel like we could talk about something right now and in a few weeks it’s gonna be something new. So what trends are you noticing in hospitality, social media right now?
Dino Jevric:
I think a trend that is here and is here to stay, and that is really shape reshaping the social landscape in terms of hospitality, is showcasing authentic human content. And I know people might be thinking like, that’s not necessarily a trend that isn’t like, you know, a fast moving pace moment. But I think that when it comes to trends in social, in hospitality, social media, that is one of the biggest that people really do miss out on because they’re really focused on what’s culturally happening in… And that doesn’t, that, you know, that doesn’t mean that brands shouldn’t focus on what’s happening in culture and really honing in on that. I am someone who loves going off of all these different cultural moments and what people are talking about. But I think the real big general trend that we should be following is showcasing authentic human content, things that people can connect to, things that people can emotionally connect to.
Dino Jevric:
I think that on social media, a big issue is that we find trouble in emotionally connecting to content, which is why it’s hard for people to then book a hotel. So yeah, that’s really the key there, so doing things from showcasing your team, going behind the scenes of a big moment or event that you’re doing on your property, interviewing your GM or guest experience team, these are all things that people are really drawn to and that really promote the au authenticity and story driven moments that give them an inside look into your brand and how it actually operates. And something that we’ve actually done recently is we launched a Behind the Door series where we take our audience into these big brand moments and these behind the scenes, restaurant openings and living room gallery installations, and it really builds a connection between a brand and an individual before they even stay with you. And I think that it’s definitely important now that we are in Arlo’s tenure anniversary, that we’re leaning into this even more and bringing people closer to the brand through things like behind the scenes content and social first campaign. So really excited about, things that are coming within the next year, but this is something that we’re really, really, using as the backbone to our social media strategy.
Cassady Quintana:
Oh, I love that. And it’s awesome. It’s kind of the same thing I mentioned of, if you feel like, you know, the area or the property, you’re already five steps ahead. But beyond that, if you feel like you resonate with the people that work at that property, I talked about, previously in a webinar I did that, I went to resort in Mexico last year and I stalked their social media. And when I got there, I feel like I already know, I already knew the people that works there, even though I had never met them. But because that property was so adamant on posting their people, because your people is what makes your property special, right? You could have the most beautiful hotel, it could be having, it could have the most stunning amenities, but if your service and your people don’t match up to that, the experience falls short. So I love that you guys are doing that. I feel like people first is the way to do social media because of course we’re gonna connect with real people other than just a still image of an empty room. So kind of as we wrap up a little bit, I love to ask all my guests this, if you could give hoteliers that are trying to improve their social media right now, one piece of advice, what would you give them?
Dino Jevric:
I think that the biggest piece of advice that I would give is really focus and hone in on the ever shifting landscape that is social media. You know, social landscape is always shifting and you really need to be shifting alongside of it. It’s important to stay curious. It’s important to be culturally aware and have your finger on the pulse of all things that are happening within the hospitality industry. But it’s also important to not get too comfortable with one approach of social media. I think more importantly though is really focus on content that’s actually valuable to your audience, and not just visually appealing. I think going back to what we were talking about in terms of people just, or brands just posting images of a bed, images of an empty lobby, it’s really not driving people to your hotel. It’s probably driving them away because they really can’t connect to that. And I think that if you consistently create content that makes someone say, I could see myself staying here, or I could really see myself enjoying this experience, you’re really already ahead of most brands. So those are two pieces of advice that I would really give that are really, really important to succeeding in hospitality, social media.
Cassady Quintana:
I love that. And previous, you mentioned Arlo’s coming up on its 10 year anniversary. First of all, congrats to you and to the team. That’s such an awesome place to be. It’s super exciting. Do you have anything you can share with us, maybe some exciting campaigns or announcements coming up?
Dino Jevric:
Yeah, I mean, it’s been a long time coming. We’ve really developed as a brand over the past 10 years and we’ve succeeded in so much. But yeah, this year is our 10 year anniversary. We have amazing, amazing, amazing offers coming very, very soon. I’m pretty sure that they’re probably gonna be launched by the time this is posted, so I’ll just go ahead and talk about them. But for social specific, we’re actually launching a 10 year throwback drop. So you’re gonna be able to stay like it’s 2016 and we’re gonna be dropping $100 same day rooms every day from 10 to 11:00 AM hotel local time for those that are in different areas. But yeah, that’ll be happening every day for the rest of the year. We’re partnering with some huge social media partners to kind of get this campaign going. So yeah, I’m just really excited to see where that goes. Yeah, the brand is really happy with where we are. We owe it to the community. We owe it to the people who have been loyal guests and people who we continue to welcome every day. And yeah, we’re just really, really happy to be in this position celebrating 10 years, with you guys.
Cassady Quintana:
As you should be. That’s an awesome place to be and it’s super exciting. We’ll make sure we stay up to date on everything you guys are launching. So Dino, thank you so much for joining. For our listeners that are here, where can they find you?
Dino Jevric:
Well, you can find me. I actually just launched a new newsletter, called the Pickup Report and where I dissect what’s happening in social media, specifically within hospitality, and I dissect topics like the one that we discussed today from a creative and performance perspective. So you can find that on substack and LinkedIn. But personally, you could find me on LinkedIn, first and last name. Be happy to connect with all of you. And yeah, if anyone has any questions or anything, I’d love to discuss.
Cassady Quintana:
Absolutely. Well, thank you Dino, again for joining me. This is such a valuable conversation and I hope our listeners get something out of it. But thank you for taking the time to join me today.
Dino Jevric:
Thank you so much for having me. Appreciate this opportunity.
Cassady Quintana:
Perfect. And thank you to all our listeners. We will see you next time on the Social Success Podcast. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcast so you don’t miss an episode. The Social Success Podcast is produced by Travel Media Group, our editor isBrandon Bell, with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Cassady Quintana, and we hope you enjoyed this episode.
The 2026 Hunter Conference in Atlanta Georgia was a major success! So many hospitality professionals and industry leaders converged to share insights, best practices, challenges, and strategies for the future.
The Suite Spot had the opportunity to attend the industry event and interview some of the best and brightest that hospitality has to offer. Tune in to this special episode to hear from executives, brand leaders, presidents, and more from some of the biggest brands in the hospitality industry.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. Fresh Off the highly anticipated 2026 Hunter Conference, which certainly didn’t just fit the bill. Exceeded expectations. What an incredible event, what an amazing couple days in Atlanta, Georgia at the New and iconic Signia Hilton, Atlanta. There were powerhouse panels and education, incredible networking, truly defined. Their theme was The Home of Hospitality. Certainly hit that over that next those couple days there in Atlanta, Georgia, we had the privilege of covering the event. We have some exclusive interviews to bring you, which I’m so excited to share with you on this very episode today. We visited with our friends over at Newport Hospitality. We celebrated a milestone with Hospitality America. We checked in on the development side at PM Hotel Group and sat down with the brain leader of Graduate by Hilton to talk about that exciting brand and everything that they have cooking over there. Who also knows how to throw an incredible party, which they did in tandem with the Hunter Conference, with a ludicrous concert that capped off. And just, again, an amazing couple days in Atlanta, Georgia. We’re so excited to bring you these interviews, and we’re gonna be bringing it all to you here on the sweet spot. Thanks for tuning in.
Speaker 2:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot Live on location 2026 Hunter Conference. Excited to welcome in, Wayne West, the third president of Newport Hospitality Group. Wayne, thank you so much for taking some time.
Wayne West III:
It is a pleasure to be with you. It’s a pleasure to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, excited to be here. It’s a sleepy cold morning right now, but we’re warming things up here in Atlanta at the Hunter Conference. Tell us a little bit about your experience and, what do you think about the new location, the new digs?
Wayne West III:
The new location is great. We’ve been downtown at the Marriott for so many years. I think this is new. It’s fresh, it’s invigorating. It truly is. One of my favorite conferences. I mentioned to you, the Hunter Conference is a relationship kind of conference where you get to sit down and spend time with people one-on-one, whether it’s your brand, whether it’s other owners, whether it’s my peer group. So I enjoy this one a lot.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, it’s great because I think one of the things, you get a bunch of hospitality people in the same, in the same room. You start talking about some of the challenges that are starting to arise. And right now we got some headwinds, profit profitability, hotel margins, very slim, rising construction costs, operational costs. But you have a philosophy, control what you can control. How do you bring that philosophy to Newport Hospitality Group as we usher in 2026?
Wayne West III:
Number one, I have really good people. My colleagues are strong at my, my, my corporate level as well as the property level. You know, for many, many years the industry was, had a vibrant ability to drive RevPAR, and it seemed like it was increasing three to 5% every year that slowed down. We continue to push that where there’s opportunities, but what I think we do best and my operational team does best is control the big things. Control, cost, control your labor. We spend a great deal of time working on that every single day. We work with the leaders at the properties to make sure that we’ve got the appropriate, uh, levels of payroll and the appropriate levels of resources to the levels of business at the time. So I, I, I think a great deal. We’ve always spent time on that. But it’s even more and more important as your RevPAR may not be increasing as quickly as payrolls are.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Operational efficiency, really, really key. Try to look for every inch that you can get right now. We had the opportunity to meet up with your COO Brendan McCoy at the Hospitality Show out there in Denver. He was talking about the growth of, of Newport Hospitality Group and was really focused in on talking about strategic growth with the right partners. What does the right partner mean to you? And you see opportunity out there.
Wayne West III:
I do see opportunity. We’ve recently taken over a hotel with the perfect partner, has a few hotels, but her focus wants to be on development. She is aligned with us culturally. She has the right kind of hotel. She maintains it well, but she thinks she can make more money developing the next hotel and is leaving operations to us. So the first thing we wanna do, we wanna make sure that we align philosophically with her vision, anyone’s vision of the hotel and how it’s gonna be operated, how we’re gonna treat the guest, the employees, and how we protect her asset and grow it and make it more profitable. But I think that’s the key thing, is aligning with a partner that aligns with your vision.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And that alignment is really can be found in rooms like this, right. At a Hunter Conference, when you’re networking, you’re having conversations over that because it is key, that alignment, making sure that you and the owner are kind of hand in hand, especially in a time where it’s a little bit challenging, looking for operational efficiency. A lot of people, subject matter topics talk about AI and technology, right. Trying to fill those gaps. Talk to me a little bit about the philosophy and how you approach AI and technology. Is it more about the guest experience or employee empowerment?
Wayne West III:
Let’s be honest, AI has been around a long time. If you go back to revenue management 25 years ago, instead of, you know, we started leaning into computers to do some of the analysis for us. So I think this matured over the year and it continues to evolve. And I think it’s evolved expeditiously over the last few years, right? We first used ChatGTP to help us write sentences, and now we’re analyzing data. I think we’ll continue to evaluate how to make us more efficient, but really more effective with the data. I think we need to make sure we’re not consumed by the data and ask AI to help us with the right questions and get the right data to make quicker decisions and better decisions. So I think we’re testing it today, all the different kinds of AI out there. We’re testing it in all the disciplines. We’re testing it in HR, we’re testing it in operations. We’re testing it in sales and marketing. We’re testing it in HR. So I think when you apply it to those and then see what bubbles up and see how, how, what best results you get. But let’s not be consumed by it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely.
Wayne West III:
Because you gotta take care of the guests first.
Ryan Embree:
100%. And I think, you add those things up, you add those little gains up, that’s, and, and kind of take a step back and look. Now you become more operationally efficient. You control what you can control what you said, and hopefully improved your business there. But that’s great perspective to look back. ’cause you’re right, technology is no stranger to our industry. It’s been there just been maybe in a little bit different path.
Wayne West III:
We called it it something different. Truly it is intelligence that helps make us better.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Use it correctly. Love it. So, another thing we like to try to do at these conferences is look into a crystal ball. Try to predict the future, right? Everybody’s telling you what’s next, three, six months and down the line. What’s your vision? Maybe let’s start wide at the hospitality industry and then maybe you can dial it down from Newport Hospitality.
Wayne West III:
Again, I think I said it early, you know, we’ve been spoiled by the ability to grow our rates every year substantially. That’s slowing down. So we’ve gotta be smarter. I think a big opportunity is food and beverage globally from the, in, from an industry standpoint, I think doing food and beverage right drives preference to your hotel. I came up in the food and beverage world, and I think when select service hotels came along, we, we weren’t as good at food and beverage as we were 20 years ago. And we’ve let outside restaurants and bars wildly successful take a piece of our, our business. So I think we can do better if we would concentrate a little more on food and beverage, finding out what the guest really wants, needs and desires are when he checks into your hotel, and that that guest will come back. It will drive preference and it’ll drive RevPAR. So I wanna concentrate on that a bit.
Ryan Embree:
Great differentiator there for guests. Also attracting locals. If it’s a nice restaurant, you know, it’s your hotel restaurant isn’t of that of the same 40 years ago. Right? So, um, what about Newport Hospitality Group? Will you see the vision there?
Wayne West III:
We’ve got a couple letters of intent out today. Great brands, great owners. Two, were buying into one or actually purchasing a hotel. It’s the right hotel in the right location at the right time. We think we add some value by some additional sales and marketing that Whitney will do with her team. Whitney and Kirsten will do, whether it’s digitally or whether it’s just a different way of looking at our guests and attracting the guests. So we’re trying to find the major brands in our niche markets. Maybe we’re not in Washington DC but we’re in Frederick, we’re not in Jacksonville downtown, we’re in Jackson, the beach of Jacksonville. So we do really well in the secondary markets. We know, well, we’re in the south, we’re in the Northeast corridor all the way down from, you know, from Brooklyn, New York to Orlando, Florida. So we’re looking for that sweet spot, but I think many, as many companies are today. But we’re trying to identify that one that we can either reposition through some capital or reposition, because we’re just gonna take a different view of, uh, the revenue side of it.
Ryan Embree:
Well really appreciate you taking some time and stopping by Wayne. So thank you so much for having being on the Suite Spot with us.
Wayne West III:
Good to be with you, Ryan. Nice to meet you. Thank you very much.
Ryan Embree:
We’ll talk to you next time.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. Live at the 2026 Hunter Conference here with Ben Campbell, CEO and President of Hospitality America. Ben, thanks so much for taking some time to speak with us today.
Ben Campbell:
Absolutely. I appreciate the time, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a cold, sleepy Atlanta morning. Very cold outside. But the, it’s warm and hot energy in here. We got some panels, we got some networking going on. There was some great activations and programmings last night. First time here at the Signia Atlanta. You’ve been to Hunter a couple times. What does a successful hunter look like to you and what do you think about the new location?
Ben Campbell:
I love the new location. I love the marquee. I love the historic nature of it. And, and we all got used to, to the marquee and then the multi-level there. Um, here, I got here early just to figure out where everything was, uh, this time to know where I was going. But, um, what a hunter success, success looks like for us is really extending relationships, making new relationships, and then getting outside of our echo chambers of our companies or our hotels and talking to other people and seeing what they’re seeing, what’s happening with the industry, what are people looking to invest in, where do they think it’s going? You know, got to listen to Chris Nassetta, uh, CEO of Hilton yesterday and provided us with some, his insight and, which was great takeaways that we’ll be able to take back to our company and make decisions.
Ryan Embree:
Some really cool announcements you typically get at these shows feels like a new brand’s popping up every single day in hospitality, but it is, you’re absolutely right there, I mean, you get a bunch of hospitality people from different markets in the same room, and all of a sudden those challenges start to arise and bubble up a little bit and maybe some innovative solutions outta that. But 2026, obviously a massive year for Hospitality America, 30 years. Congratulations to that. When you hear that, Ben, you know, as CEO and President, what does that milestone and chapter mean to you?
Ben Campbell:
Me, personally, first, it’s an honor that I’m able to be the CEO of a 30 year company and take it into the next 30 years. When I look back, it’s really about, legacy and consistency. And so for a company to get to 30 years and, and we have some contracts, we have two contracts that are 30 year contracts for us and clients. And so, you know, it’s a lot of work to, to maintain that. But it’s also a real testament to our founder Chris Cargon. It is the legacy that he has left behind and that he has poured into this company that now I have the honor and the rest of our team and, and employees have the honor of taking that into the next level.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to hear that, to hang your hat on a story of three decades worth and to usher in this new, this next 30 years first. So congratulations there. Obviously lots change in hospitality in 30 years. I’d say lots change in the last five. And we might be at a inflection point here with everything around AI and technology, which we’re gonna speak to in a second. But what do you attribute to that longevity and success of Hospitality America and this company?
Ben Campbell:
We boil it down to three different things. So we have what we call the HA Promises. We have three stakeholders that every single day we wake up and we say, are we delivering the promise to our owners, to our team members, and to our guests? So everything that we do, we boil it down into those three pillars and say that every guest comes to our hotels and we have, we’re making promises to them that we have to deliver. Same with our team members, and definitely to our, our owners. And so I think it’s through that lens that we’ve been able to have a 30 year career and knowing that really we’re here to service the guests and we’re also here to service our clients, which is our owners, and deliver on those, perform, deliver the metrics and the performance that they expect and that ultimately we said that we would do and that we are delivering on. So, that’s why I say it’s really the consistency of the company. Also I think, you know, we’ve been scaling at, at a good rate, but it’s been very strategic in how we do it. And so we have 30 year relationships. I don’t want to take on anything that’s gonna put that in jeopardy. Swo we’re very selective on who we bring in and knowing that, okay, I can be very successful with this for this owner, and we’re building a great relationship.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. We’re hearing that right now, more and more, not just looking for growth, but that strategic growth for the right partners. So key right now, especially in a challenging environment where margins, profitability hard to come by right now. But another place that Hospitality America has received some recognition recently is around its people, uh, which is, you know, the USA today recognized as top workplace for two consecutive years and top workplace for frontline workers. I think, you know, you come to a conference like this, obviously the big notes are about the AI technology, but how have you invested in people and seen those dividends pay off?
Ben Campbell:
Yeah. When I came under leadership of the company in 2022, that was a big focus of mine because we were having to rescale the company and really look at the industry and everybody was fighting for the same talent in the same talent pool. And so, like, again, the legacy of Chris Cargan, we said, we need to really define what that looks like objectively on who we’re bringing into the company. And so we boiled that down to our core values, which is outlined as a, uh, acronym P.E.A.C.H. Passion, excellence, adaptability, community, and humble. And so when we seek that talent, they know what they can expect from us, and we can tell them, this is what we expect from you. And when doing that, we’re holding everybody accountable. And so everybody, then we can say, okay, this is who we are. Peach. What we do is the HA promises.
Ryan Embree:
So everybody can strive to meet those metrics for the owner, each other as the team members and and our guests. And by holding that accountability training toward that accountability, and then everybody’s on the same page, that’s really what I think gives us the recognition. Last year when we did that survey for USA today. Really proud to say that 90% of our 850 employees responded to the survey. So just getting that type of engagement of completing the survey was a big win for us. We might have some exciting news come out by the time that this podcast dropped.
Ryan Embree:
Alright, well, we’re excited to hear about it, Ben. And congratulations to you and your team again. The conversations that I’ve had with industry leaders, those strong management companies have that kind of north star that you’re talking about. It looks like you have those two and those that, that culture that you’ve created over there, obviously the 30 years incredible milestone. Typically a time for reflection in looking at the legacy in the past, but also looking towards the future. That’s what you typically do on those big anniversaries. So what is the vision for the future of Hospitality America look like for you, Ben?
Ben Campbell:
Vision for us is still growth. Um, there’s a lot of opportunity out there. Uh, again, I think that, you know, how we do that is, is maybe a little different than we have. Um, we have two great relationships. Like I said, today we operate for five different ownership groups. We will expand some of that, uh, but we’ll also look at expanding through acquisitions. We, we’ve historically grown through development through our partnerships. Um, and so there might be a lot more acquisitions. I think right now when you look at the industry and the values of these assets, you know, the replacement costs, a lot of times you can get into an acquisition that much less than it would be to, to replace that. So I think a lot of that is what we’re hearing at Hunter as well. Um, a lot of owners are feeling that we are feeling that as well. Um, and so there’s some great assets that are coming onto the marketplace that I think three or four years ago wouldn’t, back to your question on what we see for the industry. I think the, you know, we, yesterday you heard Christmas set us say that bifurcation of the cake shape economy is gonna be coming together. I agree with that. I don’t think it’s gonna stay that way forever. Um, I think that the top end has just had a lot more cash reserves that they could bleed off over time. Yeah. The middle market is generally where we’ve, uh, been really, really well. And the Hampton ends, the Fairfield ends the, um, and then higher up we do tapestries and we have a motto and tribute and things of that nature. I think that’s where the industry is going. From an experience side, yes, they want a curated experience and a very intentional experience, but also they want to know what they’re gonna get to. So I think that’s where we are right now. We’re kind of feeling those effects of, okay, we’re, you know, we’re curating the experience, but it may not be taken to that next level. And I think that’s where we need to continue to elevate and continue to spend our dollars to ensure that when the guests show up at the Signia or one of our hotels, like a tapestry or the motto of Bentonville, they walk in and they’re blown away that by the experience because they can tell every single detail is thought through.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s very cool to see the experiential travel really blow up right now. Guests loving that, but looking for that consistency, like you said, every guest wants that unique experience, but they do want it at a consistent level too, of, of meeting or matching their guest expectations. So Ben, thanks for taking some time, uh, to speak with us. Congratulations on all the milestones and we’re gonna look, uh, for that news that you were sharing.
Ben Campbell:
I appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much. And, uh, we’ll talk to you next time on the Sweet Spot.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embry here with the Suite Spot live on location at the Hunter Conference 2026 in Atlanta, Georgia, here with Paul Sacco, Chief Growth and Development Officer at PM Hotel Group. Paul, thank you for taking some time.
Paul Sacco:
Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree:
Excited to talk about this. We’re the new venue. Uh, you visited the Hunter Conference before. How does this compare and, and what does success really look like for you when you leave Atlanta here?
Paul Sacco:
Yeah, I think it’s been a great conference. Perhaps a little hiccup with some of the weather Sure. And people getting in. But I think Teague and League and the team at Hunter have done a great job, really producing a terrific conference. And it’s really well attended now. So we’ve had great experience so far in terms of what does a good conference look like? To me, it’s all about connections. So it’s all about making sure that when you come to a conference like this, sure you have meetings scheduled for deal advancement on projects, you’re working on relationship building on some of the new relationships that you are building upon. And that that’s structured, but also that you leave plenty of time to walk the floor because inevitably you’re running into people that you share common stories with, you’re connecting with maybe there’s some things to do with, and it’s just great ’cause our business and our industry is really all about connections.
Ryan Embree:
That’s how, that’s where it’s built. It’s a big little world hospitality run into a lot of people. And when you get a lot of hospitality people in one place, they’re gonna start sharing best practices and maybe some of the challenges that they’re having right now. Absolutely. Especially with margins, uh, profits, people are looking out for that edge to figure out what’s next. Where do you think there’s opportunity when you kind of see the landscape right now? Is it a particular region, a segment that you like?
Paul Sacco:
Yeah, so we operate in full service and toward luxury segment as well as select service and then independent and boutique. And we all hear a lot right now about luxury and leisure leading the way. And we hear a lot about mid-scale extended stay and extended stay generally leading the way. And we’re in those categories. I also think there’s really good opportunity if you are thoughtful about the, the possibilities thoughtful about the deal in urban markets, on core branded hotels. I think there’s still some really good opportunity. You have to be thoughtful about your basis and about what the demand drivers are. But I think there’s some future opportunity in the near term there. I think there will be transactions that start to happen more. We’re starting to see some more pip pressure now from the brands. We’re starting to see some more lender pressure. I think the period of extend and pretend is perhaps coming to an end. Yeah. And there’ll be some transactions that occur out of that. We’re seeing more marketed deals as well come across. And I think that’s been across segments. Fortunately for us, we’re really focused in on each of those three segments as a company and we can capitalize on the right opportunities.
Ryan Embree:
And that’s where those strong connections come in to make those deals move across the finish line at the end of the, the day. Absolutely. Now PM Hotel Group, you talked a little bit about it, but it’s a competitive landscape out there. Where do you find opportunity to differentiate yourself from other management companies?
Paul Sacco:
So it is a competitive environment for sure. We’re a top 15 management company now. We do not have any particular goal or pressure to be a certain number of hotels. That’s really meaningful on two fronts. One, it means we can grow smart and do deals that make sense for our company, deals that make sense for the owner in terms of using our operation makes sense for our team. And secondly, it’s really important because it, it allows us to remain accessible to ownership at the highest levels of our company. So we always say that if there’s ever a time where an owner can’t call me or Joseph our president or others in our company and get a response that day, then we’ve grown too big. And that’s really important to us. And since we’re an independently owned company and we’re not private equity owned, we’re not public, we don’t have any of those quarterly quote unquote nug pressures to grow. We can be really thoughtful and strategic about the deals that we do and the owners with whom we’re working and remain accessible to them.
Ryan Embree:
Well it puts you also in opportunity to kind of maybe be first in line when a new developer or owner wants to go a certain route. You’ve got kind of the story to tell them and and share with them.
Paul Sacco:
We hear it a lot in reality. We are of the size and scope that our senior team remains very accessible to ownership groups, to asset management groups, et cetera, based on the size and nature of our company. I think there are some others who can say that as well. And there’s some others who are a lot larger and it just maybe just makes it more difficult to do that as effectively.
Ryan Embree:
Definitely. Now another topic on everybody’s bingo card here. Conferences like this is AI and technology, right? So what’s the philosophy over at PM Hotel Group? Are you guys using anything on the development side and how do you utilizing it?
Paul Sacco:
Yeah, I think there are some really good tools within ai, even just using ChatGPT and Gemini in order to do market research, really market assessment tools. And that’s a great way to get highlight overview of what’s happening in a market if you’re looking at a new deal, if you’re traveling to a market, a good way to gain sort of initial information and a feeling for what’s happening in a market from a development perspective. Now we tend to dive in deep and back all that up as we advance with some really good formats like CoStar and some others that are out there that help us really assess a deal and assess our business. So on the development front, I think that’s how we’re approaching things on the operating front. I think AI will continue to evolve in a way that it helps, makes operations more efficient, whereby there can be data assessment on check-ins and checkouts, which can help with labor and staffing needs and assessing those types of things. And then of course, on the commercial side, really harnessing the way that people are doing intent-based searches now. Because people will go into ChatGPT or Gemini and they’ll put in an intent-based search. We find a lot that our independent and boutique hotels come up in those searches. But how do you capitalize upon that and how do you harness that in a way to turn it into reservations?
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Everyone looking for that edge right now, right? Like I said, to combat those margins right now, which are challenging in your position, you’re always looking for the next opportunity, the next deal. What’s your vision for PM Hotel Group as you grow into the back half of the 2020s?
Paul Sacco:
So again, we’re a privately owned company and we grow very strategically. We’re not under any certain pressure, again to have a certain quote unquote nug. So that’s been very effective for us and we’ve been really thoughtful about the owners that we’re doing deals with, the types of deals that we can operate. Effectively key for us is that we’ve done a couple of small strategic partnerships, siteline a year or so ago, modus by PM Hotel Group before that. And the combination of that has put us into all these different segments that we just discussed. But it’s put our reach from Hawaii to California to the mountain states, all the way to the East Coast with different types of products. So we can really capitalize on that and harness the fact that we have coverage and reach in a lot of different markets and market knowledge. So I think for us it’s just about growing smart. It’s about putting a lot of effort behind commercial and technology. We’re, we’re making a lot of investments in that space right now so that we are out ahead of AI advancement and technology advancement. And we’re even in a sort of muted RevPAR growth environment now we’re focused on RPI. And we’re focused on TRevPAR and making sure that operationally and top line wise, we’re getting more than our fair share.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, Paul, congratulations to you and your team. We’ll continue to keep a close eye and we’ll let you get back in there. And for all the good stuff, the Hunter Conference has to offer.
Paul Sacco:
Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
Thanks Paul.
Ryan Embree:
All righty. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot live on location at the 2026 Hunter Conference here with Parker, Graduate by Hilton Brand Leader. So excited. I love this brand, it’s very exciting. But before we get talking about your brand, talk to us a little bit about your brand, where you came from and your history here in hospitality.
Parker Henderson:
It’s fun. Actually. We’re here in Atlanta. This is where I was born and raised. My parents met working for Delta Airlines, so I grew up traveling. Dad worked for Delta for 32 years. And so grew up traveling. And when I got to college, I knew that was something I wanted to major in. Went to Appalachian State University, majored in hospitality tourism management. Worked at the front desk of Comfort Suites when I was in Boone, North Carolina. And then did my internship. And I had a great professor who I was like, I’ll just do my internship and here I’m at already at the hotel. No big deal. He was like, no, you need to go somewhere. You need to do something. And so, Pinehurst Resort in North Carolina, they were interested in me. So I did my internship. There happened to be the 99 US Open, everything went really well there. Came back as a manager in development and I was with ClubCorp, who owned Pinehurst for about five years. They moved me to a location in Austin, Texas. Stayed there for a while. Resort Company wasn’t really growing. And meanwhile this beautiful 31 story Hilton was being built in downtown Austin. And I remember seeing that and it’s like, I want that. And I was always in front office operations, so I was able to join the Hilton Austin as assistant director of front office. And that was in November of 2003. And I’ve been with Hilton ever since on property roles for about a decade in San Diego, Baltimore, Orlando. And then joined the corporate front office team in 2012 where I focused on front office operations, efficient use of our property management systems, which are proprietary to Hilton, and then was able to work and get exposed to the brand side and then joined Embassy Suites brand in 2021 and just love that world. Also during the pandemic, my pandemic fun was getting my master’s in hospitality from Virginia Tech. They had a campus in the DMV area up in DC and fall of 2020, I became an adjunct professor in that program. So continuing to do that, I’ve always believed in the power of that intersection of hospitality and education. So when Graduate came through in 2024, I was the first one to raise my hand saying, okay, I’ve got the brand experience, I’ve got the university passion. And so it’s been a great experience since then.
Ryan Embree:
That’s so cool, Parker. And you know, we were talking about this, I’d love to hear those stories of people that went to school for hospitality and now look at you, you’re on the other side of the desk, you’re, you’re the teacher and, and you know, influencing the next generation of hoteliers, which is so cool. So obviously college and universities have, I’m sure you don’t get tired of talking about those never, especially in your position. But for those who maybe aren’t as familiar with Graduate, talk to us a little bit about that brand, maybe a little bit of a story as well.
Parker Henderson:
Absolutely. So Graduate Hotels was created in 2014 by AJ Capital. They found that there was great opportunity to have upper upscale position, lodging, bespoke design in these hotel, in these university markets. And it’s been a great success. They started with just one or two properties. They grew to 34-35 properties and then Hilton acquired them in spring of 2024. Since then, they’ve all come into the Hilton ecosystem, 35 assets total currently. And so they’re live with Hilton Honor, they’re live with all of the team member perks with Go Hilton and everything that you expect. But also they’re tied into all the benefits of being Hilton, Hilton Worldwide Sales, Hilton Supply Management, Hilton University, all the training programs. And so the hotels have done a great job of kind of onboarding, keeping the authenticity that makes graduate special while using the engine and all the power that comes with the distribution network of Hilton.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to hear. And you know, when I think about people and their universities and their colleges, passion is the first word that comes up. And to marry that with your brand and people are also passionate about travel. That’s such an exciting, probably space to be in. And the fact that you, that you get to talk about, these projects and here we are in Atlanta, a very cold unseasonably cold day here in March. But you know, we’re at the Hunter Conference talking to investors, owners, developers. You’re having these conversations. What do owners and developers get excited about when you’re having conversations about your brand?
Parker Henderson:
The passion, like you said, there’s such storytelling and such a passion to tell a story either about some where somebody lives currently, where their alma mater is, or maybe if they didn’t go to college or university where they were in that youthful optimism phase of kind of the late teens, early twenties, where you really don’t know where your path is and it’s just kind of starting and being able to bottle that up and put that into a project. That’s what gets people excited. The fun part is that the product is so special, it’s so bespoke at each university, at each college town, but they perform wonderfully. We, we have above market performance and revenue and occupancy and we continue to capitalize on those high impact times, home football games, move-ins, graduation, all of that type of stuff. But also with the Hilton system, we’ve been able to expose them to so much different areas of business, whereas they may have had to rely on online travel agencies In the past a lot we’ve been able to kind of broaden that to introduce more business travel. We’ve been able to work with Hilton Worldwide Sales, get more groups, meetings and events into the hotels. The average Graduate hotel is 167 keys and about 4,000 square feet of meeting space. Now with the 35 hotels, that varies greatly. Some are small as 70 keys. Some are as big as 304 keys. Some have zero meeting space. We’ve got one with over 23,000 square feet of meeting space. So there’s a lot of variety there. But all of them can play into the different mix of business that Hilton Worldwide Sales promotes.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s incredible ’cause you know, none of these properties are the same because probably none of these universities are the same. None of these markets are the same. So I’m sure it’s a passion project again, but also creating these memorable experiences around those really cool times and being able to tie your brand in there definitely means something special. Now you have a couple projects, special projects that you’re working on right now. Talk to us a little bit about those and, and maybe that differentiation between them.
Parker Henderson:
Sure. With the development side, as soon as Graduate came into Hilton became a brand that we were able to franchise. So we have been working with our development committee, that’s why we’re here at Hunter Investment Conference. But we’ve got about 60 different deals in various forms of negotiation. We’ve got a number of deals signed that we’re excited to work on. I’ll highlight kind of four ’cause I feel like they tell a good story. We’ve got Flagstaff, Arizona, that’s gonna be by Northern Arizona University, brand new build, new to Hilton owner. Very exciting project that’s gonna do some amazing storytelling about Route 66, about Northern Arizona University and just the Flagstaff community. You’ve got Boulderado, a historic, a hundred and something year old asset in downtown Boulder, right by UC Boulder. This is gonna become a graduate by Hilton Hotel. This is funded by AJ Capital. They own that. So that’s showing continued interest in the founder of the brand into Graduate by Hilton, which is something that means a lot to me. It means that we’re protecting the brand in, in meaningful ways. We’ve got Graduate Laramie that’ll come online by the University of Wyoming. This is an existing Hilton Garden Inn that’s reaching the end of its term with that project. And we’ll transition and go through a painstaking renovation to tell the cowboy story of the University of Wyoming. And that’ll open as Graduate Laramie. And then in New York, we’ve got Graduate Syracuse. This is actually owned by Syracuse University. This is the institution building something, 200 keys from the ground up. It’s gonna be absolutely spectacular there.
Ryan Embree:
I can talk to you about each one of these projects and which makes them so unique and, and that’s again the cool part, probably why both the owners and developers love it. Guests love it as well. But let’s get to know you in the portfolio a little bit more intimately. So let’s talk about maybe one of your favorite views on one of your properties.
Parker Henderson:
There’s a lot. So Graduate East Lansing, east Lansing, Michigan, Michigan State University, if you look out any of their front side windows, you’re looking right into kind of the arboretum of Michigan State University. It is gorgeous rooftop of graduate Auburn, Alabama. If you stand at the War Eagle Supper Club on the roof of Graduate Auburn, you’re looking directly towards the scoreboard and the stadium at Auburn University. Yeah, it’s fantastic. Gosh, there’s so many different ones. I could, like literally, even in Princeton, you’re looking down the street, down Nassau Street towards the gates of Princeton. You’re the fun part about these properties. And I’ve been able to go to all 35 locations both in the UK and the US. And the great thing about them is the location. Most all of them are at the intersection of Maine and Maine. They’re all walkable to campus, no further than about a mile away from the university they are next to and surrounded by the most popular restaurants, bars, shopping, points of interest, the museums, whatever it may be, they’re in the heart of it. All
Ryan Embree:
Such tradition rich places and spaces that these properties are located in tells a an amazing story. And sure, your guests get to be a part of it, which is really cool. What about signature dish maybe or a local tradition or something like that?
Parker Henderson:
So all of our restaurant, or excuse me, all of our hotels have a breakfast. Usually that’s kind of a cafe with a barista led concept. Many of those go by the name of Poindexter Coffee. So we have about half the brand that have a Poindexter coffee. Those are phenomenal in themselves. Then in the evenings we require hotels to have bar and dinner at all their locations. One traditional dish may sound basic, but it’s so good. We do a really great smash burger in fries, and that’s something you can find at almost all of our locations. Just a really good smash burger.
Ryan Embree:
Very cool. Well, you know, and I didn’t prep you for this one, but what about if there’s, is there anything, I mean, because obviously colleges and universities that they’re, they have a lot of, sometimes quirky traditions that, that are in the area. Are there any hotels or properties that have any of these local traditions or anything like that?
Ryan Embree:
Well, the storytelling, storytelling is one of our values at graduate and all of our hotels portray storytelling. We use maximalist design, we use layering of story upon story, but I think one of my favorite ones I was speaking about graduate Princeton, their headboard, if you’ve ever looked at a picture of graduate Princeton, their headboard looked like these hand carved canes and they’ve got like etchings in ’em and all different kinds of things. And I remember asking the general manager, Michael, it’s like, what is this? Why does it look like hockey sticks above my bed? He’s like, well, back in the 1860s, students used to hand carve their own canes and walk around campus and around the 1860s the upperclassmen decided, nope, the freshmen shouldn’t be allowed to carry those. So they would like beat them with their sticks and, you know, not allow the freshmen to carry them around here. So now that does not continue, but it’s now kind of an intramural fall sports festival every fall for called the Canes Prix. So it’s one of those traditions and one of those stories that you walk in and any Princeton student or alum would get that immediately. Yeah. But from somebody who went to Appalachian State would never have heard of that, it would never have known that tradition if it wasn’t for that quirky headboard.
Ryan Embree:
And there’s that special connection with the guest that is, that knows that, but also the guests that maybe not like, well, what I’m learning about right now, love that tradition. Like that’s very, that’s some cool history, you know, associated with the property in the university. So obviously a lot of growth. You just talked about the pipeline for this brand, but what’s as brand leader, what’s your kind of vision for the next, you know, three to five years for for Graduate by Hilton?
Parker Henderson:
Absolutely. We’re looking at kind of making sure that everything within the hotels we’re optimizing as much as possible. So I always love to base everything we do on our values. Our motto at Graduate is we are all students. Our values underneath that is what is fearless hospitality? We’re curious. We’re unapologetically unique and we’re storytellers. And so with that just kind of capitalizing on that and moving that into just grow within the next few years we’ll have several new openings. We’ll have more announcements to share on that.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, we’re excited. We’re gonna keep a close eye on the graduate story and yeah, we’re excited to thank you for stopping by and talking to us.
Parker Henderson:
Absolutely. Thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the latest TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl episode featuring University of Nevada, Las Vegas!
Special guest and Dean of the William F. Harrah College of Hospitality at UNLV, David Cardenas, who joins the Suite Spot to discuss the exciting curriculum and academic program of the college and how it is preparing the next generation of hospitality professionals.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. We are here for another edition of TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl. Yes, we are bringing it back. And we are live on campus at UNLV’s Harrah College of Hospitality here, with the Dean of the Harrah College of Hospitality, David. David, thank you so much for inviting us and, and, you know, bringing us here to your beautiful campus.
David Cárdenas:
My pleasure. Thanks for allowing me to share a little bit about this amazing program and share a little bit about the wonderful things that we do here.
Ryan Embree:
We’re so excited, like you said, the inspiration behind this series was just to showcase some of the amazing colleges and schools of hospitality around the nation. UNLV certainly fits the bill. We’re gonna talk about that and some of the amazing things you and your faculty and students are doing here. But before we do that, we always like a little bit of tradition. One of the things unique to hospitality is learning about people’s background because you come from different brands, sometimes different segments, sometimes you fall into the industry. Tell us a little bit about your hospitality journey and what led you here.
David Cárdenas:
Yeah. So, a little bit about myself and how I got to where I am. So, I was born in Ecuador, lived there for most of my childhood. I came to the United States to go to school in the Carolinas. And, my start in the hospitality industry is a little bit untraditional, but maybe a lot more people actually go through it the way that I did. So I was in college, and like most poor college students, I had to, to find a job. And so, hospitality was where I found it. You know, bussing tables, washing dishes, cooking, and I loved it. And that’s what paid my way through school. At the time, I was a pre-med major. I wanted to be a real doctor, what my daughter says is a real doctor
David Cárdenas:
And so didn’t think anything about being in the hospitality industry while I was doing it. And, but, little by little, even in school went from, you know, a server to a supervisor to, you know, assistant manager to, by the time I graduated, I was running food and beverage operations. And my boss at the time was like, hey, you should really think about going into the hospitality industry. And said, no, I’m gonna be a doctor. And she’s like, just do it for a year. So one year turned into two, two into three, year four, my mom’s like, you’re going to medical school? And I’m like, no, I don’t wanna go to medical school. But I realized that I didn’t know what I was doing, and I hadn’t taken an accounting class. I’d taken physics and taken biochem, but I’ve never taken, you know, an HR class, and I had to go back to school.
David Cárdenas:
So, you know, after working in the industry for four or five years, you know, I was like, I needed to go back and get an education. And so I went back and got my master’s degree, and knowing that my path was gonna be in the hospitality industry, I thought I was gonna be a corporate trainer. I loved working with people, loved getting them you know, trained to do what, if it was serving or, you know, being a cashier, being a manager. That was what I loved to do. And so that was what I was hoping to do. And when I was in my master’s program, realized that I love to teach and I loved to do research, got the opportunity to get my PhD, one thing led to another and got into academia. But didn’t ever think about the hospitality industry when I was in school. But that’s kind of how I fell into it. And I don’t regret any of it.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I love what you said there. It’s the untraditional traditional route of hospitality, and that’s actually one of the reasons we started this series, is to showcase that you can have a career here. There’s so many elements to it, as you said, and you know, in some ways you are kind of training, you know, the next generation of hospitality. So it goes full circle. So, share with us a little bit about the rich history of this school and the college here.
David Cárdenas:
Yeah. So the, the university or the college was established in 1967. So over 50 plus years of being part of the hospitality education industry. And you know, I think that there were no better place to have hospitality education than to be in Las Vegas. And the growth of Vegas as the entertainment and hospitality capital of the world was lockstep with the College of Hospitality. And as the city grew, the college grew, and, a lot of people were attracted to come to Vegas and work to thinking about it from an entertainment standpoint, from the hospitality standpoint. And then they would come and get a degree here. And then they’d start in the industry, and they’d become the giants in the industry.
David Cárdenas:
So, you know, it’s pretty amazing, you know, talking to a lot of the alumni, you know, they came here, didn’t know much about it, weren’t quite sure. Many of them came here because of the basketball team. You know the rich history of what happened with basketball, and then just kind of got their foot in the hospitality industry or the gaming industry. And then our alumni start, you know, moving up in the industry, and we have the Bill Hornbuckles of the World, which are, you know, the president of MGM or, you know, Carlos Castro, the President of Resorts World. All of them, you know, kind of started here and grew up to be stars in the industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s incredible. And, you know, it’s interesting you bring up sports because, you know, obviously, sports have now also transformed Las Vegas. The city’s going through this transformation with sports. But, you know, talking about, for those who aren’t familiar, you know, I had the opportunity to walk around campus a little bit before this interview and could literally see the top of the Paris Eiffel Tower from campus. For those who aren’t familiar, you know, you are just blocks away from the Strip. Talk to us about that location and what it means for some of the students, and really just kind of propelling themselves right into the hospitality industry, you know, steps away from this place.
David Cárdenas:
Yeah. So if you’ve never been to our campus and never been to Hospitality Hall, it’s the Taj Mahal of hospitality education, and we are a mile and a half away from the center of it all. You see, most people have seen it on television or in movies, the Strip, right? We see that every day from our campus, which is pretty amazing. And what that gives us is access to people that most other universities don’t have access to. You know, at any point in time that executive can come and walk here and give a guest lecture. Or more importantly, at any day, our students can do a behind-the-scenes tour of the Bellagio Fountain Club or Tour Allegiant Field or, you know, go up the Eiffel Tower at Paris.
David Cárdenas:
So you know, there are many universities that come here for a week to experience it. Our students have it full-time. The other thing about that is that those executives teach classes for us. So currently we’re teaching an entertainment class. The Vice President of Entertainment for MGM, Paul Davis, is teaching that class. And so the people who are actually doing it out there are here. And that’s just an amazing experience. The students, when they go to do their internship, they go a mile and a half away. They don’t have to travel for hours or go during the summer. They’re right here. So, I think proximity is one of the main reasons we are ranked number one in hospitality.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s incredible. It’s so unique. I mean, I remember being in hospitality school myself as a UCF Rosen grad and seeing the Las Vegas strip on a PowerPoint, you know, that a professor puts up and you just, students here just look out a window and it’s right there. Very cool. So, more recently, the school just announced a new strategic framework for the college. That’s not something that’s done overnight; that obviously takes a lot of work and effort. Tell us a little bit about that process and what that framework looks like.
David Cárdenas:
Yeah, so it was very much a collaborative effort. So I became Dean a little bit less than two years ago. So March 1st will be my two-year anniversary here. And when I came here, I was in awe. We have amazing faculty, great support, our alumni were doing wonderful things, but I also saw that if we stood still, others were gonna pass us by. And I often say, you know, I didn’t wanna be the, the Sears of Hospitality Education where we could kept doing the same thing over and over again and we didn’t innovate. And so we went through a year and a half process of looking inward of who we are, what do we do well, what are our values, and what do we need to do to continue being a leader in hospitality education. So we did hundreds of listening sessions, focus groups, surveys, lots of meetings, lots of emails to try to figure out where we’re gonna be going to create what we have as our new vision.
David Cárdenas:
So our new vision is creating global leaders who inspire unforgettable experiences. So we wanted to make sure that we portrayed that we are developing leaders. So we’re developing those people who are going to be developing that next sphere or the next amazing event, or, you know, the next mega event. And having that amazing experiences of what we do. And the pillars that we have that are under that foundation are student success, knowledge, global leadership, and purposeful engagement. And so for us, we wanted to make sure our students had that most amazing experience. And it was global. So Vegas is an amazing place to learn, but we wanted students to go to Macau, and we want students to go to Auckland, and we want students to go to Madrid, and learn from those types of experiences, and really be that place where engagement, because hospitality is all about being engaged, that they were doing that part.
David Cárdenas:
The next part of that strategic plan was that we restructured our college. We’ve always been known for hospitality education and hospitality operations. So if you’re operating a hospitality organization, industry, that’s what we were known for. Again, as I said, Bill Hornbuckle at MGM is running an operation. So that’s still gonna be core to what we do, but we’re expanding into areas such as sport, entertainment, travel, and tourism. Gaming has always been something that we’ve done well, but we’re gonna expand that. And then the other big area is hospitality technology and incorporating AI and the tech part into, into the hospitality industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and that’s what I want to talk about, ’cause you mentioned innovation a lot in that new strategic framework, and technology is moving so quickly. I mean, it’s insane to think some of the students that are starting their journey now, the technology is gonna be completely outdated by the time they end their journey. Right? So how do you approach technology and hospitality, and maybe also getting your take on just where you think the industry as a whole is with adopting technology, which is typically an industry that’s been a little bit slower in the adoption of technology.
David Cárdenas:
Yeah. So I don’t think we’re ever gonna catch up. But I think our job is to make sure that we’re exposing our students, because even as you said, once they graduate, it’s gonna be different than probably what we taught them in that is to think about how they’re adaptable to that technology more than that tech. Because the tech that I learned back when I was going to school is irrelevant, but it’s more about the integration of technology, the adaptation of technology. And I believe that, you know, we’re talking about AI right now, we’re teaching that in our classrooms, it’s a central focus of what we do, but in four years, we’re probably talking about CB or OS or I don’t know, something else. There’s gonna be a little bit different, right? And so it’s more about the critical thinking skills, the adapted skills, and technology’s always gonna be with us, and I don’t think it’s gonna replace everything that we do.
David Cárdenas:
We were actually having a conversation with a gentleman this morning, a little bit about that, you know, who’s scared, like, he’s like, you know, I’m gonna lose my job. Well, maybe there’s gonna be jobs that are gonna be lost, but we’re gonna create new ones. So when we developed the washer and dryer, were we mad that we don’t wash our clothes by hand? No. We were very happy about that. And there were jobs that were eliminated from that perspective, but we created new opportunities. And the thing about the hospitality industry, it’s all about the customer. And you’re gonna need to have that human connection. So for us, and specifically in our degree, it’s the interaction between the human and the technology, the interface between that and teaching our students, that when that human component is important, when that technical component is important, and how to manage both the human and the tech part. And so that’s kind of what our focus is for our degree.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I mean, it’s so important, you know, technology needs to empower those employees, students that are gonna be going in because they’re gonna have an expectation ’cause I think, obviously we look through the lens of, you know, what is this generation gonna be doing with technology, but also how is the industry going to adapt to a generation that is used to technology and they want to use it, they’re anxious to use it and saying, Hey, let’s do this in some of our individual processes. And, you know, some of the best ways that you can explore technology, how things are done or run in hospitality, is through internships. You mentioned it before. I was required to do a couple of internships when I went to hospitality school, but it was great because it exposed me to so many different elements of hospitality. And you mentioned it in your journey. I mean, you didn’t know which way to go there. It could be overwhelming for a student, but internships are a great way to get exposure there. How do you implement that into your programs?
David Cárdenas:
Yeah, so I think one of the key things about hospitality education is the immersive experience that you have to have. And so, you know, I’ll get to the internships in a second, but we have to make sure that in the classroom, they get the best of the best, the best faculty member, you know, so that content needs to be there, but then if they can’t implement it, they’re not gonna be successful. And so that applied approach is the second part that we do. And we require all of our students to do a thousand hours of applied work in the hospitality industry while they’re in school, because we want them to understand the stresses of it. We want them to understand, you know, how difficult it might be or the long hour being on your feet to do all of that is part of what we do.
David Cárdenas:
In addition to that, all of our students are required to do an internship. So, in addition to a thousand hours, they have that internship. And the other thing that all of our students do is a culminating experience. So where they’re putting everything together, they’ve done the thousand hours, they’ve done the internship, and the last thing they’re doing, some kind of immersive activity. It could be running our student-run restaurant, the Bistro410. It could be putting on one of our mega events, like the UNLVino, or it could be developing a new game for our casino. So applying all that is really, really important. We want the students to get their hands dirty and have that as part of their educational experience.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You know, a lot of the leaders I’ve had the privilege of having on this credit, a lot of those early learning, internships, and mentors. That was that first foot, or that was that first, you know, step into the industry. So really, really cool to see there. You mentioned partnerships, local partnerships, very, very important. Obviously, proximity has a lot to do with it. How important are having those partnerships and, you know, how does that also set students up for success after graduation?
David Cárdenas:
Critical. And so we wouldn’t be successful if it wasn’t for our partnerships and alumni, and what they give back. They’re opening their doors from as easy as providing internships for our students, hiring them for full-time jobs, being mentors, being guest speakers. But they’ve also been very generous with their wallet. If you’ve ever had a chance to walk through Hospitality Hall, you’re gonna see all of those names on all of our rooms. So you have the MGM Rebel Grounds, our coffee shop, you know, you have, Chairman Tso’s, who’s Ambassador Hotel is one of the largest hotel groups in Korea, who has theirs. You know you have Caesars who’s given to us. All of them have been a part of who we are and have developed who we are.
David Cárdenas:
You know, so they’ve been very generous to us. They helped build this building. This building is completely paid off because of them. And they help provide over half a million dollars of scholarships every year to our students. So, to make it affordable for them. One of the coolest partnerships, one of the most coolest partnerships that we just recently had, the president of Wynn called me, he’s like, Hey, David, I wanna send students to Macau. I wanna do a study abroad. We’ll pay for it. And they’re like, awesome. Let’s give them that experience. Let’s figure that out. So I mean, they open doors. They support our students. And they really are the ones who give us that leg up so that our students are successful.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool. And, you know, a symbiotic relationship between, you know, the partners who are also investing in the students here, because this can be the future leaders of their organization. So, you know, having those close partnerships is so cool, important, and a lot of cool stories. I’m sure that you’re hearing from your students as well. Well, I’m gonna pick your brain a little bit. I think, you know, I love having these opportunities to, you know, speak to educators such as yourself. I wanna give some tips out there, maybe to just some younger, hospitality professionals. What would you say to those who are about to enter, you know, finishing up their education career here at Harrah Hospitality School and entering the workforce? What tips would you give them?
David Cárdenas:
So, as they’re about to transition from hospitality education to be a hospitality leader, I think it’s to continue to network and to continue to build your educational skillset to be successful. So I think that the learning process does not stop once you finish school. So, figuring out how you continue to learn, continue to grow, to be able to expand your thoughts, you know, so it could be, you know, through professional development opportunities. It could be attending conferences, it could be just traveling for fun and seeing how things are in different areas. The other thing is to continue to stay connected to your university and to the programs. We have an amazing Boughner Center here for our students. It’s our career development center where it helps with internships and jobs, but it’s also available for our alumni.
David Cárdenas:
So if an alumni is thinking, Hey, I wanna change jobs, or I’m looking for another opportunity to continue to have that partnership with the university allows you to have that ability. And then thinking about how to pay it forward. I guarantee you that almost every single one of our graduates, somebody helped them get to where they are. It could be through a scholarship, somebody might have mentored them, it could have been an amazing faculty member. Well, what can they do to help that next generation? So they’re never too young to start mentoring. They’re never too young to start helping students find jobs because, you know, somebody helped them. So, thinking about how that might help somebody else.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I love that. And hospitality, we talked about it off camera before we started, but hospitality is a big but small world, and you’ve got a lot of connections out there. You’d be surprised, you know, how many people on LinkedIn, you see, you scroll down to their education, and it’s someone from your alma mater, right? That’s right down the road or doing a position. So love the advice there. What about those freshmen or, you know, younger just starting there, what tips would you give them as they enter, you know, the next four years of learning and education?
David Cárdenas:
Yeah, so I think no matter what, get involved and get engaged. Say yes to everything. The more experiences that you could have at a younger age, the better you’re gonna be. You know, is it gonna be hard work? Yeah. Take that, you know, take that difficult shift, you know, work those weekends, work those nights, because that’s where you’re gonna grow and you’re gonna experience and you’re gonna meet people. You know, if you have an opportunity to go hear a guest speaker, go to it. If there is an activity where you can volunteer to do an event, volunteer. Join a club, you know, all those things are gonna be very important. The time goes by very, very fast. And I do believe that we have amazing faculty who teach in the classroom that are amazing, but most of the learning is gonna happen outside of that classroom.
David Cárdenas:
So the more you can do outside, it’s gonna benefit you from there. The other thing is talk to people. Don’t be scared. You know, I have so many times, the students are like, I didn’t wanna bother you. Bother us. That’s why we’re here. That’s why we have office hours. You know, don’t be too nervous and, you know, make that interaction. I think it’s gonna help benefit you. And you get to meet people, and the doors are gonna open, and before you know it, you’re gonna have this amazing network base.
Ryan Embree:
Cool. And we’re hospitality people, right? We love people. That’s why we’re in this business. So, yes, definitely agree with you there. All right. So as we wrap up, I want to talk about, obviously, we have the new strategic framework, but as you look beyond, right, your vision and what are you most excited about right now when it comes to the, the college?
David Cárdenas:
Well, you know, we just finished the strategic plan, so just getting it implemented and started, so we’re working on a whole bunch of new degrees and getting those out and rolling those out. Those international partnerships are really, really important for me. You know, now it’s really thinking about how do we implement those things? And then also knowing that even though we have a strategic plan, we’re gonna adapt to that. Things are gonna change, as I said, you know, figuring out what the next AI is and making sure that we incorporate that in what we do. And you know, I think what I’m most excited about is that we have an amazing team. Our faculty and staff are here to support our students, and they’re gonna do whatever it takes for them to be successful. And that’s really exciting. So no matter where we go, we’re gonna have a team behind us to make that happen.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, thank you so much for taking some time outta your busy schedule to let us visit here. We covered a lot. We covered, you know, technology, the history, and the school. Any final thoughts before we wrap up?
David Cárdenas:
I really appreciate it. So I think the, the last thing is that if you’re thinking about going to the industry, get an education, you know, no matter what, no one can ever take that away from you. I think that that education is power. So if you don’t get a degree in hospitality, get your degree in something. Always be a lifelong learner. And we’d love to have you here at the Harrah College of Hospitality. So come join us.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, thank you so much. Appreciate your time.
David Cárdenas:
Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
Alright.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell, with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference in Las Vegas was a tremendous success! The annual event was filled with thought leadership, networking, and insights with the best and the brightest in the industry.
The Suite Spot and Hotel Equities have partnered together to bring you Hotel Equities Part 2, in the latest Suite Spot episode, which contains three exclusive interviews with some of the biggest names at Hotel Equities.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. We hope you enjoyed episode one of our special edition Hotel Equities Leadership Conference 2026. This is episode two where we’re gonna sit down with Karen Mendez and David Rosenberg, who’s gonna talk to us about the exciting updates from the postcard, cabins and outdoor collection brand from Marriott. We talked to Bill Stachler about revenue optimization. And lastly, we sit down with Albert Smith, Chief Operating Officer at Hotel Equities. We hope you enjoy these interviews, out in Las Vegas.
Ryan Embree:
Hello Everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. We are at the 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference. I’m here with Karen Mendez, VP of Operations, and David Rosenberg, President of the Focus Services Division and Outdoor Collection. Karen, David, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Karen & David:
Thank you for having us.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Well, let’s talk about this conference. First of all, nearly a thousand people are gonna be here on site. This is very, very exciting. Um, talk to us a little bit about what you’re kind of expecting for these next couple days, and then we can get into your role a little bit. Karen, we’ll start with you.
Karen Mendez:
Oh, great. Thank you. Um, this is really exciting for me. Uh, as I mentioned earlier, this is, I’ve been in the hotel industry 26, 27 years. I’ve been to a ton of conferences, and what I’m most excited about this one is bringing the postcard general managers. They have never had an opportunity to get together like this and really talk about their business. So I’m just excited for them to build off the energy and to meet everybody within hotel equities face to face, and really just know that what they do matter.
Ryan Embree:
David, what are you excited about for the next couple days here at that leadership conference?
David Rosenberg:
I appreciate that. So our theme this year is Transforming Together and 2025 was an incredible year with the additional postcard, cabins, springboard, hospitality, our continued organic growth, not only in the US Canada, but as now we have presences in the Caribbean and Latin America. And to come together the one time a year where we get to bring an entire leadership team. It’s just inspiring to connect, learn from each other and share this time together.
Ryan Embree:
So cool. And so it’s just a testament to the comprehensive nature of hotel equities portfolio. I think, you know, one of those spaces, obviously postcard cabins and the, the, um, outdoor collection that we’re gonna talk about. Karen, you want to talk to us a little bit about your role and, um, what it, you know, how it kind of correlates with the outdoor collection?
Karen Mendez:
Sure, my pleasure. Um, we started working with postcard cabins last year, um, in January with a specific goal of bringing that brand and launching it into the Marriott ethos. So the past year, my job has been molding the two cultures, all the systems, the general managers onboarding, and getting this team ready for Marriott and getting Marriot ready for outdoors. Um, it’s been a really exciting journey, a lot of learnings and yeah, now we’re, we’re a year, a little bit over a year full into it, about six months, uh, launched on outdoor collection and really just excited to continue to see this brand grow and scale and, and see what we can do.
Ryan Embree:
What an accomplishment. And congratulations seeing your team. David, what about you?
David Rosenberg:
From my perspective, this is new territory, right? Um, it’s a segment of the business that really, uh, was born through COVID as people looked for different types of, uh, experiences. And what we found is it’s sustainable and, uh, it allows a segment of the traveler to enjoy something different than a brick and mortar hotel experience. Uh, what we’ve also found is this is a great opportunity for a drive-in market. So most postcard cabins are within an hour and a half, two hour drive of major cities, major destinations, and it, and it’s experiential and it allows people to enjoy nature in a way of what’s important to them. So it’s a drive in trip, it’s flexible, and it’s not camping, it’s not glamping. It’s a little bit of a combination of both. And we have found that customers really enjoy this experience.
Ryan Embree:
I wanna drill into that because I wanna get your opinion on why you think, David, that has such staying power as a model and how it’s not just one of those, uh, you know, fads that kind of pass by hospitality. This has some real staying power here. So much so that Marriott has, you know, has going all in, so to speak, with the outdoor collection.
David Rosenberg:
So with Marriot’s launch of outdoor collection, they also see this opportunity to scale this business, and specifically for 25 to the 45, uh, demographic, um, that really, that have really morphed into this hybrid work environment and allowing them the flexibility to, uh, extend weekends. So these cabins have wifi and they have things that, uh, they’re not typically for a business traveler, but it allows, uh, the flexibility for someone they want to be online or if the opportunity to completely unplugged Yeah. Uh, and get away from their day-to-day life. And we’re also finding that it’s a short-term booking, that it’s, it’s, it’s just so instinctual that it’s not a trip that’s planned months out. In fact, we find that most customers of booking these cabins, uh, three to seven days out, and, uh, and again, the feedback we have received from customers through Marriott surveys, through online, uh, reputation management, um, is just outstanding.
Ryan Embree:
No, I love, I love to hear that. And Karen, you know, on the operations side, I mean, as David mentioned, it’s very different type of experience out there. How do you kind of ensure, uh, guest satisfaction and make sure that, you know, the travelers that are are getting there, obviously getting the experience they want, um, but also with the level of service that they expect?
Karen Mendez:
Yeah, you know, it brought a unique challenge. Um, postcard cabin is a hundred percent contactless. So our entire guest journey, we do not have a front desk. There’s not a main lobby. Everything. The tone has to be set through a text message, um, from the day that you arrive. And how do you do that with a Bonvoy member? And how do you make that BONVOY member feel appreciated? And how do they find their cabin? It’s been an adventure, and what we’ve learned is that guests like the adventure. They like that little satisfaction that they get. Like, I kind of found this place on my own, and I had all the directions that I had, all the tools, and it really sets the tone correctly at the very beginning of the state to have that disconnection that David talked about. Um, and then it’s just making sure it’s really hotel basics, clean rooms and everything in working order, because there isn’t a front desk to go and talk to. And so having those hotel basics in there, it’s really molding the two of the outdoor and what, you know, what you expect a hotel.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Fascinating to hear. And, uh, you’re right. I mean, it’s, it’s an experience unlike any other, but at the same time, that foundational piece still has to be intact there, uh, with the lo the unwavering loyalty that Marriott, uh, Bonvoy members obviously have for, for the brand. David, walk us through the postcard cabins model, you know, for maybe, uh, uh, someone that’s not too familiar and, and why it works operationally.
David Rosenberg:
Yeah. So there are 29 postcard cabins everywhere from the East coast, uh, up in the Catskills to the West coast in Big Bear in in California, and good, as Karen mentioned, the contactless journey. Um, when we first got involved, very different than a hotel playbook, and we were very, uh, focused, we were very specific on how do we make this work for this customer where not only they have a great experience, but being a new segment of the business. We need the customers to be the marketing engine to grow this business through their feedback and what they like. And what we have found really through Karen’s operational expertise and the platform she created and has now executed with the team that less is more and focusing on, uh, execution, reservation check in, checkout and services in between. The guest just wants to know they have what they need. Everything is prepared in advance for them and allow them to journey how they choose. Sure. And, uh, every story is different, but the common thread we hear is people love this journey. Um, these cabins are well appointed. Uh, the bedding is fantastic, the little kitchenette, there’s showers, all of ’em have fire pits and, and picnic tables. So the opportunity to really cook outside, over open wood campfire, but sleep under the stars with massive bay windows where you do not see another cabin from your cabin, but could just enjoy the sounds and sight of nature, allows people to relax and refresh and recharge. And again, the feedback has just been overwhelmingly positive.
Ryan Embree:
Well, to reiterate your point, I mean, the guest being the most powerful storyteller out there, I mean, what, what you just kind of set the table on, uh, if you see or hear that experience from a fa family member, a colleague or a friend, um, how powerful is that and being the ability to do that. Very, very cool. Karen, you mentioned your GMs are gonna be here at the leadership conference, who is very exciting for you. How have you really mobilized your team to, uh, achieve that consistently high guest satisfaction score that David’s talking about?
Karen Mendez:
Um, really listening to feedback. I think we were all a little nervous starting this journey, and I think, uh, in the very beginning we decided to sign with TNGI think it was important for us to be consistent in the brand voice, knowing that this was a new brand and people were gonna be interested in knowing about it, but also taking that feedback that we were getting and being nimble and really trying to say, Hey, is this working? Is this not working? Um, and really working with our partners in Marriot to say, okay, this isn’t gonna fall in line with a typical Fairfield in or this model model this is, and how can we make this successful? Um, and really just having open conversations. So I, I think that from like looking back at this whole, the last year, um, the general managers really just believed in the product and then stayed true to it, but then also knew that there’s a lot of flexibility. We had to sort of at times guide our ship into the way that we wanted to
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Well, listen hospitality, you know, sometimes it, it gets a bad rap for not being flexible or nimble in some of the, you know, brand standards or anything like that. So being able to, you know, know that this is a new brand, you have to make changes on the fly and your GM being open to those, um, and listening to that feedback, right? Our travelers are giving us the blueprint for a perfect stay, every single review or piece of feedback they leave. So, uh, very, very cool. Now, uh, obviously the major part of this last year was the, what you and your team did with the integration with Marriott. How David has that become, you know, being a part of a major brand ecosystem? How has that influenced performance, uh, and confidence in the postcard cabin motto?
David Rosenberg:
Yeah, I think having the Marriott engine behind this brand, and it is a relatively new brand, was critical. 80% of our reservations come now through marriott.com, um, 350 million plus BONVOY members. Uh, Marriott is fully committed to the outdoor collection postcard, cabins being a founding member of outdoor collection. And we believe we’re just getting started.
Ryan Embree:
So cool to see. And like you said, a a major brand like Marriott coming in with the outdoor collection really shows that it’s a staple. It’s not one of those passing fads. It’s, it’s here to stay. So, uh, I, you know, one of these things I talked, um, you know, in another interview about these conferences, we always try to like, to predict the future look into the crystal ball, so to speak, right? So I want kind of ask you both kind of what your vision for the future is, now that you are fully integrated, uh, what do you see this brand kind of transforming into transformation obviously being a major theme here? Karen, we’ll start with you and David. We’ll, we’ll end on you.
Karen Mendez:
Yeah. I think outdoor environment is limitless and almost what it has. I think what makes postcard very cool is the disconnection part of it, where you are on your own individual journey, but I think outdoors can be group environments. It can grow into so much more, a little bit more high scale and a little bit more roughing. It. I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw people in Yorks with a brand at one time, you know, in the future. I think there’s a lot of limited po possibilities for it as it continues to grow. And, um, I’m really excited to see what the future brings.
David Rosenberg:
Yeah, I would add that growing population of 25 to 45 with discretionary income. We have 29 postcards. There’s plenty of capacity, opportunity, the entire country, Colorado, Wyoming, the, the Midwest, uh, Canada, um, there is so much opportunity for, uh, outdoor collection or this type of business. I think we are in the first inning, uh, of what’ll end up being I hope, a very successful, not just brand, but a segment of our business that seems to be untapped. Yeah. And couldn’t be happier that we’re starting with Marriott, uh, major brand distribution to, um, their channels, the Bonvoy members. It’s powerful. And I would anticipate over the next five plus years, uh, we’ll be talking at this at a much larger scale than 29 assets.
Ryan Embree:
Well, plenty of outdoors to go around, like you said. Uh, you know, very cool to see this brand and everything at its infancy and so many more of those storytellers and experiences just widening and broadening and, and now with the power of Marriott behind you, uh, sky’s the limit, so to speak, on, on this, uh, segment and brand. So, congratulations, Karen and David. Thank you so much for spending some time with me today.
Karen & David:
Thank you. Thanks, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
All right.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. We are here at day three at the 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference. I’m here with Bill Stachler, SVP of Revenue Optimization. Bill, thank you so much for taking the time. Thank you, Ryan. Scheduled to come talk to us. Appreciate it.
Bill Stachler:
It’s fun to do.
Ryan Embree:
Guys have had a busy couple days here. Uh, I wanted to talk to you about kind of the, uh, how the event goes so far and what you hope to glean, uh, to glean from, uh, you know, connecting with your peers here.
Bill Stachler:
Yeah, this, this is fun for us. And, you know, revenue management teams, we’re always remote. We’re always in our house. We’re in a small office, no windows. And, uh, it’s great to see the teams come and look for their revenue manager. Yeah. And all, all the, all the happys and all the conversations, you know, it’s, it breaks the monotony of we stare at spreadsheets, we look at the computer and they’re actually getting the intermingle. So it’s fun. It’s, it’s a good experience for everybody.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure. And you know, we’re gonna talk about it here, but there’s that, that close relationships between revenue and operation, so critical. Uh, but before we get into that, uh, give us a little bit more insight about your role and maybe hospitality journey background at led you here.
Bill Stachler:
Hospitality Journey background. I, I, I guess I, I’ll, I’ll start with that and I’m gonna age myself a little bit. So, um, I started in the hospitality industry a long time ago, and I was at a resort in Scottsdale and I was the, um, director of rooms. And one day, um, I worked for Red Lion. They brought in a new gentleman, his name was Stu Maines. They just hired him from American Airlines and he was going to start Revenue Management. I checked him in and we started talking and he asked me to launch. And before I knew it, I was the first revenue manager at Red Lion. Oh, wow. So I went from, I was on the wrong side of every merger. I was at Red Lion that got bought by DoubleTree, that got bought by Promise, that got bought by Hilton, that got bought by Blackstone. Um, and I was, I was there for about 26 years with Hilton. I was the senior director of revenue management for franchises. And, uh, joined he’s team about five years ago.
Ryan Embree:
Very cool. And you know, one of your thi one of your elements of your story, uh, is something we hear all the time whenever I ask about hospitality backgrounds, is just, is typically like a mentor or somebody that really influenced you or, or got you excited about hospitality and then just the transformation evolution between brands and, uh, gives you a lot of experience. And, you know, one of the things that when you talk about with revenue optimization is you have to look at the macro environment. You have to see kind of what guests and travelers are, uh, the sentiment that they’re feeling and how that’s going to translate into bookings and try to predict that. Try to put your finger on that. Um, what do you think in today’s climate right now, which is challenging, um, but what do you think right now travelers and guests are feeling, and how does that translate to what you’re doing?
Bill Stachler:
Well, you know, unfortunately, and you may have heard this from other people on our team, it, I wish it was a bigger picture, but it’s become a very street corner to street corner mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And I think that’s has been the evolution is you have to get dialed in because you have the data, which we’re gonna talk about because each market is so different. Then you have things, uh, like the World Cup a couple years ago, Taylor Swift, what we were talking about. You have these events that come through that really have a, a major impact on, um, sometimes your entire year. Um, but you know, there there’s also a misunderstanding that it’s just about pricing. What other factors beyond pricing or levers can you pull, um, that operators are focusing on right now to make, uh, you know, to make end meet?
Bill Stachler:
Yeah. Good point. Um, I can’t price myself out of anything. I, I, I like to believe I can. Yeah. I, um, base is so important and hitting those windows has become even more important. I spent a lot of time with the, with, with our marketing team about our presence for each one of our properties and where we positioned, um, things that I’ve never quite honestly cared about, are focused on Sure. Is now one of the most intricate parts of, of what we do and are we priced to the, what we’re delivering. And that’s, you know, everybody wants more rate. Rate. I can’t tell you a day where somebody doesn’t go, bill, we need more a DR. Right. However, you know, it’s like we, we played a game yesterday with our focus service GMs on the RevPAR game, 10 hotels length, the stay when is things coming in? And it’s just trying to get everybody on the same page, I think is the most important about what is our, what is our price value, and are we pushing the envelope when we can?
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And it’s those little, um, margins, tweaks, changes that make the difference Right now when margins are so tight.
Bill Stachler:
And when Star came out for this year, it was 0.8, they’ve already revised it to 0.6. Yeah. So the game’s gonna be, can you sell out when you can? Yeah. Can you find that extra two rooms? Can you find a penny, a dollar? Yeah. And, you know, those are the things that it’s, it’s going back kind of a little bit of old school to the how many details can you pay attention to at the same time. Yeah. Yeah. And trying to identify trends. You know, we’ve just, before we got on, we were looking at you and I, I was pulling up my star report. Sure. One week doesn’t make a trend. Yeah. Even three, four weeks doesn’t make a trend. But we’re always trying to identify, catch the wave. Yeah. Or get in front of, um, things that might not go the right way.
Ryan Embree:
That’s a great point. And you know, one of the places where you can maybe find that edge is in the data and the analytics, um, which we have more than ever now. Right. I don’t think, I’ve been to one of these conferences within the last three years and heard about AI and how that’s, you know, giving us more data, but it’s leveraging that. How are you using that on your end with the data and the analytics side?
Bill Stachler:
Yeah, there’s a million reports available. And I think consistently looking at the same reports, I think is more important. The more noise isn’t always better. Um, we’re actually spending time with my group today for about a half an hour just talking about opportunities using AI to, whether it’s shop, get more informed about what’s going on in the market. Um, I make everybody use it for email. Yeah. Um, and we’re, we’re just, we’re just trying to get ahead of that. Yeah. My goal always is I wanna be a disruptor in every market. Um, but that doesn’t mean in the week for the week, it’s, we’ve been focusing in out 90 days. Yeah. You could see patterns. We have the data, we could see who’s booked. Yeah. And going after some of those targets. The, just what we were just talking about, those three extra rooms, that one extra dollar rate, you can get that when no one else is paying attention. ’cause everybody’s so hyperfocused in inside of 14 days right now.
Ryan Embree:
It’s, it’s very, I important. ’cause that booking window has certainly evolved and, and changed a little bit.
Bill Stachler:
It’s inside a week right now. Yeah. It really is.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and what you need, there is some close relationship between your operations team and, and the revenue management team. Uh, speak to that and how, you know, something like this where you’re getting together with those, how, how closely you need to stay in contact.
Bill Stachler:
Well, each one of my people has, uh, they’re equal or the VP of operations for every asset I sit in between Pete and Dave in my office. So we’re, we’re together every day. So, um, on top of it, we have our sales connections as well. So if all three of those are on the same page and they’re, we’re not looking at the same data, we’re not looking at the same opportunities and or same challenges, we’re never gonna be successful. ’cause if you don’t move the whole ship towards the right direction, you’re gonna be challenged.
Ryan Embree:
Staying consistent. That’s where the, the magic happens there. Um, what, how do you, you talked about how, you know, market conditions right now and not focusing so much on, you know, two or three weeks doesn’t make a trend. Ownership groups right now, though. They’re looking at, they want that extra dollar, they need that extra dollar. How do you keep them focused on long-term stability and not so much focused on that volatility that might change from data?
Bill Stachler:
That’s, it’s hard. I mean, everybody wants to do better, right. And we’re very owner centric. We’re very transparent. They have access to the systems. Um, we could talk about a week, or we could talk about last night I two emails, what happened last night. Um, I think the big key to that is making sure that we’re all in the same, again, I go back to the same page, but that we’re having the communications, we’re explaining what we’re doing. We’re open, open-minded to some of the, some of the opportunities. I have no problems with testing anything, but if we have to test something, I always tell everybody, you gotta put your hands under, under, under your legs for at least a couple weeks. If we’re gonna try to test something, can we push, can we push? And we’re, we’re willing to make mistakes to do better.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and that again, lends to what we talked about, giving you more data and you can learn from those, uh, successes and sometimes even better lessons learning from those failures.
Bill Stachler:
It’s okay to fail. Yeah. Let’s just not do it all the time. Right. Let’s not make the same mistakes over and over again. Um, we have a couple tests going on right now. Uh, there’s three specific ones in my head. Um, one of them is an absolute failure. The other two we’re kind of in the gray area. So we’re kind of excited to see if, if we can’t leverage that in different markets, you know, I like to believe that every one of our markets at least has a couple clone markets Yeah. That are gonna act the same way. So we, what we do is we have a weekly meeting, and then we have at the end of that, we have about 15 minutes where we share, and we have an ongoing team. So somebody’s trying something, somebody sees something. And, you know, we’re over 20 people now and we, we cover the us It’s a constant beeping in the corner of my Yeah. But they’ve, they’ve all adapted to it and they’ve all kind of championed it. So we like to stay ahead of everybody.
Ryan Embree:
And thats the benefit of scale, that hotel equity is, uh, that hotel equities brings. Well, we’re gonna wrap up and I’m gonna challenge you. Gimme some, uh, hopeful good news for hospitality and, and 2026 and and beyond.
Bill Stachler:
I’m excited about the summer. Okay. Um, you know, the winter’s been rough. I mean, we’ve had some, we’ve had some challenging weather. You know, we have, we have the World Cup. We’re gonna wait and see what happens with the World Cup. Hopefully that brings, um, some extra demand. We had a really good summer last year, and, you know, the group, the group position in a lot of the bigger brands gets better as the year goes on. Sure. So, um, we all benefit off of that.
Ryan Embree:
We heard a lot of that kind of stormy weather, doom and gloom at the beginning of last year, but ended up being, like you said, a really good summer for a lot of hotels and on markets.
Bill Stachler:
It’s, you know, uh, the glass half full, glass half empty. I’m always the guy who doesn’t like the glass I got.So we, we, we always the, the idea is change the story.
Ryan Embree:
Love it. Well Bill, thank you so much for taking again, time outta your day at the leadership conference, and, uh, we’ll talk to you next time on the Suite Spot.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot coming to you live from the 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference. I’m here with Albert Smith, COO at Hotel Equities. Al thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today.
Albert Smith:
Fantastic to be here with you.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Busy couple days here at the leadership conference. Buzzing, you can feel the energy here. Almost a thousand attendees. It’s been an, an incredible couple days. Um, I wanna talk to you about the theme, transforming Together. What does that mean to you and what do you hope to get outta these, you know, couple days what spending with your team?
Albert Smith:
And again, thanks for having me. Absolutely. Uh, you kind of hit it at the beginning. Transforming together, we’re as large as we’ve ever been, right? We had a merger about this time last year and, uh, we’re, we’re topping off 12, 13,000 employees across the entire enterprise. So transforming together is really about synergizing our enterprise, providing stability, getting people to know each other, leveraging best practices, and, um, being able to do that in a intentional and meaningful way.
Ryan Embree:
Ben Rafter, your CEO, uh, talked about fit over volume. You just mentioned this is the biggest you’ve ever been. Uh, how do you continue on a operation standpoint to be disciplined about growth, um, and not kind of lose that identity?
Albert Smith:
Lemme go backwards for half a second. Biggest is fine. This is the largest we’ve ever been. Being large is not necessarily important to me. I wanna be really good at what we do. So, to answer your question, um, a level of operational readiness, the tools, the support, the people, the expertise to make sure that as we grow, if that’s what needs to happen, that we do it well and we can stabilize very quickly.
Ryan Embree:
You are also expanding into some new horizons. We had some really exciting conversations about postcard cabins and just the brand and, and everything you’re doing over there. Really cool. Even entering into new segments like Caribbean and and Latin America. Um, how do you do all of that scale operationally, but still, you know, not making it a one size fits all?
Albert Smith:
That’s a, that’s a great question. First of all, continuing to rely on our fundamentals and expectations. First and foremost, um, we have been very intentional about building different operating, um, divisions and applying very specific expertise within those divisions. So if a new asset comes along in either Cala in our lifestyle division, full service, focus service, outdoor hospitality, we’ve got no shortage of resources that can lean in, absorb, provide stability, and, uh, at the end of the day, um, uh, provide value for our owns.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, each segment, each market, very different. Um, you know, the diversity of, uh, Cala and that region too, being able to have an onsite team there, uh, I think critical, we talked to your team about that, uh, with having such a large portfolio, Al Albert, when you’re trying to roll something out to everyone, how, how is that methodical testing before bringing it to scale? Right? Because I wanna make sure everything works functionally and, uh, fits within your culture
Albert Smith:
Unofficially. But I’ll give you a little bit of a sneak preview. We have a fourth operating vertical, if you will, and we’re, we’re at the moment calling it HE Labs In a very controlled environment, and by the way, leadership, there is tech forward. Uh, but a variety and diversity of resources to help stand up whatever it is, we’re beta testing, right? Uh, so in a controlled environment, we’re able to test a new technology, uh, explore new markets and done with no shortage of resources that have been there, done that stood up operating verticals in the past. Um, so we, we, we tested out, we refine along the way and, uh, when it’s ready, we either roll it out in a very methodical way, training, communication, uh, no shortage of support to make sure that, uh, training wheels on the front end, but you can take them off very quickly and, uh, trust that, uh, those that, uh, need the ride the bike can do it, uh, efficiently.
Ryan Embree:
It, it’s brilliant. We hear a lot of, uh, brands doing something very similar trying to roll out to their franchisee. So what with, uh, portfolio of your size, I mean, um, you to see that kind of strategy and methodical, it’s gotta also be really great for your employees to know that they, this has been tested. You know, you’re, you’re making sure that you’re making a run on it and it’s being ruled out and delivered in the right way. Um, so hotel equities scale nowadays is a, a, uh, asset. It’s a privilege and, um, uh, an advantage. How do you make sure that your own property teams are, uh, seeing that as a, uh, advantage rather than a complexity?
Albert Smith:
Lemme make sure I answer that question correctly, but our shared services are, are important, right? So accounting is agnostic to style, right? Um, it is agnostic to style. There’s some nuance there, but we wanna make sure that the shared service that we have within our company is strong. It is, but it allows the experts across lifestyle, full service, outdoor hospitality, where there’s, in some cases brand nuance or in some cases needs to be more marketing forward. How we tell the story, how we go out and acquire guests, how we create awareness, uh, shared service allows us to, first of all, that’s the backbone, but let’s the experts do their job, lean in and ultimately support the property level teams so that they can operate efficiently.
Ryan Embree:
Alright, so Albert, as we wrap up operationally, been asking a lot of your, your team members, kind of, what’s the vision for 2026 and beyond for hotel equities with all this growth?
Albert Smith:
Well, first of all, transforming together, right? You gotta, you gotta start somewhere. We’ve been doing it. We’re, we’re coming together in a meaningful way. The stability portion is gonna be really important, uh, but making sure that the fundamentals are there so that we can execute at a high level.
Ryan Embree:
Well, really exciting. Like I said, we’ve had a lot of your team members here talking about all the strategic growth. Uh, love to continue to see hotel equities and, and what’s next. Hope to see, uh, you here and, um, everyone transform together. So Al thank you so much for taking the time.
Albert Smith:
Ryan, It was a pleasure. Thank you, Sir.
Ryan Embree:
All right.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell, with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Last week’s 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference in Las Vegas was a tremendous success! The annual event was filled with thought leadership, networking, and insights with the best and the brightest in the industry.
Did you miss any of the panels, sessions, or key moments? Don’t worry!
The Suite Spot and Hotel Equities partnered together to bring you Hotel Equities Part 1, in the latest Suite Spot episode, which contains three exclusive interviews with some of the biggest names at Hotel Equities.
Episode Transcript
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Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here from the Sweet Spot for a very special episode where we head out to Las Vegas, Nevada for the 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference. There we had the opportunity to sit down with several key team members from the hotel equities team. In this episode, we talk to Greg Osteen, chief Development Officer, who talks about the strategic growth of hotel equities and where they see opportunity. Becky Ley with commercial and strategy tips and trends that she’s seeing right now within the portfolio. And Maria Parla, who is focused on that Kala region, the Caribbean and Latin America, uh, region, which hotel equity has been growing is so excited about Can’t Wait to Bring It all to you in these next three episodes in our special Hotel equity episodes, part One. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Sweet Spot. This is the host Ryan Embry here at the RA Resort and Casino Las Vegas at the 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference. I’m here with Greg Osteen, chief Development Officer. Greg, thank you so much for joining me here at the conference.
Greg O’Stean:
Thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree:
We just talked about it, almost 800 or almost a thousand attendees about to file through here. We’re right next to registration. Uh, this is your first Hotel Equities Leadership.
Greg O’Stean:
It is.
Ryan Embree:
What are you excited about? What do you hope to take away from these next couple days?
Greg O’Stean:
So, as you said, my first, I joined April of last year, so I just missed last year’s conference. Very excited about this one. Very excited to talk about all the things that have happened in the last year. More importantly, talk about where we’re going Sure. As we are transforming together and as we’re changing, you know, what is a great company today and making it even better. So I’m excited about that. I’m excited about meeting all the folks who make it happen every day. Yeah. Because most of the people coming here today are the leaders from our hotels, from the properties. It shouldn’t be a surprise to you there. At the headquarters where I work, there are no cash registers. Right.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool. And there’s something magical when you get those onsite property Yeah. People all together, because we’re gonna talk about it here in a second, but, uh, you start to hear patterns, trends Yeah. Things bubbling up that, you know, you have properties all over the country. We do. But it could be a property, you know, that shares that struggle across the country. That’s right. And then be able to discuss those issues and, and challenges that, uh, hospitality right now, you know, continues to phase, but also all the, all the great trends that are on the horizon.
Greg O’Stean:
A hundred percent. And we’re growing across Canada and Latin America as well, but just in the US. Each state is a little different. You talked about being from Texas, very different from Georgia, very different from California. But there are patterns across, yeah. Right. And so when someone from Oregon says to someone from Florida, uh, here’s what I’m experiencing. And they go, oh yeah. Have you considered this? Or, here’s what we’re doing. Or, here’s a new tool, or, here’s what I tried. Sure. Right. And you take the best of the best and share those best practices. That’s, that’s what makes a company great. That’s what makes a team great. Otherwise, we’re just a collection of individuals sitting out at properties with no real vision and no real teamwork. Yeah.
Ryan Embree:
Well, absolutely. And again, it’s, it’s, it’s times like this, places like this that, that make that special happen. Now, Greg, you said you’ve been here, uh, you know, just less than a year coming up on a year. Um, tell us about, you know, obviously, uh, chief Development Officer always looking for new opportunities for the business. But tell, talk to us a little bit about your role, um, with, within Ho Hotel equities.
Greg O’Stean:
So, so my role is really the, it’s the intersection of the type of owners that we want to have, but people that actually own the hotels that we manage. Uh, because today we have largely one type of owner profile, and there’s really five or six out there, more institutional owners, more private equity groups, more family offices. Each owner profile has a different, you know, different, uh, goals, different hold periods, different things that they’re looking for. And so we wanna diversify our owner base. We also want to diversify our geographic base. Mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And you know, I was really looking for this conversation because I think you have some really unique insights we talked about, about the insights that you can glean from when you get a bunch of hotels together, but also when you’re talking to owners and investors constantly, I think some common trends and themes also start to percolate a little bit. They do. And you get to have to, you have the, the firsthand experience of being able to see those and hear those stories and insights from multiple people. What are you hearing right now when it comes to owners, investors, and, and a climate right now that it, again, it’s a little challenging right now.
Greg O’Stean:
It’s a challenging environment, no doubt. And that’s what we hear from the owners, right? It’s, you know, with labor costs going up, materials costs going up, inflation, but your top line is really not growing. Top line is flat at best, right? Yeah. So your margins are shrinking. Sure. So, and, and a lot of investment is reconsidering whether or not they still wanna be invested in hotels. Right. Because your typical institutional investor or real estate investor doesn’t have to invest in hotels that can choose, you know, to invest in a data center or multifamily or whatever. Yeah. So a lot of them were questioning like, well, what do I do now? Like in the past I could buy or sell or refi. It’s hard to do all of those right now. So the next best thing you can do, or the best thing you can do in a challenging environment is revisit your relationship with your manager. Right. If, if you can’t sell it for the price that you want and you can’t refinance it for the, for the proceeds that you need, and you can’t change the flag, because most of the time it’s a long-term agreement. Right. Then what can you do to make a difference? Reconsider your relationship with your manager. Yeah. And that’s the opportunity for us.
Ryan Embree:
No, absolutely. And, and especially with a portfolio, the size of yours, the sheer experience Yeah. That the organization has and the history that it hangs its hat on. Um, you know, what, what have any of these conversations kind of influenced the opportunities that you’re choosing to pursue? And I think all as equally important not to pursue right now.
Greg O’Stean:
Sometimes the best deals are the ones you don’t do.
Ryan Embree:
I’ve heard that before.
Greg O’Stean:
Yeah. And I learned something at my last, well, two companies ago, um, and this was actually a client who told us this bigger is not better, better is better. Mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I, I, I love that. And, and strategic growth, what you’re talking about. How do you, uh, you know, without giving any maybe secrets away of, of the trade, like what, what do those conversations sound like to differentiate hotel equities? Um, because it feels like, along with, uh, obviously a new brand popping up, there’s also another ho hotel management company around the corner.
Greg O’Stean:
Yeah. Everybody, when we talk to them, everybody wants to know what makes hotel equities better, special or different, right? Because it’s easy to put all third party management companies into a, a bucket and say, you’re all a commodity, you’re all about the same. So what is it that we do that’s better special or different? And the answer is really in the performance of the hotels, right? We, we have to be able to tell stories that relate to that specific owner. So if that owner has a 200 room hotel in Orlando, we need to be able to show them, well, here’s three other hotels in Orlando. Here’s what it looked like when we took it over and here’s where it is today. We can do that for you. That’s what resonates with the owners.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and you got a lot of stories to choose from. Yeah. Um, on the, on the, when you kind of look at the landscape right now, are there any, you talked about geography, are there, are there any places you think that there are opportunity asset types? Uh, you mentioned.
Greg O’Stean:
We definitely want to do, uh, more luxury, more upper upscale, larger hotels. We’re not, we don’t have much of a presence in the Northeast, so there’s a lot of opportunity for us up there. We should have a larger presence in places like Florida and Texas. So we’re working on that. We just expanded some in Texas, but Texas, as you know, is a big state. Massive. So there’s a lot of room, a lot of room there. A lot of room in Florida. Um, so, and really we, we will follow where our investors are going. The smart investors, the institutional ones are saying, okay, maybe we’re done with Nashville for now. We’re done with Austin for now because they’re renovating the convention center. Sure. Where are we going next? And we help them find those markets. We help them go to the next place.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, some of these can look, these locations, markets look very different. You know, Nashville, Austin running really, really hot right now. Yeah. Um, and again, with the expertise to be able to kind of guide those ownership and investors to say, Hey, this is, this is a good opportunity.
Greg O’Stean:
And that’s what they look to us for, right? Yeah. That is a sign of a good management company. You’re not just managing their hotels, you’re helping them manage their company by showing them, this is where we think the puck is going. Right? This is where we think the next opportunities for your company will be, are in Kalispell, Montana. Right. Wherever they may not be thinking because they’re so focused on, okay, what’s happening in my portfolio today? We can help them see, well, this is where you wanna be in two years, three years, five years.
Ryan Embree:
You know, a lot of these conferences, uh, that I attend, investment conferences around the country, uh, relationships, whether it’s the brand and the property, whether it’s a management company and an owner investor, those are always dissected during these, uh, yeah. These types of events. Uh, you know, hotel equity is known for being very owner aligned. What does that mean to you on the business development side?
Greg O’Stean:
Well, so the, the main reason that we are in business is to deliver better returns for the owners, the people who have entrusted us with their hotels. And a lot of our owners, the, the cash that we return to them is what’s feeding their families and sending their kids to school. Right? Yeah. So if you’re not aligned with that owner, you’re not gonna have a very long relationship. Right. It’s very different from an institutional owner that might have 200 hotels and you miss the numbers one quarter on one or two of them, you’ll have some conversations. Yeah. And, and you’ll make some adjustments. But when you’re dealing with an owner whose family is depending on the cash flow from that hotel or the next generation of that family, they need to know that they trust you. They are entrusting you with their lives, not just their investment. Right. Yeah. So it’s understanding what we’re in business for, who we’re in business for.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I guess especially again, with this climate, that, that’s another thing that they talk about is, is, you know, where profit profit margins are really, really tight right now. You need those trusted experts. ’cause hospitality is such a wide ranging space. You can’t be an expert at anything. So leaning on those industry experts in the places that you need them, recognizing that one you need.
Greg O’Stean:
And answering the phone when they call. And having the right person that when they say, Hey, I have an issue, and they say, I’ll get right on it. Yeah. Right. And that gets harder and harder the, the larger you become mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, another thing that we love to do at these events, especially in hospitality, is try to predict the future, right? Yeah. Try to look into that crystal ball and see, uh, what, what do you see 12 to 18 months or even maybe hearing from owners and investors right now about what, what they want to see out there other than returns, of course. Right?
Greg O’Stean:
Yeah. So, so we get our opportunities really from three main areas. Someone builds a hotel, someone buys a hotel, or someone changes the manager of that hotel. Um, it’s very difficult to build a hotel right now because costs and returns, and in the short term, it’s just not, uh, economic to build a hotel costs too much to build Sure. For the term that you’ll, that you’ll get as far as buying a hotel. The last two year, the, the last really good year, high activity year was 2019. Yeah. Then you had COVID, the, the, the entire pandemic and the recovery from that for the last few years has been a bid ask gap between what, uh, sellers are willing to, to accept and what buyers are willing to pay. Yeah, I’ve heard that that’s, that gap is closing. So this year you’ll see more activity than last year. You’ll see. And I’m not making that, I mean, the brokers will tell you the same thing, but the brokers are always optima. If you ask, if you ask a broker, they’re always gonna, its always a good time to make a deal. Next year is better. It’s a great time to do a deal
Ryan Embree:
I’ve heard that. We’ve heard that a lot from industry leaders. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we’ll continue to look, um, but, you know, a stable ship here with hotel equities and Greg, thank you so much. We hope you enjoy, you’ve got an incredible two and a half days planned here, you and your team, looking forward. Congratulations. Forward. Uh, thank you for sitting out with me.
Greg O’Stean:
Thank you. I enjoyed it very much.
Ryan Embree:
Thanks. Awesome.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone, Ryan Embee here with the Suite Spot Podcast. We are live here at the Hotel Equities Leadership Conference 2026. I’m here with Becky Vealey, SVP of Sales, Full Service & Lifestyle Division. Thank you so much for being with me, Becky.
Becky Vealey:
Oh, thank you for having me, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
This is exciting. I know the energy is all around. You guys have almost a thousand attendees. I heard. We do. Incredible. Next couple days full of education panels, connections, hospitality is all about. What are you most excited about for these next couple days?
Becky Vealey:
Oh, without question, the collaboration between all of our peers. Um, I think it’s great when you can get everyone together and, you know, some of these people we’ve never even met. Yeah. So it’s an amazing time to have everybody in one place collaborate, you know, um, just peer to peer, you know, collaboration.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. A lot of newcomers here. And first timer, we’ve been seeing those on the, on the badges, which is really cool. Before we get too much into it, since this is your first time on the sweet spot, tell us a little bit about your role here at Hotel Equities and maybe give us a little background on your hospitality journey.
Becky Vealey:
So I’ve been in the hospitality industry for about 30 years. Um, I joined Hotel Equities in 2022 as part of the Greenwood Hospitality strategic partner. And so I became the, uh, senior Vice President of sales for Lifestyle and full Service divisions. And so I oversee the sales initiatives for a multi-brand, uh, portfolio,
Ryan Embree:
And we’re gonna talk about that because this sales and commercial strategy has been through a ton of transformation. Mm-hmm. In fact, uh, the, the leadership conference, the whole theme is around transforming together. Yes, yes. And I think that segues great into this question. Mm-hmm. How has that commercial strategy and sales really transformed over the last couple years? Yeah,
Becky Vealey:
I, I think a lot of ways, I mean, and you’re gonna hear me repeat this probably numerous times, but that, that, uh, relationship between sales, revenue management, marketing, and operations is key. And making sure that that’s the solid foundation for any commercial strategies. Um, that hasn’t changed. You know, regardless of pre pandemic, post pandemic, that is a killer. Right. Um, and then just making sure that we’re creating a commercial strategies for the properties and being very detailed in what the property needs. Not doing a broad brush stroke Yeah. Of strategies. It’s, it’s not a one size fits all anymore.
Ryan Embree:
No, no. It’s, I mean, especially in a portfolio where we just, you know, was talking about postcard cabins that could look very, very different from, of course, full service. And, and we’re gonna talk about that here in a minute about those differences, um, and similarities between those commercial strategies. Um, where do you think that the industry still has to improve on commercial strategy right now?
Becky Vealey:
Absolutely, Ryan. So I think the commercial, um, strategies have to be tailored to the property. It cannot be a playbook that, you know, is brush striped across all the properties. And then again, strong alignment between commercial sales, revenue management, marketing, and operations.
Ryan Embree:
I think this is a great place for that. So it’s not so siloed. You can actually hear some of the challenges that maybe a revenue manager is having in one part of the country, very similar to the other one, and how to kind of combat that. So there’s that exchange of ideas that happen at a time like this that I think is really, really cool to see. Um, especially in a portfolio, a growing portfolio like yours. Now, uh, every property here wants to grow its market share, right? That’s the ultimate goal. But how do you do that without, uh, sacrificing long-term positioning?
Becky Vealey:
That’s a great question. So I think understanding the asset and the guest and the market is key to this for long-term growth. And then making sure that our rate positioning is where it needs that we have price integrity, and that we consistently execute, I think are the key things.
Ryan Embree:
And we have so much data right now, more than ever before, to kind of pull these levers and for you to get to know your guests. So, uh, absolutely knowing your guests app is gonna be critical and, and key, uh, to that. Now, we talked at the top of the episode, uh, about your title, uh, overseeing both the pool service and the lifestyle division. Uh, you talked about with lifestyle hotels, a lot of storytelling involved there Exactly. Grow, uh, that brand. Um, how is there comparisons between the two segments so you see it, Becky, and maybe some differences?
Becky Vealey:
Yeah, it’s really interesting. Uh, full service hotels, of course, lean in on various revenue streams. You’ve got transient group food and beverage banqueting, and a host of other ancillary revenue streams. And the sell cycle, of course, is much longer. And the segmentation can be a little more specific. And then on the lifestyle size, it goes back to what you mentioned. It is really the brand storytelling, the experiences, and then the activations on property are key to drive demand in the lifestyle division, you know, strategically. Um, the two may be different, but those foundational pillars of growing commercial are the same in both.
Ryan Embree:
It’s really cool to see, uh, the creativity right now in lifestyle hotels. It’s kind of having its moment right now, the activations, like see some of the programming that these properties put on, and I’m like, it’s so impressed and it’s really cool. It goes back to your point though, if you can do that in the correct way, and your guess is now the ambassador of that brand, whether it be social media reviews, um, it, it’s so important and could really be a key driver or success. Um, so where do you see kind of commercial strategies breakdown at the property level and, and what do you kind of put in place to prevent that, Becky?
Becky Vealey:
Yeah, I think lack of communication. I mean, that’s number one. Um, two, I think that there, when there is like a lack of shared accountability that always creates a breakdown and then just inconsistent execution. You know, if everybody’s not, you know, doing the same thing from the same playbook, that creates issues.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And, uh, you never wanna see that, uh, obviously happen and, and not knowing who your segment is, I think that’s what you’re talking about, uh, of kind of keeping staying in the dark. We talked about it. There’s more data out there than ever lean into that, make sure you know who you’re trying to attract and, and get to your property. Uh, we had Greg Osteen on talking about, uh, growing and diversifying the portfolio. Super exciting. How do you make sure you do that without kind of losing, uh, your vision and, and as you continue to grow and diversify Hotel Equities?
Becky Vealey:
Yeah, I, I think it goes back to the foundations, right? You know, you have to have that strong, and again, I’ve kind of a broken record here, that strong collaboration between sales, marketing, revenue management, and, uh, operations is key. Um, and then I think just always looking forward and ensuring that the messaging is correct, that we have rate integrity, and that our positioning is correct.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, thank you so much for taking the time. Uh, wishing you a very successful next couple days. Really excited to hear about all the insights you and your team are gonna glean from this.
Becky Vealey:
Thank you, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you for joining me.
Ryan Embree:
Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. We’re at the 2026 Hotel Equities Leadership Conference. I’m here with Marilia Pergola, VP of Ops, Caribbean, and Latin America. Thank you so much, uh, for joining me today.
Marilia Pergola:
Thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree:
We’re here. It’s, uh, middle of the conference right now. Exciting. There’s an energy buzzing around people all around. How’s it going for you? And, you know, what is something that when you’re done with the conference, you hope to have a, a, a good takeaway of,
Marilia Pergola:
I don’t even have a year with hotel equity and for me, just be here with almost what, 700 people that I think, uh, they said, uh, it’s incredible. Just to see so many new faces for me and still share all these experiences for me is, is very exciting. Yeah. And also shared the experience from us in the color region as well with the team here in the us. It’s
Ryan Embree:
One of the most exciting pieces of hotel equities. And we’re gonna talk all about that, but I want to get a little bit about your specific role and maybe a little bit about your hospitality background that led you to hotel equities ultimately.
Marilia Pergola:
So I have 26 years working in hospitality, and I have been in different roles. I have been working my career actually started at Hilton and I have been in sales revenue management, also general manager. And, uh, and now I have the opportunity to be with hotel equities and working with different brands and, uh, learning more and more every, every day, you know, so when I think my, my role at the, with the hotel equities and the hotels we operate today is really making sure that the properties, they have the support on day to day to make sure that they comply what they have to comply in terms of not just the agreement, but also with the brand, the standards, and make sure that the owners, they’re happy with the results and they’re satisfied with our, what, what we are doing at their hotels. Yeah. So this is my, my day to day
Ryan Embree:
Marilia Pergola:
I think we go back also to operations know if we don’t have, uh, the right team on board. And I think for us, the most important thing is our team. Yeah. It’s people. If we don’t have the right people on board with us in this, uh, adventure of growing hotel equities in the color region, this is not going to work. Yeah. So for us, it’s a long term always with the, with the owners. This is what they expect. And also the brands, when you work with brands, you need to have this long-term relationship, and this is what we are working for. So we are setting up a good team in terms of operations, because if we have, uh, uh, the strategy is just to give us all, like this direction and the operational excellence, I think is the key for, for that to happen.
Ryan Embree:
And a, a key, uh, component of your strategy was to keep, uh, the, a local in-market team, uh, for that. Why is that critical? And and why was that a priority?
Marilia Pergola:
Yeah, that is critical. It’s not even negotiable, I would say. Uh, we need to make sure that, uh, it, it, that is a lot of nuances. No. And just the local, uh, labor laws, the taxes. If you don’t understand that, if you have a team that don’t understand that or just operating the hotel from far, uh, you’re gonna be reacting instead of leading. So this is not going to work. And also the owners, they need to feel that to trust us that they know what we are doing. And there’s so many things that we can do. And in the color region, you have so many countries and it’s so different. It can be so diverse that, uh, we need to understand that and not just even talking about also the, the language. You need to speak the language to communicate properly, not just with the hotel team, but also with the ownership group. Make sure that we are all aligned and we are talking all the same language, you know, and, uh, in a good way.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I mean, and, and that can, uh, you know, we talked about it, so many nuances there, uh, between different countries, I’m sure developing. Um, you already have several projects, which is really exciting. Um, any, any projects, upcoming projects that you’re excited about or even maybe a project that you feel like fits the strategy and vision of what you’re, what you’re trying to look for?
Marilia Pergola:
Yeah. We opened the first hotel that we opened the color region was the Hampton in Saint Thomas, USVI. And, uh, it’s doing very, very well. It’s a very nice product and a very good location owners, uh, happy as well with the results. Good. The, the Normalist Arenas, it’s an autograph collection. Dominican Republic, it’s an also a very nice project we just opened in November last year and is also doing very well. So I think all these projects they talk about hotel equity is growing in color region and we are super excited. Next week actually, we are opening the CITAs Resort in HaCo in Costa Rica. I’m flying from here to Costa Rica to open the hotel. And, uh, we are very excited that there’s so many other projects to, to come in the pipeline and different islands in the Caribbean and also Mexico and the Dominican Republic.
Ryan Embree:
No shortage of, uh, bucket list vacations, uh, for you and your team, uh, let’s switch to an owner’s perspective. Uh, what you think excites an owner, uh, about operating in this collar region?
Marilia Pergola:
I think, well, well their focus is rent profitability, right? Yeah. That is the first one. And this is what they all they want, uh, they want, right? Uh, but I think what they’re excited and what they expect from us is that knowledge in terms of the culture and everything that we just mentioned about all the challenges. And I think nowadays, globally, we are all facing a lot of challenges. Now. It’s not just the Caribbean, Latin America. Uh, I used, we used to always here in this conferences with the hotel business, US was never a country that was facing so many challenges like it’s facing now. We are used to that in the Caribbean, Latin America region. Unfortunately, it’s our reality day to day. Uh, so I think the owners, when they know that people that know everything that is happening understand all these challenges, they feel that we are valuable. And I think this is a very important thing for these owners.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s, it’s what you said, it goes from being, you know, reactive to leading. Uh, like you said, I I, I love that point.
Marilia Pergola:
And also having the, the team in field to help. Yeah. Not operating from far right. This is, I think it’s key and having the right team in place
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Feet on the ground for sure. Definitely helps. Um, you know, the whole theme of this conference of Sears transform together, right? Uh, we talked about, you know, this is a different region with different nuances, a lot of diversity there. How do you stay true to that region but also not feel disconnected from the hotel equities as a whole?
Marilia Pergola:
Now we work as a team. What is good is that the hotel equities in the color region, we have, uh, the empowerment to make all the decisions in the, in each market. So we can do that. But we are part of all this, the entire system. No, not just the distribution system, but also the support in terms of the commercial, the distribution, revenue management, shared services. So we work all together, uh, the development team when they need help as well. Our team is also helping. So we are all working together, marketing, revenue management. Uh, we are part of hotel equities at the end, but what is important that hotel equities in the color region, we can make the decisions for the market in the market to the owners that we have the relationship.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I’m sure that’s a great selling point to owners and investors thinking about, you know, taking on, uh, what the bot,
Marilia Pergola:
It’s a peace of mind for them because they know that they’re dealing with people, they understand what they’re talking about and not just trying to explain to someone that doesn’t leave that reality.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. So, um, you know, another thing at these conferences I’ve talked about before is we always like to try to look into the crystal ball, predict the future, so to speak. Um, you know, in 2026 and maybe beyond, what’s your vision, uh, for the collar region and, and how it continues to grow within hotel equities?
Marilia Pergola:
Yeah, I think first thing, we need to make sure that we are providing the support to the hotels that are under operation. Now. We need to make sure that we are not, uh, paying attention to them. Uh, but we are also working with the team to make sure that we are scaling our team to, to grow. Uh, as I mentioned too, we have our hotels under construction now. Yeah. Uh, in the pipeline. And what, it’s interesting that we have different, uh, brand tiers now from select service brand to full service lifestyle, luxury hotels. So we are working with the hotels under, uh, there are under construction, but we also always prepare to any deal that can just show up like a quick conversion. Sure. We are always ready for that. So the team, it’s all on board to, to be prepared for any quick conversion so we can step in and take the over the operation and do the best, what we do every day. Awesome.
Ryan Embree:
Well exciting times, uh, in your region and, and congratulations to you and your team. Uh, we’ll be on the lookout for all these new projects coming up. Thank you. Thank you so much. We’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The inaugural episode of the Suite Spot: Social Success Series is here!
Join first time host and Brand Ambassador at Travel Media Group, Cassady Quintana as she sits down with special guest, Aislynn Roberts, the TMG Enterprise Client Success Manager, as they discuss the latest and greatest social media trends and landscape for hotels.
This first installment of the series is the beginning of a new age for the podcast and we hope you enjoy the discussion between two social media gurus on how hotels and property management groups can not only optimize their social media presence but also how they can see the greatest return on their social media investment.
Cassady Quintana:
Hello everyone and welcome to our very first episode of the Social Success Podcast, A Suite Spot podcast powered by Travel Media Group. I’m your host, Cassady Quintana, Brand Ambassador here at Travel Media Group. Super excited to finally kick off this podcast. You know, the reason we decided to start this was because of the success of our social success webinar series that we did last year and we’re still doing to this day. But I was hearing a lot of feedback from people that were watching and there’s a lot of opinions and hot takes about hotel, social media, but not nearly enough conversations with people that are actually in the thick of it working in hotel social media. So I thought, what better way to have Aislynn Roberts, our Enterprise Client Success Manager here at Travel Media Group as our first guest, she is working with partners and talking about these topics every day. So Aislynn thank you for joining me.
Aislynn Roberts:
Thank you for having me.
Cassady Quintana:
So kind of before we get into social media, I want people to know what your role is like. So just walk us through kind of what your day-to-day looks like.
Aislynn Roberts:
Yeah, of course. So as the enterprise Client Success Manager, I have a unique opportunity to work not only with individual property owners, but I also work with brand team execs and the C-Suite for hotel management groups as well. So it’s a very interesting role in which you are talking to these executive teams a lot around overall portfolio trends. What you’re seeing across the board industry, news updates, especially if you consider meta, how many times they’re updating. Making sure that they’re in the know of what’s happening, but also giving them trend analysis for their portfolio. What’s working well, the performance, what we’re seeing across the board versus when you’re talking to individual properties, it’s very much focused, right? What their individual goals are, what they’re trying to achieve, and, and really honing in on what works well for them. And social media content wise. The conversation becomes very much focused into their amenities, what their guests are, what type of audience they’re looking for, versus what the C-suite and brand. It’s overarching, right? Like how can you continue to capitalize this across the board?
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, I totally agree. And so when you’re having these conversations, what are some of the biggest concerns or reservations that you’re hearing the most from these people you’re speaking with?
Aislynn Roberts:
Yeah, it can differ across the board. Most of the time it really depends on each individual’s comfort level, which surprisingly matches throughout the executive team. So whether you’re individual property level as you go up, dependent on your personal use, your personal comfort with social media, your conversations could be the same or it could be vastly different. If you’re talking to a director of marketing or VP of marketing who’s eats lives and breathes social media. So, those conversations shape a little bit different, but there is a lot of fear of not knowing what to do, right? Not understanding how it works, fear of doing something wrong, or needing to be a hundred percent professional and completely photogenic and photographed and all this stuff. And like, and that’s not necessarily what social media is about. So, and then for the individual property level too, you go into time consuming, right? So they’re already in their day-to-day dealing with guest requests, having to follow up with groups that are coming through, dealing with fires that they have to put out sometimes literally that are going on at the property level. So to them, like giving them an extra task of having to think about how to create content can be very much like, whoa, like I don’t want anything to do with it. Or hard for them to wrap around their head and they just get added stress to their normal day.
Cassady Quintana:
And I feel like once you have, all that stress of social media, it’s easier to just put it on the back burner. Because like you said, their day-to-day is dealing with actual guests, you know, they were hired to deal with guests and do things at the property and social media is usually put to the back because it’s like, I can’t even think about that right now. So obviously you’re having these conversations, you’re educating them of the importance. Have you seen that shift with leadership and and how seriously are they taking social media now?
Aislynn Roberts:
Absolutely. So definitely among the brand teams and the C-Suite, when you, when you talk to them, the seriousness of social media’s definitely shifted. They understand it’s important. They know the role it’s playing in the traveler’s journey and how people are using it to make a booking decision. Especially when you’re considering the younger generation who grew up on social media. So it’s a definitely different market at the individual property level. You do still have some, but some are still a little bit slow to the take in understanding it because they themselves don’t use it or they’re only using it to communicate with their friends and family. So they’re not using it as a way to plan their trips, but when you get down to it and show them how it’s using, or you talk about booking dot com’s update where that’s now through Instagram, it opens up the eyes a little bit more, but the C-suite and brand teams definitely understand it. And that’s why you’re seeing more and more brand initiatives come out regarding social media. And it’s the hotels and themselves are almost like at a scrambling trying to figure out how are we gonna meet these brand standards, make sure we’re reaching to it because they’re still a little bit scared of how to move forward.
Cassady Quintana:
Well, it’s a lot. And I don’t blame them for being scared because you know, me and you look at these social media trends all the time and every week there’s something new coming out. So I can’t imagine working in a hotel and then having to stay up to date with all this. And then on top of that, your brand is sending you these requirements. It can be a lot. So kind of when they get past that hesitation and maybe they understand it a little bit more, what’s really exciting to them on social media?
Aislynn Roberts:
Yeah, so sometimes it takes several conversations. It’s not like an overnight switch of the mind where they start to see this. So I think what I’ve learned working, especially with brand teams and C-Suite, is that they generally have two departments for everything, or not several departments for everything. They have an operations team, they have a revenue team, they have sales and marketing. So sometimes those teams don’t necessarily communicate with all the trends that they’re seeing across the board. So if your operations team handles your reputation and your online reviews, they’re not necessarily communicating the feedback and trends that they’re seeing that way into like the sales team, right? Sales teams know what they’re targeting, they know what their budget is, they know what type of groups they’re trying to reach to bring in business into the hotels. But necessarily that’s not portrayed across the board. And what I’ve learned is that when you relate the guest feedback into turning it into an easy social media content strategy, they start to see that connection. So oftentimes, especially at the property level, when I’m talking to individual GMs and they’re weary and they don’t know how to get started, I leverage their guest reviews. So, you know, your really positive feedback that highlights everything great about your hotel, the amenities your guest really love, that’s an easy property feature post for sure. You know, write something about your shuttle or your complimentary breakfast or whatever the great thing that keeps being highlighted. If you are seeing some gaps, service gaps, whether it’s concerns about a specific policy or you had a shuttle but you don’t know where to find it in those reviews, that’s a great opportunity to do an info share an update on social media where you’re sharing, Hey, this is your pickup location for your shuttle, or these are the times. I’d say a really great example is parking. We get a lot of reviews that mention parking. Sometimes it’s about, oh, the garage is confusing. I don’t know where to find the garage. Especially if you’re in a downtown market. A simple video of just driving down the street, showing where the entrance to your parking garage is, could do a lot as far as like educating and having that transparency to perspective guests.
Cassady Quintana:
I think it’s interesting ’cause you mentioned earlier about these hoteliers wanting to be perfect on social media, feeling like they have to have the right shot. They, they don’t have a professional camera, but like you said, social media, it can be super easy. Take the, take the video of driving to the garage or take a video of your breakfast spread or show a sunset outside your pool with your iPhone. We have some of the most amazing cameras on our iPhone, and it doesn’t have to be rocket science. Social media is all about authenticity, which we’ll, we’ll touch on a little bit. So kind of where are you seeing from your perspective, you know, you’re talking with multiple different kinds of hotels. What’s the difference between hotels that seem very confident in what they’re doing on social media from those that might be a little bit stuck or uninspired?
Aislynn Roberts:
So I think the main thing that separates them is when they realize that their personality matters online just as much as it does in person. So especially if you’re a property who consistently gets praised for your service and your team members and the attention that you do. So that is all their personality that’s coming across the board when they’re face to face and interacting with these guests, that same personality should mimic onto social media, right? So when you think outside the box, when you keep your true personality into your content, you start to see a little bit more success because you’re having fun with it. And that’s what social media is. You don’t wanna be so polished that it becomes a mundane task that you have to do on a weekly, monthly basis. It should be something that’s super fun, you think outside the box, but keep true to who you are and showcasing an experience. Because that uncapped storytelling that you have with social media, being able to create this experience and identify that, but also get people to dream about it and wanting to have that experience is ideally where you want your social strategy to be.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, absolutely. So kind of in that same lane, where are you seeing these hotels start to overcomplicate things on social?
Aislynn Roberts:
Definitely the idea that it needs to be polished, like their website. So, you know, we work with a lot of hotels that don’t have the images. They don’t have a professional, photographer that’s gonna come out, or they only have the images are on their website. And those are great images to have, but doesn’t have to be polished. Like you said, it could be a cell phone. You just go out, take a photo. I’m sure you have team members. Every property has team members that have cell phone or maybe you’ve had to tell them, Hey, don’t be on your phone so much at work. It happens, it happens here. So you know, when that happens, if they, if you kind of create this interest or you’re like, Hey, if you’re walking around the property on your break, or, if you have a restaurant and the chef makes you something to eat for lunch, take a quick photo of that dish. Use it for your social media content. So it doesn’t necessarily have to be super duper polished in order to be able to have success with it. But the more content, the more image and video you have, the better to keep your feet fresh and get people to stay connected with you.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah, absolutely. And then kind of on the flip side of that, where are you seeing hotels underestimate, you know, a lot of the things you’re having to do is convince these hotels that social’s important. A lot of the individual properties are not seeing it yet. So what are you telling them that they’re underestimating of the potential they could have on social media?
Aislynn Roberts:
Yeah, they’re definitely underestimate the value of it. So when you talk about social media, especially if you’re looking at, if you’re dealing with maybe the revenue team or Director of Finance, for Suite Suite and the brand teams, they are all numbers based. So they expect, “Hey, we’re we’re doing a marketing strategy, we have this in place. What am I getting in return from it?” And I understand it, I get it, but social media doesn’t operate that way. So they’re truly underestimating the value of the reach associated with it versus the cost. So it’s not necessarily about what I’m getting physically in return for it, it’s the potential, the longevity. So you have this ability to tell your story in a way that nobody else can tell it. No advertising campaign that you do can tell a story the way a social media content strategy can do. And it’s the ability to really to connect with people at every point in the traveler’s journey because people are on social media looking at things in different ways. For different reasons at different times during their day. So it doesn’t matter what you post, you’re targeting everyone during that piece and during their journey.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. And I think it’s important. You know, we hear the ROI of social media all the time, and that’s not usually a physical number. You don’t, you don’t see that. Maybe you see it through engagements and your followers and all and clicks and things like that. But for me, I set it on my webinars before, you know, I went to a resort last year in Mexico and I felt like I knew everybody that worked there because of their social media. And that’s not something I actively told them, but I was so comfortable there already because of the things they were posting on social media. So if we can get that message across and hotels can tell their story and show their personality, like that’s what matters most to these guests on social media and that there is no number that can show that obviously them returning is a sign that it’s working, but it’s, it’s hard to give those exact numbers. And, you know, some people believe in, some people don’t. So we just keep preaching that same message. But so when our team, when we start to work with these properties and we’re talking through their strategy, maybe they’re starting from zero or they have some type of presence, how important is creativity versus consistency?
Aislynn Roberts:
Yeah. So that’s a really great question and an interesting topic because you have a lot, like when we talk about people who are scared of it, it is that creativity. They don’t know where to start with it. They don’t know to go with it. So, but when you take the concept of consistency and you talk about, SEO and like all the stuff that’s going into social media now and the searchability of it, it’s really what consistency that drives content and drives performance. So I mean, if you, if you think about it, you know, a lot of people get stuck on, oh, virals the only thing that’s successful. If you talk to anyone that’s went viral, I guarantee you most of the time the answer is gonna be it was a fluke. Right. You know, they didn’t plan it. It’s not something that they knew what they were doing, it’s just, it’s something that resonated with a lot of people and it took off. But they got to that point because they had a consistent lead into that they were consistently posting. So when that, when that one viral moment went out, then people looked at their past content, decided, oh, this is a cool page. I’m gonna stick around and follow along with it. So the concept is you need both. You definitely need both. But consistency is what drives, and if you to kind of peel it back even further, we talk about sports, right? We both like sports, right? So think of your favorite sports team. You’ve been to some games, right?
Cassady Quintana:
Of course.
Aislynn Roberts:
Do you follow them on social media?
Cassady Quintana:
Yes. Right.
Aislynn Roberts:
So the experience you see on social media is the same experience you get at the game. That’s what social media is about. You’re selling an experience. It’s not, I mean, you are selling your property, but it’s more important to sell the experience that a traveler can have. To have that connection and be able to like, Hey, I can picture myself here. So when I am in town, whether it’s two months from now, six months from now, I’m gonna think about that property when I’m planning my trip.
Cassady Quintana:
I love the sports analogy. I think that’s a good way for people to understand. You know, when we talk about hotel, social media, it’s easier to see it when you can compare it to other industries like a sporting event for example. Or maybe you’re going to a music festival or any of those things. They’re all experiences. Sometimes we think of hotels as just somewhere to lay my head at night. Of course, at the end of it, that is the most important thing of why someone’s staying at a hotel. But if you can make the full experience something that they remember, it’s more than just somewhere they laid their head at night. So, kind of shifting gears a little bit. You know, we talk about authenticity on social media. Now we’re seeing an overwhelming amount of AI kind of content. So how do you think this is gonna play into hotel strategies as we move forward?
Aislynn Roberts:
Yeah, so I do think there is a proper, a good way to use ai. I think there’s definitely a use case where AI does benefit and can help you a lot. But to your point, you know, people are definitely craving authenticity so they can spot when it’s fake really, really quickly. I mean, it’s all over now in my feed where it’s like, tell me your post is AI without telling me me, it’s ai. Right? That’s a constant thing. And every single post has hundreds of comments on it because people can feel it. They want the real stuff, they want the authenticity and the reason they want that, it goes back to they’re trying to have an experience, right? They want a true experience of what’s they can do at your property, in your area, what they can go and see things to do. So there, there is a way that you can leverage AI and think about it. Maybe not do the whole thing ai ’cause it is spot able, right? People can see it. But think about if your GM and, you know, you don’t have a lot of photos. You have only like your empty professional photos for your website, which are great for your website, but think about how you can take that, pop it into an AI image editor, say, add two guests checking into my property. And now you have this great lobby photo with actual people in it, which is a true experience, right? If I see that I am gonna see the same thing when I walk in and it enables and furthers the reach and performance of that content. ’cause now people are envisioning there. Same thing for our pet friendly hotels. I work with a lot of pet friendly hotels who love to promote that, but very little of them have images of actual pets in their property. And it’s something that I’ve always recommended. If you have someone coming in, ask them if you could take a photo of their pet. And it’s still one of the last things. But imagine again, throwing it into an AI image tool and you just say, add a pet in this guest room, whether it’s on a compliment pet bed that you have or it’s on the actual bed in your room. And just now me as a pet owner, I don’t have to worry about leaving my dog behind when I want to go and stay because I can see, oh she’ll be comfortable here.
Cassady Quintana:
I think it’s gonna be important as we continue to head through this year and we’re already seeing OTA integration with AI and Instagram and TikTok and being able to create your whole itinerary on Instagram to really focus on what the gray area of AI is on social media, right? Because what you said, the examples you gave are a great way to use AI to show a real experience that could happen. But if you’re using AI to generate images that are not possible, things that you don’t have on your property, maybe you wanna expand the how big your gym is or what the equipment you have in your gym is, that’s something we wanna stay away from. So it’s gonna be important, and I’m sure both of us are gonna be watching this year, how AI continues to evolve and how social media platforms are evolving with it and what people can post and what, what works and what doesn’t work. So kind of as we move into this year, what do you think these hotels should be paying more attention to on social?
Aislynn Roberts:
Interactions. So, and that’s actually, more of a focus for social media too. Like they’re updating their algorithms to focus on reach and true real interactions. So that’s gonna be really big, but not only just with social media also in person. So how are your guests interacting with your property, with your staff, with your amenities, what they’re using the most. ’cause that’s gonna be an easy way to develop and fill in your calendar for most of the year. If you have a set schedule of content that, you know, like I wanna cycle through fitness center posts every month because it’s a highlight. We have five peloton bikes or, or whatever equipment that your guests really love about you, it makes it easier to fill those small gaps with your creative moments. Yeah. So if you strategize on your consistent right off the bat and you know, every once in a while I’m gonna do this and, and this, then those creative moments come in and those small moments, but online interactions present a little bit differently. So it’s comments, it shares, likes, post reactions, and in those moments you get interactions throughout every piece of the traveler’s journey. So knowing what they’re interacting with the most, is it a static post? Is it a video? Is it a real or a carousel image? And that could change throughout the year and it can change year over year. So it really just depends on what travelers are doing. But knowing how they’re interacting with it, understanding that and being able to adapt to it is gonna be key to be able to continue to see performance, have success with it, and be able to promote your property the way you want.
Cassady Quintana:
Yeah. And I think it’s important, and I know our team here at TMG is constantly looking at those reports and seeing how things are performing. So it’s important for hotels that may not be working with us to set a reminder on your calendar. You know, every month I’m gonna take a look back at our interaction, see what kind of content was performing, what kind of content may be flopped and we won’t do more of that and we’ll do more of this instead. And paying attention to those things and paying attention to when they’re interacting with it, especially, you know, we’re heading almost into spring break season and then it’ll be summer. And what content is gonna resonate with those guests at that time is important. So if you’re not taking a look at your interactions, you’re just posting blindly, right? You’re not, you’re not understanding what your guests actually want to see and what they’re enjoying to see. So you personally, Aislynn what’s exciting you most about where hotel social is headed?
Aislynn Roberts:
There are a lot. So I do like that social is becoming the new search. And I have an exercise to challenge everybody that’s kind of listening here. But you know, when you take into the fact that social is the new search, how they’re using it, how the journey is becoming more integrated because of the social search, you’ll have a better idea of what strategy to put in place. And we all use social media. I don’t think I’ve ever met anybody that doesn’t use social media in some manner. So when you’re on social media, you’re, there’s many moments where you’re just scrolling aimless. It’s mindless, right? You’re going through it, you’re just going through, maybe it’s right after work, you’re decompressing and you’re just scrolling through things. Me, that’s reels. I scroll through a bunch of reels and if it, sometimes it’s a quick pass rate, sometimes I watch the whole thing. Other times I’m searching with purpose and I’m scrolling with purpose ’cause I have attention behind it. Whether it’s, I wanna go to a new restaurant, so I’m gonna look them up, see what their menu items are, or if I am looking for a hotel and I wanna see what’s happening there. So those are purposeful scrolls. I’m actually trying to find something about it. So with that in mind, that’s a search engine tool, right? I’m purposely scrolling for something, try to find things. So one thing that I find that’s super enlightening when you kind of look at this is if you do sort of like a focus group, ideally non hospitality people. ’cause as hospitality people, we’re a little bit more in tune. So we might go a certain way with it. But you know, if you do both and an integration of both, but your family, your friends, ask them, let’s plan a trip to Denver, Colorado and find out where they start. You’ll be surprised. I think that most of them will start on social media now, and it’s because that mindless scrolling has created an algorithm for them that when they do Denver, Colorado, they’re gonna get videos of things to do in Denver, the best restaurants in Denver, they’re going to get all this stuff. So now they’re like, okay, this might be an interesting place. I wanna go here. And then they go to search for rooms, hotels rates and now is your property meeting the amenities that I require or the things that I need? And then it goes into, you’re moving more into that booking. So just a fun little exercise. I find it super fun when I do it, you know, whether where they start off and it’s just showing that social media is moving into this more frame and it’s getting far more focused with search and trip planning.
Cassady Quintana:
It’s not even getting just more focused on the platform itself, but we’re seeing, even on Google, there’s a tab at the top that now says short form video, right? So if you click that, that’s social media videos. So we’re gonna see that continue to evolve into Google and other actual search engines. But I love the term “social is the new search”. I feel like I’ve said that a million times and I preach it on our webinars all the time. But it’s true. And it’s just gonna continue. Again, like I mentioned, those OTA integrations, being able to do everything in one platform. I’m sure once we see the development of that, eventually there’ll be a way for hotels to add their booking right into the platform too. And that’s exciting, right? That’s exciting. And it’s exciting that you can make it that easy and you can share the, your entire experience before a guest even stays with you. So these are the conversations I wanna continue having with people. But Aislynn, thank you so much for joining me. I know we’re gonna continue to watch these trends and talk about these things throughout the year. But thank you for joining me on this first episode. It’s been a blast.
Aislynn Roberts:
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Cassady Quintana:
And thank you everybody for listening and we’ll see you next time on the Social Success Podcast.
The 2026 Hunter Conference takes place on March 16-28, in Atlanta, Georgia, at the Signia by Hilton. Tune in to the preview episode as hoteliers and hospitality professionals prepare for the cornerstone industry event.
Special Guest, Madison Thibodeaux, Senior Manager, Events & Partnerships at Hunter Advisors, joins the Suite Spot to share insights and behind-the-scenes details about what conference attendees can look forward to from speakers, panels, themes, F&B, and much more.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree here, a familiar episode, if you can believe it. I’ve got a jacket on because it is absolutely frigid outside, but we’re thawing out. We’re getting ready for conference season and covering some of the biggest hospitality events of the season with the first one being the Hunter Conference. And I am here with, even though this is the Suite Spot’s, third time attending the conference, we have a first time guest, which I’m really, really happy to bring in. Maddie Thibodeaux Senior Manager, Events and Partnerships at Hunter Advisors and Conference. Maddie, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Thank you for having me, Ryan. I’m really excited to be here.
Ryan Embree:
We are going to have a constant theme throughout this episode of a lot of the things you love about Hunter, but a lot of new things on the horizon as well, which I’m sure you and your team have been extremely busy. We can’t wait. Hoteliers can’t wait. Sponsors can’t wait. This is gonna be one for the books, but before we get into all that, Maddie, we have kind of a tradition here on the Suite Spot, especially for our first time Suite Spot guest. Tell us a little bit about your background in the industry and the journey that led you to Hunter Advisors and Conference.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Yeah, I would love to talk about that. So my journey almost pretty much started at Hunter, which I know you’ve had Sarah as a guest on your podcast as well, and I’m sure she has a little bit of a similar story. But I was a student at Georgia State University, the Cecil B. Day School of Hospitality. I am one of the odd people that when I got to college, I already knew that I wanted to be in the hospitality industry, which I think is a rare story that you hear. Most people typically fall into it. But I went into school knowing that I wanted to be in event management. I wanted to plan events. And so throughout college I had a few different internships in hospitality. So I got some experience in the different sectors of hospitality. I worked with a catering company. I worked at a hotel in Cape Cod one summer, which was a lot of fun. Got some operational experience in hotels with the front desk and housekeeping. And then my junior year of college, Dr. Debbie Cannon at the School of Hospitality made me aware of the internship that was open at Hunter for their conference intern. And so I applied for the role, got it, accepted it. I worked for Hunter my junior and senior year. Got a lot of hands-on experience planning the event as the intern. And something that Hunter does really amazingly is they really give anyone on their team, even if you’re an intern, a platform and a seat at the table to where you can really innovate with them and present your ideas. And some of them you can see like actually come to life. And so I had a lot of great mentors at Hunter who really, you know, prepared me as a student with my professional development. And so had a great time with Hunter once I graduated from Atlanta, moved out to Chicago and started working in the trade show side of things for an exhibitor services company called GES and got a little bit more trade show experience so that I could come back to Hunter and, you know, give a little bit of insight into other events going on in the world, even outside of the hospitality industry, and kind of bring that knowledge back to the team. And so just recently this past summer, I joined the Hunter team in this new role and it’s been really exciting and really happy to be here. And I got a taste of the corporate world, but really ultimately I was missing the family feeling of Hunter. And so they welcomed me back with open arms and now I’m back with the Hunter family.
Ryan Embree:
It’s such a cool boomerang story to hear. And you know, something we hear a lot about in hospitality, unlikely path, like you said, a lot of people don’t go get into hospitality and that’s something we’re trying to change here on the Suite Spot. We obviously have our hospitality campus call, which teaser we’re gonna talk about here in a little bit. But to get more people to think about career or careers in hospitality as more than just maybe a summer job and what exposure that must have been for you as a student. And I ran into actually the dean at FIU’s Chaplain School of Hospitality, Dr. Chang at Hunter last year. And he was telling me about all the students and the involvement as a hospitality student myself, back when I graduated all those years ago. This is the type of exposure that can really open your eyes to show the hospitality is more than operations. It can be anything, events, F&B, there’s so many different sides and unique spaces in hospitality. And getting that exposure I’m sure was, was really cool. And now you get to be the person to expose other students to that. So that’s really cool. So give us kind of our Suite Spot audience, a little bit of a behind the scenes look at your role over there at Hunter Advisors and the role that it plays in the Hunter Conference.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Yeah, so I love my role. I feel like I’m really lucky to be in this position because my job is really just talking to people, building relationships, working with our partners and really being that advocate for them. They tell us what they need, like why they’re attending Hunter, what their goals are in attending Hunter. And it’s my job for us to really give them that platform and that space to do business and have a positive experience at Hunter. So I’m really lucky to be in this role on a personal-professional development aspect level of everything. I get to meet so many people in the industry, hear about their roles and what they do, and really use that to shape who I am. You know, like how can I be doing a better job in my role? And so I feel like I’m in a really lucky space where my job is really just talking to people and making friends. Who doesn’t who doesn’t love that, right?
Ryan Embree:
But you be, you bring up an important point because you know, at the top of the episode I mentioned it, I mean this for a lot of people. I tell people all the time, you know exactly when the Hunter Conference is happening because it literally feels like it shuts down LinkedIn in the hotel space and everyone is there, Who’s anyone, and what you said, Maddie, everyone comes for different reasons. We’ve seen brand launches, we’ve seen acquisitions in mergers that happen between management companies. We say it all the time, but as much as a few years ago we had to go virtual, the event space now is more important than ever. And that’s why, deals get done in these places. Owners, brands, management companies, general managers, even all the way down to hospitality students can glean and learn so much from this event. And that’s why we are so proud to be headed there back again for the third consecutive time. But as we mentioned, a lot of new things including its location now, funny enough, last year, quick story, we were at the Hunter Conference covering it as we do, and the morning of the second day we were actually at the Signia by Hilton Atlanta doing our spotlight series. So we were actually spotlighting the property, talking to some management over there, while it was at the same time being announced that Hunter would be moving locations to that. So just some, some really cool, kind of like fortune there. But what are you most excited about of this new location and what can attendees expect from being hosted here?
Madison Thibodeaux:
So as you know, from your Spotlight series, yeah, it’s a brand new development. I think it’s been open, gorgeous for three years or so, and there’s so, it’s so modern. It’s very refreshing. There’s so much natural sunlight, which when you’re attending these conferences and with my trade show background being in convention centers and you’re in there all day, you’re like, what, what time is it? Is it still light outside? Is it dark? You don’t really get that feeling here. It’s very airy and refreshing. And I think the layout of it for our event too, it’s really, it’s an easy flow. Things are just kind of stacked on top of each other and it’s really easy to get from point A to point B. So there’s been a lot of opportunity over there for us. And then where Signia is located in downtown Atlanta, it’s right next to the Mercedes-Benz Stadium and the State Farm arena. And being close to those places really opens up a lot of doors for us as well. And we’re excited for our attendees to, explore that side of Atlanta a little more too. The Monday night of our event, there is a Hawks game, and the Hawks have already partnered with us and they’re offering discounted tickets for attendees. And so there’s a lot of new and exciting things attendees can explore within the Signia and also around the Signia in Atlanta while they’re there for Hunter.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool, Maddie, because you’re absolutely right with it being a new build Signia property, they built that for event space. They knew exactly what they were doing the natural lighting, even the stories behind, you know, if you’re an attendee or hotelier that plans to attend Hunter. And please do find out all you can about some of the names and the stories behind some of the conference rooms. It is, is really the, the, the way they described it was a love story to the city of Atlanta. Um, there’s so much meaning, and I, and I love these new builds now that put so much passion and culture of their local community into these projects. And, um, it’s really shown they’re so excited to be headed there and, and staying there for the first time. Like I said, just a little bit of a taste of it, but excited to be there. Now, another element of Hunter that maybe new to many this year is the recent Hunter, advisors rebrand. Can you share these rebrands, especially with such a strong legacy that Hunter has, it doesn’t happen overnight, right? A lot of thought process, very meticulous, a lot of intention behind a rebrand like this. Give us a little bit of a, kind of a background of the rebrand and what it means for the brand moving forward.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Absolutely. And I’m really glad you’re bringing this up ’cause exactly like you said, there was a lot of thought behind this, a lot of intention and a lot of hours from our team internally, just going through every single detail going in there with a fine tooth comb going through our website, every single line. We wanted to make sure it was portraying the Hunter voice in the appropriate way. And my favorite thing is when people stop me and say, oh my God, I saw like your new website, a new logo. It looks so great. I’m like, you don’t understand how much that means ’cause of how much time went into this. And so really our goal behind this was we wanted to have a brand that really conveyed a little bit more clarity, confidence, and connection when listening to people in the industry and not just, you know, the investors that we work with on a day-to-day basis, but the broader hospitality landscape. There’s a lot of people out there that don’t know Hunter Advisors and Hunter Conference are under one entity under the Hunter name. And so we wanted a brand that conveyed that connection a little bit better. So people know that when we’re planning the Hunter Conference, we really have this unique perspective where our organization we’re in this business on a day-to-day basis. And so really wanted to have that give a little bit more clarity and bridge that gap a little bit better between Hunter Advisors and Hunter Conference. And then going a little bit deeper with the actual design of the rebrand, you’ll see that it’s very modern and contemporary. It has a very clean look. And I think that is a testament to Hunter’s commitment to always evolving and innovating and growing and showing that, you know, we are adaptable and we listen to the industry and we want to bend with where it’s gonna take us. But at the same time, still remaining very true to our core values and what Hunter is. And it’s being that organization that’s very personal and people centric. So we’re not compromising those core values. But you don’t, evolution doesn’t mean that you have to compromise those things. And so it’s a very exciting time for us. And I’m glad you brought it up because it’s something I love talking about.
Ryan Embree:
I bet. Yeah. It’s exciting new chapter, and it still pays tribute. I mean, you, you mentioned the word family at the very beginning, you, it’s a legacy here, there’s a family, this is a family business at the end of the day. So, you know, to be able to have this rebrand still stay kind of true to what you said to its roots, but also see that it’s evolving into this new era is super exciting. And that along with the, the location change for the Hunter Conference this year, really, really excited. So we’re gonna get into it. Let’s, let’s talk about the conference. You know, a lot of work, you know, Sarah, always comes on these preview episodes and talks about how day one after the conference is done, you’re already looking to next year. So a lot of time, a lot of, sweat equity has gone into this conference. Give our audience a little bit of behind the scenes, look at what that process is like, and as you start to plan the programming for the event.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Yeah. So, I actually wanna correct, ’cause I was watching that video with Sarah and I was like, Sarah, come on. We don’t start just day one after the conference. We’re planning this year’s conference and already making notes of like, oh, let’s do this different next year. So it’s a really exciting time and especially this year with the opportunity to do everything new and in a different way. There’s a lot of things like our gears are turning. So it is a really exciting year, but with our programming in particular, I would say we approach it the same way that our advisors approach a transaction. And, you know, it’s very intentional, it’s very disciplined, and we have a deep respect for our audience. We’re always listening to them and we wanna be, you know, respectful to that and give them information that they’re here and want to hear. And so I attend a lot of industry conferences too. And so there are, there are a lot of buzzwords that go on in our industry. And for example, AI is one of them. And there’s a lot of confusion out there still, and it’s still very new and people don’t really know where to go and where to turn in that realm. And so something that Hunter wants to do, it’s something we’re being very intentional about, is when we’re hosting a session, we don’t want it to just be like a broad overview of this topic. We wanna get into those details in a sort of case study format. Like these are the tools that we, as a hotel owner, this is what we’re using, these are the partners that we have that are providing these tools to us, and this is what’s worked for us. And so something that is new this year, we’re introducing what we’re calling focus sessions. And so it’s similar to a breakout session. We’ll still have a normal breakout session track, but these focus sessions are 20-minute conversations with two to three speakers. And it’s truly, it’s a conversation, it’s a case study, here’s what’s working for us. And so these hotel owners can leave with, you know, actual actionable items. Like, this is what I should be implementing with my organization. And so we’re, we’re really trying to lean into that and be really intentional with our programming this year.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so important because it really sets the tone, especially for when you have a lot of investors. You have a lot of owners at an event. You know, some of that programming makes for great icebreakers, great sessions on, you know, maybe the start of a conversation, about something that they heard, something that resonated with them, something that they can use in that conversation when talking to an owner or a management company that’s gonna further the conversation there. And that’s where I think, again, the live event space conferences right now is in this special place because we’re in a very tricky place. I’m sure we’re gonna talk about it and, and it’s within programming, within the programming of this year’s event. But it’s going to be those, those human connections, quite frankly, that are going to move deals forward and move our industry forward, quite frankly, with some of the challenges that, that are going, the cost of labor, you know, just rising costs in almost every element of hospitality it feels like. But those conversations really spur kind of change and might be the first step towards that. So anything you’re most excited about on the agenda when you look at it?
Madison Thibodeaux:
So we do have some really exciting keynote sessions this year. Chris Nata, the CEO of Hilton is one of our keynote speakers. We have kind of parallel to the hotel industry, but we have a speaker coming to talk about the World Cup that’s gonna be hosted in Atlanta. So giving a little bit of that tourism perspective and what people can expect and what goes into planning this global event. And then also the Barat Shaw Leadership Speaker series that always happens at Hunter. This year the guest is Tony Ressler, who’s the owner of the Atlanta Hawks. And so we have a lot of these really fun, kind of industry adjacent speakers also coming to the Hunter Conference and really excited to hear those sessions.
Ryan Embree:
I love that the Hunter Conference looks sometimes, like you said, kind of adjacent to the industry because it’s sometimes those outside voices that can give some really great perspective. Because we talk about it all the time on the podcast, hospitality is really in everything that we do and in almost every vertical out there. So, of course they’re learning lessons from us. We certainly learn lessons from them especially in a time of really, deep change right now and, and transformation. So, one of the things that has stayed that is, is a staple of the Hunter Conference and, and it looks like it’s still on the agenda, is the Hunter Conference Award for Excellence and Inspiration. And this year’s recipient, Glade M. Knight, Founder and Chairman of Apple REIT. Talk to us a little bit about the award, Maddie, for those that might not be familiar and why Glade was the right choice for the recognition.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Absolutely. Yeah. So the history of this award, it was really created to honor leaders in the hospitality industry who have shaped the investment landscape, but not just through scale and success. So not just you click on their LinkedIn and you see the steps that they took to get to where they are, but really the people who have shaped it through Integrity, vision and the impact that they made on the people in their organization and the ecosystem around them. And Glad Knight is just the perfect person who embodies that. He made a really large impact in our industry. And it’s a really timely year to honor somebody from Apple Hospitality because they did just celebrate 10 years being a part of the New York Stock Exchange and also 25 years as a business. So it’s really timely for us to honor the person who got them to the position that they’re in today.
Ryan Embree:
A lot of milestones to celebrate, very strong parallels to the Hunter Conference, right. Celebrating some milestones. So 2026 will, as I mentioned, will be my personal in the Suite Spots, third time attending the conference. Love the programming that you put together. I think we shared some of that, but also the networking, right? I hear those conversations happening. We see those, you can’t, you can’t miss it. Everyone’s kind of in the lobby, it’s buzzing. That’s why I love about walking into the Hunter conferences. That energy that you feel just walking in from those conversations that are happening, you’re moving to a new location. I’m sure a challenge was to make sure that that buzz, that energy, that networking was gonna translate seamlessly to the new location. How have you and your team ensure that?
Madison Thibodeaux:
Yes, so networking is probably the most exciting part of the Hunter Conference, I would say. Like the programming is so important, but really people are coming to Hunter to do deals. So networking is a huge part. And something that’s really cool about the Hunter Conference is that just having a chair at a table is like really prime real estate at our conference. People wanna sit down and network and do deals with people. And so with our new facility, there was a lot of opportunity, what are gonna be the new hotspots where people are standing and having those casual conversations. Something new this year we’ve rebranded our exhibit hall to now be called The Hub. And we were really intentional with the design of the hub. And it’s a, the floor plan is this circular design, which was created to give that sense of the attendee, have that sense of exploration. They’re not just walking up and down aisles talking to sponsors in their booth. They’re really having to get in there, walk around, see what’s going on. And I think we’re gonna touch on it a little bit later, but our theme this year is the home of hospitality. And so the Hub is designed to look like a neighborhood. So our diamond sponsors, each of them have an activation inside the hub where, you know, their booth is thematically integrated into the neighborhood. So someone is the library, someone is the pet shop, someone is the creamery, and they’re positioned in all different areas of the hub, giving people that sense of exploration. So they wanna get around and, you know, have that starting point in networking. You walk over to IHGs Booth and they’re greeting you with, you know, a bottled water because they’re the flower shop and you need, gotta water your flowers. And so we’re really excited about that. And yeah, so there’s a lot of networking that happens at the conference and the Hub I think is gonna be the hotspot for people to go and, you know, start those conversations and we’re excited for people to see the design of that.
Ryan Embree:
I love that. I mean, you know, again, credit to you and your team for re-imagining what the sponsor floor could and should look like. Because I think you’re absolutely right. I think events have evolved and changed and the way that, you know, these attendees, hoteliers, owners, investors, what they’re looking for is also is also changed. And they’re not looking for that maybe what we would call, I guess, old school style where it’s going through, you know, and seeing the vendors and they’re standing behind a trade show booth that’s more interactive. The conversations can spur some more creativity, some activations love to see those. Because those are the things that kind of make those memorable memories, so to speak, so that you remember them after the show, which is what, which is every sponsor’s goal.
Madison Thibodeaux:
There’s something else I wanna touch on too. With the networking aspect of Hunter, something that we’re really proud of and something that I’ve heard people say to me directly is that even though Hunter brings in around 2300 attendees, the conference feels so intimate. And I think our team does a really great job at making it easy for people to casually bump into somebody and start that conversation without having to have a designated meeting with each other. And we really want, that’s a strong value of ours, is to make our event very approachable and easy for people to integrate and feel like, they can walk up to anybody and have a conversation. And something that meant so much to our team. We were just at another conference and a staff member from the University of South Carolina came up to us and we have a lot of student volunteers from all over the country that help put on the Hunter Conference on site. And she was like, our students love coming to Hunter. They say it’s just really approachable and they feel like they can actually join in on these conversations with hospitality leaders. And I think that’s really important because if students are saying it, then emerging hoteliers probably also feel that way. We want them to feel really welcomed at Hunter and know that this is the place that they can go and really have a seat at that table.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that goes back to that theme that you were talking about, home of hospitality, right? And that southern hospitality feel. So, you know, last year’s theme was Elevate Your Game. One of my favorite parts of our conversation with Sarah every year is talking about the theme. And I know it’s just a couple words, but it’s so intentional. Like the theme to each one of the conferences that I’ve been to, and I’ve seen it integrated throughout. Like once I know what the theme is, I can see it incorporated into everything. And I love that. So I wanna talk about it and touch on it and kind of talk to our audience about the thinking behind this year’s theme and the intentionality behind it.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Yeah, so I think it really goes back to what we were talking about with the rebrand and how we want people to know that Hunter is evolving, but at the same time, our roots are the same. Like, we’re still this family business. And I think at a certain level of the theme, the Signia, that is our new home. And so we’re introducing this new home to our attendees and we’re welcoming them into our home and home being where family is and to kind of really tying into how Hunter is this approachable place where people should feel comfortable and feel like they’re, they’re home with us. And so we’re just excited to really share with our industry this new evolution and new era of Hunter, but still being loud and proud about, we’re still the Hunter family at the end of the day.
Ryan Embree:
Well, very cool and eager to see, again, how you and your team kind of incorporate that theme into the event this year. We’re gonna switch gears because, you know, one interesting thing that we’ve found in common, you talked about at the top of the episode, was your journey as a hospitality student. I also went to UCF Rosen, so two hospitality students talking to each other. That’s exactly what we want to see, right? So I mentioned we have a series called the Hospitality Campus Crawl. Georgia State has a special relationship with the Hunter Conference. Talk to us about that relationship there and then maybe kind of how the Hospitality School set you up for success and where you are for your, your hospitality career.
Madison Thibodeaux:
Absolutely. So the Cecil B Day School of Hospitality at Georgia State University is a co-founder of the Hunter Conference. And so we have a really deep relationship with the team over there. And similar to my start at Hunter and Sarah start at Hunter every year, we welcome on a conference intern from the Cecil B Day School of Hospitality Student Base. At the same time we also offer free admittance for all, Georgia State students. ’cause we really want them to get involved in, they are a part of our origin story. So it’s a way we give back to that university for being a part of that team with us. And then we have the Barat Shaw Leadership Speaker series, which, you know, is put on by Mint Shaw from Noble Investment Group honoring his father. But that is a speaker series that was also partnered with the school for that speaker series to make that happen. And so there’s a really deep relationship with the School of Hospitality at the Hunter Conference. I am forever grateful for the School of Hospitality at Georgia State for where I’m at in the professional world. I was a student that really, I wanted to get involved. I wanted to know my professors, you know, really well, and I wanted them to know me in return. And that school, it’s really, you know, what you put into it is what you get back out of it. And they have a really strong commitment of fostering their students and setting them up for success. And there’s so many opportunities there and they send their students on different trips. And when I was there, I was able to go to Prague and attend the ISHC conference where, you know, Lee, our chairman is one of the members there, and some people from our board members are members there. And as a student being able to be in the room with these industry leaders, really it sets a student up for success so that they attend these conferences and they don’t feel really lost. You know, because our industry is so small, you see the same people at all of these conferences. And so it gives you that confidence and kind of helps without imposter syndrome when you’re new into the industry, if you just know a familiar face and you know, from there they can introduce you to more people. And so the school does a really good job at not just educating students in the classroom, but giving students those opportunities outside the classroom to really get hands-on in the industry, start meeting those people so that when it is time for you to graduate, you have a list of people you can reach out to for jobs. And so I’m so grateful for the school and everything that they provided to me because I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t be with Hunter with without them.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to hear your story, Maddie. And you know, I would just say for any hoteliers listening to this, that plan on attending, talk to these students, talk to these hospitality students. Because if you’re also looking for trends of where hospitality is headed, you need to be talking to the next generation of hoteliers and hospitality professionals, what they’re learning, what they expect from hospitality, what they’re looking for in their first job, right? We’ve talked about it all the time about this younger generation looking for an ease of technology, that they’re going to just assume that your brand, your management company, your hotel, has already implemented it into its systems. So this could be a great kind of conversation to have with the students to say, what is your expectation when you come out of hospitality school for what a career looks like? How quickly do you wanna move up in hospitality? Do you wanna stay in one place? Do you want to travel? These are all benefits and perks of hospitality and the young minds of hospitality professionals are such a great way to try to figure out what hospitality might look like 5, 10, 15 years down the line. So, we’re super excited here at the Suite Spot to announce that we will be on campus at Georgia State during the Hunter Conference to do another episode of our Hospitality Campus Crawl, at the Hospitality School at Georgia State. I’m so excited. Maddie, thank you so much for connecting me over there. We talk about hospitality connections, this is that in motion right there. So we’re, we’re so happy to feature that school and share some insights and see what these young professionals are getting ready for in this world, this ever changing hospitality world. So, we’re coming up to the end, as we wrap up, you know, I’d love to talk to the hoteliers that are having attended a Hunter conference or are really considering joining for the first time in 2026. What would you say to them, Maddie, and maybe some of your top tips for first time attendees?
Madison Thibodeaux:
I would say, you know, Hunter is the place to be. You’re missing out if you’re not there. Aside from the things we talked about, like our programming and the networking opportunities. There’s so much more that happens at Hunter beyond what you see on the program. And our partners do a great job at keeping attendees busy throughout the event. And this year, something really exciting that we’ve never done before. Two of our partners are hosting late night events on property, so really easy for anyone staying at the Signia to hop downstairs and attend those events. And it’s gonna be a lot of fun. We have some live music, maybe even a couple big artists that people might recognize at these events. And so it’s something really exciting for us. And, you have to be there to experience it. You can’t just see the pictures on LinkedIn and have fomo. You gotta be there.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, I cannot wait. Its gonna be an incredible conference, I would say is if you’re planning on attending, obviously do. But just to exactly what Maddie said, embrace it. Every opportunity, so much is going on in our industry. It’s changing faster than ever. And this is the conference again that people mark on their calendar because it marks a big brand announcement or these mergers and acquisitions or just to network and get to know more of your hospitality community, which we have been so fortunate to do these last three years and we can’t wait to do again. And Marge, hopefully in some warmer conditions than it is right now, Maddie. But thank you so much for your time today. Really appreciate it. Cannot wait for March and The Hunter Conference. Any final thoughts before we wrap up?
Madison Thibodeaux:
I just wanna say thank you so much for having me, Ryan, and for highlighting the Hunter Conference. We love having the Suite Spot there every year as well. And yeah, I just hope to see everyone there.
Ryan Embree:
Alright, well thank you so much. Thank you Maddie. Thank you for listening to the Suite Spot, and we will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the very first Suite Spot episode of 2026 as special guest and Director of Product – Respond & Resolve™, Jackie Avery, features the Top 5 Guest Sentiment Tags of 2025 and what the key findings of these tags mean not only to hoteliers but the industry as a whole as we kick off travel in the new year.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. Happy New Year as your host. As always, Ryan Embree here with another one of our favorite annual traditions. A great way to start off and kick off the year here with Jackie Avery, Director of Product for our Respond and Resolve™ review response solution for hotels. Jackie, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jackie Avery:
Thanks. It’s so great to be here. I look forward to doing this every year, so I’m happy we’re back at it.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, again, it’s an annual tradition. It’s a benchmark for the beginning of the year. It’s actually one of our most viewed and listened to episodes of the year, and I think it’s because hoteliers really want to get a sense of what’s going on over the course of the calendar year when it comes to reviews. To set this up off the top, we are looking at reputation, sentiment, data, the data within online guest reviews, that Travel Media Group actually pulls, and a lot of these reviews you and your team are responding to.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. It’s exciting. So if it’s your first time here, welcome. And if you have been watching us the past few years, welcome back. We’re excited to kind of talk through, some of the data that we kind of went through. So to put it under perspective, we’re looking at information analyzed from over 45 million sentiment mentions.
Ryan Embree:
That’s an incredible number. The popularity and importance of guest feedback and reputation right. Now, I know we talk a lot on this podcast about AI technology. We’re always trying to see what’s next, but there’s no replacement for word of mouth. Right? And whether that’s physically telling someone about your experience or sharing that, what we’re talking about today, sharing that online with guest feedback and reviews, you can take away so much from that. And hoteliers, travelers obviously are looking at sentiment data, trying to figure out whether they should choose the one hotel versus another hotel. Hoteliers are looking at this data, digesting it, and trying to figure out how to improve on the guest experience. But what we’re doing today is trying to find the top five sentiments. Talk about some themes. What does this mean when these types of sentiments are found in your guest feedback? Are there things you can make operationally changes? Is it training at the hotel? Is it capital investment? Sometime some of it, like location, which we’re gonna talk about unavoidable, right? You can’t just pick up your hotel and move it. So really interested to see the list. We always start from the bottom of the list and work our way up. So kick us off with number five.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, absolutely. And like you said, it’s so powerful to spend that moment reflecting. Yeah. Sometimes it’s just taking the information and putting it into this bite sized way for you to process it. So hopefully everyone finds it pretty easy to kinda, you know, come along this journey with us. So, number five, it had over 3 million sentiment mentions, right? So that’s a lot of people talking about it. And we’re talking about facility amenities. Now, some people are listening and they’re going, well, I don’t have a pool, so of course I, that didn’t get a mention for me, or, I do have a pool. Of course they mentioned that, but stay with me on that. That’s actually its own category. So here we are talking about the lobby, the hallways, seating areas, elevators, luggage carts, right? So now think about, put that into perspective. More people can really relate. So I don’t know about you, but sometimes when I’m come, coming to a hotel, right, I’ve had a long travel day. I’m a little tired. I am, you know, feeling antsy. I just wanna get there. But when I get outta my car or I get to walk in, I’m feeling that excitement. I’m ready for my trip to start no matter what I’m doing. I’m like, here we go. So then you’re taking that all in. Of course, travelers are mention mentioning this, right? You have those first impressions of a hotel, it gives you pause. So sometimes things that you feel as a hotelier or as someone who works at, at a property, maybe you just brush past ’em. It doesn’t mean a lot to you. It’s no big deal. Sure. You’re maybe not sure why somebody positively mentioned it or negatively mentioned it, but I wanna put you into the shoes of a traveler who’s just arrived. They’re finally at their destination and they’re ready to start their stay. Look at your hotel through a fresh lens. Was the hallway welcoming? Was it kind of dark? Did the elevator come right away? Were there any luggage carts available? Right? Did it excite you to see somewhere that maybe you might meet your friends down in the lobby and you guys might hang out there before you headed out later. So all of those things I challenge you to now kind of view your facility amenities from that first time arrival guest perspective.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s a great point Jackie. And, you know, I started my career in hospitality as a Bellman, so, it was very easy to kind of take all of that for granted seeing that lobby. But you’re right, these travelers are more than likely seeing it for the first time. You know, one thing I’ll also say is the way that we use the facility amenities has really evolved the way that we’re building new hotels right now. Especially the work from home or work from anywhere type of traveler, that could be their office space for the entirety of their trip. So they’re looking at your lobby, they’re looking at your public space and amenities a little bit different than historically they might have done. And again, the brands, development companies, they are building for this type of traveler. So not surprising to see that category tag fall into the top five. Let’s move on to number four.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, absolutely. So, kind of shifting down this year, number four is gonna be location. So, as you mentioned, I think a lot of people feel trapped when they hear this sentiment being mentioned. Like, well, I can’t move my hotel, but actually you have a lot of power here. You can control what you’re saying about your property. And guests are mentioning your location in reviews positively, negatively, but it’s being brought up, right? Uh, so when I think about that, I think about when I’m traveling with my kids, I’ve got two young kiddos. Location is so important for me, not necessarily is it just right near the main attraction I wanna attend, or, you know, is it close to the place I’m going? But I’m looking at, are people mentioning it’s near a grocery store? Is it near a pharmacy? Is it near everything that I need or that I may need when I’m traveling with young kids? If it’s not, that’s fine, as long as I knew that. Because then I’m gonna pack, right? I’m gonna prepare for everything I might need. There’s a big mental load with that. So you can ease traveler stress and turn even just maybe what isn’t this amazing location into a positive tag if people felt like they knew what to expect with it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I think that’s a huge part of it, is setting expectations for location. If you claim on social media or your website, that you’re close to the airport and you’re 40 minutes away from the airport, that might not be close proximity to some travelers versus another. So you’re right, the location is really based on the expectation of the traveler and what’s convenient to them. You really want to put in perspective to that traveler. If you look at, everybody has Google Maps, right? And, and has used that app for if you have your hotel and nothing else around you in the traveler’s eyes, you really have kind of failed them as far as showing them or giving them an expectation of what that location looks like. You want that thing to be filled with dots. You want them to know exactly where your restaurants are in comparison to your hotel. If there’s an airport, attractions, as you mentioned, even things like grocery store, pharmacies, minute clinics. I mean, you know, you never know, especially with, with people with families or children or pets that they might be traveling with. These are very, very important places to your traveler that that could make the difference between a good experience and a bad location.
Jackie Avery:
And I think sometimes we come in with our own feelings about, well, we have a good location, or we don’t, but think of all the people traveling. All the people staying at your hotel, you don’t necessarily know exactly what they’re looking for. You might think that your location is are just fine, but actually it’s exactly what they want.
Ryan Embree:
And a great place, again, as respond and resolve™, a great place to really put that location in perspective is your review responses, right?
Jackie Avery:
Absolutely. Someone praises your location or they express dissatisfaction. That is exactly where you get to share the details. And people reading those review responses feel informed and they trust you. And now they are excited for their trip. They feel even more prepared, they don’t feel stressed, and they’re ready to get going. And, you know, those positive sentiment tags are gonna come your way.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. So important. You know, whether it’s travel media group responding your reviews, or even a team member the property. Have them really paint a clear picture for your traveler of where they’re at location wise. ’cause obviously this being the number four tag, it’s very, very important to travelers. Moving on to number three.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. So number three shouldn’t be a surprise with over 3.6 million mentions, it’s gonna be cleanliness. So it’s moved up this year, which, I think people kind of expect this to be brought up. And I think when you’re putting this into perspective, I want you to think about the different ways you approach this yourself as a traveler. So I kind of mentioned before, if I’m traveling, you know, with my family, these might be some things I’m thinking about. Every once in a while I get to kind of have a little getaway or stay at a hotel with just me and my spouse. So my husband and I we’re going away, maybe we’re headed into our hotel room. You walk in and you’re like, wow, it’s so nice in here. It’s so clean. And you have this added positive feeling of I didn’t have anything to do with it. I’m really on vacation, even if I’m traveling for business or even if I am on vacation. It’s just, just a short getaway. It is this positive feeling that compounds itself, right? So, not only that, but right now, everyone, you know, stress is high and everyone wants to acknowledge hardworking team members. So when you walk in and you see that room and you just feel the freshness and you’re excited to stay there, they’re so grateful for that hardworking housekeeping team and they want to praise that hard work. And so you’re seeing that mention in reviews more often. The tag right now is predominantly positive. People are not coming in and just saying, it was this, it was that. It’s actually just praising the hard work being done and how grateful they were to stay somewhere where that was something the property prioritized.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to see, I mean, we’ve done this episode, we were talking about it off camera now for five plus years. And obviously during that 2020, 2021, even 2022 year, this was a very, this was a difficult tag to kind of talk about because a lot of guests kind of saw cleanliness through the eyes of health and safety and almost saying for hotels, if it wasn’t clean, then there was a lack of empathy or even caution towards that, that guest wellbeing. And now we’ve kind of shifted. I think the expectation is still, you know, I think everyone still expects a clean room, but it’s kind of moved away from there. And that housekeeping that you’re talking about that’s even evolved within hospitality. Now you sometimes have to opt into hospitality and overnight service and things of that nature. Sometimes you have to stay a minimum amount of nights. This needs to be clearly communicated. A big theme of this episode right, is such clear communication to set the proper expectations. If something like that is a policy at your hotel, especially around cleanliness, or you’ll see that tag, fall more on the negative spectrum, right?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, absolutely. And I think it’s hard, I think for people sometimes, especially right, they’re working so hard, they’re, they’re running these property teams, they’re maybe overseeing multiple hotels and they feel misunderstood. Like, well, this is the reason we have that policy and price matters to people. So we’ve been able to make this accommodation to keep our price down. And don’t the guests get that? And how do they not understand this? I think they feel upset, but also just because you have a certain policy, it doesn’t mean the sentiment is going to be negative about it. But it will be if you hide it. Yeah. Right. If a guest feels like you misled them. No review response, you know, will help you recover, recover from, you know, lying. Right. You have to be clear, you have to be transparent, and then you can just withhold what you need to do. And the guests will understand because they expected it. And if they need assistance and you assist them, of course, now you’re going to get that above and beyond praise.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I think a great parallel to that is when it, they first introduce kind of not cleaning, exchanging your towels every single night. And then it was explained that there actually was more of a green initiative and that you could opt into this. And, you know, once travelers kind of got that, and especially those savvy travelers that were doing it more and more often, they understood that this isn’t the hotel trying to mislead me or pull back on the guest expectation. It actually could be something that benefits, is a green initiative and could happen to help the planet or help the earth. Right? And then your guest feels a little bit more vested in that, and there’s that little sense of pride and good feeling surrounding it. So, and I think that’s a really good parallel whe\n it comes to cleanliness. But, so important still in the guest experience as we saw at landing at number three on this, on this list.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, absolutely. So I think now we’re jumping over to number two, right? Which feels like the perfect segue. ’cause we jumped to over 5 million mentions.
Ryan Embree:
So almost double from number.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. We’re steep, so, we’re talking about staff, which fits perfectly with everything we’ve said. Now your staff play a huge role and they’re never not going to, it doesn’t matter what kind of travel you are. If you’re traveling solo ,family, just a couple and you’re having a quick getaway, those team members make a difference. And right now, traveler expectations are going up. People want unique experiences. They want to feel like something special is happening for them. Your property wants them specifically to stay. And I will say team members are rising to that challenge. Properties are putting their best foot forward, they’re getting positive mentions and they are doing small things that really resonate with guests that feel personal. Right? It’s more than just your name on the tv. It might be that you put something in the comments that you’re celebrating and they went above and beyond the expectation there. And from the get go that staff has immediately mentioned, your special moment and your stay is off to a great start.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you think about unique stays, you said every single guest nowadays wants a unique experience. What’s unique about your property, your people, you’re never going to be able to replicate the same exact staff across any hotel. And for you to get culture and service buy-in from your individual team members, they can make or break. This is the second most mentioned aspect of your reputation online. Meaning that this has the second most important lever to impacting your reputation online. So if you get buy-in from your team members right now, which is so interesting because by the way, we spend so much time talking about AI and technology and trying to predict the future of hospitality. And yet again, the second most important or talked about part of the hotel experience right now are the people. And that is the reason why this is gonna continue.
Ryan Embree:
We’ll probably do this episode here for another couple years, or we’ll probably do this episode for the foreseeable future and staff will always be included because it is such a memorable piece of the hotel experience. And it’s cool to see, I mean, you think about those moments, I still think about to my days as a bellman or a front desk agent sitting behind the front desk and someone recognizing me because they had heard or seen my name on a review. It’s a really cool moment and it kind of a welcoming place of, you’re starting off on the right foot. It’s that first impression of, oh, you’re Ryan from, I read you about you on the reviews. It’s such a fun place and I’m sure probably one of the most rewarding spaces when you work with a hotel to see their team members celebrated and rewarded on online review sites.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, absolutely. And it doesn’t surprise me at all that people were praising you online, you helped everyone have a great stay that’s so fitting for you. I wanna point out in reviews, I guess, I think sometimes people kind of get in this loop where they feel like, okay, well sometimes my team members can’t fix that, or this guest expectation is unreasonable, or I can’t change that. There’s nothing I can do here. So I’m always gonna have a neutral or a negative kind of sentiment, but that’s not the case. Guests sometimes understand more than sometimes. Understand that you can’t actually fix everything, but your team member can make them feel heard, can make them feel valued and respected. And that’s what we see in review response. It’s not always that they gave me money back or they moved my room or they did this, but it’s like maybe someone, you know, there was a noisy train outside and they had a white machine. And they proactively offered it, right? Or they didn’t, there wasn’t one available, but they went and found one or they offered me some tips on how to get here more easily because I expressed frustration. It’s sometimes it’s just taking an extra minute and listening to that guest in the moment and trying to help them, even if you can’t actually fix all of the problems that staff member plays such a valuable role in helping that guest feel a bit better about whatever may be happening if things aren’t perfect.
Ryan Embree:
I completely agree. And, you know, hoteliers are always trying to figure out how to kind of pull the lever to generate more feedback and reviews. I’d be so curious to hear the percentage of reviews that are left on sites, because of an individual. Because they say, you know what? I’m gonna leave a positive review because Jackie at the front desk went above and beyond for me. And I normally don’t leave reviews, but I’m going to because she made my experience special. I’d just be so curious, again, to see people being the reason our staff or team members being the reason that a review and guest feedback, especially in positive, right? Sometimes it’s negative, but most of the time a positive review was left because of the impact that his team or staff member made.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. And definitely, and it’s almost like gift giving, right? If you take the time to praise an employee, you also feel good about that. You are like, I’m so happy I took the time to say something about the service I received. So people like to do it. So, mention it’s gonna be this situation where it keeps compounding upon itself. Just bringing more positivity and more, you know, kind of great reviews and great sentiments and eventually great stays to everyone who you know, who’s on your property.
Ryan Embree:
So powerful. So powerful to see. So we’ve made it, we’re up here at the top of the list. Number one, what was the number one top sentiment for 2025?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. Number one. So 8.3 million mentions, kind of dominating the conversation is accommodations. So no shock there. ’cause you’re traveling and it’s your room, it’s the home away from home. I think here, what I’d like to say first is kind of put aside some of the things you immediately probably thought like you thought the bed and did they have a refrigerator? Put that aside and maybe focus a bit more on stuff that may not come as naturally, but plays such a big part of if people are happy. So again, I told you I have two little kids, so think traveling a family of four, you’re excited, you put your key, you go get in the room, you turn on the lights, how’s the lighting? Is it what you wanted? How’s the temperature? Are you comfortable? Are you worried that you’re gonna be hot or cold? Or do you not have to feel that stress as you walk in? What’s the layout? Are we gonna feel cramped in here or No, this is exactly what I expected. I can’t wait. We’re already picking our spot. I’m gonna put my suitcase here. Let’s put your suitcase there. The kids are opening the drawers, they’re looking through everything. Feel that moment because that’s what your guests are doing. They’re not walking in with a checklist going down your room details, but they’re going off what they expected versus what they arrived. Yeah. To right that moment. You, it’s so hard, I think, to do that when you’re in and out of a hotel room for the thousandth time. I’m not saying that’s easy, but it is possible. Right. Kinda like circle back to number five where I said walk in your hotel room as if it, your hotel lobby is, if it was the first time, do that every once in a while with your hotel room. Mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. They’re, it’s the number one, a aspect of their stay. Again, not surprising. Um, great perspective though on that. And I think, you know, as hospitality people, we host so many people per year, right? You could have a hundred plus rooms and all of those with a average night stay of, you know, 1.5. You know, you’re seeing so many people faces and they’re experiencing different things. Putting your yourselves in the shoes of that traveler and, and looking at those important pieces. Is it, is it too noisy Right When you come in, how’s the noise? Uh, am I concerned about my neighbors? Uh, you know, all of these things are, are normal kind of feeling and sentiments. And that’s what, how, how this gets onto review sites, right? Is is the true feeling about the stay, about the accommodations, the room, you know, this is hospitality and then it’s a combination of your staff and the entire experience. So really cool to see. Um, as we wrap up, I, I thought it’d be fun. Um, any any parts or elements of the, uh, hotel experience that you expected to be on this list or maybe were shocked that weren’t on there?
Jackie Avery:
I wouldn’t say shocked, but I would say I kind of wish it was, uh, I would say I love talking about kind of the food sentiment, not just ’cause I’m a foodie and I, I enjoy the great flavors, but, uh, because of what a powerful impact it has on people’s stay. So it didn’t make the top five, but it was an honorable mention with 2.8 million, you know, kind of different records. Yeah. It’s, it’s a big deal. And uh, I think when you hear food, you think breakfast. Mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
I think hotels are having a complete renaissance in f and b and it’s been one of the themes that we’ve actually talked about several guests on the sweet spot about how, uh, independent hotels, even branded hotels, are really leaning into the f and b side. Jackie, you know, you and your team have the pleasure of, you know, partnering with some amazing hotel partners, which also include some restaurants within there. What are some of the tips and tricks that you share with your team about responding and the nuances of responding to a restaurant review and maybe some of the things that, things that you can incorporate in the response versus maybe your hotel review?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. So obviously I’m not gonna give away the tricks of the trade here, but, uh, I will say keep your menu close. Yes. While you’re responding, you want to know, right, uh, what the person who left the review was looking at and menus change all the time. So if you don’t even know what was available when they dined with you, how could you appropriately respond? Yeah. I would also kind of keep in mind what experience were they going into? Is it a hustle bustle hotel? Is it you can feel the vibes of the hotel from the restaurant? Or is the whole idea you’re supposed to be feeling like you’re not in the hotel anymore? Sure. So, uh, you really need to get, uh, keyed into the atmosphere and the specific menu that was available when that guest stayed. Otherwise, I think it’s really hard to give an authentic, careful, caring response.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. A restaurant in Miami Beach on a Friday night, it’s gonna have a very different atmosphere and vibe to, you know, a a branded hotel, uh, maybe off the highway, right? And, and responding to those two reviews could look and sound very, very different. My little tip, I don’t do the responding to reviews, but my little tip is storytelling. Your culinary experts, you know, telling their story, they have immense passion. Some of the most passionate people that I’ve talked to in hospitality have been, uh, chefs and f and b uh, culinary artists. To get that passion and to put it into your, uh, social media, your website, your reviews and and responses. So important. And also share if you have a story with sourcing how you source your food. Uh, local sourcing, so important right now and things, you know, travelers care about Gen Z, younger travelers. This is the type of stuff that they want to talk about, they wanna share with their friends. And again, have that kind of feel good moment there. So those are my 2 cents on tips.
Jackie Avery:
Absolutely. And you’re not wrong. Those are going to be mentioned in reviews because kind of what we mentioned earlier as well, it feels good to share that you dined at a place that was doing this Yeah. Or that was serving this. So as long as you put that information out there, they’re gonna keep spreading it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And reviews great barometer with how well you’re telling your story. You think you’re telling your story about your chef for your locally sourced food. If you’re not seeing that mentioned or talked about in your reviews, uh, it’s falling flat, it’s not hitting. And that’s just not for f and b, that’s for your hotel experience too. ’cause I, I’ll talk to guests on, on this podcast, they’ll share some amazing fun facts and then we will go to their website and can’t find it anywhere or their reviews and can’t find it anywhere. So make sure, you know, that’s all part of getting your team members a, a, a part of the story and sharing that with the, sharing that with the guests. Great tip. And again, you want a barometer with how well it’s working, just check the reviews and um, hopefully Jackie and her team will be responding to those. So Jackie, thank you so much. Um, always so interested to kind of hear this, this list and gear us up for 2026. Yeah. Are you, uh, thank you so much for being on the podcast and thank you for doing this with me.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, thanks for having me. I love going through it all. Um, I can’t wait to see what we’re talking about next year. I know. But uh, you know, of course I’ll work on getting you some of those data points you were interested in. Maybe we’ll get some of those staff mentions next time.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’ll be here before we know it. Ho Hoping for a record breaking year. It and travel is certainly not slowing down, so can’t wait to talk with you, uh, about it. And good luck to you and your team as, uh, you head into 2026 and continue to partner with our hotels across the country.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, thank you. Thanks so much. We’ll talk to you next time on the Suite Spot. Thanks for listening. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the final Suite Spot episode of 2025 with our annual Year in Review retrospective episode with Travel Media Group President, Dana Singer. Learn about the highlights that took place this year for the organization and what our hotel partners and Suite Spot audience can look forward to as we prepare for 2026.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot for an annual tradition. One of my favorite episodes. We were talking about this off camera, about how many years in a row it’s been that we’ve done this, but it’s such a cool time, obviously, end of the year, beginning of a new year, such a time for reflection. And, you know, looking into the future and with me today is a very familiar guest president at Travel Media Group, Dana Singer. Dana, thank you so much for joining me back on the Suite Spot.
Dana Singer:
Absolutely. Good morning, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
From the comfy confines of our TMG headquarters and Maitland. So grateful for you having the opportunity to join me on the sweet spot too. You know, look at TMG year in review. We do this every single year. Dana 2025 has been an exciting year. It’s been a year of innovation, productivity success, obviously on the Travel Media Group side, but more importantly for our hospitality partners. And I’d like to start by just kind of reflecting on this past year and sharing how TMG has grown as a company, but also how those efforts have made meaningful contributions to our hotel partners.
Dana Singer:
Yeah, sure. 2025 has definitely been a successful year for Travel Media Group. We celebrated a number of milestones, but most importantly, as you just said, you know, for our hotel partners that we collaborate with and support every single day, it’s been really exciting to see their growth. One of the most significant markers of our progress this year has been the expansion of our teams. Increasing the depth of new talent across multiple departments has strengthened our ability to deliver the level of service our partners rely on. And it’s been inspiring to see fresh perspectives join our longstanding expertise. Everyone’s working together towards the same mission. It’s all about delivering industry leading solutions and an outstanding client experience every step of the way. Internally, our goal is to anticipate the industry’s needs, and based on that, we’ve developed new solutions. We refined our existing services, and we’ve continued to advance our technology. Every innovation has centered on the question, how can we empower our partners to achieve their goals? And our commitment has always been to help hoteliers succeed. And we achieve this by innovating without compromise. And in 2025, I believe we’ve done so in more meaningful ways than ever.
Dana Singer:
It’s so cool to see and to, quite frankly, to be a part of, to see the success of our hotel partners, new partners coming on board, um, along with new team members here at TMG, helping our partners, succeed and achieve those milestones and goals. Because I’ve had several guests on this podcast talk about the guest expectations and how not only are they rising, but they’re becoming more complex, especially with the integration of technology, it’s becoming faster than ever. The pace and acceleration of these guest expectations. And the same applies to, you know, our hotel partners. How has TMG kind of maintained to stay one step ahead and really positioned itself as the leader as we try to enhance the guest experience in our services at TMG?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, I mean, exceeding guest expectations is the foundation of success in hospitality. So it’s vital that we not only adapt, but we anticipate what hoteliers will need next. And this year, innovation has once again been at the center of our business strategies. You’re gonna hear me talk about that a lot, probably this morning. One of the most exciting recent advancements has been the launch of Smart Response. And this is our hybrid human AI review response solution, which has been added to our existing suite of response services. And what makes it unique is its incredibly advanced AI training that’s built on more than 2 million reviews that our in-house professional writers have personally crafted. And so that depth of expertise provides an unparalleled technology with nuance authenticity and hospitality care that hotels expect. Every response generated is overseen by our team of professional writers to ensure accuracy, empathy, and alignment in each property’s unique voice. You know, across the board, every team at TMG has been laser focused on elevating our services, refining workflows, and galvanizing our partnerships. We’re so committed to understanding our management company partners needs to ensure a positive guest experience while improving operational efficiency without compromising authenticity. So, you know, just seeing the real impact of these efforts is, is rewarding. I mean, I love hearing about the wins and watching our partners grow, and that’s what makes the work that we do so meaningful.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it really is, again, so cool to be, to be a part of those wins with our hotel partners. And I think at the foundation of a lot of the innovation and advancements to our solutions, Dana, have been conversations, meaningful conversations that we’ve had with our hotel partners, not just this year, but over the years. You know, whether that’s talking to, you know, we’ve covered a ton of hospitality events, from the Suite Spot standpoint and hosted some really industry leaders and professionals, thought leaders in hospitality. And from our educational webinars that what we host our brand, ambassador Cassidy hosts every single month. Where do you think that, or why do you think it’s important rather to kind of grow in these areas and how has it helped improve the business?
Dana Singer:
You know, as you mentioned, the best way to understand what hoteliers are facing day to day is to be in a position to really listen and understand their strategies. And it just doesn’t matter, you know, if that’s in person at an event or virtually, you know, these touch points allow us to deepen our understanding of how to develop our innovation roadmap to better serve their needs. And throughout 2025, if we look back, we’ve really doubled down on our commitment by attending major industry events as a press resource. This includes the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference, NYU IHIF, the Independent Hotel Show, and the Hospitality Show. And next year, we’ll be adding even more. These interviews that we conduct at these events are an important facet in keeping the industry in tune with trends and leadership strategy. It’s just one small yet crucial part of what’s shaping the hospitality industry today.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s been, again, such a privilege to be able to talk to industry leaders, thought leaders, you know, across the country. You know, some of the team members at TMG have been able to speak on panels at some of these events and share their insights and what we’re learning from our hotel partners. That is the catalyst for meaningful change in hospitality because 2025, it’s been a challenging year for hotels. The industry is becoming more complex and a time, there’s almost, there’s only a finite time that a hotelier has to meanwhile their daily duties and responsibilities continue to grow. So being a resource for them, as you mentioned, Dana, on the education side, has been huge. And we’ve heard, and the feedback and engagement that we’re getting, people are craving that connection right now, especially in hospitality. It’s really, really inspiring to see and hear from, from our hoteliers. And again, 2025 big year for hospitality, big year for Travel Media Group. From your standpoint, Dana, how do you make sure as a leader, we’re continuing to make that impact that TMG’s known for?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, you know, 2025 has been very validating in terms of strengthening TMG’s position as a trusted leader and partner in the hospitality industry. And there are a number of notable highlights. We’ve worked diligently behind the scenes to develop robust partnerships with important industry platforms. This year we finalized our direct integrations with Booking.com and Expedia, and this enables us to build review response workflow efficiencies that are unparalleled in the hospitality industry. We’re also honored to lead the industry with a unique, scalable social media content creation solution that’s developed specifically for hospitality clients. We achieved several milestones with that solution, including surpassing 1 million custom-crafted social posts. And that’s especially important as today’s travelers increasingly rely on social media to make their booking decisions. We celebrated the eighth year of our Suite Spot podcast. We’ve now surpassed 190 episodes, and clearly we’re, we’re just getting started. The podcast features guests from a wide range of hotel brands and management companies, and this platform allows them to share their diverse perspectives with a global audience, with messages that resonate, across the industry. I could go on and on, but ultimately, the true measure of our impact comes from the feedback that we receive, whether it’s from our partners, listeners, or other industry professionals. It’s clear that our initiatives are making a difference, and that motivates us to keep innovating and raising the bar.
Ryan Embree:
Again, I’ll circle back to just being such a privilege to work in hospitality. You can feel the passion of the hoteliers that we work with, that I speak to on the podcast and conversations that we have across the country. It’s such a special industry that we work in that we get the privilege to work in every single day. And at the top of the episode, I mentioned this episode represents a great time of reflection to look back on this past year to see how far we’ve come as an organization with our hotel partners, and celebrating the milestones and goals that we’ve been hand in hand with our partners to help them achieve, but also to look towards the future, right? And to see what’s next. That’s always so inspiring as you kind of get geared up for a brand new year. So, Dana, as we mentioned this and we wrap up the, not only 2025, but this episode today, can you preview anything for our Suite Spot listeners, what to look forward to in 2026?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, sure. You know, our teams are already hard at work, shaping and implementing new initiatives for 2026. Every conversation we have starts with the same question. How can we better support our hotel partners in the industry as a whole? Essentially, we wanna give them what they need before they know they need it. As I reflect on 2025, it’s been a year of growth and innovation, and we’re committed to carrying that momentum, into the new year ahead, and I can promise there will be new introductions of creative strategies and solutions to help our partners succeed to all of our Gen Z subscribers. Get ready for an exciting new addition to our podcast series that focuses specifically on social media. Everyone is excited about what 2026 will bring for TMG and the hotels management companies and brands that we’re committed to serving.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, I am geared up and ready for 2026. I know me and my team, the podcast, the Suite Spot team is ready to go. We’ve got some incredible content planned for you, so stay tuned here. Very excited to see all the innovation that comes out of our organization at Travel Media Group, but also hospitality as a whole. This might be the most exciting time to be in hospitality right now with all the disruption happening, all the innovation that we hope to bring all of those value and insights to our customers, our partners and, and hospitality community every single day through, like I said, our educational webinars, our podcasts, some of the innovative solutions, that we’re partnering with hospitality in. So, again, Dana, as we kind of wrap up today, I think I’ve asked you for this the last couple years, is just kind of a final thoughts wrap up to this year as we kind of put a book into not only this episode, but 2025.
Dana Singer:
Everyone with this as we wrap up 2025. What resonates most with me is seeing how our work has helped our partners succeed. The commitment and passion that all of our team members have for our industry is evident in their work every day. They show up and take big swings that propel our partners forward. We never get tired of hearing about how our solutions support our clients by saving time, enhancing guest experiences, and ultimately strengthening their reputations. And that’s really what it’s all about for us. So, to our listeners, if you’d like to learn more about what partnership with Travel Media Group can look like or what we do, now’s a great time to reach out. We look forward to talking with you, and I can assure you, that you’re in good hands and of course to our hotel partners, thank you for your continued trust, and collaboration. And Ryan, thank you for inviting me to the Suite Spot this morning. I always enjoy spending this time with you.
Ryan Embree:
Well, thank you. I know, you know, you take time out of your day, especially around this time of year, which can be obviously really crazy with the holidays, but appreciate you having these conversations again. So inspiring, so exciting. We are ready for 2026 here at Travel Media Group. I know the industry is ready to start a brand new year and really appreciate your thoughts and insights and joining me today, Dana. So thank you for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Dana Singer:
Yeah, my pleasure.
Ryan Embree:
To all of our listeners, Happy New Year. Thank you so much for joining me. Whether this is your first episode listening or 190th, we’re so excited to be celebrating 200 episodes at some point in 2026, but again, we’ve got all credible lineup of content planned for you. But sincerely wish you nothing but the best and a happy New Year. So thank you for listening to The Suite Spot, and we will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
As 2025 closes out, the Suite Spot wraps up with the latest inductee into the TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. CEO of Hotel Equities, Ben Rafter, joins the podcast to discuss all things hospitality and technology and how these two components come together to make the perfect guest experience for travelers.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree here with a very exciting, informative episode continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. This is our series where we are talking to those industry leaders and brands, management companies that are paving the way forward. I’ve got an absolutely amazing guest, I’m excited to speak with him today. Ben Rafter, CEO of Hotel Equities. Ben, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot.
Ben Rafter:
Thanks, Ryan. Looking forward to it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re gonna have fun conversation, talk all about hotel equities, but on the Suite Spot we do a little tradition where instead of just doing your normal bio, I actually like handing it over to our guests to kind of talk through their hospitality journey. because sometimes you get a little bit more insights. Us hospitality people, we got mentors. We come from different brands, sometimes fall into hospitality, quite frankly. You know, talk to us, our Suite Spot hotel audience, a little bit about your hospitality journey and what led you to your role as a CEO over at Hotel Equities.
Ben Rafter:
Sure, I fit into the fall into it category, without a doubt. I was a, uh, tech guy for better part of 15 years, mostly startups. Sold two of ’em and after selling, the second one was locked out of the industry for a year and got a phone call from a hotel guy. And he said, what are you doing? You want to come to Mount Everest with me? And just because nothing better to do for the next month. We packed up and headed over to Nepal and on about the third day he said to me, so what do you think of the hospitality industry and hotels? And it was dumb enough to open my mouth and give him my opinion that you needed to sort of fuse together larger than life hoteliers, which was his background and kind of quant tech data, guys like me. And over the next 20 days, we hashed out starting a hotel company literally on the side of a mountain, in this case. And after that ended, it was 2008, the market crashed. We had a new president. I flew to Hawaii and we started with four hotels in Hawaii. And it’s been nonstop ever since. So definitely not a traditional way to get into the industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, yeah. You give new meaning to kind of climbing the corporate ladder, so to speak, when, when talking about that. But I think that’s what honestly makes hospitality so fascinating. Because yours, honestly, a lot of the majority of the guests we talked to Ben, hospitality was not their final destination, so to speak, what you were talking to. But I think it brings new perspective and obviously insights into an industry that, quite frankly, we’re gonna talk about it in a minute, but needs some more technology integration into hospitality right now. And to fast forward to today, obviously a strategic merger in May, 2025 with Springboard Hospitality. It’s been extremely busy second half of the year for you and your team, including a couple exciting announcements we’re gonna talk about in a second, Ben. But, you know, can you share some of the biggest kind of takeaways and lessons you’ve learned for the business, over this past six months? Maybe give us a state of the Hotel Equities as you would say.
Ben Rafter:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean one thing, coming from sort of independent and generally either gateway market or leisure focused. You learn how diverse some of these markets are and how much different it is running a courtyard or a Rest Inn or a Hampton in a suburb versus running a resort in the middle of Waikiki. And it’s been great kind of seeing both sides of the spectrum there. And then trying to figure out how initiatives or which initiatives work across the entire entity. And then which of ’em should be limited to $400 a night hotel or a select service hotel. And I gotta say, coming from the independent space where we’re all about content and drone shots and Instagram and social media and things like that, obviously walking into a suburban flagged select service hotel is a whole different, a whole different ball of wax, so to speak. So that part’s been great. We have great leaders in all of those divisions and it’s been great working with them.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I mean, just adds to the exposure, again, what you were talking about. And to add to that, right. You know, in October you were back on a panel discussing outdoor centric hotels at the lodging conference in Phoenix, we talk about the spectrum of from lifestyle, and now you’ve got this experiential glamping. This was the perfect topic for you and hotel equities, obviously through your management of postcard cabins, which is with Marriott’s new outdoor collection. Talk to us, how about how you guys are really capitalizing on this trend, experiential travel, that glamping that now even the big brands are trying to get into?
Ben Rafter:
Yeah, every, everybody’s trying to get into it. So we were on all of the postcard cabins, and that was kind of the feature point of Marriott’s launch of the outdoor, their outdoor segment. It’s one, it’s been great. It’s an area that’s growing two and a half, a little more than two and a half times faster than the regular hotel on the street. Now, of course, you break that down by segments it maybe two times and maybe three times. And it’s also so new for the brands that they’re trying to sort of get their arms around it. And because you, you just have to think when you’re staying in an outdoor experience, you’re not staying in a city. And when you search on Marriott or Hilton or Hyatt or whatever, the first thing you usually do is you type in New York City, you type in Seattle, you type in whatever. Well, if you’re gonna stay in the middle of the national forest where the nearest city is 2000 people and you don’t know what it’s called, like how do you even search for this kind of stuff? And then you combine that with staffing, where, the GM better have a pickup truck and be able to go to the nearest Piggly Wiggly or whatever to go find whatever’s needed because you may be an hour away from the nearest area to get the entity. There’s no Sysco truck driving by in the middle of the afternoon. And then high seasonality. And the big question I think for the industry is going to be how do you fill some of these things on a Wednesday afternoon in off season? Obviously we’re targeting groups in corporate and to make them kind of intimate experiences where 8, 10, 15, 20 people can get together. But it’s, it’s a totally different space. But the great thing is consumers are really interested in it because they’re interested in branching out from their traditional leisure stay, and now they can find this kind of stuff.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, listen, as someone who climbed Everest, right, I mean that is all about the experience. The destination and getting to that is part of the journey and part of the experience, which I think is why people love it. And they’re gonna do a lot of your marketing for you to be honest with you, between the storytelling that they’re doing on places like social media, now all of a sudden they’re telling your story and, and people are, are, are just really seeing this in a time where we’re gonna talk about in a minute, technology’s kind of taking over, but being like, Hey, maybe this is a nice little escape for me and, and something different that is going to be an experience. You know, we talk about that all the time. And a true experience.
Ben Rafter:
Yeah. And it doesn’t have to be outdoor travel. The great thing about this industry in general, and the way it’s evolving and I’m looking forward to talking more about technology, is that people want something more and more customized and more and more localized. It could be a food vacation, it could be outdoor travel, it could be adventure travel, which to me is a different category. And the way that we’re now interacting and searching for these experiences getting much more advanced and people can now find them. Versus before it was, I know I wanna stay outside, I’m gonna research some natural national parks, and where do I go from there? Right. And now it’s a wide open space.
Ryan Embree:
You wanna see how many segments our industry has gotten chopped up into go to any hospitality conference. And you’re talking about heritage, travel, food travel, like you’re talking about travel, that’s multi-generational travel, right? It used to just be business and leisure. Which one are you on now? There are so many different ways and priorities the way that people and travelers are looking at travel through a completely different lens than they did a decade ago. And I think a lot of that, to be honest with you happened. What happened in 2020. It’s interesting to see brands, management companies adapt to those and try to be at the forefront of that because it’s these emerging markets and trends are popping up and they’re becoming widely popular.
Ben Rafter:
Yeah, it got it, it was accelerated for sure. In 2020, I, there’s a comparison I like to make. Back, back when I was a kid and was learning how to ski, we had the little skinny narrow, super long skis. It was difficult. Snowboards came around and everyone complained about snowboards ’cause they carved up the moguls or whatever. I can’t remember what it was, but ultimately the snowboards made skiing better and the ski technology advanced to what we have today. And I look at the emergence of Airbnb or things like that, they’ve really pushed the traditional sort of hotel lodging space to up its game. And I think we’re sort of seeing that with all these different concepts coming out. And I think it’s needed too. And we have one advantage over some of these, some of these transient vacation plays. And that is, at the end of the day, we still the human in most of the hotels. And I think we need to up the game in terms of the level of service that the people at the hotels provide and can provide to sort of make it so, Hey, I’m staying outdoors. I’m staying in a gateway city. I’m on a food vacation, whatever, but that person actually at the hotel is going to provide value to my vacation.
Ryan Embree:
They’re gonna supplement it, sometimes even be a part of the experience there. I think that’s the big knock on what we see on Airbnb is, you have to be the housekeeper, you have to be the concierge, everything like that. And they’re starting to adjust, obviously with what they’re doing on the tech side. So it should be interesting to see, but you’re right that that competition I do think has accelerated that and really interested. We’re at a very cool inflection point right now. And speaking of, you talked about your strong tech background, Ben, you know, when you come into hospitality, where do you think we are right now in this an overall technology cycle? And then maybe you can drill down a little bit more into, when you look at your portfolio at Hotel Equities, what’s your approach to kind of this technology?
Ben Rafter:
You may have heard the, or seen the big sigh on where we’re at in the industry. Since I got here has been behind, and there are a lot of reasons for it, but we’re gradually catching up. And AI although probably not over hyped, but over talked about AI will make a major difference in the hospitality industry because of the nature of what it is, much more so than other industries. We’re just not quite there yet. So, a long-winded way of saying we’re still behind. We have a lot of legacy backbone issues and technology in general. We have too many startups chasing too few solutions and then trying to prove that they can do other solutions. But the great tipping point coming up is how people are searching for their hotel stay, whether business or leisure is changing dramatically, how the back end of the hotel is operating is changing dramatically. And some of these solutions that are being built are now targeting these areas. So I’m not excited about the past, but I’m pretty excited about the future because everyone wants to talk about the front end and search, and that’s probably the more exciting thing. But just think about scheduling workforce in a 300% hotel and how effective and efficient that is becoming. And we need it because margins are being eroded. RevPAR is flat. Well, expenses are up 5%. And so we need to be able to squeeze out every ounce of efficiency in all of these hotels. And our owners are all demanding it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you’re absolutely, I mean, the conversations we’ve had at covering hospitality conferences with leaders is talking about both sides of the desk. And the opportunity at both sides, because I do think we get that shiny object of the, how can we improve the guest experience andeven the sci-fi that robot coming down with the towels to do all that stuff, but it’s really gonna be those small efficiencies that get us to a closer place to what we’ve been talking about forever in our industry, personalization and, and this seamless traveler journey, right?
Ben Rafter:
Yeah. And we can figure out what, you know, we try to define a great hotel experience historically, or luxury historically, and what’s the thread count and how many fixtures are in the bathroom and all this other stuff, which is important. But now we’re nearing a point where we can understand, okay, what really means luxury or a great hotel experience to this individual guest? And it may not be five fixtures and a 600 thread count. It may mean something else, right. And the level of personalization we have is nearing where we can define that experience when the person arrives. But yeah, so that’s, it’s, it’s all really exciting. And one of the great things we’re pretty aggressive with technology as you might guess. And so we beta a lot of different products and I want to continue doing so because although, three outta four may not work to the satisfaction that we have, or four outta five, you do find the ones that do, and we can embrace and adopt those really, really rapidly.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I talked to a leader at the hospitality show back in October who said the modern hoteliers tech stack today is absolutely, it’s the most vast it’s been, and it’s gonna be very interesting to see, because so many people are doing what you’re doing, Ben, a lot of beta testing, a lot of trying out new technologies to try to calibrate it right to that point, to where we can be closer to personalization. And to your point about luxury, right? I mean, we’re even to a place now where if you’ve checked out White Lotus, the ultra luxury is actually removing technology altogether, right? So, but I think that’s, to your point of my luxury, could look very different from your luxury. And I think that’s what the true place of AI and technology is gonna get us to where we can personalize that perfect hotel experience no matter where we’re at.
Ben Rafter:
Yeah. And there’s a debate that you’ve had on this podcast and had with other people I’m sure is does AI help or hurt the most for flags for OTAs, for independence? Where is it gonna make the biggest impact? And I won’t say where I think it’s gonna hurt the most, but I do think it really, really helps sort of soft brands and independence, because soft brands and independence have the ability to tell a story, and they can augment that story through technology content sort of finally is king. We’ve been talking about content being king for 20 years, and now content finally will be king because people are searching and AI knows what I want or what you want almost as well as you do, right? And so just think of how you’ve changed using Google over the last 10 years, where now you’re generally asking it questions instead of typing in prompts, multiply that by 10, and suddenly we have AI that says, oh, I’m going to Honolulu. I usually stay outta Westin because that’s what I know, or a Marriott or whatever. But AI can say, oh, you’re gonna Honolulu here, stay at this place because it has a restaurant that you’re gonna love. They make a great cocktail, and they have this thing that you indicated you liked when you were in New York City. And so this is your thing. And of course, what AI really gets advanced is gonna say, and I’ve booked it for you and I requested this, and I’m gonna monitor it for the next 30 days to make sure the revenue managers will screw up and lower the price. And if it does, I’ll cancel and rebook it for you.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I mean, all of a sudden you’re telling your story to a little bit different audience with that and trying to capture that agent’s attention, maybe that, so that they can kind of put you front and center in the eyes of the traveler and the guests. But wanna switch our converse along the same lines, but more of a cautionary tale in hospitality and technology. What’s obviously headlining the news recently, the Marriott Sonder story, and you commented on this on LinkedIn. I saw Ben, you know, you said, and I quote Saunders shut down highlights just how complex our industry has become, where tech integration, long-term lease structures and multi-state partnership must align to create a sustainable operating model. So in a time when technology, right now, a lot of people would argue is, I mean, every day is at its peak, right? We’re peaking every single day in technology. Why is still having the right partnerships in alignment still so important? And, and we still see a Marriott Sonder story happen today?
Ben Rafter:
Taking a step away from technology, I think the real lesson learned from Sonder, and it’s unfortunate because we learned it with WeWork too, is if you’re going to lease a bunch of properties, you better make sure, you can fill those properties through thick or thin because that lease payments come in due no matter what, right? Suddenly you’re representing yourself basically, and you’re trying to fill the owner’s shoes. And WeWork failed, and Sonder I think ultimately failed because of that. But underneath it, you have to make Sonder never carved itself out as, Hey, it’s seamless technology that gets me into my room with no interaction. And what is the additional value of that, and what will somebody pay for it? And then I think they plug into Marriott, I don’t know, obviously, but they plug into Marriott for broader reach and distribution. But now you’re searching New York City, you’ve got 30 other Marriotts who all have a well-defined brand, or probably a hundred other Marriotts in New York, you’re searching somewhere, right? And the seamless technology story just got lost in the whole thing. And then it’s like, okay, why am I gonna stay at this place over these other 20 choices I see on Mary’s site? And then ultimately the whole thing collapses. But it’s a classic case, a very long-winded way of saying it’s a classic case of technology for technology state sometime just doesn’t work.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And well, and it goes back to the storytelling part, right? Without a defined value to your brand. And if that’s not being translated to your guests, you know, it’s ultimately we saw what happens when that goes on.
Ben Rafter:
Yeah. And I’m going to put myself into the position of saying, I wanna be the last person on earth who gives up on human interaction as part of the hotel experience. And, you know, we could put in kiosks and everything like that, or robots or whatever. I think we’re better off investing in training our front of house people or all of our people, team members to interact better. And let’s use all these new technologies so that we can truly interact and provide a better experience. And yeah, maybe 25% of the audience, or 30% or 50, or whatever the number is, doesn’t wanna interact. But I think most people want the hotel experience to include people.
Ryan Embree:
We got to a place, I would argue where it was in 2020, it was almost, there was a risk to going to the front desk sometimes. So, you know, quote unquote, and people still did it, right? We still needed that human interaction, the brands made it easier than ever to get to your rooms without needing people. And we still wanted it. The, the travelers still demanded it in some way, whether it was house-keeping, whether it was interaction. So I think if there’s ever a use case, you’re absolutely right. And I’m there, I’m right there with you. I’ll be the second to last person there with you saying I don’t want that in my hospitality experience either. But we’ll switch gears here, Ben. Second, I had in late October, I told you I was out out at the Hospitality Show, caught up with Rob Robinson, a little bit colder than where he is in Hawaii, but president of the lifestyle division at Hotel Equities, we talked about lifestyle and independent hotels, we’ve talked about on this, on this episode continues to grow popularity just ever increasing. Why do you think these have remained so attractive to travelers? And how has, I mean, obviously Hotel Equities with that strategic partnership has really positioned itself as a leader in this segment.
Ben Rafter:
It’s growing because people want an experience, right? And there’s obviously a market for checking into a select service that’s the same no matter whether you’re in Dallas or you’re in Seattle or you’re in Vancouver BC right? But there’s also an equally large segment of people who are saying, whether it’s business or leisure or any of the hundred other derivations of travel, when I go somewhere, I wanna stay at a property that tells a story. And usually that story is going to be around the place. If you stay with our properties in West Hollywood or you stay where Rob is at in Hawaii, you should know you’re in Hawaii and you’re going to, you’re going to get that sense of place that you’re there. And lifestyle and independent properties just naturally can sort of expose that story a little bit better if they’re run well. And then we can market to that story. And independents have to, because the distribution capabilities of the flags are amazing, right? And so the independence, their only counter balance to that is, I’m going to market via the story that I tell and the content that I produce. And then of course, the middle ground and Marriott, and Hilton and Hyatt have done so well with it is the soft brands. And what I would like to see, or what I hope I don’t see is they start to harden those soft brands because an autograph with the flexibility to tell a story that’s still plugged into the Marriott distribution system in this case is, is a powerful thing.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. So immersive these lifestyle hotels can be offering amenities and experiences that the brand hotels are great. And I just think people, when you want consistency, consistency’s there, but everyone doesn’t want to tell a consistent story. Sometimes they want a unique story. They wanna be immersed in their in the local culture that we don’t get the opportunity to see every day. That’s why we love travel.
Ben Rafter:
But we have to embrace it too and make the investment to do it. And I think there’s some ground, there’s, there’s some work wood to chop, so to speak, in terms of, you can’t just say your hotel’s independent or a boutique or a lifestyle hotel and then not invest in content and the activities that make it there. No, I think that’s where we need to grow a little bit. And as noted earlier when we were talking, I think we’ll be forced to, because the way that people are searching for these hotels, if we don’t, then the hotel’s gonna fail.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Listen, more seasonal, F&B options the better from local source places at these lifestyle and independent hotels, I will take that all day to make those memorable experiences.
Ben Rafter:
Well, and F&B is a good example because all of the major operators now have these relationships with the giant F&B providers, or for that matter, the giant F&E providers, and sort of turned F&B into a similar commodity. I could tell you the Sysco fries at 50 different hotels, it’s this, you know, it’s, it’s, oh, this came from Sysco or this came from over here, right? And so localized F&B and in Hotel Equities’ case, the ability to have a national relationship, but the ability to also give the independent restaurants and outlets the flexibility to do what they want with local vendors is critical. Because we’re sort of homogenizing F&B in the same way that we’ve homogenized a lot of hotels.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, that’s a microcosm of what’s going on in our industry as a whole right now, the return of the hotel restaurant, right? Which used to be, I think, a decade ago, well, decades ago, that used to be the place to be. And then all of a sudden it kind of got to that place, what you were just talking about, and now it’s reemerging. And I think a lot of brands, management companies, the smart ones are seeing that and seeing an opportunity to not just welcome, obviously outside travelers, but locals are embracing it too, about saying, Hey, you know, when you come into town, you might be staying with me, but I’m taking you to the local hotel restaurant for that experience.
Ben Rafter:
I mean, I guess it, it goes back 500 years to hotels are the gathering place. I was on a call yesterday. We have a cocktail bar named the Green Lady at one of the Hawaii hotels. And the person who runs F&B said, Hey, do I have to buy this and this and this? A memo must have come out, right? And I said, well, obviously no, like, who’s your audience? And he said, well, it’s 50. This is Hawaii, which is full of 10 million tourists and 1 million residents, right? And he said, well, it’s about 60% locals and 40% tourists. And obviously he’s buying highly, highly customized products for, in this case, for that, for that audience. And hotels have to be, it’s really easy to understand a restaurant that orders local and everything. The broader thing is the hotel needs to be the same way.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Like I said, microcosm of what’s going on, you know, throughout the operations and brand to be quite frank, gonna switch topics again, we’re covering everything today, Ben. Hotel Equities, in February, 2026, you guys are headed out for your annual leadership conference in Las Vegas, Travel Media Group, our parent company have the privilege of attending. We’ve spoke the last couple years in sponsoring the event. This will be your first time, I would imagine. And what are you most looking forward to, and can you share the impact of events like this have on a culture right now, where staffing, over the last couple years has still been a struggle for our industry?
Ben Rafter:
So events like this are critical. And its easy to say that, but at the highest level, and what I’m looking forward to most is you don’t see everybody very often anymore. Remote work has its place. Bigger company people are going to be, I used to try to get to every single property that we had at least once or twice a year, right? And as you keep growing, that becomes a little more difficult.
Ryan Embree:
And it might be tough now.
Ben Rafter:
Exactly. And so this is my chance to see everybody. It’s everybody’s chance to see me and to see other leaders of the team. It’s a chance for people from New York City and Atlanta to meet people from Honolulu and most importantly, trade ideas and figure out what’s working and what’s not. And I think a good management company or a good operator should be doing it not just once a year, but all the marketing people should be getting together. All the finance people should be getting together. And yes, there’s a cost to that, but the amount of creativity that’s unleashed from doing it is amazing. And we have, so that’s what I’m looking forward to.
Ryan Embree:
It would be a fascinating study to see how some of these major ideas and concepts, initiatives and hospitality as a whole, the groundwork is laid at these in-person events. And I think it can be traced back to and just to speak to the importance of getting together in a time where we thought, do we really need to get together as anymore, can we just say virtual? Obviously that that has a place for it. But I think the groundswell of support when you get a number of people together in one area having the same challenges. And I think that’s a powerful sentiment when you hear someone in Honolulu and New York City having the same exact challenges and trying to get through that is ground zero for trying to create creativity and solutions, which hospitality people, I mean, you think maybe I’m biased, but we’ve got the problem solving critical thinking skills. Because you need it. It’s a skill that you need every single day. You’re practicing every single day when floor floods or, or some, yeah. So you need that.
Ben Rafter:
People still put hangers on the little fire things and then the floor floods. You wouldn’t imagine, 40 years later, but here we are. No, you’re exactly right. No good idea. Oh, I’m sure there have been a few over the course of history, but we like to say no good idea comes from one individual sitting in their home office. Tapping away all the best ideas come from people interacting.
Ryan Embree:
Totally agree. Well, obviously this is also award season and a lot of those great ideas translating to the operations. I want to congratulate your portfolio hotel equities on a few of those. Notable recognition saw Marriott’s international top performing number one, top performing management company in the US and Canada for Q3, and some individual awards, the 2025 International Association and Full Service Awards, F&B Excellence, we just talked about F&B, and then opening of the year, the Vanguard Autograph collection, Ann Arbor Autograph collection. What do these recognitions mean to you, Ben, and and how does it reflect on kind of the reputation overall in the industry for hotel equities?
Ben Rafter:
Well, I mean, anytime you get an award, it should mean a lot to, to people. And it validates what we’re doing. And it validates that we’re doing it right to win awards from all the way to partnering with Marriott, who’s been a great partner throughout the years to winning. We got a Michelin key at an independent hotel, right? And then the Vanguard launch, it’s validation, and it’s not validation of what I’m doing, it’s validation that the team members who are actually executing on this stuff are doing a great job of it. So internally, what I’d like to expand is kind of rewarding people for that, that we started giving away money for people who created ideas. We’re starting to give away awards for people who, you know, there’s always the guest service component. We got a letter from Marriott just yesterday, two days ago, some guy had taken the time to write to somebody pretty high up and Marriott and saying, look, I had the best customer serviceI’ve ever had from this individual. It was actually was at the Vanguard, oddly enough. And it’s a necessity for me and team members to recognize that, because we talked a lot about it is human aspect of this industry is the most important. And a little side story when we were on the side of the mountain creating this, creating our hotel company 15, 20 years ago, the larger than life hotel guy who was not me, he said like, one thing you can never forget. Well, you’re looking at all these spreadsheets and data and all that other stuff is there’s a real guest in the room and in Hawaii that real guest may have saved a year for their one leisure vacation, that they’ve dreamed about possibly their whole life, right? And he said, never forget that there’s a guest in the room. And then he convinced me to put my cell phone in all the rooms. And we did that for the first 11,000, hotel rooms that we had. So, and it was worth it because it, every once in a while is a reminder that, hey, we are in the service business and people are, we are people first business.
Ryan Embree:
Listen, probably some pretty interesting conversations you had with guests having a direct line to you. But I think, very sobering to hear, again, that I think that’s great advice for anyone that is struggling right now talking, thinking about are we doing enough on the technology side to keep that north star there of, there is a guest in the room. This is what people are looking for. We’re hosting people in our home. So yeah, great advice there. I’m gonna quiz you on one more piece of advice, Ben. Because I think, I started this podcast, we’re almost 200 episodes deep. I always feel like it’s my kind of mission, especially for younger hospitality professionals that just coming into the workforce now, listen, when I when I came in to to hospitality, I didn’t have the looming clouds of, you know, AI might be be taking these jobs. So what advice would you give maybe a message of hope or even advice, tips that you would give to a young hospitality professional entering their career right now?
Ben Rafter:
For sure. Don’t be afraid to reach out to people like you, people like me, CEOs. I don’t know. I mean, obviously we have a lot of competitors and we compete with them for obvious reasons, but I don’t know a single one of them that would not respond to someone who reaches out and says, Hey, how did you get where you are? What do you like doing? I think I just use a double negative in the sentence there. But, I would, I don’t know, a single one who is not willing to help expand people’s careers. And then the second thing is complacency just kills. And if you have ideas, push ’em. And I was 19 or 20 when we did our first startup, it would’ve been really real easy to not do it. And then five years later, 10 years later, life changes. And if you have the idea, push it and do it, and you’ll be rewarded for it later. And you’ll never look back and say, oh, hey, I wish I wouldn’t have done that.
Ryan Embree:
Very good. And like what would it you have said if I told you 19-year-old, Ben, that you’d be given hospitality advice to young hospitality professionals.
Ben Rafter:
When I was 19, I was terrified to reach out to people, like, why would anybody talk to me? But, you know, we’re all out there. And so I think that’s two pieces of advice. One, reach out to anybody that they’ll respond. And then two, if you have an idea, push it. People, people are, there’s a lot of self-doubt out there. You have it, I have it. You think, oh, that’s not a good idea. Well, it’s not, you prove that it’s not a good idea. There’s just as good a chance. It’s gonna be a great idea. And if you’re implementing technology, get the implementation part done because, it’s great seeing a thousand different technologies, but 9 times outta 10, they don’t talk to all the other ones we’re using.
Ryan Embree:
There’s some tech advice at the very end. I love that. Right on brand. And so wrap it up into 2025, 2026. Can you share any notable developments right now in the hotel, equities, pipelines, or even projects that within the portfolio you’re excited about right now?
Ben Rafter:
Really excited about the Caribbean and Latin America and particular Mexico. I think in some of these regions, third party operators are just emerging. I mean, obviously pretty common in the US and in Canada. We have an awesome team down there and we’ve, we’ve kind of got it in our little laboratory so they’re protected. And I just think the impact they’re gonna make next year across the Caribbean and Latin America is gonna be fantastic.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Tons of market opportunity there. Keep hearing a lot of harder earned dollars spend down in that region for sure.
Ben Rafter:
Yeah. And fun stuff, great hotels and you know, obviously we know Hawaii pretty well. We know Florida really well. We know the traditional US vacation destinations. If I were the governor of Hawaii, I would grab about 10 members of the ledge, or 20, or as many as we could fit on a plane from Hawaiian Airlines or Alaska and fly somebody down. You probably can’t do it, but fly somebody down to Mexico, down to Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic, because if they could really see the quality of the product down there, they would be investing in more tourism marketing in Hawaii. So governor, uh, Josh Greenham, Hawaii pay attention.
Ryan Embree:
Well listen, we have a Suite Spot spotlight series that actually profiles some properties. You gimme a call, Ben, whenever you’re ready to spotlight one of those properties in the Caribbean, I’m happy to make the trip down there and help you out with that. So yeah.
Ben Rafter:
Awesome. I’ll look forward to it. I’m gonna hold you to that.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Well, as we wrap up the year and as we wrap up the episode, I think this is obviously a great time for a lot of reflection. Thanksgiving just happened. Looking back on 2025, what are you most proud of in 2025, and what are you most looking forward to in 2026?
Ben Rafter:
It’s, I mean, look, we got the Springboard/Hotel Equities combination done. And I’m really excited. So, we’ll call that the most proud. And I’m really excited for seeing where this combination goes in 26. But as the tech guy who seems to be more people focused than most, I mean, you look at this industry and we’ve got several thousand team members and I’m proud that they can deliver every single day. And I think everybody should say that is like, if you don’t have your team members, and if you don’t have your GMs on the front lines fighting, there’s nothing. And so I’m most proud of what they’re delivering.
Ryan Embree:
There we go. Awesome. Well, Ben, we’re excited to watch, continue to see Hotel Equities grow, wish you nothing but success, covered it all today. Got the large spectrum from your journey to tech and even Marriott, Sonder and, and covered some awards and developments. Any other final thoughts you got before we sign off?
Ben Rafter:
We’re all over the place. That’s fun. Makes it great. No, looking forward to seeing you in February. And I think you covered the most important thing. If you are young and new to this space, and Ryan, you teach and speak at I think UCF, but probably everywhere, do not hesitate to reach out. Just track somebody down and they will remember you five years later or 10 years later. And when I’ve long gone, you know, their careers will be going crazy. And that’s, you know, that’s good. We need more innovation. We need more young people.
Ryan Embree:
100% agree. Hopefully there’s another podcast sitting on here and maybe they’ll be mentioning our names as someone they reached out to back in the day that we can only hope, right?
Ben Rafter:
We’ll go to Nepal or China climb an 8,000 foot meter mountain and, on the side of the mountain we can all, we can all share stories and create the next hotel company.
Ryan Embree:
That’s all you need to do. That’s it. So, all right. Well thank you so much, Ben, for taking the time. It’s been a pleasure speaking to you and like I mentioned, wish you nothing but success. And yes, we will see you in February at the Hotel Equities Leadership Conference.
Ben Rafter:
Great. Thanks Ryan. Looking forward to it.
Ryan Embree:
Thanks Ben. And thank you for listening to Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Senior Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer at Newport Hospitality Group, Whitney Altizer, joins the Suite Spot in the latest episode of TMG Hospitality Trailblazers to give audiences a close look at what makes the Newport portfolio and brand unique in the hospitality industry and why social media is critical to a hotel’s success in the digital age.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Welcome to another edition of our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. I got a fantastic guest. We actually had an opportunity to meet with someone from the, the Newport Hospitality Group just a couple weeks ago at the Hospitality Show, but we got a brand new guest here with us today, senior Vice President, Chief Commercial Officer, Whitney Altizer. Whitney, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot today with me.
Whitney Altizer:
Hey, Ryan, thanks so much for having me. Appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
We’re gonna have a fun conversation today. A lot of exciting stuff and news about Newport Hospitality, but as tradition here on the Suite Spot, hospitality, as we know, is one of those things where people can come from all different places, brands, management companies, and unique journeys that led you to where you are. So let’s hear about yours, Whitney. Talk to us a little bit about your hospitality journey and what led you to Chief Commercial Officer at Newport Hospitality Group.
Whitney Altizer:
Yeah. Well, I always joke that Newport raised me. You know, I went to Virginia Tech for business and hospitality, and then I moved to Atlanta and worked with Darden restaurants for a stint. You know, and I love the experience, but I just decided I needed a new perspective on food and beverage and the industry in general. So I ended up back in Blacksburg at a full service Holiday Inn that Newport actually owned and managed at the time. So 22 years ago, I walked into that Holiday Inn as a director of catering and sales, worked there on property, and then, moved up to the corporate director of sales, a corporate revenue manager. Then I was the director of Revenue and Digital. Then came along the Vice President of Comms Stratt, which catapulted me to where I am today which is the Chief Commercial Officer.
Ryan Embree:
Your story is a genuine reflection of our industry, of how many facets there are to hospitality, from everything from food and beverage to sales, to all the positions that you, that you held in, in between. You know, it’s one of the reasons a lot of people love hospitality is because you can really do anything within it, right? It’s almost its own ecosystem within our industry, and it’s really cool to see, and I’m sure that was, you had some incredible experience, which lends you to where you are right now and knowing different people’s positions. That’s what we hear is sometimes the most successful hospitality people are the ones that got exposure to those different aspects of hospitality and kind of use that in their experience today. Some of those, hospitality professionals maybe even had to, you know, during that, that 2020 era had to get into some of those departments that they hadn’t done in a minute, and certainly shared some experience there. But, we won’t talk about that time, but doing some research for this episode, I wanna talk about Newport Hospitality and their story. Right? I always find it so fascinating when we talk about to these management companies and brands about how they first got into hospitality and fun little facts. That the origin story really dates back all the way to the 1850s. It goes back way, way far. Could you give a little background on the early days, maybe not take us that far, but a little bit early days of Newport Hospitality and how it’s led to the amazing growth that you guys are experiencing right now in 2025?
Whitney Altizer:
Yeah. Newport, in my opinion, was built on hard work, dedication, and two families. So in 1990, we were officially founded by Bill Carey and Mike Pinger, and but as you noted, the story dates back much further than that. Bill came from a ranching and entrepreneurial background and was the great grandson of a man that had built a large land in cattle business in West Texas in the 1850s. And that cattle business is what went on to help fund the start of Newport, and then as well purchase a lot of the hotels that we currently own.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely incredible. Just such a unique story. So happy that it’s on the website where I’m sure employees and and guests can even check that out and share that. And led to where you are today. And I want to talk about fast forwarding today, ’cause you got some exciting news, a new website on the horizon. Talk to us a little bit about this project and this new chapter, for Newport Hospitality Group.
Whitney Altizer:
Website debut coming soon. We are beyond excited. This has been a labor of love. There’s been joy, there’s been passion, there’s been divine intervention. We are just so happy to see it come full circle. Really the design intention was to speak to our partners, our clients, our team members, but do it all at the same time in the same platform, right? So we’ve tailored this website so that it doesn’t matter who you are or what you’re looking for, you will find the ability to get the information that you are looking for and the correct person to interact with you know, in this current climate of digital changes. Its been very interesting to walk through this process. It’s a lot different than, you know, 10 years ago when, when we started on WordPress, right?
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s, it’s kind of, it’s exactly what you said, Whitney. It’s very fortuitous timing as far as, you know, ’cause I’m sure even the way that websites are being designed and kind of strategically, you know, built today, it, you said 10 years ago, I would even argue just a couple years ago, is very different in the landscape, even with the way that people are trying to look for information, whether that is, young hospitality professionals trying to find out some background, about the hotel or the culture that, which we’re gonna touch on here in a minute, to ownership groups and developers that are, you know, trying to look for information. So, great timing, can’t wait to see it. But on that, that new website is, is gonna be that diverse, incredible portfolio that Newport holds right now. And as marketing people, we always love to talk about what’s next, right? What’s in the pipeline, what exciting project, what are you, what’s getting you excited right now about either projects or, or stuff in the pipeline right now at Newport Hospitality?
Whitney Altizer:
Yeah, so the biggest thing right now is that we’re gonna be opening a new Hotel in Q1 2026. So it’s currently under build right now. It’s with a partner that we already work with, Andre Hickman and Sanford, Florida. And this is his second hotel with us. We built his first hotel. Now we’re getting to build his second hotel with him. And we’re just beyond excited to see that all come to fruition and have two hotels in the same market with the same great partner, you know. And then of course, our Chief Development Officer, Sean, is always moving and shaking. He’s always got something on the horizon. And right now we’re looking at three potential acquisitions in Virginia, two in Ohio, and then a large expansion into the Northern Territory. We’re mainly east coast right now. Those are not over the finish line yet, so I can’t quite say much more than that. But we’ve been very thoughtful about who we wanna grow with, how we wanna grow, and making sure that we’re aligned with those partners so that we’re all walking together on the same path.
Ryan Embree:
Thats fantastic. And, you know, Sanford, right here in our backyard Travel Media Group’s backyard, right down the road, right down I-4 which, which could take a little little time depending on, on when you’re going. But, uh, but, you know, so exciting to see. It looks like you’ve already might already need some new changes for that, updated website here soon with some new properties. So we’ll continue to keep an eye on that. Another aspect that really stood out to me, you know, doing some research for, for this episode, as well as talking to Brendan at the Hospitality show was the commitment to employee culture. And I saw right now on social media, which you got a huge presence on. You’re running this voice of 35 campaign. I wanna talk a little bit about that campaign, but you were actually featured on there, Whitney, and you shared, we not only invest in our people, but the relationships with our owner as well as the community. So again, maybe talk about that, that voice of 35 campaign, what you’re trying to accomplish there, and then expand a little bit more on that, investing in people, relationships, and community.
Whitney Altizer:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, voices of 35 is something that we feel like captures the heart of Newport. It puts into words why I’ve been here for 22 years. So the intention was to celebrate the whole 35 year journey, the people that made it possible internally, externally, and then to reflect on those team members and their growth. So we’re really lucky that at the corporate level, we’ve got over 10 employees that have been with us for 20 to 30 years, so do the math on that. They pretty much been around since the, the inception. And then just even within my department, you know, a lot of the commercial strategy people have the same story that I do. One of my revenue managers, him and I started on property together 20 years ago doing banquets and catering, and I’ve gotten to watch his journey beside my journey. And that’s just really what Newport is, right? We invest in the person and then we help them figure out what will fill their tank what’s their next big step? What do they wanna learn? And then offer the learning, the support, and ultimately the positions to help them have a path that is what they’re interested in.
Ryan Embree:
Love to hear it. I think it’s a true testament to what you said, Whitney. I mean, having those stories within your organization of people there that have been there a decade, you know, two decades plus is something that, you know, we had a separate series ’cause the hospitality campus crawl, where we would speak to hospitality schools and educators and talking about this next generation of young professionals. And one of the challenges was just showing that this doesn’t have to be something that you fall into. It doesn’t need to be a career that you have a summer job and now next thing you know, you look up and you’re 30 years into it, you can actually pursue this as a 30 year, 40 year career. And having those stories within your organization, again, just huge testament and testimonials to the employee kind of culture and development that you’re doing over there at Newport. And it’s, it’s certainly paid some dividends. ’cause obviously you hear that, that term all the time of happy employees equal happy guests. You have an entire page dedicated right now to some of the accolades and achievements. I wanna make sure I get all these cover all these Marriott Partnership Circle Awards, Hilton Awards of Excellence. When you see that list, Whitney, in your position, what does that mean to you and how are you using it over at Newport to kind of earn more business, both on the traveler side, demand side, as well as ownerships and partnerships?
Whitney Altizer:
Well, obviously we’re incredibly proud of those awards. It gives our owners the recognition that they deserve. They’ve trusted us with their investment and it affirms that trust. It keeps our name active and respected in the marketplace. You know, it, it gives us something to put on the new website. Well, ultimately it’s just as important to our team members. It shows them that their hard work really does pay off. These aren’t corporate level trophies. These trophies were won in the lobby at the front desk, in the laundry room on the construct call. And they represent the regal people that are doing that exceptional work. You know, from a business standpoint, it demonstrates to our perspective owners and partners that we don’t just manage the property, we invest in it and we invest in the success. You know, as a revenue person, obviously strong performance translates into even stronger revenue, which allows us to reward our employees and then also provide owners with bigger returns. When I see that list, I think pride, validation and proof that what our we’re doing for our approach actually works.
Ryan Embree:
Incredible and hope to hope to see more of those come through and hope for more updates on that websites moving forward as you open these new properties and have them in the pipeline. But speaking of along the lines of online reputation, especially we kind of talked, touched on a little bit about the digital landscape of today where, online reputation a few years ago, maybe a decade ago, used to just be, here are the comment cards and reviews that I’m getting on my TripAdvisor now. It encapsulates so much more than that when it comes to reputation and one of those being social media. And I’ve seen you guys have a really, really prioritize a strong social media presence across your portfolio. What role, Whitney, do you feel that social media is playing right now in that traveler’s booking journey?
Whitney Altizer:
Yeah, well, I’ll start with a huge shout out to Travel media group. We partnered back in the summer, and, you know, you’ve just allowed us to take what we wanted to see and translate it. And that has been just phenomenal for us. You know, to us, social media is a huge role in a traveler’s journey, right? It’s the first way that they interact with your property. So we kind of think about it in three buckets. So strategies to sell, stories to share, and then stars to celebrate. So strategies to sell. It lets the guests see the value in choosing us. You know, it highlights the offers or the packages or something unique about that hotel. Stories to share lets us bring that experience to life. So they get a taste of what it feels like to actually be on property to the point where they already have a connection before they step foot inside of that building. And then, of course, none of this is possible without stars to celebrate, right? So that is the ability to spotlight our team and our, um, our special guests and show that engagement and responsiveness in real time. So to us, social media is, it’s the tangible, interactive way that we allow a guest to experience us and want to come and be part of us.
Ryan Embree:
Well, thank you. And you know, it’s a privilege to work with partners like Newport Hospitality Group Whitney, that really get it. And you encapsulated it, and articulated it perfectly with right now what’s happening with social media, especially with the younger generation that might even use it as the first place that they do search for a hotel or a property. And it’s much more now than does something look pretty on social media. It’s that feeling that you get, right? And we’re craving that feeling, especially in a time which we’re gonna touch on in a minute, where the one thing that AI is still will struggle with hopefully is feelings, right? And sentiment. And you know, what it’s like to walk in through a lobby on a busy, after a business trip where you’ve had maybe a delay because the airlines and you’re greeted just so warmly at the front desk and everything is seamless and nice. So, you know, these are the type of feelings that we, and sentiments that we try to capture in social media, because it can create that trust and authenticity, which, which we create. We’re craving so much right now. But speaking of AI, don’t think it’d be a podcast in 2025 if we don’t touch on some sort of AI and technology. So how are you and your team at Newport Hospitality viewing AI and and are you using it to more to empower your employees, which is one way that I’m hearing a lot of people are doing that, or is it to improve the guest experience?
Whitney Altizer:
Yeah. Can I say all of the above?
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely can.
Whitney Altizer:
AI is not a buzzword to us, and we have woven it into every day. So it feels like it’s normal, like it’s part of what we do and how we execute things. We use it in all facets. So we work with Lighthouse Analytics and that helps us with all of our revenue management stuff. And where there are big changes, I come in every morning and I’ve got a bullet point for each hotel from an AI tool saying, this happened, you should do this. And then of course, we allow the revenue managers then to make decisions based on all the information. But we use Collibra’s Hummingbird for all of our sales data mining. We use Core to communicate within the hotel to all the different departments. We use guest facing apps to welcome them and solve problems while they’re there on property. So we’ve just tried to make it something that is part of daily life so that it feels more personal and is still something that is just an extension of the people not machine led.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, and that’s what I was talking about empowering, employees and giving them the right data. I think that is, there tends to be this trend right now in hospitality where people are just like having this FOMO effect of like, I’m not utilizing technology and AI to the degree that I should, and my competitors are doing this, or they’re seeing these robots at these, at these shows that are doing this and that, and they have an expectation of where they should be. But really all of those use cases you gave me right there, Whitney, that’s creating an ecosystem and embracing technology and AI, and I think I feel like is probably the most far forward. You know, you can be right now because we’re seeing sometimes that those robots might fall flat at a hotel. It, it’s a big splash, but it’s not helping the daily efficiencies of everything we talked about how intricate hospitality is, how many elements there are to it. So there’s a lot of use cases in there. And finding those little ways I think is gonna be more impactful than going after the shiny big AI and technology that that, that seems so futuristic out there. And maybe your guests don’t respond to that as well as likely. So I talked about at the top of the episode, meeting up with SVP and COO, Brenda McCoy at the 2025 Hospitality Show in Denver, Whitney, a lot of panels centered around challenges to profitability right now, margins are tighter than ever, especially in today’s climate. The travelers feeling it in their pocketbooks or wallets. Where do you think there’s opportunity right now, Whitney, when you see our industry, especially for hoteliers and owners who are starting to really feel the weight of that economic uncertainty right now?
Whitney Altizer:
Brendan and I talk about this with our teams every day. Obviously operations and commercial strategy are walking together, intertwined, the days of set it and forget it, they don’t exist anymore. Every hotel, we have a very targeted plan right now to go after their business and their specific markets, because every market is different right now. The Strat calls some markets, the philosophy is, okay, we’re gonna use really competitive rates. We’re gonna drive occupancy, and then when a DR starts to recover, we’re gonna push up. We’ve got some hotels where it’s all about that base business and we’re having a hard time finding it right now. And so it’s, what are those new creative non-typical pieces of business that we should go after? Are we okay with the different stay pattern? Maybe we need to consider that L&R down the street that only has 50 rooms to give us right now and, and grow with them. So we work from a revenue management standpoint, but then of course, also on Brendan’s side, it’s about payroll and expenses and just managing all of that stuff. Clearly you can’t manage a hotel and a profitability, but you can certainly influence it. And so we’re just proactive and strategic, and honestly, we have to adapt on a daily basis. You know, the plan at nine o’clock on Monday morning may not be the same plan at three o’clock on Tuesday. And we’ve got a great team that helps us just do what we need to do at the right time.
Ryan Embree:
I would argue, and we might be a little biased here, Whitney, but hospitality people are, we love, we love a good challenge and ingenuity and creativity comes out in those times of challenge. And I think that’s what’s happening right now. Do we like to obviously like stress about all of this stuff and maybe not see the greatest news coming out? Absolutely not. But I do think it’s during these times where hoteliers start to get really, really creative. We raise the bar on our service because we almost have to at that point, and we kind of take it up a notch to say, okay, we’re gonna have to really fight for that occupancy right now. We’re gonna have to show that a DR has value and is worth it to our guests. And we’re we’re gonna get loyalty and get those guests to maybe spend a little bit more because of the service that we provide. So, you know, again, in a challenging time like this, I’ve been to enough of the hospitality conferences to hear the issues and, but I do think that there’s going to be some good that comes out of this time, and it’s going to be the management companies and brands that come together, like you were talking about Whitney, and come up with a well designed plan and strategic kind of cerebral plans to that that really thrive. And I think there’s still opportunity out there. It’s not, we’re not done growing as an industry. We’ve been down and out before. This isn’t there, but just to stay focused. So, one thing we switch topics a little bit to what we talked about. On this podcast, I have the privilege of an honor of having a lot of tenured hospitality professionals with ton of great experience. I’m sure you have the opportunity to interact with a lot of younger professionals. First getting into their, you know, career. I’d love to try to get just some nuggets of wisdom from leaders like you, Whitney, of what you would share. What advice would you share to the younger hospitality professional, maybe listening to this podcast early on, just trying to learn about the industry. What would you share with them today?
Whitney Altizer:
It’s really simple, Ryan. It’s live hospitality, be what our industry is, create a memorable experience with every person you interact with, whether it’s a guest, a partner, a vendor, your own team, someone in your parking lot. I think for me, a lot of my success has come from being able to be part of all those different teams. And so everyone sees I’m willing to do the hard things. I’ll roll up my sleeves, I’ll pour the water in the banquet room. I’ll do anything that we need to do to work together as a team and accomplish that goal. And to me, that’s how the trust is built. Leaders all the way down to the bottom right. And one of my most favorite quotes from Simon Sinek is that leadership is not about being in charge. It’s about taking care of those in your charge. That’s the essence of hospitality. Take care of people, they’ll take care of the guests, the owner, the business, and if you take care of each other, you will be successful.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I love it. I mean, hospitality along with, again, being creative and, and in our problem solving, it’s also the ultimate team sport. Everyone has to kinda work together within that organization, within that hotel and ecosystem to make the best day. Your a tribute to that, to that story of be open to any opportunities too. Learn everything, you can be a sponge in hospitality because you never know what your next position is and the skills are so transferrable, right? Hospitality, it might be a different market like you mentioned in Sanford than up north right now, but the hospitality is the same, it’s still hosting guests, serving people, exactly what you were talking about, taking care of people. So, love that. Thank you for that, Whitney, if you can believe it, we are coming up on the end of 2025 and we’re headed straight to 2026. I mean, this feels like one of the, one of the fastest years as we reflect. This is always, I love this time of year, Whitney, ’cause it’s a great time to reflect on, on this past year and we love to look forward in hospitality, but also reflecting back, what would you say your biggest takeaway for 2025 is, and then looking ahead, you know, what are you most excited about for Newport Hospitality Group as we go into 2026?
Whitney Altizer:
So for 2025, I’d say engagement, right? Engagement, meaning understanding how travel’s evolved and continues to evolve. You know, we’re sitting in the middle of a government shutdown and a lot of travel delay right now. So it’s understanding what guests need, booking behaviors, their use of technology, and again, being able to shift, to help those people in that moment. But it’s also engagement in platforms. Newport’s been lucky enough to put a lot of new technology and platforms in the last 18 months. So a lot of 2025 was built on great. We got the platform. Now that we understand how to use it the best we possibly can, are we getting everything out of it? And, we’ve brought, brought in a lot of speakers about each one of those pieces of technology to help us do trainings to make sure that the general manager gets out of it what they need. And the director of sales gets what they need and housekeeping gets what they need to ensure that those were dollars well spent and they’re gonna catapult us forward.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we had a hospitality professional on the podcast a couple episodes ago that just said there’s no way that you can mentally be an expert in every aspect of hospitality, right? Like from the pH levels to your pool, to how you’re sourcing your food. We have a lot of unbelievable people and smart people in hospitality, but for you to be a savant with all of that stuff, it’s so challenging right now and it continues to get more challenging, especially with AI and technology that feels like it’s changing every single day. So to have those speakers have those professionals to lean on in our industry, so important. Love to hear that, that you guys are doing that. Wish you nothing but success for 2026. We’ll continue to watch that with all the new openings and, and pipeline development that you have going on. As we wrap up today, we covered a lot, advice for the young generation, AI and technology, social media, reputation, all the above. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today?
Whitney Altizer:
No, I just really appreciate the time to be able to chat with you and we expect to see you with that Comfort Inn Sanford Grand opening.
Ryan Embree:
Let’s do it. Let’s, yeah, I would love to be there. Can’t wait to see it. And like I said, Whitney, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot, sharing some of your insights and expertise, with myself and our Suite Spot, hotelier audience out there. Excited to continue to watch Newport Hospitality Group grow and such privilege to be partnered with you as well. So thank you Whitney. And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Celebrations are underway at TMG headquarters, and we gather round to recognize the milestone of reaching 1 million social media ad spend across all of our hotel partners!
This achievement would not have been possible without the continued support and trust of our partners, and their unwavering commitment to creating compelling stories and digital content for travelers, as well as fostering genuine connections with hotel guests.
In this special celebratory Suite Spot episode, Travel Media Group’s Chief Technology Officer, Jason Lee, and Product Manager – Social Media, Brian Ross, both join the podcast to discuss the incredible accomplishment and what it means for TMG and our wonderful hotel partners.
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Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We are here back, we’ve been on the road, we’ve been visiting and hosting people on the Suite Spot virtually, but we are back here at the Suite Spot Podcast studio with a very familiar guest, Jason Lee, Chief Technology Officer, who we’re gonna have on in a second. Then we’re gonna be visiting with Brian Ross, our product manager, social media, to celebrate this incredible milestone. Jason, welcome back to the Suite Spot. Thanks. Yeah, glad to finally be back. Yeah, we’re excited to have you, celebrating a milestone today. A million dollars in ad spend for our hotel partners. Again, you know, with Travel Media Group, we work exclusively with hotels. Let’s first, you know, off the bat, huge accomplishment milestone. What does this mean to hear you kind of hearing this being there since the very beginning of this solution all those years back?
Jason Lee:
Yeah. It’s exciting. Obviously it is when you think about it in the increments that we boost posts at, it’s a lot of posts. Yeah. It’s a lot of posts for a lot of hotels. A lot of weeks of content. So just extremely proud of what it has produced for our hotels. But also for our amazing social media team that creates such engaging content and makes boost able and ad worthy content.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and that’s the important part because, you know, obviously a million dollars is a big number. But you don’t need necessarily a million dollars to run an effective ad campaign, and that’s what you were kind of talking about. With the small increments. Talk to us a little bit about that, because I do feel like sometimes hoteliers, rightly so, are intimidated with something like social media ad spend. They don’t really know where, you know, ’cause you can boost a post for as low as $5 all the way up to, thousands of dollars. And they’re still going to spend your money in one way or another. So kind of talk through that process because effectiveness is really the key to the game there.
Jason Lee:
No, absolutely. And I think it gets into how you create content. What is the cadence of that content? How often do I do it? But then it also gets into what am I trying to do? So you can create content and not boost it or put ads any kinda ad spend behind it at all. And you’re going to have that content on your page. You’re gonna reach out, your community is gonna see it if if they have that, you know, alerts or whatever set up for you. But what boosting does is it allows you to reach this audience that is not inside of your sphere. So it allows them to be able to see these posts, but even more importantly, it allows them to engage with these posts. So if they engage with them, now you kind of have them in the algorithm. Now, now you’ve got ’em a little bit. Right. There’s future state with these, uh, guests. But, but we’re talking about $5 increments. So for this very small amount of money, you’re talking about 10 to 30 x on reach and engagement. And, and that is incredible. Uh, and especially because it’s sort of like builds on itself because the more that a post is interacted with, the more feeds it’s inside of, you know, somebody shares this post. So now you’re like, obviously any content that is engagement worthy, the algorithm is gonna put out in front of people.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s that social media ripple effect. And, you know, we say it all the time for hotels. I mean, who’s not thinking or typing in their social media search bar, uh, about travel Yeah. Or thinking about travel or, or, and, and we’re at a really, really cool spot in our industry where we could be that social media post could be the thing that inspires someone to take action to say, I want to take this trip, or I’ve been thinking about this, and now all of a sudden you’re all in that all important algorithm that you’re talking about. And that’s really where social media ad spend comes into play. Because before it used to have to be either someone shares this information with you or a follower of yours interacts with that social media ad spend, um, really targets an audience that might not be following your account.
Jason Lee:
Absolutely. But is looking for travel in your area. Right. So, or is following content like your content. Right. And I think that’s what’s so cool, but you add to this, right? And so we, we’ve talked about short form video, uh, on this podcast before, but you add boost to short form video and now you’re in this whole other thing where it’s not about engagement as much as it is about time viewed. So if I watch an entire video of yours about your property or an about an event coming up or about your restaurant, right now I’m in this algorithm. Yeah. So now the next time I put content out, it’s pretty good bet it’s gonna be in my reels feed. So that’s, and that’s, and that’s very powerful, especially for a $5 boost. You could get out to three, 400 people. Right. And you get from that three or 400 people, let’s say you get 15, 20 people that fully engage with it. but you do that three, three or four times a week. Yeah. This is this, these are compounded numbers that really make a difference.
Ryan Embree:
Well, we always say it and have said it is had a parallel to the online billboard, right? Yeah. About seeing that sign on the, uh, the side of the highway. But you don’t know the intent of every single one of those people every single time someone drives by that billboard. Uh, whether you’re targeting the right person or not. Uh, when, when you’re doing social media ad spend, you have a, you can be a little bit more prescriptive there. Yep. And I think the conversations that I’ve been hearing, you know, at the hospitality show and, and these other events and talking to industry leaders even through the podcast is everyone has this interest right now in how hotels are being found.
Ryan Embree:
Right. Obviously the LLMs is what our, everyone is talking. Right. Right. But there’s a natural transition, especially in the younger generation of them going directly to Instagram and TikTok to figure out where to travel Yeah. And that to, you know, talk about that and what you’ve kind of seen or even heard from hoteliers and, and where that’s sitting in the booking journey right now.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. You know, I think social media, social media is really amazing. And I, and I do feel like where social media content sits in the minds of a lot of marketers is inspiration to travel. Like, it’s sort of like that’s where I draw to Yeah. You go, well, let’s say inspiration to travel. That’s the thing that gets me to want to travel. But we’re seeing more and more and more where inspiration travel is absolutely there. But pre-booking research is there. Post-booking is also there. So now I’ve booked my room and now I’m going to your Facebook page or your Instagram page to see what’s going on at your property. So, so now I’m in this kind of secondary thing, or I’m sharing that, I’m sharing that information, but then in post stay, so in stay, I, I shouldn’t, I I I got ahead of my skis there in stay. I think it’s also important because this is more information about what’s going on at your property, if there’s a valuable enough information that’s happening, and I’m not talking about every, every, uh, post is a pitch mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And where loyalty is built. Absolutely. Which is brand loyalty is built, which is what we’re looking for. You know, as marketers, obviously we want to inspire, but you know, we don’t want this to be transactional between guests and hotel. We hopefully this is the beginning of a relationship. And one of the places we’re trying to connect with a traveler in a world where we’ve removed a lot of friction in the guest experience where they don’t even need to speak to an employee anymore at your hotel. So this could be your mainstream of connection between you and the traveler could be social media. Yeah. Um, and, you know, it could be a social media ad that they first interact with that could get you there. And I think that transitions to my next question, which is sometimes the most effective social media isn’t a call to action of what you said. So, you know, how do you kind of talk to your team, the product, the social media product team about that and, and saying that, you know, we don’t need to put a book now, uh, and big lettering on every single one of our social media ads.
Jason Lee:
Yeah, you’re absolutely right. It, because I think it gets to that thing where it’s like, I don’t, so go to the boost post, right? So now I’m a traveler. I don’t know your hotel. I now see your post in my feet. And what is going to get me to engage there? It’s gonna be engaging content. Yeah. It’s gonna be an event that I might wanna visit or I might wanna see. It’s going to be a cool picture of your room or a cool picture of an aspect to your property that I didn’t know about. Or maybe a drink that your bartender makes that only your hotel has. Yeah. Um, or it’s gonna be maybe a point of interest in, in your town and your proximity to that. So it’s those things I think that are, that are sort of like, draw people in and once they know who you are, once they understand, oh, this is, this is a hotel
Ryan Embree:
Well, you, and you think about that, if that message all of a sudden showed up in your scroll, right. How quickly we are you, you know, kind of swiping that thumb up and down through our post, and you see that kind of giant ad you actually even might have a negative connotation associated with your hotel. Because they’re gonna recognize that as an ad in within their feed inauthentic content that they never really asked to follow versus something like what you said something about the hotel experience or something engaging, something that actually is interesting to them who have this preconceived notion of already wanting to travel. Now all of a sudden there’s that interest you get into their feed. But it comes back to having that cadence of a posting. Because that’s the other thing. If they get to your homepage, they start scrolling through your feed and don’t see consistent content there, there’s going to be that mixed match of expectation.
Jason Lee:
Absolutely. But it also lays the groundwork for any kind of future promotion you want to do. So you gotta have this like, great ground game of like the block and tackle posts of the, the features and benefits of staying at your property. And then once you have that and you’ve got this nice feed of content that’s continually pushing out passively out to this audience, then there is ample opportunity to then amplify that with promotions and other kinds of things that have a CTA on it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. No, absolutely. I wanna switch the conversation to your role as CTO and you spearhead a lot of the development for our TMG OneView platform. And within that, we have a very, very robust social media suite that you’ve worked on, uh, with, with your team. One of the things, obviously with social media ad spend is a lot of people ask, you know, where, what type of analytics should I be looking for? We always hear the return on social, right? The ROI of social media. Completely different conversation there. But what have you built or developed into the platform to help show transparency and what should you be looking for?
Jason Lee:
Yeah, so in our platform, we sort of have like kind of two levels. So, as you go into our analytic suite on the top level, you’re gonna see total impressions, total reach, total engagement, and then you can break that down by site and look at all of the various analytics that that, that make up those, those bigger numbers. Right underneath it right, is our ad spend line. So each so each post that has a little boost, on it, so you can see how much of that content or how much of that audience came from the boost. So I click on the boost, and now I can see all of the boost information, and that’s the same kind of basic information, reach, impressions, engagements.
Speaker 2:
But what’s interesting about how that works is right, is that, is that you can see, hey, high engagement of a boosted post. And by the way, not every boosted post has the same number, uh, in terms of total engagement, right? Sure. Some of them have very similar, uh, a lot of them have very similar reach and impressions, but engagement is this really important number and engagement when we’re talking about that, we’re talking about likes, we’re talking about comments, and we’re talking about shares. Those are the real, those are the keys to this. Sure. Um, and then in video, we’re talking about total time watch and total and total times that a video is watched start to to, to finish. And those are really important metrics that to have in there. So our analytics suite has all of that sort of built on top of each other so that our hotels really understand the relationship between a boost and an ad and just a straight organic post. And, but then like basically what is the total number? Yeah. What did, what did this, what did this post completely produce? So we have a real, we have a lot of transparency in that. And, and now new to our platform we’ll be having that really broken out between, uh, Instagram and Facebook. So one of the things that we have, so every property that is connected to both Facebook and Instagram, when we boost, we are boosting that content that’s going out into both platforms simultaneously. The boost money is then divided out into that audience. So, so now the Instagram audience and the Facebook audience sort of are seeing this content simultaneously in their feeds. And so you’re, you can see where all that’s coming from. So it’s very cool, very transparent.
Ryan Embree:
No, I was gonna say it’s so cool because those are two completely different audiences. Sometimes with Facebook and Instagram. And again, this is where a lot of the younger generation, especially on Instagram is where they’re starting their searching. so to be on there definitely will give you an advantage over some hotels that, you know, believe it or not, as we enter 2026, some hotels still not prioritizing Instagram right now in their marketing strategies. Congratulations, Jason, again, on, on hitting this, this mark. super incredible, all the work that you’ve been doing, all that you’ve produced for our hotel partners, you know, I’m gonna, I’m gonna end our conversation on a lot of hotels out there, don’t have maybe a million dollars to spend on right on ads. But what would be one tip that you would share for social media ads for hotels?
Jason Lee:
I think the important thing, if you’re gonna do that and I’m actually gonna give the tip on boosts because I think Boost is, I think boost is really a very important thing. And I think ads and Boost is where you don’t have to be as sparing in terms of quantity. Where you don’t wanna put an ad out every day, but you could boost a post every day. You could boost a post or five days a week. We look at it, you know, at four, you know, four to five is probably perfect for a week and add a video to that, but it’s about cadence and consistency and inside of that cadence and consistency, diversity and content that is all appealing to a traveler. So as long as you have those things, a $5 ad spend, a $5 boost, right. Consistently delivered across four or five posts a week is gonna be fantastic. You’re gonna get a great audience. You’re gonna have a lot of like that audience that comes back, the audience that’s re-seeing all of your content and all of that is gonna create trust. All of it’s going to reinforce value. All of that is gonna amplify the, the awesome features and, and attractions in your area. And so it doesn’t have to be crazy, but it does have to be consistent, and it does have to be engaging.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It follows that, you know, formula that we hear all the time, the know, like, trust. They have to know who you are. They have to like what you do or what you’re providing them. And then they have to trust you to give it, social media in a very, you know, like you said, $5 increments could be a just a trust builder. That’s a great way to think about social media spend. So again, Jason, thank you for joining me here on the Suite Spot. Next we’re gonna be visiting with Brian Ross, our product manager, social media. All right. We are back here with Brian Ross, our product manager, social media. Brian, congratulations on this incredible milestone. You and your team must be very excited to hit this achievement.
Brian Ross:
We are.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You know, Brian, you have a little bit, obviously different role than Jason who we just had on. You are talking a lot more to hoteliers talking to your team about the content your game planning. You’re talking about these booths talking about these ads. So I really wanna pick your brain as someone that’s run all these campaigns to give some practical advice for some of the hotel listeners that we have here. I think we start with the question that we hear a lot sometimes, or maybe hoteliers have on their mind right now. You know, why should a hotel or a portfolio of hotels if you manage that even invest in ad spend in the first place?
Brian Ross:
Yea, even a low level boost on your posts. I mean, really low level, it’ll increase your, your three metrics that you’re looking at, your reach, your impressions, and your engagement. And your engagement is really what you wanna be focusing on. How many likes, how many comments, and how many shares are you’re getting on the posts, because that’s where you get beyond your ad spend reach and that’s where you start to get into organic growth. And that is, that’s where the meat is. And those engagements, as you know, as a guest or prospective guests are looking at your feed when they see those engagement numbers, that’s really what resonates. And that’s how, that’s how you can tell that you’re creating content that’s relevant and engaging.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it has a snowball effect. And ripple effect of what social media. So, you know, you get someone to share a post, now all of a sudden it goes into their feed and then you talk about it just keeps on gaining on one another. And that’s what we love to see that organic growth, because at the end of the day, these ads this boost everything that you’re putting in, the money that you’re putting into, hopefully that pays off on the organic side of things. And that’s what makes for an effective social campaign. And I wanna go through some of the tips that you would maybe share with hoteliers about the best way to approach social media ad spend.
Brian Ross:
It’s always gonna come back to creating engaging and relevant content. Like any marketing, you wanna be telling a story and you wanna be creating value, you wanna offer value with your posts. So, and that’s, that’s why I say a low level boost will do it. It’s not about throwing a whole lot of money at it. It’s about creating content that’s gonna be engaging and then take on a life of its own once it gets that little bit of a lift.
Ryan Embree:
That’s such an effective tip because, you know, it is intimidating out there if you’ve never done social media ad spend before because you don’t know whether you should be spending a lot or a little, we talked about it off camera, about saying at an effective $5 campaign could yield better results than maybe a hundred dollars campaign. And the way that we kind of likened it, or had a parallel would be saying, if you had an online billboard that was states away from your hotel versus an online billboard that was just a couple exits down, what do you think is gonna perform better? The same comparison can be made here with social media ad spend. We also talked about how you can use some of your reputation data to kind of maybe, maybe plan out your content.
Brian Ross:
What to post about. And especially if you need to be selective about your spend and you can’t boost every single post, but you wanted to kind of pick and choose your sentiment data is a really good place to start. Or you can, you know, you can lean into the things that are really strong about your hotel. You can also, you can also address things that come up a lot. It can almost be like, you know, there are a couple of ways you could think, like, what are the things, we get a bunch of phone calls about a day. We could make a post out of that. And sure. That is something that people are engaging you about already. So that’s kind of like knowledge. So the other thing that’s a really fun thought exercise that we like to go through with hotels sometimes is if you could say something to your guests at your hotel right now, what would you wanna tell them? What would you wanna tell a perspective guest? If you could say one thing, what would it be? And then that’s another way to kind of get into what might make a good, good post, a good communication.
Ryan Embree:
I absolutely love that because I talk to a lot of hoteliers about that sort of thing, and the answer I get when I ask, what type of social content, you know, would you like to share? And sometimes they’re, they’re kind of stuck. They don’t know what they’re like, we could talk about this, we could talk about that. But then you pose the question like that and you flip it and you say, what are the things that you love about your hotel and what are, what do you think makes your hotel better or more special than the hotel next door? And it’s a completely different conversation. It sparks something in them that they’ve, that they know, that they intrinsically know. But when it’s weird. ’cause when you try to put that on a post, it just, it doesn’t come out organically when you’re asked about that social content. So I love what you said there about maybe just flipping the script a little bit when thinking about that because your guests are telling you what they love every single day, whether it’s on reviews or face-to-face, it’s about sharing that and amplifying that using social media ad spend, which is what this whole episode is about. So, but, you know, what type of posts would you, in your opinion, should you consider boosting? And you know, obviously your team’s creating thousands of posts each day. You know what, do you have some examples for us?
Brian Ross:
Highlighting your team members. You just talked about what differentiates your hotel from the hotel across the street. It’s your people. Any kind of, if you wanna post about the fitness center, maybe there’s somebody on staff who is into working out and, and you could have them in the fitness center and you could have, you know, Jesse’s workout tip of the week or workout tip of the month, and you can highlight your fitness center through the eyes of a, of an employee. Same thing with, you know, a bartender pouring their favorite drink or mm-hmm
Ryan Embree:
And story.
Brian Ross:
In, in story. And, and they’ll share it and their friends will see it and they’ll share it. And it’s a really good way to create some organic boost. Another thing is to talk about what sets your area apart, what’s cool about what’s cool about your area, what are some of the attractions? What are some events that are going on? What’s the vibe of the place? You know, those kind of posts, that kind of content is less salesy. And that’s really kind of the key here. You, you know, if you’re gonna select what you’re gonna boost, you don’t want to, you don’t wanna boost things that are overtly like salesy about the, the hotel. Yeah. You wanna boost things that are, like we were talking about earlier, that tell a story, that add value and, and intrigue people about either the area or your location specifically.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s so interesting now in this digital age that, you know, we used to walk into a hotel and not know anything about it. Mom or dad would, would go and run out of the car and go see if they have any rooms available. And now we almost want zero surprises. We want to know everything. We want to know, this is what the lobby looks like when we walk in and when we check in. And not only do I wanna know what the lobby looks like, I wanna know who’s in that lobby. I want to know that Brian’s checking me in behind the front desk. I wanna know that Marie’s at the bar making drinks and gonna serve me my breakfast in the morning. Social media is a great way to give a POV of what that experience is going to look like when walking into a hotel. But there’s also some, obviously cautions that, things to watch out for, because again, social media ad spend, you can spend as little or as much as as you want. They’re not gonna stop you from spending. So what are some things to watch out for in your social media ads? You, you mentioned one of them already about being too overtly salesy. Any other tips that, that, uh, hoteliers should avoid?
Brian Ross:
You’re building a presence that people will look at and they’ll see a hotel that’s engaged with its guests and meeting them where they are. And not pushing your message, but meeting them where their interests lie. The other other thing you’re building is trust with the algorithm. As when you create consistent, engaging content like that, the algorithm is gonna give you the benefit of the doubt. Now you’ve got, you’ve kind of got it trained so that it sees your activity, it sees your creating engaging posts, so it kind of trusts you now. So when you, when you wanna put out that post about the promotion you’re running or the special, now it’s gonna trust you and it’s gonna kind of give you the benefit of the doubt, and it will push things out for you that if you just tried to spend money cold like that on something, it would kind of fall flat. So it’s important to create stuff that’s just not salesy and just engaging on a regular basis. That’s really the meat of your social media.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And I think that it’s cautious to also pick the right partner, you know, that kind of knows, because again, you can, you can spend, there’s unlimited spending in social media ad spend, right. That $1 million mark that we hit as an organization came through, you know, hundreds of thousands of campaigns with thousands of hotels across the board. So you, you have to pick the right partner. You have to pick the right industry partner that also knows what moves and people will engage with and build that trust. Right. Because it doesn’t happen overnight. It’s a process. We talk about that. And for those hoteliers that are looking for a quick win and lots of bookings that might not be the right objective of what you’re talking about. You have to know why you’re, why you’re doing this. And social media is always a long-term play there, so how can we reassure hoteliers that we are moving in the right direction? There is positive momentum. What are the results that you look for to an effective social media ad spend strategy and campaign?
Brian Ross:
Sure. Well, the real eye test is always gonna come back to engagement. When you scroll your feed and you see, you know, the posts that aren’t boosted, maybe they get a handful of likes, maybe a comment or two. Then if your, if your boosted post is getting dozens or hundreds of comments or likes, now this is money well spent, you know, sometimes with our, with our hoteliers, what will happen is we’ll post about an event and that will become a hub of conversation through of users about the event. And even more so than the actual event on Facebook. People will be talking about, you know, ticket swapping and, um…
Ryan Embree:
Set list.
Brian Ross:
What song, what song are you excited? You know, asking guests a question like that in your post is a great, you know, is it, what song are you looking forward to hearing most at this concert? Or, you know, who’s what player in this game, if it’s a sporting event excites you the most, who are you excited to see? Yeah. That kind of thing. And, and it might be a little counterintuitive to think that that kind of discussion on your posts is value, but it really is like that is social media gold right there.
Ryan Embree:
It’s building conversation and community, which is what an objective could be for your social media campaigns, is to extend reach and build trust. So, Brian, as we wrap up, I think it would be really insightful for our hotel listeners to kind of hear your process, your team’s process with content creation and where social media ad strategy and campaigns fall into that process.
Brian Ross:
That’s great. Obviously every, every hotel is different. We really try to capture ev each unique hotel voice. We wanna speak to, um, a hotel’s guests, just like a hotel. Sure. Speak to the guests. And, and that’s, that’s always our goal. Um, as far as how we use the ad spend. This is another thing that you’re kind of almost purchasing when you invest in a little bit of boost on your post is you get to understand what’s working for your hotel and what’s working for your social media in those analytics. Mm-hmm. So as you’re getting the results, you know, some hotels are gonna find that talking about certain amenities are really gonna resonate with people. Or maybe they have a great onsite bar that people like and, and that will get a lot of engagement. But then other places, maybe they’re in just a cool area, or there’s something about the area where talking about attractions that are there or events that are happening are gonna create more engagement. So it’s about watching those analytics and then leaning into what’s working. And that is invaluable because that just snowballs. The more information, the more knowledge you have like that, the better informed you are as to what you’re gonna post about next. And the more successful your social strategy becomes over time.
Ryan Embree:
And the momentum just continues to build. And absolutely, before you know it, you’re just as successful as, uh, Brian and his social media team at a million dollars ad spend.
Brian Ross:
So good luck.
Ryan Embree:
To bring it all back. Well, thank you so much, Brian. Congratulations to you and your team. Thank you for all the practical tips for our hotel listeners out there. I hope to, to continue to follow you and the work that you and your team are doing out there. Last year it was, uh, you know, gaining a million followers this year. It’s the social media ad spend. We can’t wait to see what’s next, what you and your team have for us.
Brian Ross:
Thanks so much. You know where to find me.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Thank you so much. And thank you for listening to The Suite Spot. We’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Host of the Suite Spot podcast and Vice President of Marketing at Travel Media Group, Ryan Embree, breaks down the key takeaways from the 2025 Hospitality Show that took place in Denver, Colorado, last month.
Ryan shares not only his opinion on some of the most prevalent topics from the renowned industry event, but he also shares what panelists, attendees, hoteliers, and others had to say about the conference and the state of hospitality.
Tune in now to listen to the full episode.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot Podcast, and we are fresh off of our 2025 Hospitality Show coverage in Denver, Colorado. We are back here in our Travel Media Group headquarters, a little bit closer to C-level in our Suite Spot podcast studio. Absolutely incredible event. Wanna first think Questex and AHLA as well as the city of Denver for hosting from end to end. So amazing from the programming to the networking to the industry professionals that we had the privilege of interviewing. You can find all of those exclusive interviews on our TMG YouTube page, make sure to follow along. But in today’s episode, we are gonna go with our top takeaways from the Hospitality Show in Denver. And it really started right off the bat. I mean, this was an end to end, just jam packed insights, trends, everything a hotelier could want. You know, this was billed as one of the most comprehensive shows in hospitality. And from all of the education sessions that we saw, the panelists, the conversations that we had, the networking that went on again, hats off to the teams over at AHLA and Questex, where I’ll start my key takeaways is really one of the first quotes that really resonated with me as an attendee on the first day. And this was I forget who I can attribute this quote to, but was talking about how we ended the 2024 Hospitality Show in San Antonio. And everything that has happened between then and the start of the 2025 Hospitality show, an election, you know, a tumultuous start to the year, with tariffs, international travel, almost seeing double-digit drops in some places between some countries. And then now we have a government shutdown here. So, so many things that the hospitality industry had to deal with. And, you know, I have the privilege of attending multiple events throughout the year, and never have I ever been on such a rollercoaster ride. It started at the beginning of the year in March where we met a lot of hoteliers that were kind of bracing for impact. They were coming down this hill. Projections didn’t look great. A lot of sentiment out there was not was not awesome. Deals were not getting done. It just feel very like a crawl. And then all of a sudden summer came and as we were kind of bracing ourselves for this just dip or this terrible kind of cliff that we were about to, to fall off, we kind of opened our eyes as an industry and said, it’s really not as bad as it’s being made out to be. And a lot of hoteliers, as we saw and we interviewed, talked to, had some really good summers, had some really good numbers, occupancy, looking across different markets, some of the markets that weren’t doing as well rebounded. And they were starting to see a little bit of glimmer of hope. And now here we are at the end of the year and it feels like those storm clouds are brewing again. And we’re bracing ourselves for a new year in 2026. And maybe it’s because we’re just looking at the numbers. It’s budget season. We’re starting to try to forecast like we love to do and have to do frankly in hospitality, but it just feels like that worry is coming over us again. But to that, I feel like it’s in these times where there’s a lot of creativity and ingenuity that starts to really spur and, and it’s these events that could be a catalyst for real change in our industry. There were a lot of industry leaders up on stage over these last few days at the hospitality show in Denver that presented some pretty interesting ideas when it came to housekeeping, staffing, the booking experience and really challenging the status quo. And it’s these types of events that can really start a conversation and build a foundation and momentum for true change within our industry. We saw that change happen very, very quickly during COVID because it needed to, it was a necessity. But now here we are and we can all feel it. We can feel the belts tightening from the hotel all the way to our guests and consumers. And this is when we need to start looking around and trying to come up some fresh ideas. And, you know, some of those might not even be within hospitality. I mean, one of the keynote speakers was Chris Barton from Shazam, and, you know, trying to get these fresh voices maybe outside of hospitality. Blue Origin was another speaker talking about space tourism, maybe looking for some new channels. You know, space tourism might not be a couple years down the line in your portfolio if you’re a management company right now. But is it a trend that you can capitalize on, right? Are there areas where this could be happening within the next decade? You’re positioning yourself in markets that are going to cater to that demand, which could exponentially increase. It was truly amazing to hear some of the stories that we heard at the hospitality show when it came to space tourism. But all that to say doesn’t necessarily need to be hospitality led for these hospitality innovation to come from. And I feel like it’s during these times, during these events where you’re going to see that we had several different conversations. One with a leader of landing place hotels, the brand leader of landing place hotels who saw an opportunity, to do things a little differently with a brand. And they’re seeing double digit. They already accumulated a double digit pipeline right now in development. It’s very, very interesting. We’re at, we’re at a, a kind of an inflection point in hospitality right now as we enter 2026 and we in into this kind of unknown. But it will be really, really exciting to see what type of innovation comes from this. Because I do think this is when people are gonna start getting creative. ’cause those margins are just too tight right now, right? Between staffing, construction costs. The demand is still there, but the profits are not being seen. And that was, there was no, it was not an error that the Hospitality Show started its programming with multiple sessions on profits and how these management companies, brands can work together and these owners assets can work together in order to see profit margin increase. Because right now it’s just slimmed over these last couple years. And it’s being felt, it’s being felt throughout the industry. You know, it was interesting to see some of the leaders that I spoke to and interview, got the opportunity to interview, talk about capitalizing on some of these trends that we’re seeing right now in hospitality, you know, personalization, multi-generational travel, experiential travel, right? Marriott announced recently it’s outdoor collection and, you know, lifestyle brands, all of this mixed in. And I think what’s happening right now is the traveler, the consumer is feeling that tightening in their belt, but they still want to travel. It was, it has not been taken away from them like it was in 2020, but they certainly have to do some more due diligence. And when they do travel, which they’re going to prioritize, they wanna make sure they make the biggest bang for their buck. So they’re gonna start prioritizing and maybe looking for those hotels that they feel can give them the widest and breadth of experience, right? Rather than just be loyalty to those brands. So those brands are seeing that they’re trying to capitalize on these trends and they’re exploring more into the soft brand lifestyle division. We had heads of man of a couple different management companies talk about, you know, the patterns that they’re seeing in consumer sentiment and what they want out of their experience. They want to feel like they’re having a localized experience. We’ve always talked about that on this podcast about how to try to tell your story, how to make your guest part of the story, part of your local community, how to give them that community first experience. But now guests are clamoring for it. They’re looking for it, they’re doing research, they’re doing research in different places. That was another big trend and takeaway that I heard a lot is hotels management companies. They’re starting to look at how guests are using the booking journey right now. And l and where does LLMs fit into that? They feel like they don’t want to be get left behind in a search, just like I’m sure when Google started to aggregate all these hotels online, they didn’t want to be on page two or page three, right? So how can, when a traveler searches best hotels in this market, or maybe a little bit more specific of a search your hotel be retrieved in those how can your hotel be a part of those results, right? And I think more and more hotels are asking that question. It’ll be really interesting to see where that goes. AI and technology, it feels like it has to be a part of every programming agenda and conversation that we talked about now. But it is starting, I feel like, to settle into two separate camps. One that really wanna prioritize the employee empowerment, right? How can I use AI and technology to empower my employees to do their job efficiently? Something that we’ve preached at Travel Media Group where we have several AI innovations that help the employee get some really deeper insights into its online reputation. But also, you know, there’s that second camp of, well, we’re gonna try to go guest experience first. What can I do with AI and technology in order to make a big difference on the guest experience? And I think those two camps actually go hand in hand, to be honest with you. If you empower your employees to improve the guest experience, one is gonna happen towards the other. It’s kind of a symbiotic relationship. But it is interesting to see, because you talk about AI and technology, I think the one thing that everyone can agree on hospitality is you don’t want to be left behind, right? And there was an interesting keynote that was at the hospitality show, futurist that was talking about hospitality and how you have to, you don’t wanna be the first one into the bear cave of technology. You’d rather be the second person exploring the bear cave. And while I do agree with that, I do think it is gonna be those innovators that jump into kind of the deep end and try to integrate this stuff. I think guests right now, and consumers are out out of place where they’re still willing to accept a little bit of a learning curve when it comes to AI and technology, then they will be in, let’s say six months to a year. So it might be that first brand that goes all in that might be known as a trendsetter rather than saying, well, this was, this was rolled out prematurely. So we’ll be interesting to see more and more brands obviously rolling different things out. But I think, you know, they’re trying to go about this really systematically in hospitality as we know, a little bit late to the game with adopting some of this technology. I mean, you get to some of the hotels and some of the some of the technologies still very outdated. So you talk about rolling that up across a brand or a portfolio of hotels could take some time. So we’ll see how that plays out. You know, a couple great conversations. This is always a great show to look at the relationship between brands, management companies and owners, especially at a time, like I said, where profits are so tight, margins are so thin, who can bend a little bit more and what goodwill is that going to potentially serve in the long run here? I think there’s a jockeying for position between the brands right now. We’ve seen management companies, you know, sprout overnight and some really, really successful management companies start to make some strategic partnerships and start to get into areas that are trendsetting. You know, I think about hotel equities in the postcard, cabins, portfolio and play. I think it’s very interesting to see, and we’ll continue to see that because right now we’re at a place that just feels we’re getting a little stuck in our industry and we gotta figure out a way to kinda wiggle through it. And that’s where that creativity and ingenuity that I was talking about comes into play. And then finally, you know, my last takeaway from the incredible couple days that we had out in Denver was, first of all, what an amazing city. Denver, Colorado. And I love the fact that they actually, they had the mayor of Denver at the show was a part of the ribbon cutting ceremony. Rosanna Maieta from AHLA did a great interview with, the mayor of Denver and talking about how the city had teamed up with hospitality. And it was really inspiring and it was really cool to see Denver, you know, they talked about the importance of sports tourism. We were there during a Denver Broncos, Dallas Cowboys game. You could see that sports tourism dollar being spent all over the restaurants, hotels. So it is interesting in markets that might be a little bit more challenged right now, you know, we saw this last year with San Francisco, this year, Las Vegas. Can some of these city stakeholders come together with hospitality management companies, associations, professionals, and do some things to again, kind of get us unstuck in some of these markets that have been struggling? There’s other markets right now that are doing a fantastic job and we spoke to you know, some of the portfolio leaders that have assets in those, in those markets. And it was extremely compelling. Definitely suggests, if you haven’t already subscribe to our YouTube page, you can see all the exclusive content. We had eight incredible interviews with professionals, hospitality professionals, like I said, heads of associations, brand leaders and c-suite executives from multiple management companies. And it was just such a privilege and an honor to be able to, to kind of talk hospitality with them. So, you know, again, Denver was incredible, very excited about Miami next year. And if he didn’t get the opportunity, go check out my interview with Alexi Khajavi at Questex who did. I think one of the best ways we always have our, our hospitality show preview with Alexi, I think in the interview we had out in Denver was probably the best way to really hype up what Miami 2026 is gonna be about in a event that is so comprehensive. The independent hotel space is really bubbling up right now. Brands want to be independents, independents wanna act more like brands. There’s this, there’s this inflection point that we’re headed towards this fork in the road that we’re headed towards. And it’s all gonna culminate next year in Miami, an independent hotel capital of the world. We are very familiar, as you know, we head down there on an annual basis. I’m so excited that it’s right here in our backyard. We’re gonna take the bright line down. We’re gonna be bringing you so much coverage, exclusive interviews, and we’re gonna get, we’re gonna get a little bit more exclusive coverage and we’re gonna be doing a lot of stuff leading up to the show to prepare you for it. So I hope you’ll stay with me. Subscribe, follow, but to put a final bow on 2025 hospitality show. Incredible. Thank you again to AHLA and Questex for making this possible. Can’t wait to see what you have in store for us in Miami 2026. Thank you for listening to the Suite Spot, and we will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the most recent AHLA Check-In episode with President & CEO of the AHLA Foundation, Kevin Carey! As a familiar face on the Suite Spot, Kevin stops in to give us the latest and greatest developments and advocacy work taking place at the American Hotel & Lodging Association.
Be sure to watch now to know what current events are impacting the hospitality industry.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embee. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree for another AHLA industry check-in this time with a familiar guest, Kevin Carey. Familiar guest, but a little bit different position. We’re gonna talk about that in a second. But he is the Chief Operating Officer at AHLA and President and CEO of the AHLA Foundation. Kevin, welcome back to the Suite Spot,
Kevin Carey:
Ryan, terrific to be with you again. It’s
Ryan Embree:
Great to have you. Like I said, you know, you’ve been on a couple times we’ve talked about that, but this time in a new role with AHLA, congratulations, by the way, on that. Can you share with our audience a little bit about the new role, maybe a day to day and what you get the pleasure of doing every single day, as President and CEO of the AHLA foundation?
Kevin Carey:
Well, I’d be happy to. It’s definitely keeping me busy, but it’s a good busy, and very much a rewarding, busy as well. And in my new capacity, where I get to lead the foundation, I get to work alongside a dedicated group of colleagues, Jen, Eliza, Kara, and Lindsay, to also a committed group of industry leaders, who were on our board of trustees, and the organization that we help to advance is one that’s focused just on that front on advancing the people of the industry, our workforce, so day in, day out, having that teamwork and collaboration, but also working with our industry leaders to put the people forward on the industry front, and to work to support not only our current employees, but also to identify the future workforce is a vital role and very engaging.
Ryan Embree:
So critical. Right now, you’re right, we’ve had conversations about it. We’re gonna touch a little bit on this episode, but, you know, I’d see AHLA foundation all the time, the work, the stories that you guys are putting out there, you travel the country just got back from the lodging conference a couple days ago. But, you know, for those hoteliers who, you know, see the brand, they see some of the stories, you know, can you share maybe some of the origin story of the AHLA foundation and really at the foundation, so to speak of its mission over there?
Kevin Carey:
I’d be happy to. The foundation has been around for 72 years. It was founded in 1953, as a scholarship fund. And over that tenure year and arc and of its existence has done terrific work. What I’ve also shared recently as we’ve been working through a process with our board of trustees as looking at our future direction is that in many respects, this is a young 72-year-old organization. And by that I mean a number of the most prominent and highly visible initiatives that the foundation is involved in right now, whether it’s our forward initiative or No Room for Trafficking. These are programs and initiatives that have really been created, launched and grown over about the last three to five years timeframe. So, while we’ve got a proud, uh, tradition and history, we also have a number of, of very important new initiatives. And the work we’re doing to advance the industry’s workforce and to ensure the people are front and center is really vital in the current environment. As we think about the industry’s future growth prospects.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s an incredible legacy. And to be able to, that’s what you want out of advocacy and foundational work is you wanna be able to say, we’re introducing new initiative strategies, the AHLA tackles so many important issues, but perhaps none more important than human trafficking prevention. Something that a lot of the brands have, have taken major steps to get behind. You recently held your No Room for Trafficking Summit, an event dedicated to that. Tell us about that event and some of the feedback that you were hearing from hoteliers on this really critical issue.
Kevin Carey:
Let me put that initiative in the context of our role and mission overall. So, as I talked about with being that young, 72-year-old organization, we really view our mission in advancing the workforce as being centered around how do we develop and support the current workforce today, the 2.1 million people who serve guests, and work together to create that experience as future workforce is being so important to ensure that over time we’re attracting people to the industry and they know the career pathways that are available, but a third area and this aligns with the No Room for Trafficking Initiative. How can we leverage our role as a convening entity for the industry, bringing together all segments of the industry, including the service provider and supplier segment, to focus on initiatives industry-wide, where we can make a difference. And in that respect, that’s where No Room for Trafficking fits in and really underscores the industry’s longstanding commitment to working to eradicate human trafficking. We created the No Room for Trafficking Initiative in 2019 with a focus on bringing training to the industry, so our employees on the front lines, vendors and suppliers as well, could see the signs and help provide that frontline and bring awareness to this issue. We also in 2022, created the Survivor Fund, so we could help provide funding meaningful contributions to local community-based organizations to help assist survivor of survivors of human trafficking get back on their feet and ideally create an opportunity for employment in the industry as well. So this is an issue that our work is not done. We’re reaffirming our commitment to this. We’re aligning, the work the brands do around this area with owners and management companies, as well. And you’re gonna continue to see us in this area leaning in on this important issue.
Ryan Embree:
So powerful. And, you know, I’ve had the, the privilege of attending the hospitality show, which we’re gonna touch on here for the last couple of years, and to hear some of the inspiring and, and moving stories from that initiative. And it’s, again, so powerful to see common cause like this, where all the brands are really trying to get involved vendors and the, like, you know, we really need the entire industry, to really team up against an issue like this. Good. Couldn’t agree more, not be siloed.
Kevin Carey:
Its obviously a global issue. It’s not unique to the lodging industry, but the lodging industry’s leadership in this area the industry-wide commitment to playing a meaningful role in this respect. And to your point, Ryan, the individual stories, just about a week ago, Eli and I attended an event at the University of Maryland, Baltimore Safe Center, which is an organization that’s providing critical services to survivors of human trafficking. And to hear, one of the program participants, a survivor herself, to help tell her individual story and how she’s now thriving, and shows the strength to share our own experience, but also serves, as someone who is such a role model for, others who are impacted by this area. So, through the Survivor Fund, we’ve now contributed close to $2.4 million, in grants, to community-based organizations to help them provide these surround, surround support services, to survivors. And we’re very proud of this work and the impact it’s having and our continued commitment to it.
Ryan Embree:
That’s an incredible figure, congratulations to you and your team, and, you know, so happy to hear that so many people are contributing to this. Now, another key initiative you touched on was the foundation really leading in its advancement of women in hospitality through its forward program. I’ve had the honor of having several hospitality, female leaders and influencers in the hotel industry incredible, who have mentioned this program. Can you share some of the details, of this initiative and the impacts that you’re seeing?
Kevin Carey:
I’d be happy to forward really is a movement, we’re so proud of the growth, that we’ve seen and the engagement since its launched as a conference alone in 2018. But now, the initiative has expanded from an event and a conference that we convene annually to leadership development through our Build and Elevate program, and as well, through the community building aspects through a network we’ve established, that has close to 5,000 participants, mostly women but also men who are engaged in this initiative and wanna play a role in helping to women to advance in the industry. So across each of those three categories, the conference and event, the leadership development, and the community building aspect of this forward, continues to grow, through awareness engagement. We’re excited, as we look ahead to 2026, to host our event again in Atlanta, Georgia, April 16 and 17. So, please mark your calendars.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, we will. It’s so awesome to see, you know, movements like that, like you mentioned, Kevin, because it’s something that organically starts to, you know, through the community and networks starts to build. And then you put an event like that forward conference that happens in the spring, and you can just see the energy and, you know, something that hospitality is, you know, really needed for us. We talked about the staffing shortage, you know, through these times a couple years ago and really inspiring all walks of life, even especially young people to see hospitality as more than maybe just a summer job at college, but a career path that they can go down. And I saw recently, I wanna make sure I get this figure right, the AHLA foundation awarded more than $700,000 in academic scholarships to 246 students nationwide. The Suite Spot has a soft spot for those college graduate, I’m a UCF Rosen graduate, you know, we did our hospitality campus crawl series where we visited different hospitality schools in the state of Florida. What is this accomplishment? When you hear that figure 700,000, almost 250 students mean to you and your team?
Kevin Carey:
First, a major thank you to our generous contributors over time who’ve provided funds who really see this as an investment in the future of the industry. So, we wouldn’t be able to distribute the scholarship dollars and see that the impact that they’re having without our generous sponsors and contributors over time. An interestingly right now is a unique period where we’re starting to get notes and emails back from some of the recipients of these scholarship funds and just the deep impact and the personal impact that it has so many of the students for sharing what this means for them and their ability to advance their studies and advance their careers, in this industry. But this is an important, aspect of our focus around ensuring we have the future workforce, to help enable and support the industry to thrive. So, whether it’s a focus on our affiliated schools and the two in the four year community, also looking to expand, our focus, you referenced the career pathways, Ryan, it’s, it’s vital that not only students, but prospective future employees just understand the breadth of roles, opportunities, and access that this industry provides. And what an attractive opportunity for career advancement and growth that the hospitality and the lodging industry represent. So we’re thrilled with the scholarship, aspect. Such a rewarding time of year to see some of those individual impacts it’s having. But know that we’ve got a big responsibility as we look to the next five and 10 years to be working on initiatives that can ensure that the industry has the people in place to deliver that hospitality and to help be an enabler of future growth.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. As me and you know, Kevin, it’s an amazing industry. The more we can be transparent, show these success stories, and more hospitality leaders I can host on the podcast that said, Hey, you know what, I got a scholarship from the AHLA foundation and went through a hospitality specific course of education. I think we’re doing our job there. Because, right now, staffing continues to be a challenge. But I think more than ever, there’s so many incredible inspiring, stories out there that have made have such a love for hospitality, and it’s such a unique industry.
Kevin Carey:
We had the opportunity, Ryan just, you referenced, lodging conference, to host some students, while in Phoenix. We had students from Howard University and Bethune Cookman. Many were pure play hospitality students. Others were in the business school, but were looking at and considering the hospitality industry. But the diversity of fields of study that they were coming from, from legal to finance to sales and marketing. But their eyes were opened about the unique qualities and attributes of lodging in the hospitality industry. And it was terrific, to see their eyes opened and the enthusiasm, that they were gonna carry back to them. And I said, you know, you can grow your career here in a meaningful way and from the entry level to the senior most levels, but tell your peers and friends as well. Beause we wanna ensure that people understand the opportunity that this industry represents.
Ryan Embree:
Great point, Kevin. I mean, hospitality conferences, there’s so many events that happen locally and nationwide. You know, the hospitality show that AHLA does in their regional events, great exposure. If you’re a young professional, highly, highly encourage you to go visit those network talk to industry professionals who’ve made a career out of it, because this can just only develop you professionally throughout your career. And mentorship, you know, we’ve talked about that. That’s one of my favorite questions to ask. And sometimes it comes up organically when I ask about people’s backgrounds and hospitalities, they’ll mention one or two names that were really strong mentors to them in their hospitality journey, which led them to where they were. And, you know, the AHLA runs a leadership mentoring program. I think sometimes people are intimidated sometimes when they hear that word mentor, right? And so, I would almost ask you, you know, what would be your pitch to any hotel leader or hospitality professional to be really embrace mentorship, whether that’s formal program like the one that you offer at the AHLA foundation or simply just by guiding the next generation.
Kevin Carey:
You mentioned, I think both of us used the word access, whether that’s the opportunity that the industry presents, but also how so many hospitality leaders, in our industry make themselves accessible. Just back to the reference I made to the students we hosted in Phoenix, I saw our chair, Mitch Patel, and a chair of our foundation, a new Senna with Hilton Supply Management, spending time with the students and having conversations, providing their LinkedIn credentials, probably their cell phone numbers as well. So mentorship can take a quick, it could be an individual interaction or it can be a more formal process over time. But it’s so essential, a plug maybe an industry friend and someone who just authored a book on this called, who Believed in you by Dean of Powell McCormick, and her husband, David McCormick, who’s the US Senator from Pennsylvania. Just an outstanding book that talks about power of mentorship and the role it’s played in so many individuals, careers and lives. And this industry really responds to that call as well. Our own mentorship program we’ve got 30% more in participants than we set as a target. And that’s linking together industry leaders with emerging professionals in the industry who are available to share their lessons learned and provide guidance, so people can have that access to industry leaders. So, we’re thrilled with the role we can be, we play as a facilitator and an enabler in that regard.
Ryan Embree:
And mentorship can come in all different types of forms. I mean, you mentioned it, you know, even responding to a simple LinkedIn message, telling your story, sharing that story. A lot of the times, that’s what I find so inspiring in hospitality is, you know, talking to a professional that’s been doing it for a decade, two decades, maybe you’ve even made a 30 year career out of hospitality. And how transferable their skills is where they’ve been able to go all over the world, travel and have that career that they’re so proud of. So mentorship can really come all shapes and forms. I think some of the, those most powerful ones are just sharing your story sometimes. And, you know, one of the places we get the opportunity to hear those stories is the GM of the Year Awards at the Hospitality Show. We’ll both be headed out to Denver. We ran into each other and at the opening ceremony in San Antonio at the party. You know, what’s, what’s your favorite part of the hospitality show, and what are you most looking forward to this year?
Kevin Carey:
What’s always best about that and that really aligns with the role, AHLA plays of bringing the entire industry together. There are a number of conferences, we attend them, they’re terrific, but that they may be focused on a particular function in the industry or objective, bringing the entire industry together from the brand companies to independent hotels, to management companies, owners, all forms and industry verticals of suppliers, as well students, GMs having the entire cross section of the industry ecosystem together in one place with a common focus on the purpose of the show, which is how do you leverage technology and operations to drive profitability? So it’s just great to have everyone together. We’re always gonna be strongest as an industry when we’re working together and being able to, through our roles at the AHLA and the AHLA foundation play, that convening entity role with our partners at Questex, is really just a terrific opportunity. And we’re looking forward in two weeks, to being out in Denver.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a must attend event. We’re so excited to be headed there. Once again, you know, we both love our industry, but it certainly it’s one of the most complex as well. There’s so many elements to it, which also make it so beautiful. And what we talked about, about how people can find different careers in any shape, size, or form in hospitality, because there are so many different elements that you’re exposed to, which makes for a great show, like the Hospitality Show, which hosts so many aspects and insights from that show. So we’re excited to be there. Hopefully we’ll get to run into you, Kevin, and get some what far go. Get some onsite thoughts there. But for hotels, listening, you know, always like to provide resources, education for the listeners, if they’re looking to get more information about, or even get involved with the AHLA foundation in some capacity, what’s the best way to do that you can share today?
Kevin Carey:
There’s so many avenues, of engagement, for AHLA as a whole, but the foundation in particular, we’ve referenced a number of them through our events, like Forward and the No Room for Trafficking Summit, through the work that we do to support current workforce through apprentice programs, and, and to engage with prospective future employers. So we welcome, that participation and engagement, in so many forums, beyond the Hospitality Show in Denver. We’ll be turning our attention to our annual night of a thousand Stars event, which we’ll recognize, the top employees, across a number of areas in the industry. So please, certainly visit our website, reach out to me directly and or our team, everyone who’s got an interest in helping to advance our people and cast that spotlight on the industry and help play a meaningful role in attracting the future workforce for the industry. We’ve got an interest in working with you and a place for you and one of our programs or initiatives.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, again, incredible gratitude and thanks for everything you know, that you and AHLA and the foundation does for our industry. So important. We’ll wrap up the same way we like to kind of to wrap up every episode, kind of looking into the future. What are you look most looking forward to for the rest of this year? And before we know it’s already gonna be 2026, so what are you excited for next year going into for the AHLA foundation?
Kevin Carey:
I’m really excited for the future direction as I referenced, we’ve spent a lot of time this year looking meaningfully at our portfolio of initiatives, working closely with our leadership in our board to ensure that we’ve got the right portfolio of initiatives and how can we expand those to have that right impact on supporting the current employees in attracting the future workforce. And again, where we can play that convening entity role and make a meaningfully difference in human trafficking prevention and advancing women in hospitality. So you’re gonna hear more from us on all those fronts and with our terrific team and my colleagues, look forward to having more discussion with you over time.
Ryan Embree:
We’re ready for it. Ears and eyes are ready to go. And like you said, you know, it’s got a legacy of a foundation, but still young in its roots and some of the, the major initiatives you’re doing. So thank you again. Any final thoughts as we wrap up today? We covered a lot.
Kevin Carey:
Sure. We certainly did. Thank you for the opportunity. I know I send greetings from my colleague, Rosanna, who leads, AHLA overall, and we’re working closely together on through both entities to really advance the industry, and also to support and advance, the people in the workforce of the industry. So we like to say that we’re, two, enter two entities, but one enterprise, working together to really make this industry a special place. Appreciate your efforts. Another, who give us a platform to share that.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you, Kevin. You know, we know your time is very precious with all the initiatives and, you know, traveling you’re doing. So appreciate you taking time outta your day to talk to us here on the Suite Spot. Thank you again for all the work you’re doing over there.
Kevin Carey:
Thank you so much. Thanks, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Thank you. And we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to this special episode of the Suite Spot to hear from two very special guests of the International Luxury Hotel Association. First off, President of the ILHA, Barak Hirschowitz, and Co-Founder of the association, Jonathan Edelheit, join the podcast to preview the upcoming INSPIRE USA conference taking place on December 10-11, in Las Vegas, Nevada.
These two luxury hospitality experts discuss several important topics in this episode, including the humble origin of the ILHA, how the luxury hotel market is leading the industry in innovation, what attendees can look forward to from INSPIRE USA 2025, and much more.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, episode 185, and from the title we are previewing another hospitality event. One of my favorite things to do look at, and this one, it’s a first timer for me, not certainly for our guests. I’m gonna bring them and we’re gonna talk all about it. The Inspire USA event hosted by ILHA, the International Luxury Hotel Association. My two guests with me today, Barak Hirschowitz, President of the ILHA, and Jonathan Edelheit, co-founder of the ILHA, Barak, Jon, thank you so much for taking the time and checking into the Suite Spot with me.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Well, thank you. It’s wonderful to be here and great to meet you.
Ryan Embree:
And we’re excited about it, excited about the event, but before we get into that, I wanna just start with a little bit of hospitality background. We always love to kind of start there. Hospitality’s such a funky industry. People come from different brands, they come from different backgrounds. Sometimes they fall into it, sometimes they fall into the industry with a summer job, sometimes they’re born into the industry. So I figured let’s go ahead and give our Suite Spot audience a little bit of background into your hospitality journey and what led you to the ILHA Barak. We’ll start with you and then go to Jon.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Yeah, thanks. So I started in the industry in the late, late eighties, early nineties. I went to Johnson Wales. I started as a, I started in culinary, as many people do in the hotel industry. And those were interesting times because back then there were really only a couple of places you get a degree in culinary arts. So it led me to, you know, travel abroad, which was great. I started, just before I went overseas, I did an internship at the Grand Floridian, which believe it or not, was still a fairly new hotel back then. And then started working abroad internationally, moved eventually to more the hotel side of the business. I worked in South Africa for some very well-known hotel brands. Sun International. Sun International is Saul K’s original brand that he had when he was still based in South Africa. So that, you know, today we know him for Atlantis and we know him for one, um, one and only hotels. But, um, back then he had Sun International, so I worked with him. I worked for a company called Halian Hotels, which had, uh, luxury hotels in, in South Africa, and actually a few up Africa as well. And, um, I had an opportunity, I guess my sort of real push, first push into luxury was in the late nineties. I got to help open a hotel called Bushman’s Klu in South Africa, which is a luxury safari lodge. The year, within a year of opening, we, um, we became a member of Relay and Chateau, which was a pretty prestigious, uh, pretty prestigious organization. And after I left a couple of years later, the hotel went on to win Best Hotel in the world, um, travel and Leisure. So, you know, that was a, it was really a, a great opportunity to see the best of the best in the world. I still to this day think it’s probably the most luxurious property I’ve ever stayed in, and still the best service, uh, that I’ve ever seen in any hotel. So it was great to be able to work in a place that had that level of, of, um, of luxury and, and, and guest experience. And so I think everything that I see compares to that time back then. So that’s really how I fell into the luxury hotel industry or came into luxury hotel industry.
Ryan Embree:
What an incredible story and journey, one of the questions I pose all the time on this to my podcast guest is, your favorite hotel that you’ve ever stayed in and to be able to work for the number one hotel or have at one point, probably an easy answer to that question. Then, Jon, let’s, let’s move over to you. Where is your kind of background, and hospitality and brought you to ILHA?
Jonathan Edelheit:
I think it was definitely an interesting path over to the ILHA, originally, out of law school, I actually went into the health insurance industry, and then I was the first one to implement corporate wellness programs, employee health and wellness before was employee health and wellness. I, eventually, um, got very passionate about options for healthcare and founded the Medical Tourism Association, which operates all over the world as the Global Trade Association. And, and interestingly that’s, there’s a big segment of luxury, uh, travelers in that who are traveling, who have a lot of money to travel for the best healthcare in the world, stay at luxury, uh, hotels, and also engage in luxury kind of wellness activities. And so, uh, from that space, we, we dealt with a lot of governments, tourism boards, luxury hotels around the world. And that was a little bit of my segue, um, not not sharing the full story of like how Barack and I met and, and the founding of the ILHA, but came in from kind of a, a different side of it and, um, you know, but very passionate about it. And you mentioned about, um, you, the comment about your favorite luxury hotel. When you say that, I feel like it always evokes in all of our minds, you know, we get this visual of a specific hotel or specific experiences that really make us love certain properties. And I feel like that’s something that the luxury side has, that the other side doesn’t have, where, you know, there’s that the, they’re so focused on these special moments in every single detail that it really, I feel like almost seers into your brains and emotions, like some of those special things. And you notice it when it’s not there at properties.
Ryan Embree:
Well, 100%. And that’s why you hear with, uh, especially the luxury sector. I mean, you have generations sometimes going to the same property or hotel that say, you know, my grandparents, I grew up here going to this luxury resort, you know, my parents then brought me, now I’m taking my kids here. You know, really in depth, uh, connections to our guests and travelers that you’re absolutely right, Jon, I think the luxury sector has, and, and it’s such a privilege to be in that space because you really get to emotionally connect with your traveler there. But I love hearing both your stories because it’s a, a, it’s a parallel of what we hear all the time in, in hospitality. One, uh, person that went to school for hospitality and culinary, and then the other one that went to school for something completely different and found themselves. And it’s the perfect mix and match, and that’s what makes our industry hospitality. So great. We’ve had the pleasure on this podcast. We’ve spoken to founders of management companies, you know, even a couple new brands, which seem to be popping up every single day, but I believe this is the first time that we’ve had founders of a hospitality association. So I wanna know what kind of goes through, you know, your mind, what’s the inspiration behind saying, Hey, let’s start this and, and give us kind of that, that background story about the ILHA. Jon, we’ll start with you.
Jonathan Edelheit:
Sure. I think what’s interesting about it is, is probably not many people that are like, let’s go start a, you know, let’s go start a nonprofit trade association, right? But I think you have to be passionate about wanting to bring change and wanting to bring innovation. You know, so you know, how ILHA was, was born, and I’ll tell my side of the story, and then Barak could share his is, you know, we saw this, this very specific fit within medical tourism with the medical tourism association within the luxury hotel segment. And that there needed to be deeper ties and connections to the space because everything needs to be integrative. Someone’s traveling for healthcare with their family, and they’re staying at a luxury property. Like it needs to be interconnected, it can’t be fragmented. And so we decided this was an area that we really needed to have deeper involvement from the luxury hotel side. And so I had reached out to Barak to speak at one of our conferences. And then I’ll let Barak maybe segue in from, from there as we, uh, you know, continue the line of the story.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Yeah. So I think, yeah, definitely I’ll bring you up to how Jon and I met because we started as luxury hotelers for those of that have known us since the beginning. I think what happened when I went to hotel school was we were taught that this is how luxury looks, this is how it smells, this is how it operates, this is how it feels. This is a, we all know that vision. If we’re, if you were in hotel school, uh, you know, even I think of like Alex Soar, president for Europe and Middle East, he went to Lassan, same thing, right? So when he, when we were talking about this, when he was in hotel school, it was, you know, it was marble, it was white table cloth, it was French chef, and pretty much that was luxury, right? So luxury was a very easy to understand, very easy to build or, or vision of what luxury is. And the guest expected, right? Then the internet came along and changed everything, right? So it changed our industry and continues to change it ever since. So let’s say for 300 years, luxury hospitality or luxury hotel industry looked one way, and then all of a sudden it went in a million different directions. And so, and with that, so did the growth of the industry. So at that time, those of us who had started to reach a point in our career where we were making bigger and bigger decisions, often those becoming quite expensive decisions. We couldn’t rely on the information that we learned from, let’s say, the traditional associations in our country that were, you know, the kind of associations that have been going back forever. Or the schools, they were what they had taught us was starting to change. Those rules didn’t work anymore. And so we started to but the internet was, was coming around forums. I dunno if you’re, I’m sure you remember forums were kind of a new thing back then. And so in the early two thousands, we created a forum called Luxury Hotels. And the idea was we invited 50, approximately about 50 hotels that I knew through the industry that were all kind of working internationally for brands, operators, asset management. Some of them were getting to asset management then. And the idea was just to kind of crowdsource or brainstorm some best practices to take on some of these new challenges. And so luxury tellers became this forum. It was around the time LinkedIn was starting as well. So, we moved on, we decided, oh, this looks like a cool tool. I’m not kidding you. And we started our group on LinkedIn, we had to tell people what it was, right? So they were like, well, what’s that? I’m like, it’s just a platform, but it’s kind of cool for this purpose, right? So we started the group and uh, we started just crowdsourcing, asking questions, and it was like a, for the forum just took off. And we were the first hospitality or travel group to ever had a hundred thousand people on LinkedIn. This was quite a long time ago. And at the time, we were a top 100, uh, group. Actually, LinkedIn asked us this. They used us at, they, they used our group as their example at their annual conference. And so of what groups can do, and so to, I mean, there’s so many things, but just to give you like some simple ones from the early days, right? Back then, Chinese travelers were first starting to travel and stay in luxury hotels around the world. And many of the hoteliers didn’t know how to cater for that, right? So we created one of our forum topics was we invited a couple of the hoteliers, uh, Peter Gaston was one of our co-founders, was the time he was he just retired, but he was one of the senior people for Ritz Carlton and Asia based in Hong Kong and a couple of others. And we said like, what can we do for guests that are traveling? And I remember one of the first things that came outta that was, you should put disposable slippers in the room, right? And here today, every time I open like a cupboard in any luxury hotel around the world, and I see the, so this disposable slippers, that was like one of the first things that really, like, it’s a great reminder of like the early days of the organization, but it was, it was, it was things like wifi, should we charge for wifi, you know, all these kind of discussions. We even had, I remember there was a Swiss hotelier that had like four or five ski lodges and was looking, was starting a loyalty program. And he asked for a name, and I think he got like 120 names or something in 24 hours. And he said he was able to pick like two or three names better than any agency could give him, you know? And that’s when we realized, wow, we’ve got some power. So at that point, a lot of the people who were quite actively involved in the forum suggest that we start an association, and we were told, I started to contact some of the existing associations and other people out there that, you know, kind of were involved with associations. And they’re like, why do you wanna do that? You know, the associations are like trying to be what you are today, right? Because back before then, associations, you, you couldn’t only get business information from school and then later on through your company, or if you wanted to know what other people were doing, you had to go to an association, an association event, get the association magazine. But now we had these new online forums where you could share information and it was a little bit more opaque. I mean, it was a little bit more transparent, sorry, and easy to get. And so, but at the same time, I think you need that connection and just structure, because we were all just volunteering our time. And that’s, as Jon said, he invited me to speak at an event. He had a very successful travel association. I the event that I attended, I think he had about four or 5,000 people at. And we were chatting afterwards, and that’s when he, you know, he suggested to us that we start the association, or at least to give us the structure of an association. As Jon mentioned, he went to law school, and so he really knew the ins and outs of that. So we were able to kind of combine the best of both worlds, which is this very large audience that we have, but then take in some of the structure of an association so that we could really employ some people to help this thing continue to grow.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s incredible foresight to see, I mean, LinkedIn in the early days, I remember that was just a big job board for a lot of people for you. So for you to see the foresight to say, Hey, let’s use this as open forum. Let’s stop. You know, Jon, you mentioned fragmentation of the industry sometimes and silos that what that we sometimes find ourselves in, but to exchange those ideas because the luxury traveler today is truly international, and the luxury segment. So to make sure that you’re sharing those ideas, seeing those trends, and I’m sure a lot of those get brought up at the, what we’re previewing today, the inspire USA, event that we’re gonna turn our attention to December 10th and 11th, 2025 marks the 16th edition. It’s gonna mark the first edition that I will be going there. Almost positive you guys have been at every single one. Maybe talk us through the evolution of what year one looks like in comparison to year 16 and what the, and what we have in store for in Vegas this year.
Jonathan Edelheit:
Cool. Well, Jon, you were pretty heavily involved in year one, so let’s give you, uh, let’s give you the, the start on that one.
Jonathan Edelheit:
Yeah, no, I mean, I think year one was interesting. I forget what city that took place in Barak, but,
Barak Hirschowitz:
DC.
Jonathan Edelheit:
Okay. Because I remember Orlando, we had the elephant. We had a 10,000 pound elephant to come in the room. Her name was Roxy. And that was a theme around the elephant in the room. The industry was this topic. But, you know, when we started, it was, you know, ILHA, you know, was built out at the same time as we were holding our medical tourism conference, because part of the purpose of that was to lend the expertise of, you know, running a trade show is not easy. You know, the executive producers, the management, the space, there’s a huge investment in, in organizing it to launch it. And so, you know, I, you know, it, it’s always exciting and stressful when you’re in events because it’s not just, you know, from the first events, I feel like is the hardest. But at the same time, as you grow, I almost feel like there’s more pressure in year 16 than than previous years, because you always have to be better, right? You’ve gotta bring in, you know, better speakers. You have to have growth. You have to really dive into innovation and what people want. So the first year, it was a smaller event, but great in the fact that it’s new, right? So people come, everyone’s passionate, and every year we’ve really, um, striven to, you know, grow and make the, the, the attendees more diverse, bring in always better speakers, you know, and, and stay on top of what’s going on in luxury hotels and travel all around the world so people can get everything. ’cause like you said, is back in the day, I feel like luxury travel was almost like very siloed in the type of people that would travel. And now it’s a very diverse industry. I’m sure there’s people who still potentially don’t under, uh, understand it because you also have segments of luxury that like, where wealthy people can’t afford those luxury hotels because there’s all these different segments going. What I’m excited about is just, you know, some of the niche in our events going forward, focusing on all these areas of personal experience and the breadth of where we’re seeing luxury, luxury go. But I’ll, I’ll turn it over to Barak.
Barak Hirschowitz:
So, and although our event was quite small, as Jon said, you know, at the first event, it was actually a large event. So what happened was, and this is the benefit of partnerships, right? So by meeting Jon, they already had four and a half thousand people coming to their travel conference. So he gave us space and the expertise and the lift to be able to build a co-located show within his show. So the amazing thing was that even though our show was a segment of his, you know, a smaller part of his show, and we did that for about three years before we were able to kind of really have the size to go out on our own. But those first couple of years were great because people who attended the event for them, I mean, they were able to attend basically two events in one. We had some really high powered, high level speakers because of the size of Jon’s event, and that really gave us a lot of cloud in the early days. So, you know, I can’t thank Jon enough for taking us and helping us have kind of those training wheels in the early days and make us, we were able to bat a lot bigger than we you know, than we were at that time. So that was great. I think it really helped us.
Jonathan Edelheit:
Barak, I just had the flashback to, I think it was after the three years, Barak said, Hey, listen, we, we need to be in a luxury hotel now, because we were doing it in convention centers, right? A luxury hotel conference can’t really be in a convention center.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Although I say I say that. And now it’s interesting because, and, and I know we’re the topic of this, this, this, uh, podcast is on the INSPIRE USA, but I’d like to mention that we inspire, Europe is returning for its third year, and it’s actually next month, uh, in November. So it’s, it’ll be the 12th and the 13th in Prague. And Prague is, we’re very excited because Prague doesn’t normally get larger conference. They’re obviously, it’s a very, very busy tourism city, probably one of the best, and busiest tourist cities in Europe. But they don’t get a lot of meetings there because large meetings there because of the hotels that are quite small. And so for us, even just to find a hotel that could hold more than a couple of hundred people was difficult. So we partnered with the grand with the Park Hyatt there. However, the event is actually taking place in the Czech National Bank headquarters Congress Center. So it’s their former, their former, stock exchange commodities exchange, which is the most beautiful you can imagine. The bank uses it, and Moody’s just had their European conference there. So it’s this very beautiful royal building, and it’s right across the street from the hotel. So we’re very excited to be having that there. But yeah, and that’s only because we’ve, there just wasn’t the capacity for us there, um, in luxury hotel, but fortunately in, uh, in the us there is, and so we’re, we’re back in Vegas again this year, um, at Resorts World, and we’re really looking forward to, to that.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that’s what I was gonna say, and Jon, to your comment, you know, you say bigger and better. So I’m expecting two elephants this year, uh, in Vegas, but you know, I don’t know.
Jonathan Edelheit:
I dunno if they’ll let us in the convention center. Where we either Orlando, our executive producer thought we were crazy, and it took about a couple calls over a month, and she was like, oh, you’re serious. And then two weeks later, she called back and said, you won’t believe it, Jonathan, but there’s an elephant sanctuary outside of Orlando, and we can get the elephant in the convention center. Said, we’ve never had a request like this before, but then they approved it.
Ryan Embree:
Hey, there you go. You know, and anything can, especially in Vegas too, anything can happen. So let, let’s try to make it happen. But I do wanna talk to you about that location is everything in hospitality when you’re talking hotels, but it, the same can be true with a successful hospitality event returning to Vegas this year. Barak, why, and maybe you can speak specifically to Resorts World, why was just this makes the perfect venue, for Inspire USA this year?
Barak Hirschowitz:
Yeah, so we had a wonderful event last year in Las Vegas. We’ve been we were a few years ago, we were at the Four Seasons Las Vegas, which we loved. It was a great event. They just, we just outgrew the space that they have there. Vegas is a, you know, Vegas is one of those places where you’re when you grow, if you get too big, I mean, if you get too big for the regular hotels, you still have to get a little bit larger to get into the very big spaces. So it’s kind of awkward and it can be tricky to find the right space. And last year we did with the Fountain Blue, we were very excited to be one of their first events from their opening, and we really enjoyed it. We try to change it up every year just to have something a little bit different. But Las Vegas was so successful for us that people just felt we should, we’ve never kept it in the same place two years in a row. We’ve always moved it kind of East Coast, west Coast, and, um, I chatted and so we, you know, we, we decided to, let’s, hey, let’s, we loved it. It was just so great being in Vegas, and it was easy for people to get to and there. And so we decided to look around, see what was there, and the weeks that we normally would do it at the Fountain Blue was, had already been booked from a year earlier. So we knew we were gonna have to be in a different location. Went over to Resorts World, checked it out, and while we were there, carnival uh, cruise Line was actually having a conference there. Arnold Donald, who used to the previous CEO had actually, um, been a speaker at one of our conferences previously. Uh, uh, and so I, I met a couple of his people there, uh, and they said, oh, come in and have a look around. And the space was perfect for us. So we, you know, we approached them and we’re very excited. It’s kind of a, it’s kind of a fun space because the area that we’re in is, it’s there, you know, the, the, there’s the normal convention side, and then there’s the part we, where we are is, is kind of like where the, a lot of the restaurants and things are. So it’s got a very engaged feel. Often I think you feel in meeting spaces, like you could be anywhere in the world. You know, meeting spaces tend to look a lot similar. What I’m very proud of this year is that both of our events are one in Prague and the one in Las Vegas, they don’t feel like they’re in convention space. So the space, for instance, that we’re in is multi, it’s kind of multi-floor, very unique space, but it’s also got views full floor to ceiling, you know, instead of looking at banqueting walls, we’re looking at floor to ceiling views of the strip. So, very excited about that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you can’t get much better than that. And that’s the beauty of having those connections made. You know, you might have a connection having a conference or convention in the Hotel next door, and you can go ahead and poke your head in and maybe see if it’s right for, for your association. So, uh, very cool. Jon, any thoughts on, on returning back to Vegas this year?
Jonathan Edelheit:
I’m excited to return back to Vegas, and I’m also excited, while the Fountain View Blue is a beautiful property just opened, I think a lot of our attendees also, they wanna experience other luxury hotels. They want to see everything that they have from the rooms to like, you know, just all the different aspects of it. So I think it’s just cool to be able to move around and showcase that. And I think the thing that excites me the most is we’ve really created this special place where the VIPs in the industry, you know, the owners, the asset managers, the hospitality management companies, the GMs can come together in like kind of an intimate group and share innovation and connect. And I think we’ve fostered a really great environment where it’s not in any way clique-ish. It’s like you can, you know, you, you could be standing there and meet the CEO of Carnival Cruise Lines or, or Virgin Hotels or the owners, uh, you know, someone who owns a hundred hotels and, and just like a normal person, and you can have a conversation. And that’s one thing I really love about our show is, you know, we’ll participate in shows in the hotel space, but I feel like there, there’s these big exhibitions where just you’re just meeting exhibitors. It’s mid-level people and you know, you’re just, you’re learning of our products, but there aren’t decision makers. And I just love the fact that we bring those decision makers that kind of share what they’re doing that’s special and that we can kind of impact the industry, but bring it together in more of an intimate setting. And we’ve also always tried to really control, um, that while we have sponsors, you know, that it’s, that it’s a limited number of sponsors, that it’s the right sponsors and that, you know, there’s that those right connections take place.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Sorry, John, I was gonna jump in. Um, I’d also just feel like this is a good time to, just a big shout out to, um, Encore and Cvent our event partners. They, um, well, obviously Cvent has, they, they do all of our, you know, our ticketing and registration, and they’ve made that really easy. But Encore, they have been supporting us over the years with, with just amazing innovative, uh, event tech. But I try to push the boundaries a little bit every year and try to think outside the box on how we can do this. Last year we wanted all stages in one. I think for us, when we can speak to this, I think, you know, it really lends to networking when you can keep people in the same area. And I think one of the problems with events and event spaces is often you’re spread out all over different places. So we pushed them last year, um, or not pushed them, we challenged them last year to come up with ways to keep everybody in the same space. And so they created these stages within spaces, um, so that you never had to leave the main space to go to any meeting space. And it meant doing something that was very unusual and it was very successful. And so when we met this year, they were like, what are you gonna do for us this year? What are you gonna, what’s, what’s the challenge for this year? So I said, well, this year we are going to, I said, you know, to be honest, conferences are great and they’re really important. Um, and it does, we, we do try to keep ours limited. We’re not trying to be an expo, but at the same time, most people can’t go to them, right? And we have to be respectful that our audience and our community, most of them are not gonna be able to attend this event, right? If you have 500,000 people that are in one way or another, connecting with you and your content and what you guys do in participating, there’s no way. So what we do is we give away everything, all of our content’s given away. It’s all recorded, and it’s all shared for free to everyone that’s out there that wants it. We’ve always done that. And so this year, to make that easier, we, our challenge to encore and, um, Helen and Brad from Encore, who have really, and their teams, was to create stages that were actually recording studios. So this year, all the stages are actually recording studios, and they’ve, they’ve built them to look like TV studios. So when our, and also I said, we don’t want anyone to feel like when you have multiple stages, there’s always like, oh, we wanna be on that stage or the stage. I said, each stage has to stand on its own at its own level so that when somebody speaks, whether they’re in, you know, the bigger room, I guess you could say, or the smaller. So we took these unique spaces that they created and we really built, like for instance, to me, the one that’s standout is a full on, it’s a full recording studio in an all in kind of a converted, um, they use it as meeting space, but it’s a converted, uh, retail luxury retail space that’s right next to us. And, but it’s all glass. So people from the whole, so while there were gonna be, you know, it has seating as a stage would normally have, but it’s built like a TV studio and it’s all glass, and you can see it from across the Mall of Resorts world. So as people are at restaurants and shops, they’re gonna kind of that times square effect where you, you’re in Times Square and you watch them shooting TV shows, it’s gonna look like that. So we’re really excited about that part of it this year.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s so cool. Another example of you guys breaking down barriers and silos, again, to give that content out and share that with everyone. Especially, I mean, right now we are at a really unique time in our industry where, I’ve talked about it on the podcast before about, I think hoteliers are, yeah, I’ll create a new term here, like FOMOT, which is like the fear of missing out on technology. And they are really, really nervous about, am I implementing technology enough or are my competitors ahead of me? So it these intimate settings that you’re talking about, you know, like Inspire, USA, these are great forums and opportunities for hoteliers to talk about that challenges that they’re having, the wins that they’re having, you know, and, and actually get a better sense and calibrate where they sit in trends, issues, and challenges that they’re having in the hospitality space. And that’s what we’ve craved and missed so much when events kind of disappeared, uh, on us, uh, a couple years ago. So, really excited to do that. And, you know, looking at the speaker list for the event, it’s really a who’s who in luxury hospitality. We could almost have an entire episode based on this agenda that I’ve seen so far. But Barak, Jon, what, what sessions are you most excited about, uh, seeing in this year’s educational programming? Barak will start with you.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Well, I’m not gonna fall into that trap of answering that question,
Jonathan Edelheit:
Ryan, you know, you’d mentioned something before about tech and I, I think it’s important because one thing I love about the luxury segment is that they invest, right? And they’re looking at the most advanced tech and the most, you know, the best experience they can give. And I notice it ’cause I always stay at different luxury hotels. I don’t stick to one brand ’cause I wanna see what’s going on no matter where I travel, Latin America, Asia, you know, uh, middle East, and you know, and then you, you see stuff you love and then you go to another hotel and you’re like, oh, this is so frustrating, right? Like, uh, uh, especially stuff you can do with your phone. But also, I was recently at a show, um, I won’t say what show it is, but like, big, big, big hotel, hospitality tech show and you know, and there was all different tech there, you know, like from the robot making coffee and espressos and cappuccino to other things. And, and I was talking and I was like, you know, going through and saying like, oh, this would be amazing. Like if this was at a hotel, like it wouldn’t be just cool for me. But like my kids, anyone with family members would love a robot making their cappuccinos. And I’ll sometimes talk to like, go around to look what’s innovative, what would be good for the luxury space, and talk to them. And it’s funny ’cause it’s like, how’s your adoption going? And they’ll be like, well it’s, it’s, it’s not, you know, we’re having a hard time penetrating the hotel space. And it’s like, who are you selling to? And they’ll be like, well, we’re selling to, you know, the, they’ll throw out the normal brands like mid-market, right? Or, or lower market. And I’ll be like, well, have you talked to the luxury side? And and they’ll be like, no. And I’ll be like, but you realize like they’re the ones investing in all this new cool stuff where mid-market and the lower market. Like, they’re not making investments in that stuff. And I think it’s important if you’re doing something innovative in technology or just innovative in the hotel space, the luxury hotels are very successful. Post pandemic revenue’s gone up, everybody’s spending money. There’s different segments. These are the groups that are willing to push the edge on innovation. And then the mid-market and the others are looking at one luxury. Every fo everyone follows luxury to see what they’re doing. For me, an exciting thing for the upcoming conferences, uh, one of the sessions on longevity, everybody says they do wellness. And I think, um, you know, like every hotel and then you don’t know what, what true is wellness or wellbeing, uh, ’cause right? ’cause every hotel is doing something very specific and sometimes it’s not defined. And I think we have some really great brands and some innovators coming to speak. And I think there’s gonna be this big change in the industry about, it’s gonna go from maybe general wellbeing to like very, there’s gonna be a niche of very, very serious where it’s like people looking at, you know, how do I live longer? How do I, um, my, my maybe my quality of life. So maybe I’m 70, but I’m, I’m, I’m, I’m 50 a 50-year-old. Like, you know, you know, in the 70-year-old body reverse aging, reverse disease, we’re starting to see a lot of luxury properties around the world roll out stem cells to reverse disease and reverse aging. I went through stem cells about a year ago, um, in my biological age reduced by seven years. And, uh, and we’re seeing this huge investment in properties now, bringing clinics in and looking at, you know, mixing, um, not, I wouldn’t say healthcare, right? You’re not coming and, you know, and, and, and, uh, and getting something where all my knee hurts or I’m sick. It’s more of I wanna know what’s going on in my entire body and I want all the most cutting edge like, um, supplements or tests or things where I can learn like how to reverse aging, reverse diseases, live a better life for me or my family members. And, you know, being at the front of it, and in a lot of these conversations as these projects are being developed are in the conceptual phase. I’m super excited because I think we’re gonna see this wave of a lot of longevity, serious longevity pop up in luxury hotels around the world. It’s already starting, but the wave’s coming and then projects get launched around true serious intense wellbeing. And it could be a mix of western medicine and eastern medicine. And I think that also what we’re seeing is people realize they’re not getting this from their doctor. They’re not getting it from, if they have insurance, insurance isn’t really covering anything. And so what they’re looking at is, where can I go take a vacation, but at the same time get this like complete check-in. And then there’s another segment of it that I think that depending on the segment of the guest and the, the, the wealth, right? There’s this signal, um, a virtue signaling was like, you know what? I just spent 25 grand for this, right? I just went to this luxury hotel and I spent 50 grand for this experience and now I’m gonna live longer and my family’s gonna live longer and we’re gonna live healthier. But I’m excited to it because I wanna go stay at these properties. I want to go through these experiences.
Barak Hirschowitz:
I was just gonna say, it’s, it’s very exciting. So we have, and Jon’s I think introduced us to some amazing, um, so, you know, if you, if you’re not able to come to the event, certainly keep following us. Um, you know, we’ve, we’ve we’ve learned a lot about longevity and how it’s moving. Some real examples like Clinique la Prairie from, um, Switzerland, for instance, one of the original Longevity institutes. Not many people know this. It’s, uh, what’s the cost to stay there, Jon, for a week?
Jonathan Edelheit:
Yeah, I I feel like it’s, I could be wrong. Like it could be like 40, 50,000. It’s not, yeah,
Barak Hirschowitz:
It’s really, it’s in the tens of thousands to stay there for a week, I believe. And they’ve just opened, um, they’ve opened in, um, in Dubai, um, in a hotel in Dubai. They’ve opened, um, their opening in Saudi, in China, in Thailand, um, all in partnerships with luxury hotels. And these are, people will pay to travel to these, um, to these longevity institutes that are now being built into luxury hotels. So that’s a really exciting part of it. And then just to, to kind of pivot back to the question that you were asking about, you know, some of the sessions coming up and who the speakers we have, I’m really, I mean, every year our team really knock it out the park with speakers, but the lineup this year is like, is the who’s who of everyone. So whether it’s on the investment side, on the finance side, I mean, we’ve got John Tore, uh, Dan Peak, we’ve got um, uh, Glenda Powell, we’ve got Jonathan Fick, all these people that are, I dunno if you, you know, check out our agenda. But they’re all like the heads of, you know, leading companies on the capital, on the real estate side of the industry. And then of course, big management companies, Walter Eisenberg’s back again this year with us for our CEO of Sage and a lot of the big management companies with president of Abridge for Europe, speaking in Europe. And so we have really the who’s who on, on not just the, the brand side, of course, you know, hor Hor Schultz is gonna be with us this year, one of the co-founders of Ritz Carlton, an iconic hotelier if there’s ever one. And so we have, it’s, it’s hard to pinpoint specific sessions, but if you wanted to kind of like see some of the diversity of sessions we have and how wide ranging it is, we’ll be talking about like investment. Obviously we, we know there’s headwinds right in, in, in the real estate side of the industry right now with capital markets being what they are. And we’re at the top of a long time growth in hospitality. So we’re starting to deal with some of those headwinds. So how we could turn those headwinds into opportunity. But we have literally like the biggest people in industry speaking about, right? So the, the, the who, who then you kind of flip to like sports tourism is a really big thing. Um, I’ve traveled for sport. I’m, I’m a marathon runner, so I, I do a lot of that kind of thing. So we have like, uh, it’s just really interesting ’cause we have like a session on, on, on how hotels are starting and obviously Vegas is a perfect example of Formula One. So, um, one of our partners, a DA cosmetics, I don’t know if you know this, but a DA cosmetics is part of BWT, which is the owners of the, of the, um, Alpine, uh, formula One team. So, um, they are, you know, gonna be talking to us. We have a confirmed 360 who, they’re providers, I don’t know if many people know this, but they, they’re behind some of the biggest concierge companies around there. Like when you go to one of those concierge companies and you say, Hey, I need tickets for Taylor Swift Front Row, can you get ’em? They’re the ones that actually get those tickets. And so confirm 360 are actually partnering with us, with us this year because they, they used to really just do this for elite concierge services, but now they’ve started to extend it to the hotel industry and, um, especially now that guests are relying more and more on the hotels for coming up with this kind of stuff. And so they’re doing an activation for us where, um, they’re gonna give our, our attendees an opportunity to go to the stadium, um, the Raider Stadium and take a tour, go back, back tour of it and things like that. So, um, that’s very, very cool. We have, uh, as Jonathan mentioned, we talk about things like wellness. Technology’s obviously huge, so we have a lot of sessions on, on that side, F and BI mean, for most of these investment people who attend, they rarely have F and b um, sessions, you know, so for them, they’re, they’re picking up on stuff that’s like sustainability and f and b and things that they maybe wouldn’t connect with at other conferences. So we’ll be talking about, um, obviously like the big labor challenges and some of the trends, brand and luxury, we try to look at the advantage of being at the end of the year is we kind of, we look at what people have spoken about already and then we kind of look at what’s really coming in. And I’m gonna tell you like my, my, I I, I have something personal every year that I kind of take on that. I think just from our big picture perspective as the president, like what is something that’s like right now, like this year that people haven’t quite clicked with yet. And for me, odd message, and like I said, I’m speaking about it next year, at our next week we’re at a vendor conference in Texas is, and I spoke recently at a conference for the, I was invited to speak at the, at the fitness industry, CEO summit, which is really unusual for me to be there. And they wanted hospitality in there. And it’s along the same lines, which is really, you know, guests are now expecting this kind of stuff, right? Like, I think fitness and wellness, this is the year that that changes, right? I think most guests are not happy anymore with your crappy gym. They’re not happy with crappy gym equipment. They want classes in the hotels. They want things like this. And so we’re actually partnering with some of the biggest fitnesses organizations. Not just the equipment makers, but actually gym companies too. There’s always gonna be the innovators, like, you know, Equinox and these guys who, who, who partner with these gyms, the Epic and Miami, who has, you know, a gym with glasses and one hotels and those brands that were, they’ve, they’ve been in it already, but for everybody else out there, you know, this is the thing where the guests are now starting, it’s the wifi of today. Like, what is your fitness offering at your hotel? And I think that that’s like, I think part of the driving, like I would leave with people today to start p their eye on that. And then also, but then how do we know we as hoteliers, how do we know when we need to do this? And this, my thing this year is your suppliers or yours service providers or vendors or whatever you wanna call ’em, they are often the brightest minds in your hotel when it comes to answering these questions. Right? We had, at our event last year, Serta, one of our longtime partner Serta Simmons, brought in sleep scientists. ’cause we’re in the business of sleep, right? And the funny thing is, we are terrible at it. Like we think we’re good at it, but we’re putting in LED lights, we have curtains that don’t close. We put super high thread count sheets onto mattresses that basically we didn’t know this. And their sleep scientists came in and said, listen, you realize if you go super high thread count, you’re saran wrapping a mattress and a mattress designed to take heat away from your body. So what’s the guest gonna do? They’re gonna crank up the ac. So not only are you paying for fancy sheets, the guest is unhappy and your your energy bill goes up. So by realizing that some of our ven our vendors are, you know, they’re not just selling to us, they’re selling in retail and they know what is, they know how to use their products, but they also know what the consumer market wants today, what, what’s important for them today and what’s coming. And so, you know, I think that that’s something that I, I I, our this year’s leave is don’t just look at your suppliers and your vendors as like somebody who brings you something or you purchase something from, think of them as actually the solution or the expertise that you need to make some of these decisions around. Like, don’t just go and go, Hey, I need 3000 mattresses. Go to them and say, how can you like, help our guests sleep better or help us understand how to do this better. You know, same thing, but we used coffee as an example earlier, like, how am I supposed to know about my guest today wants to know where this coffee was sourced, what kind of bean it is? You know, how am I supposed to know all this stuff? Right? Well, if you have a good coffee supplier, they can tell you and they can also tell you what the guests are expecting and what’s important to ’em today. And so, um, you know, that’s I think something that I just, I feel for us is really important this year is just really teaching the hoteliers how to look at their partners, just not as suppliers, but also as like as, as a wealth of knowledge to help them keep up with these guests that are, you know, constantly demanding something new because that’s what they have at home now.
Jonathan Edelheit:
And you can’t get, you can’t get away with you what you could in the past. I feel like, you know, if I’m at a luxury hotel and the coffee in the room is not good, it’s poor. Like that’s a reason for me not to come back to that luxury hotel as a little ’cause you just don’t expect it. Or you’re talking about the gym is, you know, when I go to Abu Dhabi, I love staying at the Grand Hyatt. It’s one half of the four is the gym facing the sea. Right. It’s gorgeous. You get like, they get it. I love working out. It’s a place. And then I, you know, and then you go to like, I think it was the St. Regis in Doha. And I go and it’s kind of like in the basement, it’s small, everything is packed in. It’s older. You’re looking at walls everywhere and you’re like, you know, like this is not the experience that your guests who are coming for, who this is important for them. It’s like you have to, you know, every guest has their own passion and you know, within that space, like, and you have to be able to accommodate them. And I think it’s so much more in the details of what matters to each of ’em that’s important.
Barak Hirschowitz:
We don’t, yeah. And we don’t, as hoteliers we don’t, what do we know about gyms? Right? So, you know, I I try, I also say to, you know, our industry has an incredibly high turnover. We always have. We always will, right? And as much as we try to improve that, it’s the nature of our business that whatever you bring in, it’s, you need to make it something that is, we’re not act, we, we have a high turnover. And that does tend to hurt sometimes us being able to kind of keep up as well with this demand. So not only are we like battling to kind of keep our staff and keep our turnovers low, but we’re trying to understand what these guests want all the time. And I think that’s where like, you don’t need to be an expert, but you can partner with a gym company who can tell you how to run a gym. I mean, as simple as take the equipment you have in it, let’s say you bought really nice equipment, but is it placed correctly in the gym? Do you have, you know, if I walk into one more gym and I look at a bowl of apples and some towels and a pa plastic water dispenser with paper cups, then I know you’re doing the absolute bare minimum congratulations. Right? But those guests don’t want that. They want, they go to the gym five times a week and they’re traveling and they want to have a similar experience. So you better partner with a gym or get a gym company to help sort that out. And I think that that’s where I think we don’t need to be overwhelmed, right? We just have to look at our partners and find the right partners who are experts at it and say, Hey, listen, we don’t know anything about gyms but our guests, it’s really important to them. How can we get classes in here? How can we make our gyms better, um, help us understand how to do that.
Jonathan Edelheit:
That’s, we’re, we’re harping on gyms, but I’ll go when I was, I was just in Malaysia at the, uh, was it the four c St. Regis. And I walk in and they have, like, I travel a lot and I get back pain from long flights and they have the, the one piece of the back equipment that I, that just solves all my back pay. And, you know, you see it and you’re like, you’re just so excited. And every day I go to work out, but to use that piece of equipment, I’m not a runner like Barack, but it’s like those things matter. And I think hotels need to ask the experts in the industry versus just saying, we just, you know, we’re gonna do the bare minimum, we’ll have the equipment and that’s it. I don’t think they understand the importance.
Barak Hirschowitz:
So, and they, but their guests understand the importance and, you know, again, they don’t need to know. They, they, you know, today’s GI guess the, the, the takeaway is that, you know, today’s innovation is tomorrow’s baseline and you need to kind of keep up with that. And that’s, I think what our association has really been trying to help a lot of, uh, hoteliers understand is, okay, where are we in the cycle from innovative? Like, cool, you can have it and you can really impress guests. Um, to, you know, the first time I ever saw classes in a, in a gym was when we held an event at the Epic in Miami, I mean in a hotel. And today it’s like, it’s gonna be normal. I would say within two years. Most luxury hotels will have some sort of classes, whether they’re virtual or not. So in, across whatever it is that we, whatever our is that our guests want, you know, we, we need to know where they’re at in that cycle.
Jonathan Edelheit:
The other thing is how do you measure and track stuff? So my wife’s traveling to a luxury hotel in like two weeks, right? And I’ve texted, I WhatsApp the hotel several times ’cause they have a WhatsApp number. They don’t answer, they don’t answer their phone for some reason a couple times. And they don’t respond to WhatsApps. It’s been three WhatsApps in 48 hours. So someone at that hotel has decided, right, I’m gonna implement this technology so guests can communicate with us easier. But what happens when that doesn’t happen? And I’ve had that happen on other trips where they have WhatsApp, they have what texting and it takes hours for people to respond. Then you go to a property where you do it and there’s an instant response, right? So it’s, you know, you can go adopt the most cutting edge tech, but are your people trained? Are you measuring it? Are you doing it right? And getting that, you know, that the benefit out of adopting it.
Barak Hirschowitz:
We’ll cover a lot of that stuff at the event of course. Um, and, you know, we’ll this is kind of what we talk about. So you’re, I guess we should, we should we, we could probably talk for days and hours, very passionate as you can see about this kind of stuff. But I think to kind of bring it back to the event a little bit and, and look at what we have, uh, coming up. I mean, it’s, I think you’re gonna have, we try to balance a little bit in each category. So one thing you can expect is that there’s going to be something at least two or three sessions very specific to your niche. And then we highly suggest you go to other topics that maybe you wouldn’t normally attend because you’re still gonna go to those other shows in your niche, right? This is the one chance you get to go listen to some of the speakers about some things that are very relevant to you, but maybe not something you deal in your day to day, especially at events. And then we have some fun stuff around the event as well. Um, we’re doing, like a vendor is one of our biggest partners that I, I mentioned, I’m speaking at their conference next week. Um, they’re doing a, like a whole networking thing for us on the, on the first evening we have a president’s dinner. I, it’s a invitation only event that we do. It’s, um, it’s, we don’t reveal it until we have a really cool, um, activations company that helps us put it together and we don’t reveal much about it until the time. Come to the event and find out. Um, there you go. Yeah. So there’s gonna be a lot going on. It’s, it’s really, I I think it’s, it’s big, but it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s a small event in that intimate, like if you come there for two days, you’re gonna pretty much get to meet most of the people that are there. And not that many events I would say can say that about, about networking.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that’s why I love these preview episodes because the intentionality behind these conferences. ’cause as attendees sometimes we just, you know, we show up, we see the agenda, we see all the programming and the intentionality behind your education, your programming, the activations and the hard work behind that and the, and the reason why, you know, even from the location to the time of year that you, uh, you know, you, uh, host this show. It’s so, it, it, it’s so methodical. It’s, it’s so cerebral and what you guys are doing. I’m, I’m so excited. I mean, you guys have got me pumped up and energized to go, uh, in, in December. Um, and one thing on wellness and longevity, I mean, we, we talked at the top of this episode about how, you know, luxury travel has a special connection to people, you know, through tradition, you know, and, and connection and, and that longevity, that wellness, you know, it, you can call the trend, you can, it’s, it’s here to stay. I think we’ve all identified that that’s just the natural next step with luxury because, you know, it’s obviously has a strong connection to our soul. The next part of that is your body, right? So that’s what the luxury travel is going to anticipate. Like you were saying, Barack anticipating the needs before you know it, you’re not waiting for those o other sectors, like John was saying, for the brand to mandate it. You wanna be in front of this, you wanna be the trendsetter. And that’s, that’s what luxury hospitality has always been. It’s been the trendsetter for hospitality. So as we wrap up, you know, I want to ask, it’s my first time going maybe with our audience, uh, considering, uh, attending, uh, for the first time. What would be one tip from each of you, uh, for a first time attendee of this conference? Jon, we’ll start with you.
Jonathan Edelheit:
Uh, I think it would be that that common phrase, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. Uh, just, just kidding. I would say, you know, be, be confident and, and you know, everyone is very open, right? So don’t be intimidated of, oh, I’m going and I, there’s a CEO or an owner or hospitality management company. You know, walk up, be friendly, engage people, talk to people. You, I mean, you could pretty much meet almost everybody at our conference, right? I think for everyone is very open to networking and connecting, um, and learning. And so come with that open mind. Don’t, don’t worry about, oh, is this gonna be a clique-ish event? So can I just go walk up and talk to this CEO of a hotel or the CEO of a hospitality management company? I, I think that’s one of the best things about, about our event is you can meet anybody, you can talk to anybody, learn anything. Um, so, so, so come with that and come with that mindset of you’re gonna be social.
Barak Hirschowitz:
For me, um, what I would say is, and I’ll, I’ll back this up. Um, I think that this event, what surprises a lot of people, I think a lot of shows, especially expos, they have sessions. I’ve spoken at those sessions and I think that they’re, they’re not the main purpose of those events. And so when people come, they miss out maybe on a lot of expertise that’s given. I think at our event, it’s really focused around sessions. Take the time. If you get a, if you get invited or you buy a ticket or whatever, and you come to this event, take the time to go to as many sessions as you can. I’ve had some of the most experienced hoteliers in the world attend sessions at our event, come out with like notebooks full of stuff because this event was actually built for the highest level of, of decision making in the industry. So we, we really have incredible content try to go to that. Everything is recorded and it’s gonna be given away for free. But I feel like, and at, at the end of this, uh, over the year, so you’ll get access to it. But I feel like if you come in person, it’s different. And I would say bring somebody, so the people who come to me, like the ones that really wow me every year are, I get, we get like general, we’ll get like a GM or an MD of a the luxury hotel and they’ll bring like a couple of their staff members with them, their team, and the next year they bring like two more and it’s like a reward for them because they just said it’s, they learn so much at that event and it just motivates them going into the new year. So I said I would back it up. I’ve, what I am prepared to do is I, ’cause I feel it’s really important, I’ve seen it over the years. If there is any manager, general manager, hotel owner, anybody who would like to bring somebody from their team, we’ll give them a pass. So if they buy a pass, we’ll give them a pass so that they can bring one of the, because I know it’s not always, you know, it’s expensive. The good news is this year, one thing about resorts world is that they have two, we have two hotels. So we have the Conrad and we have the Hilton. So you can pretty much find anything for your budget. I think the range is pretty wide with that. But at the same time, like I said, I, I think it’s super, it’s not just for you. I think we talked about our t um, industry having, we are in the business of people, we’re a people business. And if I learned anything about being in the best hotel in the world, it’s that where most other hotels fall short on the service side is that they don’t delegate enough expertise to, or, or even bandwidth to solve guest problems to their, to their, to the people below them, their line team and stuff like that. So I think that to empower them, not just being able to take care of their guests, but also giving really big picture understanding of what’s going on in the industry is very powerful and motivating for them. So again, I I advise that anybody that’s coming here for the first time, um, bring somebody from your team and reach out to us and say, Hey, Barack said that we get free passes, he’ll match whatever we buy. So my two passes, I’ll give you two passes because the more of your team you bring, I think the more benefit you’re gonna have and it’s gonna see right? It’s gonna go right through. It’s a great way to start your new year.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And, and those topics and sessions that you were talking about Barack have heard, you know, are great conversation starters. They’re great icebreakers for, you know, what John, you know, advice was, uh, to to talk about, you know, how people are implementing longevity into their hotel brand or, or into their luxury property. So, you know, there’s a lot of continuity there. Uh, really excited for that. Uh, hopefully there will be a lot of sweet spot listeners and, and luxury hoteliers that we meet out in Vegas. Appreciate both of you coming on. You know, as we wrap up today, would love to hear as co-founders, you know, here we are, 16th edition of the Inspire USA event. You said third edition of the, uh, inspire Europe. You know, what’s your, what’s your vision for the future of ILHA as we move into, you know, the, the back half of the, the 2020s? Uh, Jon, we’ll start with you.
Jonathan Edelheit:
Uh, you know, I’m excited to, uh, I would say expansion in other regions of the world. You know, we’re, we’re working on stuff where there’s tremendous innovation and investment in the luxury hotel side. Um, so we’re looking at, you know, how we could, I don’t,
Barak Hirschowitz:
Yeah, I mean, I, and also it’s interesting. We, I think we get to see like what’s going on around the world. Very, it’s, it’s kind of fun sitting in, like John’s speaking about, like we, as we know here in the US for instance, the, the, the, the investment side is slowing down, right? So in real estate, but we know that in, like John’s very big, he’s on his way to Saudi next week. Um, he’s involved in a lot of big projects that are going on in there and in Asia, some of the projects in Asia and stuff like that. So there is stuff booming around the world, and that’s what’s good as well as is that it, you know, when one area starts to dip, the other area picks up. And so we can kind of give a perspective of that. But I’ll also say that the, the future of ILHA is really not up to us. It never has been. It’s always been organic and we’ve, you, we have, we’re it’s not John or I, you the organization is, is, is, is, is hundreds of thousands of people. And what happens is that pockets of those people start to say, Hey, we want to do something, right? We have a chapter in LA that just, you know, kind of came up over the last couple of years and they’ve been incredibly active. They just went, they had an event, uh, recently at the region for the relaunch of the region, Santa Monica. Before that, they had another one for the rebranding of w at the W Hollywood. We had another group approach us from, uh, from, from London. And so now we have a chapter, uh, they’re on their like third event already. And it’s run by like the leaders of the Four Seasons, the, um, the head of the Claridges and some of the top luxury hotels, obviously, uh, global Asset Solutions, those kind of companies. So they’re, they’re coming to us and saying, Hey, we, we were involved in your systems. We wanna do more and we wanna do some local stuff. Can we take it from there? So the future of our organization has always been by the people. Like they come to us, we don’t plan, we just go with the direction it wants to go. And we’ve been like that since the beginning. And I think that that’s, that’s what’s helped us really be strong is, is, is not trying to like, try to steer it in any one direction, but let it go where it’s naturally gonna go.
Ryan Embree:
Love to hear that. And so cool to see those, those chapters and, you know, additional events popping up, but, you know, excited for the next chapter and, uh, you know, honored to be a part of it as well. You know, travel Media group, proud members, partners of the ILHA. So thank you so much, uh, John Barack, uh, for joining me here on the Sweet Spot. Uh, just really teeing off, uh, a an incredible event that I, I’m very much looking forward to. I know hoteliers are as well. Uh, and we’ll see you in Vegas in, in just a couple months now.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Yeah. And also thank big thanks to Travel and Media Group and yourself for, for your support and being innovative. You know, like podcasts are, are, are you, you’ve really been successful at getting your podcast, um, you know, to have a huge following in the hotel industry. And, and I think that we are excited to have you guys here and Travel Media Group, what you’ve done. I think there are not many, you know, as this industry constantly changes, they need, you know, the industry needs partners that are like kind of one step ahead and can guide them as I’ve taught, spoken about it. And definitely in the like hotel marketing space. You guys are sort of at the forefront of that. So we’re excited to partner with you guys as well.
Ryan Embree:
Well, thank you so much. We really appreciate that, Jon, thanks for joining me, Barack. Thank you. And like I said, we’ll see you in Vegas in just a couple months.
Barak Hirschowitz:
Yep. See you in Vegas.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Thanks for listening to the Suite Spot. We’ll talk to you next time To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Check out the latest Suite Spot episode featuring SVP and CMO at Best Western Hotels, Joelle Park! Joelle joins the Suite Spot to discuss the incredible BWH portfolio, their Life’s a Trip campaign, marketing to different traveler segments, and much more.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, here for another special edition of The Suite Spot. I am so excited to bring in our guest today. We’re gonna be talking about everything, the Best Western Hotels and Resorts brand, but also marketing that is, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, Joelle Park. Thank you so much, Joelle, for being on the Suite Spot with me today.
Joelle Park:
Thank you for having me, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
We’re gonna have a great conversation about marketing, about your wonderful brand. Some of the recognitions that the brand has seen recently. And we’re gonna talk about some industries trends as well. But as per tradition here at the Suite Spot and really hospitality, we love to hear everyone’s kind of journey story that led you in. You know, sometimes we have people just fall into the industry, but at the end of the day, a lot of people fall in love with our industry ’cause hospitality is one of the, if not best industries to work in. Talk to us a little bit about your story, Joelle, and what led you to SVP and CMO at Best Western Hotel and Resorts.
Joelle Park:
Thanks, Ryan. Well, I’m really excited to be here and it sounds like many others. I have fallen into hospitality and fallen in love. I’ve spent over two decades in marketing overall working across brand strategy, customer experience, communications, and on every project, every account, it’s about driving results through innovative marketing. Early in my career, I started agency site and I partnered up some incredible brands in retail, entertainment, technology, and my last client was hospitality. And that’s where I fell in love with the industry. And now I’ve spent really more than 16 years in hospitality telling compelling stories. I have a love of travel personally, but I also just believe in the power of travel to make the world a better place. So I’ve been fortunate to take on some leadership roles spanning across loyalty. Now product development and something I’m especially passionate about is culture and customer experience, because the most powerful form of advertising really is the customer experience here at BWH Hotels. I have the privilege of leading our marketing, communications, loyalty and partnerships teams, and that’s encompassing of Best Western rewards and Worlds Hotels rewards. So excited to share more about what we’re up to.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s exciting to hear and it’s interesting because hospitality, you talk to a lot of hoteliers in the hospitality world, and they say, although it’s a massive industry, right, it’s a very small world. You run into people that you know all the time. Sometimes you’re working with one brand, then you go to another brand. But I always find it fascinating to find stories like yours, Joelle, where you start outside of hospitality maybe, and then find your way into it. Because I do think that really does show the passion and love that people have towards our industry because once that bug, you know, and it happens to travel too, it grabs a hold of you. It’s hard to let go. And here you are. And a lot of the hospitality professionals that I have spoken to they’ve had that exposure to other industries. And there’s just something about hospitality that is so special. And I think you nailed it on the head about talking about the power that travel has. And one of the things within travel is storytelling. And I’ve heard you in other interviews talk about your passion and storytelling, especially, particularly in marketing. How has that shaped your approach to local storytelling at the hotel level to create really what we’re all trying to crave right now, I think in this world with technology and AI, which is authentic connection between a hotel and and your guest?
Joelle Park:
Well, I’m very fortunate because the authentic connection is happening all over. And so I didn’t have to manufacture anything. I’ve marketed a lot of different things and sometimes it’s harder than others to unearth the purpose driven story behind a brand. But in hospitality it’s so clear. And at BWH hotels, a lot of people don’t realize we have 18 brands within the portfolio, 4,000 hotels around the world. So Best Western is just one of many. And so first of all, telling the story of the portfolio and that’s number one. I had no idea. And I thought, if others don’t know, I’ve gotta go and help them tell this story. But part two is shining a spotlight on the stories that are already happening at the local level. And the beauty of what we’ve been doing here the last two years with the storytelling through our campaign “Life’s a Trip” and through our overall marketing is it started with inspiration from what was happening in that guest to hotel staff interaction. Naturally, our hotel team members were sharing their favorite things about the area because they’re the soul of the destination where these travelers are. And so all I had to do, and my team and I was listen and spend a lot of time at the front lines, at the hotels, listening to our team members, listening to guests, and over and over again, we heard about the power of these small moments in a state where our staff, or even maybe it was through guest messaging, not just person to person, but they were making these local recommendations and unlocked how we enable experience. And that’s why this idea of Life’s a Trip was born. So the story sort of told itself born outta the local level.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool. And I’ll go to back to your point, Joelle, about talking about manufacturing. Because I think right now in a time we crave authentic experiences and moments in our lives, and I think as consumers we have gotten, especially the younger generation, really good at being able to see what’s real and what’s not real. And you’re absolutely right. I think for the hoteliers that listen to this podcast know, I mean, between the interactions that you’re having online through social media reviews and just everyday moments at the property, there’s just so much special that happens there, right? And if as you mentioned, just unearthing that and being able to have a place and a forum to share those stories, such powerful marketing. And if that comes off as organic, that comes off as true and real, that’s when you have something really special. And obviously being recognized, I’ve seen the brand in the news lately recognized by USA today, 2025 Readers Choice Awards, several accolades including best loyalty program, which is awesome and best extended stay hotel for sure, Stay Studio. As marketers, we love to see these type of recognitions, right? That means more getting to get the megaphone out and sharing all the great news about it. But what does this mean, these recognitions mean to you? And really how travelers feel about the loyalty program and the Sure Stay brand?
Joelle Park:
I think it’s all about value. The value that we provide that then in return makes us a brand and a loyalty program that guests value. So let’s start with the rewards program. Best Western Rewards, 64 million members. I think a testament to the power of it, but what a lot of people might not realize is we have brands spanning the category, everything from our luxury and upscale brands, worlds, hotels, all the way through economy, and sure, stay. So people see the value in the program because they’re earning these points and there is a hotel for every type of trip occasion. We also have a huge number of independent and collection hotels, and people are seeking experiences. You said it, Ryan, authentic experiences. And what better way than these collection hotels that allow the independent experience to shine and the points don’t expire? And that’s really unique in the industry. That’s our commitment to say, you earn these points with your hard earned travel, and so you deserve to spend them where and how you want. So that’s a big differentiator. I think part of what contributes to that award-winning loyalty as it relates to Surest Stay studio, this is a great brand in best extended Stay hotel brand. And it meets the needs of today’s evolving traveler with the kitchenette for short or really long term. And it’s not just for work, but for vacationers families, multi-generational family is a trend, and we see that. So some of the amenities we provided something like Short Stay Studio appeal to today’s travelers,
Ryan Embree:
It’s so great. And seeing the travel trends and we’re gonna kind of talk about that. But to have a loyalty program kind of blend with the eclectic brands that you have at BWH hotels, it really does make it kind of the perfect stay for any type of traveler out there because you see that, that travel is not just segmented into one particular area anymore, right? Or seeing more and more of a blend of people saying, Hey, I wanna extend my work vacation a little bit more. Maybe I do wanna bring my parents to look after the kids while you know me and the wife go explore the area. You know, these types of trips and travel are really starting to blend here and keeping a close ear and eye to the ground. And it’s gonna be those brands that have positioned themselves well to kind of be able to welcome any and all type of travelers that are gonna do the best. So, switching gears, Joelle, Larry Kulick, President and CEO of BWH Hotels recently shared on LinkedIn that at Best Western Hotels, we view technology as a strategic enabler for providing a great guest experience. Today we’re using technology and AI to continue to reshape the guest journey. And I think, I find this quote so fascinating because maybe other industries, we’ve talked about this, you know, AI and technology could be easily implemented and there, because there’s not so much of a human touch to it, but in hospitality, you almost have to be a little cautious and going full AI and technology because at the core of this, it is a very human human connection. You know, white glove service, you’re hosting people in a home, right, at a hotel. So how do you kind of find that balance? How is Best Western kind of find that balance there between human touch and technology?
Joelle Park:
Our philosophy is you don’t focus on technology for technology’s sake. You focus on technology and innovation to power what you uniquely offer to the world. And what we uniquely offer is taking care of people. So then the question we ask is, how can technology help us take care of people? And the great thing is, when you put that power, that innovation in front of your frontline team members, you can help them be more efficient in what they have to do so that they can focus on what they love to do, which is taking care of the guest. So as an example, check-in, check-in requires a lot of different steps that happen behind the scenes. And I like to think of it like a duck on the water. The guests should just see the ducks gliding seamlessly over the water. But you know what’s happening under that. It’s a lot of piddling, and that’s what our frontline team members are doing at the front desk to check them in efficiently, get them in the right room, make sure it’s clean, make sure they’re recognized for loyalty. So if we can use technology to simplify that for them, make it so obvious the at their fingertips or in their visual, what they need to know about that guest, guess what? The majority of that time they’re gonna focus more on delivering great service. And that’s what we are in service of and how we’re partnering with our technology team here.
Ryan Embree:
I absolutely love that. I mean, listen, as a front desk agent, more than a decade ago, the memories that I have from that position, Joelle, is exactly what you were talking about. It wasn’t, you know, the hundreds of check-ins or checkouts that I did over the span of the week. It was actually the conversations that I had with those guests. And a lot of that conversation happened after I had to get through the, all the rigamarole of the check-in process, right? So if there’s a place where we can get to where we can make things more efficient at, check-in, even any really touch points of the guest experience and be able to get to that place of connection, being able to say what brings you into town? I’d love to do some recommendations because as a traveler, as you were speaking to with the local storytelling, what what we crave as travelers is to feel a part of a community, right? So when we come into an area, we don’t want to go to the same places that we could go right down the block of where we left. We want to see the best places in town, to see the best views, to get the best places to eat. And front desk, front desk agents are the frontline workers there? And your first kind of string into what is that community like there? So anytime that you can, I love to hear leaders in hospitality talk about, it’s not about, it’s not about using technology to necessarily replace, uh, but enhance and to make, you know, give, give, uh, more power to our employees and be able to connect better with our guests. And, and we’ve heard this, you know, in in traveler’s sentiment, we’ve, we’ve seen in guest feedback about people talking about new technology that brands are putting out there. You know, we just wrapped up the busiest, time of year for our hoteliers and travelers alike. The summer season, everyone’s outta school, everyone’s traveling. I’m sure you have a very strong pulse being in your position. You have to on what both hotelier and travelers are feeling right now. How do you feel like your hoteliers are feeling going into the fall and winter months? And are you uncovering any guest trends, maybe some interesting guest trends between your Best Western guests?
Joelle Park:
I mean, it was, like you said, you read the headlines sometimes and you wonder about economic sentiment, but there it is, travel still going strong. People are prioritizing it. And uh, what we’re seeing is they’re prioritizing experiences over things. And so even if you can’t take the week long summer trip that you would’ve abroad, what we’re seeing is a lot of domestic travel. And so people are still making time for the road trip. Now, don’t get me wrong, there are still people, they’re, they’re traveling around the world and they’re making time for that. But in this time of economic uncertainty, even a small getaway for a weekend can be powerful. And that’s what we see come through in the statistics on, on occupancy, um, and even rate. And I think a couple trends that we’ve seen multi-generational travel, and you hear about the sandwich generation, those that have the aging parents and the young kids, and they’re recognizing that bringing them together. There’s some powerful moments that can happen when you’re not in the routine, daily routine at home. And you alluded to it, Ryan, the moment when grandparents and grandchildren can have time without the parents, there’s something beautiful that can happen there. And on vacation there’s a theory about when you’re outside of your routine, moments are more memorable. And so travel naturally does that. So that multi-generational, the last minute road trip, Hey, we don’t have anything going on, let’s get away for a night and we’re seeing that, and this is where we excel because many of our hotels are off the interstate or in a secondary market. So it doesn’t take a lot to just drive an hour and go, and suddenly you feel like you’re getting away. So those are just a couple examples of some of the trends that we are seeing and how we’re capitalizing on it, taking care of our guests.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I could tell you firsthand, I’ve definitely done one of those travel trends with the multi-generational travel, you getting grandparents involved and my kids. And yeah, I can totally see the appeal to that and those last minute road trips, I think speak to what you were talking about, Joelle, of people prioritizing travel before personal items. And I know, listen, we had this podcast during the entirety of the pandemic, and some of those episodes were not fun to produce, or conversations were hard to have. But there was always, there was always this hope that after we went through that, that there would be things that we could look back and say, we’ve learned some lessons, or it’s really shifted the way that we think about travel. And I think this is one of those things I think people, even in a time of uncertainty are going, you know what, it might feel uncertain right now, but it certainly isn’t as uncertain as it was back five years ago. Let’s take that smaller, maybe it’s a little bit smaller vacation, maybe it’s a little closer to home like you were talking about. So I expect those trends to continue to grow. Hopefully there’s a little bit more certainty and people feel a little bit better about what’s in their pockets and spend a little bit more. Our hoteliers would probably love to hear that on this podcast. But in that time, I do think it is comforting to know that there is, it remains a priority for people and it will be one of the last things that people stop spending their money on. So let’s switch gears to strategic partnerships. I have seen the Best Western brand in a lot of different places. It’s been in the news celebrating some most recently with the United Soccer League. How has these strategic partnerships really help fuel growth and build guest loyalty for the Best Western brand, Joelle?
Joelle Park:
Well, I’m a big believer in data to inform where we go. So, and listening, I mean, great, if you’re a great marketer, if you deliver great hostel, you listen to your guests and customers. And by listening, the data showed us that our BWH Hotels, which is the name of the portfolio, our guests have a higher propensity to love sports, a passion for it, and they traveled for it. And it’s for the big games and the local ones. And since we are really tapping into this idea of being part of the heart of the community with local recommendations, United Soccer League was a perfect fit for us because they are providing opportunities to play and watch soccer, such a passion for this sport in communities, all over the us. So they have the professional leagues, they also have the USL Academy for youth and developing players. And so this commitment to not just watching the game and the professional aspect of it, but to cultivating it in younger generations and people love to travel to see, this great sport and others. So it’s been a really exciting partnership. We’re bringing it to life together. We have an aspect of it called Hometown Heroes, where we’re celebrating heroes in local communities that are giving back to this sport in special ways. And it’s just another way that we find that when we tap into the fandom of our guests, we can create something really, really fun and great together.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool, soccer or football fans, some of the most passionate, you would argue fans out there. So to have that, to be associated with that brand brilliant move on your part, but really cool also that you get to celebrate, those heroes that you were talking about. And really looking forward to kind of seeing that strategic partnership in the future flourish. Congratulations to you and your team on that. And speaking of congratulations, as marketers, Joelle fellow marketers, we love to celebrate things, right? What’s the next project? What’s the next new development? What’s the next thing I can get out there talking about my brand and how loud can I yell at? Right? What upcoming developments or projects at BWH hotels are you most excited about?
Joelle Park:
I think one first, is really telling the story of this portfolio that we’re tired of being the best kept secret. And we heard through research, people think they know Best Western, oh, I used to travel there with my on road trips with my grandfather, but I think they don’t know about some of the incredible new brands we have. One I am so excited about and love to highlight is Aiden. Aiden is a modern boutique style, very trendy hotel. It really embraces the local area. No two are the same great F&B options. One of my favorites to highlight is the Aiden San Antonio River Walk, a speakeasy in the basement. You push a painting and you’re in. And Ryan, guess what the speakeasy is called? No Vacancy. So tie right back to hospitality. So just really fun ways to bring aspects of a neighborhood into the hotel experience. Aiden is just one of those brands we’re expanding globally. So stay tuned. We’ve got a lot of expansion in the Middle East. We have a wellness resort, a sanctuary that just opened up and that’s part of our world’s hotels property. So we’re seeing this wellness trend and it’s bringing it into the experience. And then of course our latest extended stay brand, at home we just opened our first one, all new construction, gorgeous, all the necessities but no unnecessary frills, so really efficient. So a lot of exciting brands in the portfolio and some new hotels coming into the pipeline too.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I’d love to hear Joelle, because I think, between that time that you just spoke, you mentioned F&B, wellness, simplicity, and efficiency. I mean, these are all hospitality and traveler trends. So you and your team having brands that speak to not just, any type of traveler, but what’s the trends that are fueling travel right now is really, really critical. And for any brand out there that is going to continue in a time where we talked about it, it’s a little bit uncertain times right now to making sure that you’re putting yourself in a position for success because you know what people are looking for when they travel, what they prioritize is so important is gonna continue to be so important. And you and your team over there sound like you’ve done a fantastic job. And checking out all of those brands that BWH Hotels has to offer, I have such a privilege and I’m so fortunate I get to talk to industry professionals like you and for my audience, I feel like I owe it to try to get as many nuggets of wisdom or pieces of advice that I can from industry pros like yourself. If you’re a young hotel marketer listening to this podcast trying to get inspiration or advice, what would you share with them as maybe you’re one piece of advice moving forward?
Joelle Park:
Get back to the front lines, make time for it. Even if you go into a hotel and sit in the breakfast area and observe, I love visiting our hotels. I make time for it because the light bulb moments often happen right there in front of you, and all you have to do is listen and be humble enough to know that those frontline team members are telling their stories every day. And then it’s our job just to amplify what they’re doing. I’ll give you a great example. Sitting in the breakfast area at a hotel recently, I recognized that the breakfast attendant wasn’t just clearing dishes, they were greeting the guests. They were asking how their day was making local recommendations. And I realized when you hire for a breakfast attendant, you wanna hire as if they are the concierge at the hotel. And I realized that’s asking a lot in this day with labor shortages and whatnot, but putting a different lens on how you can hire as a hotel operator, then as a, from a marketing standpoint, when you’ve got operators bringing that lens into the everyday customer experience, and if you’re a young marketer and you’re observing that, you’re gonna find those stories and mode of connection happening, and all we have to do is shine a spotlight on it.
Ryan Embree:
I love that. I mean, listen, the age old advice, that GMs used to share with me we’re, you ever really want to know how your guests are feeling, go sit in the lobby at breakfast because they’re gonna talk about it, right? And I think it’s such brilliant advice for a young marketer because I think we have a tendency to think that a lot of the connection and maybe the biggest connections are done online, behind a screen, maybe on social media or reviews. But really it’s getting those, those stories, those moments, those experience like you were sharing out into a forum like that. And those connections are not, they happen online, but the more powerful ones are the ones that happen on property and then that turn into some amazing digital moments and stories online, down the line, right? So I think just great advice. Thank you so much for sharing. As we wrap up today, we always like to gaze into our hospitality crystal ball, as I call it. You know, get a glimpse into the future. What’s ahead? How do you see the BWH Hotel’s brand 5-10 years down the line? What do you see and what’s your vision for the future, Joelle?
Joelle Park:
I think in five years we are no longer the best kept secret. We’re the best told story and we are up there as a powerhouse that people had no idea. And I hope people say, where did this portfolio come from? Global expansion. And I think what we are uniquely positioned to do is help travelers seeking that experience that isn’t your cookie cutter, where they want that really hyper-local recommendation. And it’s not just the thing that’s the top of TripAdvisor. I mean TripAdvisor is great in the emergence of AI. You can get a lot of recommendations, but I like to think of us like the local bookstore. There’s a shelf there and it has the local staff recommendations. So it’s great books, but with the why and the insider scoop and in five years time, I think people will realize that any BWH Hotel they stay at, they’re gonna get that experience and watch out world because here we are.
Ryan Embree:
Alright, well we’re excited. We’ll keep our ears and eyes open to all those stories that, that you and your team over at BWH Hotels are sharing with us and telling us every single day. So thank you. I know we covered a lot of ground. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today?
Joelle Park:
I would just thank you for the opportunity and what a joy to share someone that has the passion for connecting the world through hospitality like I do. So thanks Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. We’re excited to hear it. Thank you so much for taking the time and again, like I said, we’re gonna keep a close eye on the brand and congratulations to all the work you and your team have been doing so far and wish you a great 2025 and into the future over the next couple years. Thank you Joelle.
Joelle Park:
Thanks, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Alright, and we’ll talk to you next time on the Suite Spot. Thank you for listening. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot takes a trip to central Florida to visit the incredible AC Hotel Orlando Downtown, part of the Kolter Hospitality portfolio. The Regional Director of Food & Beverage at Kolter, Robert Mason, joins the Suite Spot to discuss:
- Seasonal Menus
- F&B in the Guest Experience
- How Kolter Hospitality is Shaping F&B
- The Importance of a Social Presence for a Hotel Property
Be sure to tune in to catch the whole episode.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, continuing our series of the Suite Spot Road Trip into the summer a little bit coming into the fall. I’m here with right down the road from our Travel Media Group headquarters, I-4. I know you probably hear that and think might be a long way away. I-4 can be congested sometimes, but not too bad of a drive here. We’re gonna talk about that today. I’m here with Robert Mason, Regional Director of Food and Beverage at Kolter Hospitality. Robert, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot. Hey, thanks for having me. And we’re gonna talk a little bit about your property today. We’re gonna talk a lot about the portfolio and your job here as the Food and Beverage Director, but I do want to get to, as it is, tradition here on the Suite Spot, get to know a little bit about your background and what led you to Kolter Hospitality.
Robert Mason:
Wow. So I’ve been 42 years in food and beverage. It’s all I’ve ever done. It’s all I know. I started in the culinary side. I worked all the way up to executive chef. I actually studied under a master chef in San Francisco Bay Area and, had a really fun journey through culinary for about two decades. And about 15 years ago, I made the transition to the dark side, as I say, got into the front of house operations. and it’s been a great journey. Work brought me to Orlando. In San Fransico, I was kind of a small fish in a big pond, but here I’m kind of, was kind of a big fish in a small pond, so to speak. Yeah, but Orlando has certainly grown and developed over the last 20 years that I’ve been here. And just having fun. And this opportunity actually came up right in the middle of COVID. I came from a much larger property down in South Orlando. And the reason I took this job was couple full first, you know, I like the company culture. I liked the fact that the Skybar had so much to offer. I saw the potential right away. And it’s a smaller, easier to manage kind of thing ’cause everything’s in one place as opposed to a big sprawling resort with 15 outlets and that kind of thing. But I have stayed with the company because I really do enjoy all the people I get to work with Sarah, I know, you know, Sarah and John from our corporate office and Scott, our president, they just do a wonderful job. And they’re really people first. We’re a really people first company. So I believe in the vision here and that’s why I stay. It’s awesome to hear. And your story resonates coast to coast, but I think it’s a true example of hospitality professionalism. ’cause it’s transferable skills, right? Yeah. You know, you can work at a hotel, whether you’re in food and beverage on one side of the country, and then move all the way to the other, side of the country, like your story. And here you are in Orlando, before we get to talk about your property and this beautiful skybar that we’re in right now,right behind us, I four can throw a rock to the Kia Center, Citrus Bowl right over there. Orlando City Stadium. For those that aren’t familiar, Robert, that might be listening to this podcast, paint a picture of why this is just the perfect intersection and location. You’ve got yourself a great location here.
Robert Mason:
We really do. We really do. So, you know, I always tell people we’re kind of three different operations within one. So during the week we get a lot of the downtown business people, a lot of the movers and shakers in downtown that come here for happy hour, A lot of celebrations. But then we transition on the weekend to really a sports venue before games, after games when the magic are playing. We’re full of magic fans. We’re kind of the go-to spot for magic fans here before and after games, especially when they win. And then of course when there’s events, you know, next week alone we have, I think six concerts in seven days. And so again, we’re kind of the spot that people wanna go to. They see the cutout of the building and they go, wow, that’s really cool up there. And so you could drive by and see that. So we’re right kind of in this intersection, where we’re close to everything. Dr. Phillips is a block away. Kia Center’s a block away. The soccer stadium’s two blocks away, so it’s just kind of right in the middle of all that excitement. And there’s more to come, I don’t know if you know, but downtown right next to the Kia Center, they’re gonna build a whole entertainment venue. A lot of things gonna be going on there. So downtown only continues to grow. It’s funny, mayor Buddy Dyer said 10 years ago that he was gonna make downtown an entertainment destination. And people thought he was crazy. But now it’s actually coming to fruition.
Ryan Embree:
It’s incredible. We see here, we got a concert in just a few hours here at the intersection of I-4 and 408, but also the intersection of so many events, different types of travelers. And here at the AC Skybar, you really get to enjoy it all. And it’s really cool because I’ve seen over the years, I’ve been in Orlando resident now for almost a decade now, you see, start to see the skyline of Orlando. And this building is part of that iconic skyline. When people do drawings or people take photos, it’s very, very cool to see. But you also got a lot of people taking pictures of this incredible view right behind us. Talk to us about this AC Skybar and what guests just absolutely love about it.
Robert Mason:
So, obviously, you can’t go wrong with the view that we have. We get great sunset views 365 days a year. And sometimes, it’s funny, we’ll be empty and then sunset’s 10 minutes away and people will just pile in and, and go along the glass to watch the sunset. And that’s a lot of times what attracts people here. But I think what has continued to elevate our business and has continued to resonate with locals and our hotel guests alike, is not just the great view. That’s great. But it’s really a bonus, right? It’s our craft cocktail program that we’re so proud of. We’re so proud to announce that we’re four years in a row. We’ve been the number one rooftop bar in Orlando. So continue to do that. Our food program and our outstanding service team that just continues to make our guests feel welcome and welcome them back.
Ryan Embree:
Well, congratulations on those accolades. That’s super exciting to hear. I was a bit of factor of being able to enjoy some of that food and beverage and the hospitality that the AC Skybar had. Thank you for that. So generous. And you know, it was absolutely amazing. Got the steak sandwich and the banana old fashioned cocktail part of a seasonal menu. We’re gonna talk about that in a minute. But Robert, we’ve had a lot of conversations with operations people, marketing people, hospitality leaders. A big trend that is sticking with hospitality, especially over the last 10 years, is the impact that food and beverage has on the guest experience. Kolter Hospitality really, really focuses in on that. And you’re a big, obviously a big part of that. Share with us how you bring creativity to that and how it plays a role into the overall guest experience.
Robert Mason:
So I think it’s really a matter of involving the people that make it happen every day. I think there’s a lot of different components to it. Just to kind of digress a little bit. But you know, here at the Sky Bar, one of the things that’s made us successful and that we’ve tried to now carry down some of our other properties is this idea that hotel, restaurants and bars often feel just like that. They feel like a hotel, restaurant and bar. And so when we put this together and we said, what’s the vision for the Skybar? We didn’t wanna be another hotel bar, another hotel restaurant. We really wanted to have our own identity. So it’s everything from how we do our social media to having our own website. And a lot of times people will show up here and they’ll say, wow, I didn’t even know this was in a hotel. A lot of times people think, well, the hotel rooms will help drive food and beverage. We look at it the opposite way. We look at food and beverage as a driver for the hotel rooms, and a lot of times that’s what we see. And so, really just taking what we know sells, right? Staying on top of those trends, reading those periodicals, staying on top of what’s new, what’s hot, what’s coming out, what’s available to us. And really capturing that and then carrying that to our other hotels and our other properties and allowing them to kind of be experienced that and be exposed to some of that. And sometimes they’re not, right. We all get busy in operations. We all get busy in day-to-day. Sometimes they’re not looking at that stuff. Whereas myself and my counterpart Greg McGowan, we’re always looking at that. We’re always talking about new angles on how we can do things and how we can continue to elevate our food and beverage experience. And we’re just at the tip of the iceberg. I’m so excited for what the next five years is gonna bring. Because really our goal is to establish Kolter not only as hotel destinations, but to really establish us as food and beverage destinations that when people think of Kolter Hospitality, they think of not only great hotels, but they think of a great food and beverage experience.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you’re off to a great start here. Again, recognitions awards. I would encourage all of my listeners to go check out the website and menu. Talk to us though. We always love hearing from the people that create this. We’re about to transition from summer to fall, like I mentioned before. That’s a big time for you, right? Especially with a place with the seasonal menu. Talk us through that process because it’s a little bit more interesting than just saying, Hey, let’s go back and flip a page to what we did last year.
Robert Mason:
No, certainly not the case here. And it’s something that’s been an evolving process. I’m a big believer in getting people to buy into what they’re doing, giving the people that have to do it every day, a sense of ownership over it. Right? And so this is something we started kind of almost ad hoc a few years ago where we had a bar manager and he and I would sit down and brainstorm about the menu and we would talk through what our seasonal menu was gonna look like. And then I forget who even thought of the idea, but hey, why don’t we get some of the bartenders involved in this? Right? And so we took a day and we set up a bar upstairs. That’s how we used to do it. In the old days, we’d set up a separate bar upstairs. Now we just do it at the lobby bar and it has gained momentum, right? Because what we found is that all of the team, right, all of our mixologists wanna be part of that process, right? And so we certainly give some guidelines, we don’t wanna end up with five martinis on the menu, right? But, it’s really incorporating those flavors. So when we talk about fall, we’re talking about things like maple and fresh herbs and smoked drinks and things like that. A little more bourbon forward. And really focusing on those things and getting the team thinking about those things. But also bringing in some things that are new on the market that, that maybe they haven’t been exposed to before. Bringing in a grapefruit, hibiscus tequila, bringing in some kind of kitschy items that maybe not everybody else is using. We do what we call the sky high. I’m sure you saw it last night, right? With the bubble on top of it. And when we started doing that, nobody else was doing that. Now a lot of people are doing that. So we’re always looking for that point of distinction, that signature drink, that signature dish that people come back for again and again. Now that said, right, just like every year at Starbucks. You can count on it. I wait for the day that pumpkin spice lattes come out because there are certain things that are fan favorites that people come back here. We have a great pumpkin spice espresso martini that we serve and we serve it in the fall. We may tweak it a little bit from year to year, but we also want to incorporate fresh things every single year. And so what amazes me, and I’m just so proud of our mixology team, they are so creative, so passionate, and they just come up with new ideas all the time. And I’ve learned so much from them. So it really becomes a mutually beneficial process and just working with, such an outstanding team.
Ryan Embree:
It’s such a brilliant idea, Robert, because I think you talked about ownership at the very beginning and getting people buy into what were the culture here. And if you see that your drink was chosen to be on a seasonal menu, it’s a lot of pride I’m sure in some of those mixologists because there’s a lot of effort that goes into that. And also it keeps your guests really happy. Or even your patrons that, local patrons that might come in to see, Hey, what’s the, what’s the AC Skybar got in store for us this season?
Robert Mason:
It’s funny that you should say that because I just had a couple people email me this past week, say, when is your fall menu coming out? What can we expect? And so, so it’s great. And the other thing I just wanted to mention real quick was the team gets together and they do kind of these brainstorming sessions and research and development sessions and just to watch them go through that process now, is they’re not afraid of hurting each other’s feelings. It’s very collaborative. Like, hey, you know, what would make that drink better? I know it’s your drink, but what would make it better is this. And that’s how we end up with great drinks, like the banana old fashioned, right? It’s a total team effort.
Ryan Embree:
It’s gotta be so rewarding to see as a food and beverage director, and to that point of pride when you see those emails come through talking about that. When’s that seasonal menu coming out?
Robert Mason:
Absolutely.
Ryan Embree:
But you mentioned it at the top of the episode, Robert, you could have the view, you could have the drink and the food, but a lot of it has to do with staff, right? And this is something that we’ve talked to a lot of hospitality people about over the last couple years. It’s a shortness of hospitality workers right now. It’s been tough over the last couple years. You mentioned at Kolter Hospitality your passion and for their culture and what’s kept you here. How has that bled into hiring? How have you gotten creative with staffing? I mean, some of these, those things that you just mentioned have gotta be motivators for staff and recruiting and hiring.
Robert Mason:
Well, again, I have a couple of core beliefs, right? One of them is, I wanna give people the opportunity to have a better life and make better money year over year over year, right? Every year I want them to have a better quality of life. So that’s, that’s important to me, right? But the other part of it too is I want people that wanna come to work, right? So we want to have an environment and a culture where, yes, we have to have rules and we have to have certain things in place. But we want this to be a place that people wanna come, which is why people stay here. I’m a firm believer that the only way you have great service is when you have continuity of service. Where you have the same people doing the same job day after day and year after year. And so we think we’ve really created that culture here. But I think part of it too, is hiring is the most important thing I do. I always say it. And there’s certain things I can teach. I can teach somebody how to make a drink. I can teach somebody how to serve a table or pre-bus a table, but I can’t teach somebody that desire to have that excellence. That’s something you either have it when you walk in the door or you don’t have it. I call it the spirit of hospitality. So I’m always looking for people that have that spirit of hospitality. I use myself as an example. Like, I’ll be out, somewhere and I’ll hold the door open for somebody, you know, and my wife said, what are you doing? I’m just holding the door open for someone because that comes naturally to me. Because I like making people happy. I enjoy seeing people that are happy and I wanna have team members on the team that want those same things, that share those same values. And so I think that we’ve accomplished that and we continue to reinforce that. We continue to reinforce, Hey, we want you to treat this like it’s your own business. If this is your section and these are your tables, treat it like it’s someone coming over to your house. Like, how would you want them to feel? You’d want them to feel welcome. And so those are the things that I think are so, so important. And I think over the last few years, I think certainly since COVID, it was tough on a lot of people. And I think people lost that spirit of hospitality. They lost that sense of hospitality. But here at the Skybar, we’re trying to bring it back. We want everybody to leave here feeling like they’ve got friends here at the Skybar.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s venues like this that really raised the bar to back to service of where it was before. And that connection is so important, especially in food and beverage as you’re sure we look a lot at guest reviews, guest feedback, as I’m sure you do. And there’s a reason why that drink might just taste a little bit better with a friendly bar bartender and a listening ear. Or if that meal or that dish might just be a little bit more special because of the service that was provided at that place. And that’s true hospitality and certainly embodied here. And again, recognizing the awards that you guys have that you guys have recently gotten. So you mentioned social media, and that’s something that obviously over the time that you’ve been in this industry has certainly changed.
Robert Mason:
Yes.
Ryan Embree:
How can food and beverage outlets, hospitality, you get this picture of, how do you leverage social media to really spread awareness and the word about your hotel and this AC Skybar?
Robert Mason:
It’s a great question and I think it’s something that we have only recently gotten right. Something for the first few years, was kinda like, everybody had a little piece of it. And you know, as I always say, when it’s everybody’s job, it’s nobody’s job. And things kind of fall through the cracks. But we’ve recently hired someone who’s on our food and beverage team and she’s fantastic. And she’s got a background in social media and content creation and her name is Rebecca. And so she’s managing our social media now. And I think it’s visibility number one, right? I think it’s being visible to people. That means you’ve gotta be active on social media. It can’t just be 1 post a week. It’s gotta be 2, 3, 4 posts a week. Reposting things, engaging people who are responding to you and who are showing interest. I think that’s how you gain followers. And I think really it’s all about creating special things and special events. We’re gonna be doing a thing we’re gonna call Meetup Monday, which is gonna start in October, actually I think October 6th is our first event. And it’s really all driven by social media. So we’re putting it out there on our social media pages on Instagram and TikTok and Facebook. We’re gonna push it out on Eventbrite. And it’s really just getting those people who are finding us on the internet because our demographic, that’s where they’re looking. They’re not reading newspapers and things like that. They’re not looking on tv, they’re looking on social media and that’s how they’re finding us. And so it’s just continuing to be relevant and continuing to have great content. We’re gonna do a bartender focus starting in October, where once a week we’re gonna have one of the bartenders who talk about the seasonal cocktail menu. They’re gonna get to make that cocktail. We’re gonna do a short video where they’re gonna get to make it and explain it and the thought process behind it and what inspired it and really make that an interactive process. So people that are looking in from the outside into our social media, they say, wow, the Skybar, they really have something cool going on there. And I feel like I know that bartender. I wanna go see that guy. And so they come in, they say, oh, you’re that guy that was on social media. So it’s so cool to see that interaction happening.
Ryan Embree:
It is fascinating because I think there was a time where as travelers and consumers we were fueled by surprises. Like when come in and we’d be like, oh look, check this out. Look at this view. Oh my gosh, they have a skybar up here. And now all of a sudden with just this information that’s to us, especially with social media, it’s almost like we want that familiarity before we even step foot, right? We wanna know that Robert’s our bartender and he’s been mentioned on TripAdvisor, on Google for his famous martini that he makes. And it’s so fascinating that that’s happened because we want to know everything before we step foot because we want that familiarity. It’s, it’s very, very cool to see. And another great proponent of why social media is so critical for hotels and food and beverage. Right now we’re getting towards the end here. I wanna do some rapid fire. And get to know you and the Kolter Hospitality portfolio a little bit better. So listen, this one might be tough because of the view that we’re at right now, but favorite view at one of your properties.
Robert Mason:
My favorite view, honestly, in all of our properties, and we have some outstanding properties from East coast to West coast of Florida, is the view of the harbor at the Westin in Sarasota. They have just a fantastic view now, not to be outshone, but right down the street from them is the Embassy Suites. They also have a view of the harbor and a view of the Gulf of Mexico. So I have to mention them as well, but that view from their rooftop bar and eats is unbelievable.
Ryan Embree:
Unbelievable. All right. Picturesque for sure. Favorite fun fact about one of the properties.
Robert Mason:
Favorite fun fact about one of the properties. You know, that’s a tough one. I would have to say that my favorite fun fact about this property is that we’re always trying to create something new. And I’m gonna give you a little preview of something that we’re launching. In the next few months is we are actually going to, I’m sure you’ve heard of the igloo craze up in New York and the north part of the United States. We’re gonna be launching some cabanas, some private cabanas on our patio. And we are going to be using these for VIPs and they’ll be able to be rented by the hour. And it’s just a great fun point of distinction. Something different that nobody else is doing that we’re gonna have to offer here at the Skybar.
Ryan Embree:
Love that. That’s fantastic. That actually falls under my probably favorite guest amenity or experience. What about favorite signature dish at one of your properties? Robert?
Robert Mason:
My favorite, actually I was just at the Western Sarasota. And again, not anything against our chef. Our chef does an amazing job. All of his food is amazing and all of our hotels do a great job with their culinary program. But Chef Ryan has these ahi tuna nachos that he makes with like a wasabi aioli on top of ’em. And they were so good. He wanted me to try ’em ’cause he just put ’em on his new menu and they were so good that when we were done for the day, I snuck back up to the roof and had another order of them. They were so good. I was thinking about ’em all day. They’re really, really delicious and everybody should try it.
Ryan Embree:
Hey, paired with your favorite view on the portfolio. Well that sounds like a pretty good night. Well, as we wrap up, you know, one of the things we like to do, we like to start talking about our guest beginnings. We like to end looking into the future, gazing into that hospitality crystal ball. You’ve been in the industry for a while. See trends kind of come and go. What are you seeing right now in food and beverage that’s really maybe a future trend to look out for? I think people want to know the story. I mean, there trends come and trends go. There are certain things that I think, and one of the reasons and that we had the Skybar the way we did is, since I’ve been here in five years, there’ve been tons of trendy bars that have come and they’ve gone and they’ve come and they’ve gone. What makes the Skybar unique is we wanted to have a timeless experience, right? Something that would always speak and never go outta style. And there’s certain things I think in food and beverage that never go outta style. Right now, a lot of craft people wanna know the story, especially behind wines and craft beer and craft cocktails. Even it’s trickled over into the liquor side, the spirit side. People wanna know the story behind that tequila that they’re drinking. And the craft vodka has in the craft tequilas and the craft rums that is really, really hot right now. Espresso martinis continue to be hot in any form or fashion, but the twist this year has been the tequila espresso martinis. So again, wanting those craft martinis and that kind of thing. On the food side, I think farm to table continues to be red hot. People want to eat locally. I think there continues to be this drive, especially in our society for healthier options, gluten-free, vegan, vegetarian. So we always wanna speak to that and stay relevant. And I think that’s a good place to leave it because I think if you’re not staying relevant, it’s easy to fall behind and it can happen very quickly. So staying on top of those trends and really watching for those trends as they occur, both on the spirit side, the beverage side, and also on the food side, is something that Greg, my counterpart and I are constantly doing to keep things fresh and new with Kolter.
Ryan Embree:
Sustainability as well is massive, especially for the younger generation there. But you’re absolutely right. I mean, this is a timeless industry and I remember being at UCF Rosen of Hospitality, professor saying, this is the oldest industry that there is. Hotels, hosting people and feeding them. So, Robert, we appreciate you hosting us and feeding us yesterday and being on the Suite Spot and sharing some insights with our audience.
Robert Mason:
Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much. We’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The busy summer travel season is just about wrapped up, which means the Suite Spot is due for another quarterly check-in with the American Hotel & Lodging Association to get the latest news and developments taking place in the hospitality industry.
AHLA President and CEO Rosanna Maietta joins the Suite Spot to discuss current hotel trends, industry challenges, the importance of mentors and mentees in hospitality, and more.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. So happy that you are listening to us here and ready to bring you another incredible episode with our quarterly check-in with AHLA in a preview of the 2025 Hospitality Show. It’s my immense privilege to welcome in our special guest for today’s episode, President and CEO, Rosanna Mietta. Rosanna, thank you so much for being with me on the back on the Suite Spot.
Rosanna Maietta:
Good to see you again, Ryan. Thanks for having us.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited to talk about the Hospitality Show. We’re excited to talk about AHLA. What we’ve been up to last time we were together was at NYU IHIF. Since then, the AHLA and the hospitality industry in general has been super busy, that super travel season, that hoteliers love to see travel all over the across the country. Catch us up on some of the top issues AHLA is focusing on right now and maybe some of the key wins that have happened year to date.
Rosanna Maietta:
Sure. It’s been an incredibly busy summer. There’s nothing like a quiet summer anymore. We’ve had a lot going on both in Washington and around the country. Obviously, the most important thing the administration has been focused on over the last six months of this year was passing the one big beautiful bill, which while it had many, many provisions tucked away in it, the ones that our industry was really focused on were those that impacted our small business community, our franchise community, and our employees. So we were focused on passing provisions like the 100% bonus depreciation and making that permanent, preserving the like kind exchange, deferring capital gains tax on real estate at point of sale. All those changes will help the industry reinvest and grow. But we also helped to promote the no tax on tips, which will support 800,000 employees in the industry who benefit from tips. And so we’re working on what that guidance actually looks like once that detail is developed and how, and educating our employers on how they can roll that out to their employees, but also provisions around overtime and child tax credit and family medical leave. So all of those things, were really important to our industry. And so we were really pleased to help get that over the finish line. Outside of Washington, there has been a lot going on, whether it is advancing legislation in markets like Boston or Philadelphia on human trafficking training and prevention, which our industry has been leading on to working in Los Angeles, where we have seen over the last two years very intense work around pushing back against onerous regulations that would essentially increase wages for the industry by 40% overnight. Simply a situation we cannot, we cannot handle because demand is so low in Los Angeles, it’s second to only San Francisco. And San Francisco in terms of occupancy, has been starting to see an uptick, whereas Los Angeles has not, it has not come back to pre-COVID levels. So we’ve been working really aggressively there with the business community to push back on that ordinance that has gone into law, but we are still working with city council to try to make some amendments that would make sure that the travel and hospitality sector is strong, especially in the lead up to some of these bigger events that we’re anticipating next year, whether it’s World Cup and, and a look ahead to the Olympics. So, a lot happening in some of those key markets. And then across the country at the state level, also working to promote a level playing field with short-term rentals and so impacting legislation in key states.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, never a dull moment over there in our industry. You know, we’re in a constant state of change and disruption, a lot of these in positive ways, but it, we look to AHLA as kind of a north star for a way to roll out some of these things for both hotel employers as well as employees. So we’ll continue to look there and really appreciate all the work and advocacy AHLA continues to do on behalf of hoteliers across the country. Summer’s also a time for summer jobs and internships and I’ve had the privilege to interview on this podcast some incredible hospitality leaders. And if I had a dime every single time somebody was talking about how, I started as a summer job or a summer internship and then will look at where they are today, 30, 40 year career in hospitality. So important. I know AHLA, you guys have your interns. We host an intern here at Travel Media Group. Can you talk and speak to the importance of internships? It’s no secret that our industry obviously has been battling with staffing shortages continues to do so. How has internships and hospitality mentors, how can they play a role in helping young people see a career in hospitality?
Rosanna Maietta:
So, incredibly important. Who doesn’t remember their first internship? I remember mine, it was unpaid back in the day when you could do that. But it was essential to building the foundation of what it means to work in the hospitality environment. Working in an office environment or on property. You can learn so much. And that ability to shadow different people is really so meaningful. And I think that what you’re seeing, so many more sophisticated interns coming in with already depth of experience and can hit the ground running. And so I think that’s really so rewarding to see. We’ve had our own interns here at AHLA and we’re sorry to see them go. You wanna wanna hold on to all those good quality individuals? But again, couldn’t stress enough how important it is. I think you’re seeing more in more companies, properties bringing on interns or STAs or apprenticeships, those go a long way in creating that bond with the industry. And so couldn’t stress more the importance of having those. I think the other thing that we are really, that our AHLA foundation has really been focused on is building out a mentorship program and a leadership mentorship program that has been, we’ve been making the inroads for that for a couple of years. And that one-on-one connection, being able to rely on someone in the industry who maybe it has a career path that you are looking to emulate or is completely different career path that you could still learn from is really important. This year’s program exceeded our own goals. We had more than 250 participants from 80 companies, and it included all the different business sections, career levels, participants from all sorts of segments, whether independent properties or branded hotels, and even management companies. The other really important stat was that 83% of the participants on both sides, whether mentors or mentees, were from underrepresented communities. So I think that really also speaks to how diverse our industry is and how important that is to who we are and who we serve. So we do have that formal mentoring program. I would encourage anyone to reach out to the AHLA foundation if that’s something that you’re interested in. And I’m so pleased to see how many more mentors we have reaching out to say, I want to mentee someone. And I think that says a lot about who we are as an industry and that heart service mentality that we lead with.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so incredible. That’s an amazing stat. Thank you for sharing that with us, Rosanna. And it doesn’t, I think all of us also remember maybe our first internship, but, there’s a lot of people that I have on this podcast that also remember their first mentor, whether that was an official mentor or not, somebody that they probably looked up to followed in the footsteps, management companies, brands during this time, I will say, I know it’s been tough with staffing, but they’ve gotten really creative over the last couple years and looking for more resources. And this mentorship program, the AHLA provides, seems like a great outlet to go in there and try to find, because a lot of you have an incredible stat that you share about those frontline workers that end up being GMs can do. Do you have that at the top of your head?
Rosanna Maietta:
I believe it’s 53%.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s absolutely incredible. And there’ve been so many times where you talk about just finding a career through hospitality. We’re fast approaching National Hotel Employee day, September 1st, everyone get your social media profiles ready for that one posting on that day, over 2 million hotel workers in America. It’s absolutely incredible. You spoke about some of the mentorship ways, but what are some other ways we can kind of encourage people to share some incredible stories? I know at the hospitality show, one of my favorite places is the GM of the Year Awards and kind of recognizing those. How can we get those stories out there, get more people participating in our workforce?
Rosanna Maietta:
Sure. Well, and Hotel Appreciation Day or Dmployee Appreciation Day falls on Labor Day this year. So also, you know, doubly special and you’re right, I mean, our general managers are so critical to telling that story and we really view general managers as the best brand ambassadors for the industry, right? Because so many of them, half, as we noted, started in entry level positions and have risen to running, major properties, running teams moving around the country, and really have a full holistic view of what the industry has to offer. So we’re doubling down on our outreach to general managers trying to grow that network, trying to get them also more involved in, in both the storytelling, but being the ambassadors, whether it’s meeting with members of Congress when they come to their properties, or engaging in in local city politics and being leaders in the business community, that is so much more relevant when they are talking about how policies at the city and state level impact their employees, their business, their ability to grow and, and expand that sort of supply chain that depends so much on the hotel industry. So really, I think that is one key way that we are really focused on that. But we’re also trying to expand our network in major markets around the country that are heavy destination and tourism cities to develop that business community where we can really be talking about and leading when it comes to hospitality and talking about the benefits that the hotel and hospitality industry brings to cities. I still think that despite how much we contribute to local city, state, national economy, there really isn’t a direct correlation in a lot of people’s minds. And so we’re gonna, we’re you’re gonna see more coming out of AHLA in terms of reaching out to media, telling that story more broadly, really talking about the importance of the hotel industry.
Ryan Embree:
It’s incredible. I mean, it’s the backbone of a lot of these, of a lot of these major markets that are hosting events. Like you said, we’ve got the World Cup coming up, we’ve got the Olympics, right on the horizon as well. A few years ago, Taylor Swift and her tour. What would those events be without hospitality workers? Right? And the role of a GM has, has certainly evolved over the last couple decades. Such a comprehensive role now and undertaking it is such a skill. I admire all the GMs out there and what they’re able to do in the role that they’re doing. And that’s why things like the Hospitality Show, I think are very impactful. And I wanna switch gears to the 2025 Hospitality Show. We’re gonna talk about that a few weeks ago on the podcast, we hosted Alex Khajavi of Questex, and he really spoke to the special partnership, AHLA and Questex, obviously the two organizations behind the Hospitality Show. How has that relationship evolved Rosanna and helped grow the Hospitality Show to it? It was just recognized again by multiple awards, by the fastest 50 grand awards by trade show executive. So already highly recognized show in just its third year. It’s, it’s really in its infancy.
Rosanna Maietta:
I mean, it’s crazy if you think about it. I mean, it typically these types of shows, they take years and years to gain that type of following. I mean, Questex has been a phenomenal partner, Alexi at the helm with Paul and the great team there. It’s truly been a real sort of melding of the mind, so to speak, coming together to really understand who our audience is. I think we are able to bring that they have depth of knowledge and running a flawless show at that scale and size. I mean, we’ve grown by leaps and bounds in just three years, so this will be my first show, so I’m really excited to be there and be on the ground. We’re expecting some 4,000 attendees, 300 exhibitors, so it is become a destination, a can’t miss show, and we are so thrilled to see how quickly it has grown and really become another anchor in the hospitality calendar.
Ryan Embree:
We’re looking forward to seeing some record breaking numbers again from the Hospitality Show this year. We’ll be there, have the privilege of covering the show for the third time headed to Denver this October. If you haven’t checked it out, make sure to check out and hopefully you’ll join both I and Rosanna at the Hospitality Show. Looking at the agenda and the programming that you and your team have put together, it’s a powerhouse between the speakers, the panels, the programming, and it makes sense, right? I mean, you have your ears to the ground of what the hotel you’re in 2025 today cares about the topics, the trends, what is everyone talking about in hospitality? What its a very compelling, comprehensive show is really the term that I would use because of how that role of the GM has evolved where it’s food and beverage, it’s amenities, it’s marketing, it’s sales, it’s everything all put together. What are you most looking forward to? I know this is your first year, but what are you most looking forward to when you take a look at that powerhouse of an agenda?
Rosanna Maietta:
Well, look, I think this show has gained so much traction so quickly because we understand our audience and what they’re looking for this year. It’s all about profitability. And then it speaks to some of the challenges that especially the owner community has experienced over the last several years, right? They’ve seen rising costs, they have seen a drop in revenue and demand across the country. And so how can we create content where they can walk away and feel like they’ve learned something, they can immediately apply something that they’ve gained to bring down their costs to shave a little bit here and a little bit there and do a little bit better next year. And so that’s why I’m really excited about the content and the quality of speakers that we’ve amassed for this year’s show. I always say that if you deliver good content, people will come back again and again. So our team really does do a phenomenal job in identifying what are those topics that will resonate this year, who are the speakers that people care about, want to hear about, but also bringing a little bit of people that maybe they haven’t heard, but who will give them something new and different. So you always wanna have a little bit of that element as well. So we are gonna have numerous tactical sessions that we’ll talk about, profit per square foot with panelists who will talk about labor issues and layout and operational efficiencies, things that really speak to hitting their P&L. We’ll be talking about sustainability and some of the rules and and regulations around the country that are impacting that, but ways that they can boost their properties. Performance energy costs are so much of a P&L. And so how do you, how can you reduce those while thinking about all the regulations you have to deal with as well. Beyond that, the main stage will have a solution stage and education stage, dozens and dozens of speakers. We have about 60 industry leaders who will be on all of those stages, talking about really important topics. But then we have some other keynote speakers that I think will be really be interesting from other industries that our industry can learn from. With Chris Barton, who’s the founder of the search app, Shazam, which I know is on everybody’s phone. He’s gonna talk about the power of ideas and taking chances. We have a tech future as who’s gonna talk about separate fleeting fads from profitable long-term trends. How do you make sure that you’re just not falling for the thing of the moment, but you’re really focused on that long-term gain over time as well. And then of course, with everything that’s happening, macroeconomic environment, geopolitical landscape, we have an expert from Tanto Capital Partners who’s gonna talk about global forces, reshaping markets and what does that mean for consumer demand and travel, especially in the, as you pointed out, where we are expecting these big gains and a lot of interest coming to the us. So really encouraging folks to go to the HospitalityShow.com and where they can learn both more, but also register.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s really comes at a perfect time, Rosanna, because I think right now, like you said, profitability margins are slim right now. It’s challenging out there and hoteliers are just hearing all this outside noise from a lot of things about maybe the macro environment that you were talking about, but it’s also a time of disruption, right? Where they’re hearing that all of this AI and technology is really gonna make them become more efficient. So I think a lot of hoteliers have this like kind of FOMO of like, am I not taking full advantage of this and or for my business? And I think places like the hospitality show, events like the hospitality show where you can talk, network with your peers, exchange ideas, hear what people are talking about, really kind of puts you at an equilibrium and really calibrates you and says, okay, this is outside of the noise. This is where I need to be focusing. This is the newest and best technology that I can be using for my business. Put you in a position for success. So along with the Hospitality Show, the major one that happens October, 2025, you actually have regional Hospitality Shows that happened throughout the, the year across the country. I rebranded a couple years ago to the Hospitality Show. I always like, I always like to ask about these because I think this really gives a solid pulse of the hotelier today without that outside noise that we were kind of talking about. What’s been your experience this year talking to hoteliers on the ground and how do you think they’re feeling sentiment wise, heading into the fall and winter, which are typically slower months?
Rosanna Maietta:
Sure. Great question and you’re right. I mean the regional shows have really allowed us to get that pulse check on our members, but also introduce them to some of the advocacy issues that we’re dealing with in their own communities. And so bringing in local leaders, members of Congress from their district that they can have that interaction engagement with, because it has to be a two-way dialogue so that our members can also share some of the concerns that they have with people who are making their rules and regulations that govern our business. They’ve been incredibly important. And I will say this has been a tough year for a lot of our owners and our franchise communities, our small business owners. Again, demand, depending on where you are, sometimes, you know, if you’re on the upper East coast, you’re seeing a drop in travel from Canadians. If you’re in the middle of the country in some of these tertiary markets, you’re doing okay. I think some cities like Nashville and Asheville are doing really well, but that’s not been the case everywhere. And so I think there has been a lot of concern about how some of these rising costs are really impacting business and that bottom line. And so that’s what we’re taking all of that information both into our advocacy efforts, but also into thinking about how can we create a show that will address some of these challenges and burdens that people are experiencing. At the same time, this is an incredibly resilient industry, and you will hear that time and time again from anyone that you talk to, and certainly brand leaders, but also also owners while they’re recognizing this has not been a terrific year, they are still expressing a lot of hope for the future.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And that’s what really where we like to wrap up and end our episodes here, Rosanna. Is kinda looking into that hospitality crystal ball and I think AHLA does a fantastic job of really bringing to the forefront those issues that are going to impact your business. And we sometimes attend these conferences and you hear, some of that outside noise and it really gets you center at what is, what are you advocating right now and what AHLA is kind of keeping an eye on. What does that look like for the rest of this year going into 2026?
Rosanna Maietta:
Well, we’re gonna come back and hit the ground running after Labor Day. I mean, Congress has a looming debt ceiling to negotiate and deal with. So we’re keeping our eyes on that. We’re expecting to hear a little more about some of the decisions around the tariffs and how many deals have been made, what are the details of those deals. So I think some of that certainty and will bring added clarity to the industry. I think you have seen sort of a stalling of some development because of that uncertainty. So hopefully you’ll see that tie turn going into next year once some of those deals have been announced and people understand what the impact will be on costs of building and new development. So we’re keeping an eye on that. Of course, H2Bs is something else we’ve been lobbying on very aggressively this year. That is always staffing challenges are always a challenge and have been an issue this year as well. So we’re working through all of that, making sure the administration understands how important that is to our industry in particular. And again, at the state and local level, continuing to fight for a level playing field. Sessions will start opening up again, so we’re gonna hit the ground running there, but as we look ahead to the 2026 midterm elections, so for sure Washington and outside of Washington will really be consumed by that. But it’s a World Cup year, so I think that there’s a lot of a hope for travel coming back at higher levels than we saw this year and people are preparing for that. And there’s a lot of general excitement around the industry for those events.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s great to see. And 2026 will certainly be the year of the international traveler coming back and hopefully seeing all the incredible hospitality that our country has to offer. So we appreciate you Rosanna, being here on the podcast and talking to our hotel, your audience about the important issues and all the advocacy work you and your team are doing at AHLA. So thank you. We appreciate that. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today?
Rosanna Maietta:
Look, wanna thank you for putting a spotlight on our advocacy issues, but also the Hospitality Show. We look forward to seeing you there. We hope many of your, your listeners and viewers will join us there. It’s gonna be a great way to both wrap up this year, but with a look ahead to what’s to come.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited about that. Hopefully we can catch up there in Denver. Rosanna, thank you for joining me on the Suite Spot here today.
Rosanna Maietta:
Thank you, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you for listening as well. We hope to see you in October at in Denver at the 2025 Hospitality Show. And we’ll talk to you next time on the Suite Spot To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The 2025 Hospitality Show is fast approaching! While it is only a couple of months away, it will take place in Denver, Colorado, on October 26-28. Alexi Khajavi, President of Questex—Hospitality, Travel, & Wellness, joins the Suite spot to discuss the upcoming event and what attendees can look forward to this year.
Alexi shares insight on:
- New Interactive Zones & Networking at THS 2025
- Questex’s Quest Zero Sustainability Initiative
- The Changing Landscape of Hospitality
- Digital Marketing and the Importance of Social Media for Travel
And much more.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. So happy to be with you today, previewing the 2025 Hospitality Show. Yes, it is that time of year, this year. We are headed out to Denver in October. We’re gonna talk all about it, with a very frequent guest, a Suite Spot veteran at this point, Alexi Khajavi, Questex President, Hospitality and Real Estate. Alexi, thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot once again with us.
Alexi Khajavi:
Ryan, great to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. We’re gonna talk about the Hospitality Show, but it is crazy to think that this, we had you back on the podcast in 2023 when this was first announced, and here we are today. You know, this is three years strong. This is the third year going into it. You know, I wanted to start with you. We’ve talked about your journey. We’ve talked about your role, some of the mentors along the way. I’d love to just hear from you, Alexi, if we could go back to that podcast in 2023. What do you think the biggest change in hospitality that you’ve seen over these last few years?
Alexi Khajavi:
I’d say it’s half and half. I mean, on one hand, I think we were, we were absolutely correct and spot on in that hotel profitability and the complexity in hotel operations would only increase and would be in terms of achieving profitability would become harder, and more challenging. And I think we were right in that assessment and we continue to see a lot of challenges in the space. And now we’re starting to turn into negative territory in terms of operating performance with RevPAR ADRs and occupancy, which is normal, right? I mean, this is a cyclical, industry and it’s an industry that is dependent on the macro economy. So, we’ve had an incredible run, but I think looking back in 2023, we absolutely got that right. It was only gonna become increasingly more complicated and challenging, and that therefore profits would also be challenging in turn. What I don’t think we anticipated was how massively AI would start to impact not only our industry, but our world. And it is increasingly becoming, I think it’s, it’s gonna have a much more deeper impact on, in a shorter time than what we anticipated back in 2023. And not all of that, by the way, is negative. There’s a lot of positive opportunities that come out from AI, but I think we’re all trying to figure it out right now in the hospitality industry. Could be both a beneficiary, but will certainly and undoubtedly be impacted by it. But those are two things that I think we got right, and one, I think we, we didn’t anticipate the enormity of the impact of AI.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, or the acceleration. I mean, in a industry whose technology adoption is typically slower than most, we’re, we’re up there right now, I mean, or at least hoteliers. And the market feels like hospitality is trying to embrace this maybe differently than other technological fads, right. And I think it’s really, really cool to see, you ever want to explain the complexity of hospitality to someone who doesn’t know hospitality? Go to the Hospitality Show and see all the vendors that are on that showcase list, and you’re gonna see everything over there. And I think that’s why hoteliers, I know I certainly I do, but hoteliers love the hospitality show because it brings everyone to one specific place. And the challenging operations that you mentioned, Alexi, continue to kind of stack up the hats that GMs can continue to put on and wear. It’s all in one place and at one location. And with this location being in Denver. So you launched the Hospitality Show in Vegas, I don’t think probably a great place to launch any type of show. Moved to San Antonio last year, right by right beside the Riverwalk. Here we are in 2025 in Denver making its debut in Colorado. What are you most excited about for this location? What do you think it brings to the hospitality show?
Alexi Khajavi:
Well, Colorado has a huge and vibrant ecosystem of hospitality companies, all ranging from, obviously, Veo and, the ski resort infrastructure that’s throughout Colorado, but you’ve got some incredible management companies that are based there, developers and technology. There’s a thriving ecosystem across the hospitality space. And all of those categories and brands that are within each of those are supporting THS and getting that local support as we did in Vegas and San Antonio is critical to the success. So I mean, bringing it to Denver, which is a great downtown, a lot of new hotels have opened up just in the last two, three years. So a really vibrant hotel stock that’s gonna be, where our guests and our delegates and our sponsors and exhibitors will all be staying. And we’re bringing the city into the experience. So, we’ve got, as always, we’ve got an incredible two nights of evening receptions where we bring the industry together from senior leaders to GMs and students and everything in between. But it’s just a great town. You know, there’s great restaurants, great sports teams. We’re there, you know, while both the NBA and the NFL are in action, and there’s a lot of that, hospitality ecosystem that we’re bringing into experiences, whether that be for the entire delegation or for guests just to take out clients, meet each other and network and so forth. We’ve got the University of Denver, which has a vibrant hospitality program also that we’re supporting and is supporting the Hospitality Show as well as Visit Denver and, and the Chamber of Hotels and the CBB. So, Denver is a great place to be. It’s a good time of year to be there in October. It’s typically not too hot and before the snow starts to fall. But look, at the end of the day, I mean, the local economy and the state economy really does appreciate the impact that tourism hospitality delivers to Colorado and the businesses and the labor and employment that depend on that. So, we’ve got a lot of support from the local market that is great. And that will be there in full force and it’s just a great town, right? I mean, it’s right downtown. Like San Antonio, you can walk to bars, restaurants in your hotel, you can go catch a game with the nuggets, and if you come in early on Sunday, I even think the Broncos are playing. So it should be a good time, in addition to all the education and the networking, and the inspiration that’ll be happening at the convention center.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I’ve seen firsthand what you’re talking about, Alexi, about bringing that local flare. Some of the things you and your team did last year in San Antonio, a live mariachi band. So cool that that was day that Di de Los MUTOs was going on as well, as well as a World Series. You brought a little bit of that flare, so can’t wait to see what you got planned this year. We’re excited for it along with the obviously local community that has a big impact on this show. You have a great partnership with AHLA, and obviously we’ve had a lot of AHLA members kind of giving us some quarterly check-ins, making sure the hoteliers are up to date with the most important topics, trends, and issues out there that they advocate for. Can you talk about maybe that partnership with AHLA and how it’s kind of helped shape and grow this event?
Alexi Khajavi:
Yeah, I mean, look, AHLA at the American Hotel and Lodging Association is the preeminent association and membership community for the hotel and hospitality sector. And we started this in partnership with AHLA. We were both aligned around our commitment to not only the industry and the brands within the industry, but in terms of the importance of connecting the ecosystem with the products and then the solutions that go hand in hand in addressing that operational complexity that we talked about. But more importantly, in driving hotel profits. And the better off we are from an operational perspective, the better experience the guest has, the more the guest will return and continue to support the hospitality industry. And the win-win is that the rest of the value chain benefits as well. So the more profits that the fragmentation of the industry, the brands don’t own, the bricks, and there’s typically a third party or often a third party operator in the middle of that is operating that operating business on behalf of the owners under a flag for the brand. I mean, you can tell just from the business model, we’re a bit more complex, we’re a bit more nuanced, than a traditional, piece of commercial real estate. So, which makes it very fascinating, right? And then you add in this guest into the middle of that, and all of those guest, you know, expectations are changing as well. So all of that happening, you know, AHLA has a deep understanding of the industry, of the guests, of the operators, but more importantly, they’ve got a commitment to improving that ecosystem and that value chain. And so our interests are a hundred percent aligned around that. It’s why we launched the hospitality show is because the hospitality show is really the only event in the industry that brings both senior leadership as well as the decision makers in procurement, operations, general managers, food and beverage directors, revenue managers, sales and marketing, all across HR and finance. Those individuals that are all making decisions from senior level CEOs of the brands and some of the largest investment funds and groups to everyone in between. And that’s a really unique thing for hospitality in that many other industries, whether it be construction or technology or plastics or military, all have at least one event, which is what we call a tent pole event, where the best, the brightest, the most qualified and the most active in that industry all gather once a year. And, you know, hospitality didn’t have that. And the preeminent foremost association for the US lodging industry didn’t have that. And so that really was, for us, a white space in the industry and in the landscape of all the events that are out there. So, you know, AHLA is a perfect partner. They’re the right partner, they are heavily invested in this, and, you know, we make every decision all throughout the process and the planning and the post-event, AHLA and Questex, are side by side in it. So it really does put the stamp of approval, and it’s why, frankly, we get, the largest collection of CEOs and brands and operators and advisors all there with those owner operators. So it’s a great opportunity and it’s a great partnership, and we’re delighted to have them on board, and it’s a two decades long, partnership. So it’s only just beginning.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I mean, it’s such a truly remarkable, unique event and what better place or maybe authority to go to for key industry issues than the advocacy group that is AHLA pushing some of these, these important issues that are, are so critical to our business. But you’re absolutely right. I mean, the programming that you and your team put together for this event is so intentional that it can speak to your C-level executives all the way down to your frontline, even sometimes students, what you were, you were mentioning there, and you’ve really, you’ve kind of gone through the process, Alexi with me on past episodes about talking about how you’ve incorporated and listened and listened to guest feedback. And I think for events that are going to sustain, grow and be successful, you obviously have to get that feedback from attendees on what’s missing? What do you like, where did we miss the mark to improve? And you’ve kind of gave us the behind the scenes of that process for you and your team. We saw some new additions to this year’s show the recharge zone, interactive zone, F&B zone. Can you talk about maybe these new components of the show and how it’s addressed, maybe some of the guest feedback you were hearing?
Alexi Khajavi:
One of the biggest feedback, points and topics that we heard was personalization continues to be both an opportunity and a challenge for hoteliers. And it’s, much more demand by the guest, right? The guest is choosing hospitality in large part because they want to be treated, with a human, personalized, authentic, you know, service. But behind that, it’s technology that really drives that. And so the the reality is that of the 50 some odd thousand hotels that are in the US, the overwhelming majority of each of those hotels, tech stacks is already outdated. So a huge amount of transformation needs to take uptake place across the hospitality, sector in terms of the backend tech. And that backend tech is what’s gonna fuel that human experience, that personalized delivery of service and experience and memorable experiences, basically that fueled the industry. So that was a, that’s been a really strong driving point as to how do you use technology effectively to empower humans not to replace the human component of hospitality. And then looking at, to your point, the departments within a hotel, F&B, revenue management, wellness, as well as, looking at the startups that are coming into the space, because the tech industry in and of itself looks at hospitality to the point you made earlier, Ryan, as being a late bloomer, a late adopter of technology, whereas many other markets, healthcare and so forth, have already invested heavily and have already incorporated a lot of technology into their infrastructure. So we’ve got a long way to go, which is, you could look at as being a negative, but is it’s actually a positive. We’re also launching and or what, not launching, but continuing with the general manager summit and luncheon, that starts on Sunday. We’ve got the GM awards, so we’re actually bringing over 500 GMs there. Um, Which is really one of the most, I’d say rewarding parts of THS because GMs are the unsung hero, of unrecognized, but we’re, we’re changing that. Again, that’s an Asian initiative, which we’re bringing into to the Hospitality Show. But we’re also looking at the cities and how the hospitality industry can work more effectively with their local mayors, their local councils and their state, local legislations. We’ve got Walter Eisenberg, CEO of Sage Hospitality Group, which is a local Denver, Colorado based, business, which will be starting us off on Sunday. We also have, Mehul Patel, who’s the managing director of Newcrest, one of the most well-known, he’ll be speaking with Heather Tre, who’s the vice president of Ofra International, one of the largest procurement companies that we have. And then on Sunday as well, we’ve got Chris Barton, which for those of you that don’t know, probably use the technology like I do every day, was the founder of Shazam. And he may be wondering, you know, why, why we’re bringing in the founder of Shazam and it and it’s because Chris identified this human need, which is when we all hear that song on the radio, you’re driving in the car, you don’t know, you know what it is, but you desperately need to know, you know, what that song is because you love it or you hate it, whatever it may be. And you use technology to fulfill a very human need, and it becomes a very authentic and a very sentimental moment when you can capture what that song is or what that tune is. So, again, we’re trying to change the aperture of just looking at hospitality through the various departments or the various, you know, sort of technologies that go into a hotel tech stack. We have all that. We’ve got over 500 exhibitors, but we’re trying to give people the opportunity to really think about how other industries are using technology and are looking creatively to solve human needs and human wants, and then to create these memorable experiences. So it’s a mix of both information and inspiration. And honestly, Ryan, one of the things that’s been fueling us this year based off of your question and what the feedback has been is that, in an age of information, ignorance is a choice, and there’s no shortage of information and knowledge out there. So not being knowledgeable about what those products and solutions are to driving hotel profitability is frankly a choice. And so the folks that are making the choice to attend the hospitality show and lean in are making that choice to improve their operations, improve their businesses, and improve their own profitability, which is all, which is a win-win for the entire industry.
Ryan Embree:
There you go. You can punch your ticket right there. That is a great selling point to get people inspired to go to this Hospitality Show. But you’re right, I mean, I still remember the inspiring words of Admiral McRaven in 2023 in Vegas, Aaron Andrews and Jose Andres last year, incredible keynote speakers. And obviously Jose had some very impactful stories about hospitality. But I think all of the lessons learned, you’ve mentioned it on this podcast with me, Alexi, they make for great icebreakers and conversations and networking and things that you can apply to different pieces of your business, which is so eclectic and complex as we’ve talked about. And one of those topics that can continues to be prioritized that we hear personalization is certainly one of the sustainability always a hot topic. Questex has its own initiative, Quest Zero. Can you share a little bit about that program and how you see sustainability evolving into the hospitality show programming this year?
Alexi Khajavi:
Yeah. Our sustainability in that Quest Zero is you, uh, as you mentioned, that is our, not only our, our initiative, but it’s our promise to ourselves and our customers, both, you know, exhibitors and sponsors as well as the delegates that we will repurpose, recycle and reduce all of the products, the services that we ourselves use to put into, and to put on an event of the scale that the hospitality show, uh, does. And look, that’s, you know, that’s often harder than it should be because there, it doesn’t exist the products or the solutions to solve something to reduce or to recycle. But in terms of signage, in terms of carpet, in terms of lighting and food waste, those are all areas which we address directly at the hospitality show. And we reduce as well as reuse. So the food, for example, in conjunction with the convention center, we’re very focused, very much focused on reducing that food waste. And where we do have overages of food, and we always do, we want to have our delegates well fed and imbibed, in hospitality. We then contributed and donate it to local charities and centers to support the needy. So, all of those things, frankly, are replicating what hotels, many hotels are doing and programs that already exist in hospitality. And so at the very minimum, we are a reflection of what the hospitality industry is doing in terms of our its corp corporate social responsibility. And look, it’s a journey. I would be the first one to say that, you know, we’re not perfect, but we’re on that pathway to improving all of those areas. And we continue to work with, you know, industry associations as well as AHLA to find ways to reduce and recycle and frankly just minimize the impact and the footprint that putting on our event of this scale does. But yeah, it’s very important to us and our partners and our customers, also support it as well. And they do their own initiatives, alongside THS as well. So, yeah, it’s a very integral part of not only Questex, but of the Hospitality Show as well.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and it helps the travelers guests, they’re asking for this stuff, right? This is more than just a traveler trend right now of people asking for sustainable practices, corporate corporations looking at a eco budget, rather than how can we make our travel a little bit more eco-friendly? So it’s really, really cool to see that momentum. And I think this is a show like the Hospitality Show, when you have different brands come together, different ideas come together, this is when we can help move that industry forward, especially on important issues like that. Again, our guests are asking for their craving, and they’re certainly prioritizing in their travel when they’re searching for travel. So you mentioned it before, Alexi, GM of the Year Awards, one of my personal favorite parts of the hospitality show, incredible stories, incredible people. How do we, one of the things we probably would still tell each other in 2023 is we’re still battling the staffing shortage to a degree, right? I think we’re always gonna have that, but how do we get some more inspiring stories like these incredible ones that we hear out from the hospitality show into the ears and minds of this younger generation to think of hospitality as a career and not just a summer job that you fall into in college and then fall in love with after that.
Alexi Khajavi:
I mean, it’s a big issue and there isn’t a silver bullet solution to it. But to your point, I mean, it starts one by celebrating, those general managers that most of them, frankly, have come through the ranks of the operational side of the business, right? I mean, they, you don’t just start as a general manager. You start, doing the night audit. You start as a bell cap, you know, you start in housekeeping, you start in the kitchen and really in an industry, and frankly in an economy that does struggle to create career paths and opportunities to start here and end up there with higher earning power, higher authority, greater responsibility. I mean, that’s the American dream right then and there, right? So, not to be, you know, romantic or hyperbolic, but the hospitality industry is hook, line and sink, or directly linked to what we all sort of anecdotally refer to as that American dream. Is that you can work your way up and you can move into management and increase your income and your lifestyle.
Ryan Embree:
And that’s what we all want, right? So celebrating those GMs is paramount to one, why the hospitality show exists. But second to your point, it’s just very, very special. You know, to see those stories, to hear those stories and to engage with those general managers from across the country is a very special moment. We do many touch points and different variations of it, we’ve got the awards, we’ve got the summit, we’ve got the luncheon, and then of course, they’re walking through the expo floor, they’re at the networking reception, so they’re a core part of the audience. And the CEOs, I like to tell the story, the past two years, and I would expect it again this year, Jeff Bti, CEO of Wyndham and others for that matter. I don’t want to just say it was Jeff, but you know, he’s right at the front row. He’s clapping on GMs from other brands because he knows, and he absolutely is connected in his own career. You know, similar story, knows that it’s those individuals which really do deliver the experience, but more importantly, it’s ensuring that those individuals get recognized and that they become lessons for others, whether they’re in the industry today or are looking for a career, that you have an opportunity in hospitality to grow your career and grow your own lifestyle and your opportunities. Which again, which then goes to the other point, which is then connecting it to young people and young folks looking to enter a career at college or at a vocational school or coming out of high school. Again, we have a perception as an industry, a misconception, if you will, that we are a summer job, we’re low paying and we’re low skilled. And nothing could be further from the truth because it doesn’t tell the whole truth, right? And so I think we are like our partnership with the University of Denver, we are connecting this with the school, trying to help the school to promote the incredible program that they have at the university. And David Corson, the dean there is on our advisory board, the planning committee for THS. So we’re gonna be bringing students there from that program, but others as well. And really our job here is to encourage greater promotion and understanding that the industry is a great industry to be in, and it provides a lot of opportunities, but again, you’ve gotta show it from real life people, right? You’ve gotta show that GM started here and ended up there and has a great opportunity and a great career to go even higher. And I just don’t know many other industries that you can do that. I mean, nothing wrong with them, but typically, you need a four year degree and you then have to start at the top, and you may end up somewhere near the top or hopefully at the top, but this is really one that you can start in any department and really then move your way around and find your place. And it doesn’t mean that you always have to end up as a GM or the CEO, but there’s plenty of opportunities. And as we’ve seen, this is a human deliberate. This is a human powered industry. So even with AI coming on board, it’s just gonna open up more opportunities for people to choose a career that they love and have a great opportunity to support themselves and their families, which is, there’s nothing wrong with that.
Ryan Embree:
I think that’s a great pitch to a young professional earlier in their hospitality career. But, and maybe I’ll go on the other side and, and maybe speak to the veteran hospitality leaders out there that might be listening to this. Also be open to mentorship of these young professionals to show them, share your story, how this can turn into a career. And to speak to the technology side, Alexi, that you were talking about, this younger generation coming in, they’re gonna see some of these processes that we might still have in hospitality and say, what are we doing here? Right? They might like look at it as old technology, and it could be an opportunity to freshen up what you’re doing. Definitely keep a listening ear because they’re gonna have expectations of what they want in their career. So hopefully we see more of that.
Alexi Khajavi:
Ryan, I think I don’t think you could be more correct in that statement. I mean we tend to think of it as, as, you know, the business needs to upgrade and needs to modernize, but the reality is, is that it’s still our employees and our colleagues are gonna be using these platforms and these technologies. And if your CSR your booking engine, your global distribution system, your guest management system, your revenue management system, whatever, all of these platforms that are all within that hotel tech stack, if they still look like something from 1984 platform a user experience, it’s failed already, right? It doesn’t matter how good the system is that you can’t get the users to use them. And as we wanna attract these younger talent, our platforms and the user experience part of that platform in order to improve, reduce the data silos, and in order to improve the API connections between all these systems talking to each other, and ultimately to really truly provide a personalized experience in hospitality, which can drive revenue, drive loyalty, IE drive money and and profits. The platforms have to be modern, they have to be user friendly, and they’re not in many cases. And so, the startup zone, that we’ve launched is really in many cases, in many ways, a curation of those new technologies, which are not only improving the solving a problem in the industry, but many of ’em, to your point, are actually trying to create a better user experience within the platform themselves so that the users, the employees and the colleagues that we have in the industry enjoy using it, which becomes, again, it’s a bit of a win-win there.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. If any time, Alexi, it’s ripe for disruption right now with everything that’s going on. So, to be at that startup zone that you were talking about to learn, be open to these new technologies that maybe a decade ago, your organization wasn’t ready to make that shift, this is the time to do it. Because if you’re not here, you could be already five years behind. Speaking of kind of where we’re at right now, I want to give you a crazy hypothetical, but if you started the Hospitality Show, let’s say in the nineties, probably be very different to where starting it in 2023 and the role that digital marketing plays. We started the Suite Spot. It’s a digital marketing podcast. Can you talk to, I remember when I first saw the, the Hospitality Show, social media page come up, and now here you are, you got thousands of followers on social media. Talk to us about how digital marketing has played a role in really growing this show right now.
Alexi Khajavi:
I mean, marketing and demand generation capabilities in hospitality are woefully missing. Some of it is self-inflicted, but for others, for hotels with limited staff, a strategic marketing plan is frankly impossible or extremely challenging. There’s only so much you can do with a limited amount of staff. Talking about COVID, again, to your point earlier on, sales and marketing staffs were the first ones that were let go during the pandemic, and many of them have still not been staffed back up. So we lost this tranche of sales and marketing commercial know-how across the industry, and we’re still suffering from that today. So, you know, technology at its very core, hospitality technology exists to help hotels drive profitable demand through an omnichannel marketing plan. So, essentially how do you build a plan to target the right audiences on the right channel at the right time with the right price? Because the reality of dynamic pricing, which is in hospitality, is you and I can be staying on the same floor, on the same dates, in the same room type, and yet have paid completely different rate through different channels at different times. And that can’t be underestimated the complexity of that to get it right. And it’s not just just changing it willy-nilly, right? But it’s about optimizing the right channel to the right audience at the right time with the right price. And the right price is different for you at a different time on different channels. So it’s highly, highly, highly complex. And if you don’t get it right, you’re gonna be leaving money on the table. And if you do get it right, you’ll be outperforming your market set exponentially. So the campaigns have to be thoughtfully tracked and they have to be thoughtfully optimized, and they have to achieve a measurable return on investment, which is the other bit, right? Because how do you actually attribute what you did and what you spent or the resources you allocated to the return on that investment, again, achievable, doable with all within the technology that’s out there in the marketplace today, that didn’t exist frankly, five years ago and didn’t exist certainly 10 years ago, but exists today. But again, it’s about connecting that product or that solution to the right person, making sure that the labor and that the talent exists to use that properly. Because look, I mean take Meta Search or SEO programs, you know, those are marketing strategies that drive real results for a hotel to get seen on the most popular internet search engines influencing travelers. We’ve been talking about this for, you know, 15, 20 years, but talk about social media. My kids don’t go to the website, they don’t go to Google to influence our vacation plans. And they very much influence our vacation plans. They go to TikTok and they go to Instagram. And I can’t tell you how many hotels that are in destinations that we were going to, because we already knew we were going to Cabo San Lucas. But if they didn’t have a social media plan and execution and optimization and attribution plan, well, they’re not gonna get found. I don’t care whether you got five stars, whether you’re TripAdvisors, good, bad, sideways, those are things that I search for, but they’re not things that our kids and the younger generation search for, which frankly have either influenced my spend, our generation spend, or they themselves are getting old enough to make their own purchasing decisions. So sales and marketing’s a really critical area for the Hospitality Show, and we’ve built that up over the last three years. We have a partnership with HSMAI, so we bring their sales and marketing experts, and we’re bringing more of them this year, and we’re connecting them to more products and solutions that drive that demand generation and marketing capabilities. Because frankly, and I get no joy out of saying this, we still market hotels like it was 1994, to your point.
Ryan Embree:
The complexity spills over from the operational. I mean, you talked about how challenging it can be right now on an operational standpoint. Part of that operations is your sales and marketing and the digital landscape is changing at a very fast pace. And if you are fully not optimized on social media like you’re talking about, and those places are hard, we still think in old attribution models when it comes to social media and reviews sometimes of saying, how much is this? How many bookings is this post gonna get me? How many bookings am I gonna get from this five star review? And you can’t think like that. You have to think about your digital presence, they always call it the online billboard to try to make that translation to something physical. But if you don’t have that upkept exactly like you were saying, Alexi, with your, with your parallel there, you’re not gonna be found in, you’re certainly not gonna be chosen by the travelers once they get there.
Alexi Khajavi:
And the data is siloed still in the industry, right? Because of the fragmentation of the industry itself, because of the fragmentation of many of the technology platforms within this tech stack not communicating with each other. All of that data is siloed. And what that does is, again, we call ourselves a hospitality industry, but how many times have you showed up to a hotel, that you stay at often, I mean, this is me and I, and I will not name the hotel, but I stay there so much that I know who they are. And oftentimes they forget me because they’re seeing thousands of more people than, I’ve got an advantage in that human to human, occasionally a couple of them because we’ve made a connection, will remember me. Hello Mr. Khajavi, nice to see you again. But those that don’t, the fact that I’ve stayed there hundreds of times now will say, is this your first time staying with us? And, you know, there’s nothing that, that could have filled a moment after a plane ride and a taxi, and you’re tired to say, lovely to see you again, Mr. Khajavi. Breakfast is still serving, I know you like croissants, donut and a coffee. That creates a human connection. And that is what hospitality is. And I’m not asking, in this case, it’s the human that is actually performing better than the data, the technology, because a couple of the front desk staff remember me and I can tell you just that, hello, and that welcome back drives loyalty. It happens so intermittently and that there isn’t a data and there’s a solution for it. But the fact that in 2025, we still haven’t connected to that. And I’m a part of the loyalty plan. I stay there all the time. I know them, I know the ownership group, I know the third party management. So again, I’m not your normal John Doe coming off the street. I didn’t book through, you know, an OTA, I did everything right, quote unquote right, for the hotel to know me and not have to remember me, right? To have a popup come and say, Mr. Khajavi stayed with you last May, and he stayed with you for four nights and he got dry cleaning five times. The power of that. And those are the things that we can do. And those are the products and the solutions and the experts that are doing it, right, that owners, operators and GMs and food and beverage directors and heads of housekeeping are gonna meet and are gonna connect with in Denver at the Hospitality Show. Because until we get people together, together that are a part of that, and that know what’s working, what’s not working, how to make it work, we’ll never solve it, right? And we’ve got to solve this because if we don’t solve it, well now we’re just a commodity and we’re really losing out on the art of hospitality. And if we achieve the art of hospitality, I can promise you the profits and the loyalty and the demand will be much, much higher than what it currently is today. And there’s, that’s not a bad thing.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And loyalty will go through the roof, like you talked about, customer retention, it’s a snowball effect. And it’s events like the hospitality show that are gonna get us closer to being there. So if you’re listening to this, it’s the place to be. Let me make, make sure I get the dates right on this October 26th-28th in Denver. We will be there covering it. Again, bring you all the insights, exclusive interviews that we can. Alexi, wanna thank you for your time. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today?
Alexi Khajavi:
Ryan, it was great to see you again. I looking forward to seeing you in Denver and looking forward to seeing everybody else as well.
Ryan Embree:
Well, thank you so much for your time. We look forward to seeing you in Denver. Have a great rest of your summer and into your fall, and we’ll talk to you next time on the Suite Spot To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The next stop on the Suite Spot: Road Trip takes us to Cape Canaveral, Florida, to visit the newly opened Hyatt Place with special guest and Dual Property Sales Manager – Jennifer Odom!
Jennifer sits down with host Ryan Embree to discuss how a special property, such as the Hyatt Place Cape Canaveral, leverages its space coast location, social media, and community engagement to grow business and provide an exceptional guest experience.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot, in another edition of our Suite Spot Road Trip. We are just right down the road. If you could see the view that I’m looking at right now, the cruise ships coming in the ocean right here behind us. We are here on the Space Coast. We wanna welcome in Jennifer Odom, Dual Sales Manager at the Hyatt Place, Cape Canaveral. Thank you so much for hosting us at your brand new beautiful property, Jennifer.
Jennifer Odom:
Yes, thank you. No, it’s a pleasure to have you here. We appreciate the opportunity and are just thrilled to share with everyone just what a fabulous property we do have here on the Space Coast in Cape Canaveral.
Ryan Embree:
It’s incredible. We’re gonna talk all about it, but before that, We were, we wanted to learn a little bit about you. Share with our Suite Spot audience your hospitality background and the journey that led you to opening this brand new Hyatt Place.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely love to. So I’ve actually been here in this area alone for 25 years. I was the typical story of the grandparents were the snowbirds that moved from Indiana and we followed. I came down one year and was like, why am I gonna go back to Indiana when I have all this with the beach and you know, the launches of the shuttles and so forth. And so that’s what drew me here. I ended up moving and as a young teenager, I had actually worked in a gift shop that was kind of connected between a hotel and a restaurant. And the front desk people would always come over and we would chat while they’re getting snacks and stuff, and they’re like, oh my gosh, John Glynn was just on our lobby, the famous astronaut, Buzz Aldrin’s here. And I’m like, how old do I have to be to come over and work at the desk? And so as soon as I turned 18, that’s where you would find me. So I started off my career at the front desk, was at that limited service property and then found out I had a real passion for it and ended up at a full service property right in Cocoa Beach, just six miles from us here. A different, a brand that I was with for about 20 years. So just got to experience everything from, you know, working, starting off front desk to a catering admin, to a group coordinator, to catering sales manager. I mean, I’ve worn all the hats, all of it. All the way up to a DOS. So, and then super excited, I’d taken a little break and what was phenomenal is I’d seen the article about the hotel here and at the time there was so many different properties that were being built around the area and just because of all the different markets and the growth. And what I actually found was that article and I was like, oh, I forgot, like that’s right, like this property. Like I’ve gotta go check it out. And so I came over and I did a tour right when they had the soft opening in February. And as soon as I went up to our rooftop bar, I was like, oh, wow, I could sell this like this, this is my property. So then that is how I came to the Hyatt Place here in Cape Canaveral.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool that, you know, I think hospitality is one of those industries where it’s because we’re all travelers, right? We all traveled as young children, maybe with our parents, and then we get to transition into, you know, maybe working the front desk in those entry level jobs. And then here you are and you’ve got a great career and your decades into a hospitality career that a lot of people enjoy and, and you know, get to have an opportunity like this. I mean, we open your doors February, 2025. I’m sure that was a labor of love to see that you found out about the property. Probably a lot of ways that travelers and locals are finding out about property, opening up a newspaper or seeing an article online and say, oh, this property’s opening up. This is exciting. Talk to us a little bit about the story of the opening and kind of paint a location of where we are because you have, you are right at the intersection of a lot of cool things.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely. And thank you. Yeah, we have definitely a unique destination and location is just stellar. So for the hotel, to really kind of promote it in the beginning, obviously all social media channels and so forth. One of the other little known facts for our property here too is that one of our owners is a celebrity. So there was a lot of media, you know, our surrounding that. And so, to share, you know, Howie from the Backstreet Boys, he is part owner of the hotel here. So it was great that we had that. So that was going out on like Florida today and so forth. So really just to kinda, you know, to market that in the Orlando area and then here in Cocoa Beach, Cape Canaveral. So yeah, so it was just kind of what kind of helped to drive things here for the grand opening as well.
Ryan Embree:
And one of the, I mean, breathtaking features of this property is the Altitude 360 Skybar and Observation Deck. I mean, right when I walked out, I was like, this is it. You said that this was one of the things that sold you, I can sell this probably a sales manager’s dream to see a space like this. Talk to us a little bit about the inspiration and how it’s really put you guys on the map as a differentiator in this competitive market we’ve talked about.
Jennifer Odom:
No, absolutely. So certainly we are known as space coast, so just with the space industry from the days of the shuttle launches to then when it was corporatized and we now have all these rocket launches that are going off. We have obviously the beautiful port with all the cruise ships and the mega cruise ships. So there was definitely an awareness and everybody kept saying like, Hey, you know, we really need a great launch viewing area that we can really take all this in. And so unfortunately with some of the older properties in the area, just with their structures, they could not support like a rooftop, so without basically bulldozing it down and starting over. And so that being known to OCI hospitality, it was like, this is what’s really gonna set us apart and this is what’s really gonna put us on the map, like you said. And it has done just that, you know, once people come up and they see just how beautiful the deck is, we’ve already had inquiries for hosting launch viewing priorities, you know, for the rockets that are going off. And then also, you know, with hosting fam and stuff with the travel agents that come in that sell the cruise lines and seeing them make cruise ships and so forth. So it was just a killer strategy. It needed to be done. And we were the first to do it right here in Cape Canaveral. And definitely we’re seeing the benefits of it.
Ryan Embree:
It’s incredible. And that’s the coolest thing about new builds is there’s a lot of intentionality and everything from, you know, an observation deck and Skybar being built as well as some of the things that we were talking about right behind us with. So some of the F&B experiences, including the breakfast where, you have multiple entry points and things of that nature, even down to the little details in the rooms, that we were touring earlier. Now you mentioned the space tourism, the travel for cruises. You know, you’ve been in this market for a minute. You’ve seen a lot of these travelers come in and out and check into your rooms. What would be one advice that you’d share, a piece of advice that you share with someone looking to visit the Space Coast?
Jennifer Odom:
Sure. No, absolutely. So what I would definitely recommend is coming over and staying more than just one night just because there’s just so much that you can see and tap into here, that a lot of people don’t realize. And even like during stays, like this morning we had a guest that was due to checkout and they wanted to extend their stay because they had found something else that they could go and explore. I definitely would recommend trying to book early just because we do tend to like, you’re already seeing that demand, even with us being open only five months now, you know, we are starting to feel like on the weekends and so forth. So, definitely kind of keeping that in the forefront. And then also, when it comes to the rocket launches, a great website to take a look at is Spaceflightnow.com. Just because we’re launching anywhere, it seems like almost two rockets a week, so you can just happen to be here and not even realize it that there’s a rocket launch. And so certainly we post that in our lobby to advise our guests and that way they can enjoy the rooftop and go up and see but with different variables, like it may be delayed and then going off the next day. So again, I would definitely recommend coming over to our area, staying more than just the one night and really kind of taking everything that we offer from the Space Center to Jetty Park for the beaches to victory casino lines that’s right here, the famous cocoa beaches, Ron Johns, I mean, that’s just to name a you.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, and you were talking about with the cruise travelers of, there’s so many things that can happen and that cruise ship, that massive cruise ship is not gonna wait if there’s a delay in your flight or you know, something happens on the highway on your route out here to Cape Canaveral. So getting here early I think is a great tip for those travelers to make sure you have plenty of time and then you get to stay in a beautiful place like this, who doesn’t love to do that. And they get hosted by Jennifer and her amazing team. So with a new build, new hotel, it’s always a challenge to get awareness out there. That’s where marketing obviously comes in. How have you been able to, maybe some of the creative ways, you mentioned the ownership, that was, that was very crucial but how do you build awareness, whether it be kind of traditional legacy, maybe relationships you built to new innovative ways to try to get the word out there about this property?
Jennifer Odom:
No, absolutely. So most definitely social media, all the channels, you know, that’s a must. We were very fortunate with the special media that was already surrounding us. And then some of the traditional ways was just making sure that we tapped into our chamber, and making awareness there. They came out for our grand opening, they helped us with a ribbon cutting. They actually had brought in a videographer that had done drone footage for us. So they’ve got that going on their website, which is amazing. And inviting a lot of our community in like Space Coast Office of Tourism with coming here, like our city mayor here in Cape Canaveral and so forth. And just kind of trying to partner word of mouth also. One of the other great things is that we own the country and suites, which we share a parking lot with them. So as our guests were coming in there, they could see this build. And so word of mouth saying, you know, getting them excited. Look at what we’re bringing to the area. A brand new Hyatt that’s the only one right here on the strip on A1A. So just certainly with the word of mouth on that. And then also those existing relationships and just inviting them and saying, Hey, this is where I’m at. Would love to see how we could partner. Maybe you have some other opportunities for us that we could try to be a wonderful fit here for you too. So just kind of a lot of different avenues with the strategy and making sure and just the awareness and educating people that we’re here and we’re open and we’d love to take care of you.
Ryan Embree:
And you’re at the exciting part, is you’re at the intersection of a lot of different types of travel, like we talked about, right? Like obviously we’ve really stressed on leisure, but group and business and travel has really picked up around here. I mean, who wouldn’t want to be steps away from the beach, and everything that there is to do. So talk to us about maybe that process and what that looks like here as a salesman when you get those inquiries and the flexibility of this space to be able to host those groups.
Jennifer Odom:
No, would love to and thank you. So most definitely. I mean, we just have such a unique destination that we have all markets that’s feeding into us, whether it’s the corporate business, the government business, we’re blessed to have all six branches right here in our area. We’ve also got the associations that are coming over the sports market, especially with USSSA, that came to the area in 2018. So certainly when you’re looking to owe something and looking at a hotel, we received those inquiries and then really we talk with you and kind of find out truly what your needs are, what’s keeping you up at night, you know, what are those three hot buttons or those major deciding factors and making sure that we’re a good fit for them. And what’s unique for our hotel here is that we do have such flexibility, with regards to, it’s 150 room property, we have a meeting space that is perfect for the smaller scale, say 25 people, where we can do up to theater, just kind of really depending on what that fit is as far as their program and what kind of setup they’re looking for. The other part of it is, is that we do utilize our rooftop for private events. We actually have a customer that is going to launch their consulting firm and so we’re doing an event for her on Monday. You know, and that’s exciting just to elevate it, to be on the, the Space coast to launch the new, you know, consolidation for Yeah. On Wednesday. Yeah. It’s so great. Um, and then, you know, obviously we’re in Florida so we always have to worry about weather and we have that backup. And what’s really nice is with the flow of our hotel and the design, is that we can take some of those larger events of a hundred, 125 people and actually accommodate ’em down here. ’cause the breakfast bar closes in the morning. So that space that we can utilize, we can obviously utilize this area here too for the place to read. That is a nice flow. And again, just kind of depending, if it’s more of a cocktail reception and so forth, the other great item is that again with that flexibility is that our sister property, the country inn suites, she also has, several meeting rooms over there and we’ve actually have shared, groups to where we’ve housed some here, they’ve done like a little executive meeting here and then they had more of the conference training right next door because it’s literally not even 700 feet to the front door for there. So, I mean, it is just amazing just with how flexible we can be and how we can cater to and take care of the needs of all the markets that are coming into the area.
Ryan Embree:
It’s very cool to see and you know, again, to have that peace of mind of being like, alright, if this plan A doesn’t work, we got plan B and C. And I think also we talked about it the way that, you know, group travel is trending, you know, you’ve got your big bigger events where you might want everyone involved, but then you want your smaller, more intimate places and meetings and for those to hold. And those might be with your stakeholders, those, those might be with your leadership team. So be able to have those spaces at in the same vicinity is really important to those planners for sure.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Ryan Embree:
So let’s talk about new properties, wave of excitement with local partnerships getting, I’ve seen it more and more trying to infuse the local community into a new property. How is that being done here at the Hyatt Place?
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely. So Hyatt’s huge on that with local flavors. So what we have done is we have partnered with all of our local breweries to where just actually one of the ones that we utilize out of this six is just probably two blocks up from us, Curry Brewery. So we make sure that we have their local brewers of pilsner, we’ve got the Pineapple Creb that’s very popular for them.
Ryan Embree:
They can enjoy them right behind us.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely. Right behind us here. Yeah. And then, um, we’ve also partnered with Oceanside Distillery to where we do their beach blonde rum. So again, so those are just to kind of name just a few that we do bring into the area. Obviously local seafood as well, that we bring in for like our shrimp ceviche that we offer upstairs. So definitely that’s huge in supporting our community. Huge in supporting our local businesses and bringing in that local flavor.
Ryan Embree:
And the great mural and piece of art. When you walk out on that observation deck. I mean, it’s so cool and stunning to see local artists you mentioned, helped you out with that. Those are the little kind of pieces of flavor that I think first of all, locals enjoy because they actually, it makes it feel a little bit more at home, but also people when they travel, they want to be infused in that community that they want to feel like they’re a part there. They don’t wanna just be walking into, you know, four rooms and a bed. So it’s those typical pieces that help make that a little bit more localized.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely. Helps us to stand out.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Yes. So as we wrap up, we’re gonna end with a couple fast rapid fire questions to get to know you and this new property better. So you talked about the launches, you have a favorite space launch memory so far?
Jennifer Odom:
So that’s hard because I have a couple. Obviously coming from the Midwest, you know, I did not know what was going on here with being so young and so I fell asleep and we lived on Cape Canaveral and I woke up to our glass doors just rattling and I get up screaming earthquake! And it was actually shuttle launch that was going on that my mother had forgotten to advise me of. So that was kind of like my first introduction. It was a night launch, so it was beautiful. It lit up the sky. So that’s always just such a fond memory that I have. I would say most recently though, I was very inspired that we had the inspiration for launch that took place in 2021. And what was so special about that, it was just an ordinary crew that they had. Jared Isman came in, they had Haley who was a survivor of cancer that worked for St. Jude. They involved St. Jude with raising funds and they reached their goal. They actually exceeded it with raising like $240 million for them or maybe 240,000. I might be wrong on that one. But just to kind of see that and just kind of where the space tourism and where we’re going with it and that individuals like me and you maybe one day be able to go on a shuttle or a rocket, to outer space or even go to the moon. I mean, it’s just phenomenal. It kind of reminds me growing up as a kid and I’m kind of dating myself here, but like the Jetsons, who would’ve ever thought about that? You know? Right. And it’s all kind of come into fruition, which is just amazing. And I think that’s why I love this area so much just to be involved just in that little aspect because then it’s so cool. And then I still have, all the other markets that I’m just very passionate about. So yeah. So yeah, so that was kind of hard. And then of course the other two is the last shuttle launch of the Atlantis and the Atlantis is now displayed at Kennedy Space Center is just breathtaking. And if you’ve never been, you have to go. ’cause it just makes you feel so proud to be an American and kind of see what we’ve accomplished.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s so inspiring and every single time a launch goes up, it’s just so cool to see and I’m sure to have a view from up there those night launches. Oh, I mean that’s, you talk about social media content. I’m sure that would make for some great ones. What about your favorite rooftop menu item at Altitude 360?
Jennifer Odom:
Okay. So for upstairs it’s more kind of sips and savory bites that we have. So I think one of my favorites is the Elote Dip, which is like a deconstructed street corn dip with the ticking chips, which is really good. I’m always a fan of charcuterie boards and then more so I absolutely love like our space themed drinks. So we have the rocket fuel rum runner, love that. Dark matter espresso martini as well. So you know, just to kind of tie in with the area and stuff. So those are just some of my favorite.
Ryan Embree:
That’s so cool. One word that would describe a traveler’s experience here at the Hyatt Place Cape Canaveral.
Jennifer Odom:
I would have to say really for here would be elevated.
Ryan Embree:
I like that it goes right along with that.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely. Just to elevate the experience, whether you’re here on business. I mean, imagine being here on business and just seeing that rocket launch as you’re trying to wrap up your day and check a few emails elevated by the Hyatt brand standards and just the customer service and just really showing that we care about you as an individual so you can be your best. And obviously taking our food and beverage to a new height that we’re elevating that as well, with the rooftop here. So love it, definitely elevated, would have to be the word.
Ryan Embree:
Then finally, favorite local partnership or collaboration. You were talking about some events that you guys are doing here too.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely. Oh my gosh, there’s so many. So you know, obviously we have a lot of not-for-profit in the area and so forth. And one of the really cool things that we get to collaborate on this year is that it’s a 10th anniversary of an annual event for the American Cancer Society. They actually host a marathon out at the space center where they actually run right there on the launchpad. And so since it’s their 10 year celebration, we’re working with them and collaborating to where we’re going to house registration here with packet pickup. We’re doing like a pasta celebration for them. We’re gonna house the runners and then that way they get up first thing in the morning and they head out to Kennedy Space Center and so forth. So a great partnership there. Another one is I’m very fond of the cruise business. They have such wonderful people that are business development managers, travel managers and so forth. So we’re actually gonna partner and house what’s called a familiarization trip where we, bring in some top producing travel agents. And so before a ship inspection, we’re actually going to host a breakfast in the morning. So why not a sunrise breakfast, get to see the sunrise, start your day, enjoy it, and then go over and see these beautiful ships that we have through ship inspections and stuff. And I mean, and there’s just so many more. So we’ll be here forever.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I love those events. I mean, ’cause they’re, you know, the, the events now are getting so curated. They’re getting so, and that’s where when you have a team that works with your event coordinator to like put those little touches to it, I think that’s what makes very memorable experiences. And that’s what really fuels in hospitality group travel right now is like, people are done with just the tired, boring event. They want everything curated, everything personalized. And both the, I think the event coordinators and the sales, the sales and group managers are helping them with that. And it’s making for a really cool moment in hospitality right now. So. Absolutely. Well Jennifer, as we wrap up, thank you again for hosting us here at your incredible property. Right behind us is the lobby. We always like to kinda wrap up the episodes talking about if you could overhear a conversation or, or what, what do you want your guests to feel as they check out and they kind of go head on home? What do you want them to feel and say about their experience here?
Jennifer Odom:
Really for us is just that they were really cared for and really, kind of creating, again, that fond memory just to take away fond memories with them. Sure. I mean, it, it, you know, that’s really what sets people apart. That’s what it’s all about, is just kind of creating those memories. During our time when you travel, whether it be for social, like going on a cruise or you’re here for a marathon, or you’re here for, you know, a company event and just knowing that they had just that experience again that was elevated that really did capture the moment and create that fond memory that they’re, they’re never gonna forget. And just to kind of share, we were up watching the Rocket Launch and there was a family here and the kids were young, maybe six and seven. They had never seen it. And I just happened to be upstairs trying to take a photo of the launch. And I captured this precious moment to where the kids, you know, dad had one kid on his shoulders and the mom was holding the other kid. And I just happened to have him in one of the photos and I was like, would you guys like this photo? Like I just, by chance, I didn’t mean to get you in the picture, but I did. You know, I captured that moment. Would you love it? And they were just absolutely thrilled to be able to have that. So, again, just kind of taking away just fond memories and knowing that we do truly care about our guests, obviously our employees as well. But, yeah, I would love for them to leave with that.
Ryan Embree:
What a special moment to share. Thank you so much, again, for hosting us here. Would encourage all of our Suite Spot listeners and audience, come visit Jennifer and her team over here at the Hyatt Place, Cape Canaveral. She’ll take great care of you. Check out a rocket launch, go absolutely jump on a cruise. So, so much to do here. Thank you so much again.
Jennifer Odom:
Absolutely, my pleasure.
Ryan Embree:
And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Special guest David Audrain, CEO of Exposition Development Company, joins the Suite Spot to discuss the upcoming 2025 Independent Hotel Show Miami and how Expo DevCo develops, facilitates, and hosts the convention. Attendees will also learn what they can look forward to from this year’s event and much more in the episode.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. We have reached the crescendo of our Independent Hotel Show series. It is fast approaching here and with me to preview the Independent Hotel show. Miami got a very special guest, David Arin, CEO, and partner of Expo Devco, which owns and produces the Independent Hotel Show Miami. David, thank you so much for joining me. I’m excited to talk about this event that is just around the corner here.
David Audrain:
Thank you, Ryan. I’m very happy to be here with you and always happy to talk about our show.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, it’s an incredible show. We’re gonna talk about the history, but before we get into talking about the show, what you have geared up for Miami Beach in September. I wanna first talk about maybe your career journey and what led you to Expo Devco and your involvement with the Independent Hotel show, Miami.
David Audrain:
Well, I’ll, I’ll try not to bore everybody with too much detail, but, I grew up in Europe, to a English Father, American mother, born in the us, grew up in Europe, little island of Jersey, the original one, not the new one. Right off the French Coast. Actually, my father and his father’s business before was a Green Grocers, wholesale and retail green grocery business. So, I actually was walking in the back doors of kitchens of independent hotels from a very early age and always had some good contacts and good friends in the hotel business growing up and going forward. Ended up leaving Europe and moving to the US Back in 1989, I’d sold a technology business and moved to the US and ended up working for an association, happened to be the Texas Restaurant Association. And my very first trade show was a substantial show in Texas for the restaurant and hospitality industry. And that’s what got me hooked on the trade show business. So I’ve now been in the trade show business for 33 years, and worked for several major, some of the largest trade show organizers in the world. I’ve produced some of the largest trade shows in the world, everything from the largest automotive aftermarket show to the largest floor covering show to the largest apparel fashion, manufacturing industry shows. And ended up running the North American business for a major European company called Messer Frankfurt. Ran that for seven odd years. And then in January of 2012, my partner, who happens to also be my wife, Stephanie Everett and I left that business and started Exposition Development company, Expo Devco. We’ve partnered over the years with several companies out of Europe and produce different shows. And the one that’s obviously relevant to here is the independent hotel show. The company that originally launched the Independent Hotel show in London is a company called Montgomery Group. They’re a 130 year old family exhibition business. And they had started the Independent Hotel show in London, more than a dozen years ago. And I happened to visit it and talk with my friends that owned the Montgomery and really liked what they were doing with it, the specific niche for independent hotel, independent luxury boutique hotel operators. And that’s how, that’s how we, we first got started.
Ryan Embree:
It’s an incredible story. You’ve seen it all, but hospitality being the one that brought you into, being your first show, I think is super special to hear. And that’s, I think the beauty of hospitality, David, is that, you know, we all get to experience it. Maybe some of those other, maybe some of those other businesses or shows that you’ve been a part of, you might not really be in that business, but we’re all in the business of hospitality, right? We enjoy going to restaurants, we enjoy traveling, and it all circles back, which makes just for the perfect and a reason why a lot of people fall in love with our industry and some of our guests even on this independent hotel show show series, you know, really didn’t start in hospitality, but fell into it and have had decades long career since. You know, one of the things I’m sure putting on all of these events that we’ve talked about before, David, is you can’t just throw a a show anywhere and hope it’s successful. You and your team picked Miami Beach, some would argue the independent hotel capital of the world. Why is Miami Beach just the absolute perfect location for the show here in the us?
David Audrain:
You’ve got it right. I mean, the hospitality industry is all encompassing and the people that are in it from every side and of the world and the marketplace. And, but they really are in the hospitality business. I say I grew up around hotels and restaurants. I’ve obviously enjoyed traveling most of my career and life and experienced a lot more than the average the average traveler out there. When we first started talking about bringing the independent hotel show brand to the us, obviously we did our research. We looked into the, the marketplace and there are great places around North America, that could be hosts for the show. But what we really wanted to look at is where could we create a base that would create a foundation to launch the show? Because to be honest with you, launching trade shows is not for the faint of heart. It’s not easy. It’s a very competitive landscape. And today compared to, you know, 10, 20, 30 years ago, it’s probably even more difficult because people —
Ryan Embree:
Well, in an industry too, David, where hospitality, I mean, time is one of the biggest assets for, for somebody in hospitality. So for, for someone, an independent hotelier, to be able to say, Hey, I’m going to a show for a day and a half, you know, as long, however long that is, has to be super compelling. And I think that you and your team have done a great job of creating so much value and saying, you, this is a need to be at show. It’s going to be worth your time and then some.
David Audrain:
Exactly right. We have to create, we people don’t go to trade shows just for the heck of it. They go because there’s value, there’s value for their time, and it is, and time, you’re exactly right, is the number one criteria for value for everybody getting involved in it. And so in looking in doing the research, we looked at many places and Miami Beach is really just a great fit for several reasons. One, Florida in general has one of the highest concentrations of independent hotels, in the country. And within Florida, obviously Miami is a true mecca of independent brands, both, upscale and midscale. And so, that became a good, a good hub to be able to bring a really great local base to the show, but also, in terms of being able to attract people from throughout North America. And we have people coming from Central America, Canada, west Coast, you name it. We also wanted to be able to make it, easy and attractive. So in terms of the Caribbean, in terms of Central America, Miami’s obviously a destination for many, and it’s very attractive for that community to come in. And if you’re in the north, you know, north of the country and also in Canada, September, and Miami’s not a bad place to be. And of course, the general lift, the general attraction of the city itself, the airport access, all make it very convenient and very easy for most people to be able to get there in a one stop hop.
Ryan Embree:
And one of the underlying themes that we’ve had throughout this series, David, is talking to some of the advisory board members, which we’re gonna talk about here in a minute, is the theme of independent hotels really embracing the local community. And I think Miami and Miami Beach in particular, has such a strong culture is a strong cultural center. And it’s felt throughout the show, it, it’s really embracing Miami. And I think when you look at the larger independent hotel, just community and business model, that local community has to be ingrained in there because a lot, because the, the most successful independent hotels are the ones where the locals really embrace it. And it feels like you’re going to, travelers when they, when they go to a different market, they don’t wanna feel like they’re just going to another place. They wanna feel like they’re a part of the city that they’re traveling in. Independent hotels have a very unique value proposition, for travelers and can embrace that a little bit differently than maybe your flagged or branded properties there. Let’s switch gears to your advisory boards. Very intentional, David, that you just boast such an impressive, deeply engaged advisory board. This was intentional by you and your team. How has that group helped shape the direction and really propelled this show to where it is today?
David Audrain:
Certainly, advisory boards to us are a key element of how we build a new show brand. We have found in launching shows in many industries over the years, that it, as much as we might think we know about a marketplace, if we’re not particularly ingrained in that marketplace, we we’re not gonna know everything we need to know. So creating an advisory board, specifically of the target buyer audience is what we do is step one, we start working on two for two reasons. One, most importantly, to make sure we’re educated on what the needs of that marketplace are. What are they, what are they gonna get value out of? What kind of education, what kind of of vendor support at the show are they gonna find useful and interesting? And more importantly, what can they share with us to help us develop the right attractive content around the show that will bring more like them, to the show.
Ryan Embree:
I love that. And, you know, I want to thank you for giving me the privilege to speak to some of your advisory board members. This series has just been incredibly, really showcasing the eclectic collection of independent hoteliers. I mean, we started up in, New York with Cat Woods, we just spoke with Nicholas Gold out there in southern Utah and Gabriel Perez down in, South Carolina. So you really have taken hoteliers from all over the country. But I think it’s so important because although as spread out as they might be and different, their markets might be, you know, independent hotels still face very similar challenges. And it’s spaces like the Independent Hotel show where you can network peer-to-peer, get together, talk through some of those challenges, see what trends you’re seeing. I mean, that you talk about AI and technology, right? And how much that’s changed in the last three months, let alone an entire year. So to have a tradition of going to the independent hotel show year after year and saying, you know, what are you, what have you implemented at your property? You know, what are you seeing? What trends, how is this impacting you? International travel is a huge topic right now, and it’s all happening here September 17th & 18th in Miami Beach. A quick reminder to our Suite Spot listeners use promo code EMBREE25 for a complimentary registration. We would love to see you there. You and your team have done a fantastic job, David programming lining up in some extremely powerful panels. What are some of the sessions, conversations that you’re most looking forward to this year?
David Audrain:
Well, I appreciate you, letting us talk about the content that’s happening because, you know, there are two really key elements of why people go to shows. And again, I’ve been doing this an awful long time, 33 plus years now in many industries. And over that entire time we’ve been surveying our customers and we continue to every year. But from an attendee perspective, they come looking for three things. They’ve always, it doesn’t matter what industry, what region, anything about the shows. People come to find new products and suppliers, they come for education and they come for networking. Those are the three things they come to shows for. So every time we, every, we keep that in front of mind in everything we do about creating a show. We keep those three elements. What is, how is something we’re doing going to affect the ability to deliver those three things? In terms of the content itself, I think there’s some great topics and I absolutely zero responsibility for any of them. Our advisory board has been key to it, and our team have worked very closely with them to develop topics. So some of them that come to mind. I know the first time we’re having a new session on the importance of food and beverage and how hotels are losing revenue to things like DoorDash and Uber Eats, even when they have their own kitchens and restaurant facilities. And in fact, the founder of Indigo Road Hospitality Group, Steve Palmer’s gonna be speaking on that session. Well, and I think that’s gonna be very interesting for many. We also, one of the things that’s comes up a lot from the independence and particularly has been some of the rating programs, and we’ve got some, a great session, by Gina Taylor from the Forbes Travel Guide. We’re gonna be talking about how ratings are measured and issued and how it works and what these independent hoteliers should know about how they can improve their ratings, as they go forward. I think that’s gonna be very valuable, for a lot of the independents out there as we go through.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely, David, I mean, those are, those were two topics and themes that were, again, underlying throughout this entire series, the importance of food and beverage used that as a differentiator between some of the different branded hotels maybe in your market. And then, yeah, ratings are, are so important, right? We’re always, as independent hotels trying to show where we stack up against competition in our area. So trying to figure out how can I show value to my traveler, which is mostly that research now almost completely done online. Now there’s new avenues of doing that research through LLMs Chat, GPT, you know, how can you be put in a position to succeed? And I love what you said about the education is really just kind of the, the starting point, an icebreaker for a lot of these conversations. And that’s what I tend to do when, when we’re covering these events, is talking about some of the sessions and how it relates back to that particular person, that specific property or market. And I think that’s what really helps some of the best events I’ve been to have the best programming. And that for some reason, you just feel the networking was amazing at that show, but it really, it stems from the educational and the programming that’s put together. Because if those topics are compelling enough, those conversations now bleed into your networking events that, that theme of network. You said those were your three pillars, right? Networking being one of them. How have you incorporated that into this year’s event, and what can guests look forward to from a peer-to-peer connection standpoint?
David Audrain:
Several things, as I said, as part of the education programs. And in fact, we have two education stages, on the show floor. So they’re integrated fully into the show, and that’s purposeful, because what we found is that a lot of people want education and they, they rate it highly, but then when they get on the show, get to an event, they tend to get distracted by all the people they’re talking to and the people products they’re seeing and and the like, and they tend to forget about the education when it’s buried off the off in the building somewhere else. So what we’ve done purposefully is build these two stages on the show floor themselves, our innovation stage being focused very much on the, the type of content I was just talking about, hoteliers, talking to hoteliers on these particular specific topic. Our second stage is our business center, and this is more of a product and service driven new technologies, new products, new information that some of our key suppliers partners are able to share with hoteliers. And that’s where you’re gonna learn the latest about, you know, AI and some of the new technologies that are out, things like that. And these, these alternate these stages alternate so that people can go from pop from one to the other. And in between those sessions on the show floor, we have two specific networking areas, our lobby lounge and in the middle of the floor and our corner bar. And both of these areas will be easy, relaxed areas for hoteliers to sit out and network amongst themselves and take advantage of being, again, all on the show floor, all in one place that they can interact with the suppliers that are exhibiting. They can look at the products, they can network with each other, they can experience the education all together.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you know, there, there’s something, the Independent Hotel show is one of my favorite events to attend every year because of that energy that you feel, right when you walk in, you got that music going, everybody, you know, you start to feel, you can tell how well a show is gonna go based on, you know, when you first walk in. And the independent hotel show absolutely brings that energy. And those networking areas are always buzzing industry influencers. You can bump into someone, vendors, brands, hoteliers. It’s really the place to be. And you know, the, the last pillar that you talked about was connecting those suppliers to independent hoteliers. And we’ve talked over the years to independent hoteliers about how important that is because the brands, they have tons of leverage, right? They’ve got thousands of these, tens of thousands of these properties that they’re able to, you know, really get the best deals, connect you with the best vendors. They’ve got these big, you know, list of vendors, suppliers that you can choose from, independent hotels. It’s a little bit different. It’s a little bit more challenging out there. So it’s events like this where you can connect directly to suppliers, the latest technology. Tell us a little bit about how the Independent Hotel Show connects supplier to hoteliers.
David Audrain:
The trade, the whole trade show model literally goes back millennia, goes back to markets in, you know, in, in ancient times. One of the key elements about the value of trade shows is simply bringing buyers and sellers together in an environment that creates an opportunity for people to find new products and new suppliers for service companies, service providers and products sellers out there. It’s very hard to get in the door of somebody new physically to actually, when somebody calls you up, if you’re even answer the phone. You know, your willingness to give somebody you don’t know time in your office, in your property to come and actually show you products is limited. And it’s very hard for those companies to get into those new product.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and I would, I, again, David, I would even argue harder for hoteliers where you could be getting a call from linens,and then all of a sudden your pool supplier, echo Lab, you know, all of these different suppliers within an hour timeframe that has to do with so many components of your business. Hospitality is a very complicated business model.
David Audrain:
Exactly. And what we, you know, in the trade show business, what we know is that somebody who wouldn’t give you the time of day on the phone, or certainly wouldn’t let you set up an appointment to come and, and pitch them in their office or their hotel will be a hundred times more likely to spend five minutes at your booth on a trade show floor. It is the most, trade shows are the most efficient way for both buyers and sellers to investigate new products and services. For a buyer, you can come and you can see a hundred new products and suppliers in a day. You can’t do that any other way. And for a supplier, you can get in front of hundreds of new potential prospects or existing customers in a day that you can’t possibly do any other way. And more importantly, even if you could get a hundred hoteliers to give you a meeting in their property, you certainly couldn’t do it in a day, and you certainly couldn’t bring your, you know, your booth or your, your showroom to them as it goes forward. So that’s why trade shows, I mean, trade shows as a, as a tool are bigger today than they’ve ever been.
Ryan Embree:
I want to talk about that, David, ’cause I’m sure this is a, listen, you’re the first guest on our show that has this much experience in the, in the live event and trade show space, and probably will be here, for our next dozens of episodes. But I wanna pick your brain about that, because I’m sure there were a lot of times, you know, you think about over 30 years, you got the great recession, you had obviously the pandemic that I’m sure in each one of those spaces, there were times where people were telling you, Hey, this is it. This is the, let’s go ahead and start digging the grave for live events and trade show. We heard it on our end back in, in 2020. How has it evolved in in that time? And you’re right, I I truly think, especially with the rise of AI and technology, these peer-to-peer connections are going to be more authentic, meaningful relationship building than it’s ever been. Talk to us through some of that evolution, David, ’cause I’m sure you got some great insight there.
David Audrain:
Yeah, it is true. I say I’ve been doing this since the early nineties. And I was with the, at the time, at the late nineties, I was with, I had a senior exec role running a division for then, the largest trade show management company producer in the world. And around those late nineties, you know, technology was going crazy. The internet was exploding. And again, at that time, as you rightly said, everybody said, well, with the internet, why do we need trade shows? Why would we need, you know, everybody can go find everything online. And the reality is, you can’t touch it, taste it, feel it, interact with it, you know, you’re not gonna spend whatever you spend. I’ve got another show where we sell, where it’s a manufacturing, and they said, huge machines. People aren’t gonna go buy huge machines without seeing them. And they, you know, they’re not gonna, I’ve run shows in the fabrics and fashion industry and the like, and nobody’s gonna buy a sheet without feeling it. Nobody’s going to, you know, nobody’s gonna buy food without tasting it. These sorts of things don’t happen online. And so while the, you know, while everybody thought to everybody, a large portion of the world thought that trade shows would, you know, disappear because the internet would replace everything. What happened is the internet provided the ability for trade shows to become even more valuable because the ability of being able to customize information, of sharing personalized information needs became much more valuable and much more authentic. And the opportunity to create that link became much more efficient. The pandemic was, was devastating. The COVID-19 closed our industry down globally for a one to two years in many different places. Our own company didn’t produce a live event for 18 months. It was devastating, but what happened afterwards is the need for that interaction, that face-to-face interaction exploded the industry back to the point where within literally three years, the industry was as big as it was prior to the pandemic. And today is even bigger globally as an industry. So I, you know, I’m a little self-serving. I’m in the industry. I produce trade shows, but I personally believe very much that trade shows will always have a place and they will continue to grow in importance and value to people, because you can do more and a live event than any other means.
Ryan Embree:
I had the privilege of attending, you know, some shows early 2021, 2022, and I would argue the fevver and passion that people came back to, those live events were different. It was a completely different show. There was just like this exhale of like, okay, this is, and the conversations were more meaningful. It was just, you know, we always talked about revenge travel on the leisure side, people coming back and missing that, of course, everybody missed going on vacation, but I don’t know, you know, you speak to a lot of business professionals, I don’t know how many of them were like, man, it just feels good to connect again with peer-to-peer, you know, some of those people. And I still think that that is still happening today with the shows that are happening. And, you know, you and your team have done, like I said, a great job to kind of set this show up for success, exposure and growth. And it really is the must attend event for independent hoteliers vendors in the independent hotel space. That’s kind of my pitch, but David, I’m gonna give you the floor to, you know, some of our Suite Spot listeners. What would you say to somebody who’s maybe considering attending this event for the first time?
David Audrain:
It’s only our third edition here in the US. So we’ve been, you know, in growth mode, in building mode, for the show, the brand, you know, been a hotel show, in London’s been around for over a dozen years. It’s been in Amsterdam for since prior to the pandemic. And last year they expanded it into Munich as well. Our colleagues over there, Montgomery are doing a fabulous job. But this is only our third edition here in the US. And what we have done is focus exclusively on what the luxury independent boutique hotel operator needs. So our focus is very much on the full range of everything from lemons and bedding to furnishings and decor to technology and services, all, everything that they will need to run their, their hotel property. But most importantly, we’re focused on the fact that these, these are independently minded hoteliers. They’re looking at ways to deliver a unique experience with their property. And so we wanna make sure they have a range of products and service suppliers, to support them and of all levels as well. So luxury properties are gonna find plenty to find at the show and to work with. Mid-range properties are gonna find plenty, as they go forward. And that’s our, that’s our number one goal is delivering an ROI for the attendees that justifies them. Spending their time, gives them a lot of takeaways. You know, if you, if you don’t leave a trade show event like this with some new ideas and some new suppliers and products that you wanna look at, then you haven’t really tried because it is definitely there for the taking.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And you’ve done such a great job, like I said, listening to the feedback from the advisory board, from the attendees themselves each year that we’ve been there, been able to cover the event. We’ll be there again, obviously this year in September in Miami covering the event. We’ve seen more and more innovation, more and more, just growth in that, in that show. So such a pleasure and privilege to be, be a part of it. I want to thank you, David, for taking the time outta your busy schedule. I hope to see you obviously in September in Miami, along with all of our Suite Spot listeners. Any final thoughts before we close down the episode today?
David Audrain:
All I encourage listeners to do is, is visit our website, IndependentHotelShow.US. There you can see the great advisory board members and brand ambassadors that are participating and supporting us. All of the organizations, that are supporting the show and participating in the show. AHLA, for example, is doing some great sessions on current advocacy work as well as issues very dear to everybody’s heart on the human trafficking awareness, et cetera. And also you can see our list of suppliers that are participating in the show and get a and start planning plan for the kind of products you wanna look at, plan for the sessions you want to attend, and get together with some hotels and plan some time together to network and share and, and have a good meal somewhere in a great city of Miami Beach.
Ryan Embree:
I’ll be tuned into the session on podcasting and marketing for independent hotel shows. Thank you David, so much again for taking the time and joining me here on the Suite Spot.
David Audrain:
Thank you, Ryan. Appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much and we’ll talk to you next time. And hopefully we’ll see you down in Miami Beach in September. We’ll talk to you next time on the Suite Spot to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The next episode in the Suite Spot: Road Trip series takes travelers to the newly renovated Marriott Pompano Beach Resort in Sunny Fort Lauderdale, Florida! The resort’s General Manager, Leslie Weil, sits down on the podcast to share with audiences the transformative renovation, unique dining options, and enhanced guest experience. Tune in now.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree as you can tell, we are not in our Suite Spot podcast studio. Instead, we are on site at the beautiful Pompano Beach Marriott Resort. I’m here with GM, Leslie Weil. Leslie, thank you so much for hosting us here at your beautiful reimagined property. We’re gonna get to it today.
Leslie Weil:
Thank you for having me. Excited to have you.
Ryan Embree:
And this is kind of a combination, of a couple different series and we’re gonna share why that is special. Your alma mater, which we’re gonna talk about in a moment. But we’ve got so much exciting stuff happening right here on property. But before we get into that, we always love to hear kind of the background of hospitality professionals. Sometimes you’re jumping from place to place, sometimes you’re local, born into the industry. Tell us a little bit about your story.
Leslie Weil:
So, I was not born into the industry, but I knew very young that this is what I wanted to do. At 15 years old I said I wanna study hospitality and I’ve stuck to it for over 30 years now. I absolutely love what I do and I’m from Peru. I was born and raised there. And then after high school, I studied for one year in Peru and I moved to Miami to study hospitality in FIU. FIU is a wonder for a school. It gave me a really great beginning in the industry and I have not looked back ever since. I’ve worked everywhere from hostels to luxury hotels at all over Latin America and the United States. So really I was lucky enough to start in housekeeping and in the kitchen and then I just got to grow to be in a GM and I love it.
Ryan Embree:
I love hearing that story. It’s something that we’re actually hearing more of now. Are people going to school for hospitality? Before it was, I fell into the industry, fell in love with it, and now we’re seeing that intentionality into hospitality. I think it’s because of stories that you hear sometimes from mentors about seeing and obviously just the love of travel. Right? I think that that’s, that’s comes with it.
Leslie Weil:
I really think the love of travel and the love of meeting people. Always merging into what can I do with those traits? And then all of a sudden it’s like, oh, hospitality. And I think as a career, hospitality is a career that offers a little bit of every career into one. Yes. And hospitality is a world of sub worlds. So really it is true that still, I feel like there’s a lot of people that fall into it. Like, you need a summer job and often sudden you love it and decide that that’s what you’re gonna do with your life. Yeah. But I think being able to study it and understanding all the components from a hospitality standpoint really gives you an advantage as you start your career.
Ryan Embree:
And a lot of transferable skills as well. Where you know, you can be at a property in the Midwest and then move to a beautiful property here right on the beach right behind us. And that’s what we’re gonna talk about next. Leslie, is this complete, we’ve visited at the perfect time, right? You would say the complete reimagining of your rooms, your suites, amenities, your pool restaurant. Talk to us a little bit about this project and kind of the journey that got you here.
Leslie Weil:
So I have not been here for as long as the renovation has been but my team has. And it was definitely, a very long but very well thought of project. It was fully reimagined. Sometimes you go into renovations and I have done 20 openings and many renovations, but this one felt like an opening because we really closed out the tower, the pool, the restaurant, while operating from one of the towers, which is not always easy on the team. And it’s also not easy on the guest of course, but it’s truly amazing to walk in and feel such a fresh outlook in what this property was supposed to be. It doesn’t feel like it’s the same building. Everything was redone. Every single room. The lobby is completely new. We have the new pool, which is incredible. And that was made of two different pools. So legitimately, I feel like we exploded the pool deck. And then just made something new and really try to stay true to our roots. Meaning we are from Pompano Beach, we’ve been here for a long time and we wanna big homage to that. So really everything was carefully thought of to how to be a guest hub and a community hub and honor the city we’re in with the names of our meeting space, the restaurant and everything else. And we unveiled it last week. So it’s been incredible to see.
Ryan Embree:
Well, congratulations to you and your team. They’ve done a fantastic job. I had breakfast out on my balcony overlooking that beautiful pool. It was a great place to work for, for the morning for sure. Leslie, you mentioned, you know that not a lot of people, I have family here, so I, I visited Pompano, but not a lot of people know about Pompano Beach. That downtown completely revamped, completely redone, beautiful. Paint a picture for those that have considered visiting Pompano Beach. What you get out of this, this location.
Leslie Weil:
I think Pompano is booming. It was like Dan known Jame in Broward County. Everything has grown so much and then it kind of moved north. Pompano is quiet, it’s beautiful, it has pristine beaches. You have a pier, you have the lighthouse. So we’re in a privileged location because from some rooms you see the lighthouse and from the others you see the pier. There is a lot to do. Great restaurants, not just ours, but there, there’s a lot of things that are coming. We have a brand new residence, building right next to us, but there’s so many coming up. So if you are looking for a little bit more of quiet and real restored experience, it’s almost like you really feel like you’re on vacation without the hustle and buzzle of other beaches in Florida.
Ryan Embree:
Sure. And that’s the best place to be, right? Is where you feel like you can get away from it, but you’re not too far removed from it where you actually feel like you have to get in your car and and drive. So, let’s talk about those guests that maybe do wanna stay a little bit more tranquil. Like I said, enjoy maybe their breakfast or their dinner right here on the beach. Some of the amenities in that reimagination there.
Leslie Weil:
So, of course I think the pool deck is the biggest portion of the renovation. I think the best part of the last week has been seeing the faces of the guests saying like, whoa, this really came out. Okay. That’s fun. But really we want the guests to have an amazing experience from the moment they walk in. So at the resort, obviously you have the pool with your resort fee, you will get chairs and umbrellas at the beach, which the umbrella is not something you typically get, but it does get very hot here. So we wanna make sure the guests are able to enjoy. It’s a great benefit. Best of both worlds. And we do have, we call our beach and pool the citrus club, right. Citrus because obviously Florida is big on Cirus, like I said, we want to pay homage to where we are. So our citrus club pool and beach have a different menu than the restaurant and you can have bites there all day. And amazing drinks and frozen drinks. ’cause obviously we want you to stay hydrated, refreshed and happy. And you can go to the pool, then go back to the beach. There will always be at attendants and servers taking care of you. We also have a tiki bar at the beach, which is very unique to this property. Most times you won’t find that. So you really don’t need to go far. And if you just wanna have a drink while you wait to go on a business dinner, you can always go to the beach, which is beautiful. We want everybody to start their day amazingly. And we’re starting putting a pot of coffee at 6:00 AM So if you wanna go see the sunrise outside, you’ll have a cup of coffee and you can just watch it come up because it is really beautiful. I’m an early riser and I’ve enjoyed many of them. So I want the guest to enjoy that. Love that. And then for breakfast, lunch and dinner we have the Caster. The Caster is our brand new restaurant. Mr. Keer used to be, well a businessman that came in 1923 to Pompano for fishing and he stayed for business. So we say it’s one of the founders of the city and we wanted to pick homage to his name. Our restaurant is American/New American Cuisine. And we’ve kind of gone around the menu so many times to make sure something people love and enjoy being very different from your breakfast experience to your dinner experience and being completely different than what you can get at the pool. But it’s all interchangeable. And we also do in room dining from the restaurant.
Ryan Embree:
That’s incredible. I mean from sunrise to sunset, you really have truly have something for every single guest. I love that. Some really unique experiences. I’m sure that’s gonna pay off on things that we’re gonna talk about later with like social media and people taking those photos and sharing. Those are the type of experience that if you can curate those and create them for guests, it pays off in dividends because they’re sharing that type of content.
Leslie Weil:
A hundred percent. We’re now finalizing our wellness program. We’re currently doing daily yoga, but we’re gonna enhance it with some other fitness offerings or wellness. You know, it might be sound healing. It doesn’t necessarily needs to be like a hard workout. And we’ll have the water sports. So if you’re on a bit of a thrill, you can also go on your jet skis or kayaking and whatnot when the weather is not rough, of course.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. That South Florida hospitality. Programming such a big part of resorts now and I think that’s something that the guests really have come to expect over these last couple years. When they check in, they say, okay where’s the programming? Where’s the schedule for my stay? So having the opportunity to offer that is a huge competitive advantage over your typical hotel that might not offer that to guests. I want to go back to what you were talking about. FIU, Chaplain School of Hospitality. Very passionate about it. Last year we had the opportunity in our campus crawl series to visit with Dr. Chang, the dean there. Wonderful campus. I’m a UCF Rosen grad. So we love in hospitality, there’s no rivalries. Everybody loves everyone. But talk to us a little bit about that experience of going to a hospitality school and how that prepared you for your career today.
Leslie Weil:
So FIU was incredible and it’s even more incredible now. I was very determined and when selecting where to go in the United States, I had some convincing to do with my parents. And Miami was easier ’cause it’s close to home. So I don’t think I realized how much FIU was giving me until I graduated. And that’s why I give back so much. And that’s why I try to stay close to the school. I’m part of the alumni board as a volunteer. Every time they call me, I go and speak to the students because the one thing that FIU has today is that it has a great alumni network. And when you’re in the chaplain school, you’re forever in the chaplain school. So I think the best that I got was firsthand that people talking to me about the industry. And that’s not something that was as common way back when. I think the curriculum at FIU was very hands-on. And it truly allows you to learn in a different way. So because they also expect you to work, to graduate, you have to work many, many hours to be able to get that diploma to make sure you know what you’re doing right. I really feel like it developed a passion and it allowed me to start, not necessarily, oh I graduated and now I have to be the manager really allowed me to work my way up and understand every department. But with that level of knowledge that having a career in hospitality and really learning in the school allowed me to grow faster because I got it. And I could relate to other departments. So I spent most of my career at the front office, but my accounting classes at the chaplain school really made a big difference to them moving me to accounting afterwards for a couple of years because I got it in a different way. And since then, FIU has grown tremendously, keeps escalating through the charts and I’m very, very proud to be an alumni there. And I see how they are involving us, the alumni, into the day to day of the students so they can really see what a career means. ’cause there’s this whole thing about, oh, you work in hospitality, you have no lives and in reality that’s not true. This is a life we choose and yes, it is a business that’s open 24/7, 365 days a year. But there is so much you can do there that it’s not always those crazy hours, but definitely it’s the most fun you’ll ever have.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. it’s a very rewarding career. And I think, you know, more stories like you, Leslie, of hospitality professionals coming back and speaking to students and setting those expectations because you don’t want those false narratives out there about the hospitality industry and saying that this can be a career. If you love travel, which most of this younger generation loves to do, this is the place to do it. Amazing perks sometimes that the best that come with your job.
Leslie Weil:
Right. A hundred percent.
Ryan Embree:
That you take full advantage of. Yeah, I mean everything that we saw at FIU and the Chaplain School of Hospitality, so many labs, hands-on, so many internships that they were sending students to, we just need to encourage that in this industry as much as we can. And so cool to see you in great connection with that. I was talking off camera about advice that you would give right now. You know, it can be a little scary right now for college graduates. They’re coming in, you hear about AI, you hear about technology maybe taking jobs. I mean, what advice would you give to a young hospitality professional right now, Leslie?
Leslie Weil:
Think the biggest thing for me is staying curious. Don’t think you have all the answers, but never be scared to speak up either. I find that I was successful in my career because I always wanted to learn more. And no matter where you start, just ask what the other person is doing. Just take advantage of everything because you have in the back of your head, you already studied it so you know it. And no matter which role you have, where you’re front desk, cage and you’re in housekeeping, you’re in the restaurant, you’re gonna see many things because in a hotel, everything blurs with everything in a really good way. So stay curious, ask, ask how you can help, ask how you can learn. And that will prepare the career forward because you already know a lot of the information. And I find that those that succeed the most are the ones that hold the best of different jobs, which is great. ’cause hotel, you have a lot of side work, upward diagonal mobility. And if you stay curious and ask all those questions and also speak up when you see things that can be done better, you’ll always grow and succeed.
Ryan Embree:
Be a hospitality sponge out there. And I think it’s great advice because I think you think back on the, we hate to do it, but back on 2020 and the lessons learned, there were a lot of GMs, front office managers doing task and jobs that they had hadn’t done either ever or in years. And I think there was a lot of learning that came out of that. And that is just the perfect example and kind of parallel of just exposing yourself to every single department. ’cause you, as you mentioned at the top of the episode, so many aspects to this. You wear so many hats as a GM, the more exposure and the more skills and traits you can do are just gonna sharpen, sharpen your professionalism, moving forward, put you in a great position.
Leslie Weil:
And also earns the trust of the team, because they know you’ve done it and you are willing to do it. And yes, I opened the hotel in 2021 and we were cleaning rooms every manager from revenue accounting to myself. We were cleaning rooms every day. Some of them had never done it. Some of them were great at it without never done it. And then it also makes you think of the hard work that the housekeepers goes through every day because I can certainly clean 10 rooms in eight hours, but they’re cleaning 17.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I mean empathy is huge in our industry. Leslie, I for one would love to host whether I’d, I’d love to attend a wedding here. I’d love to attend a meeting here. Talk us through, I saw some new courtyard space that you have for events. Talk us through what it’s like that process, to have group travel here.
Leslie Weil:
So we have an amazing sales team and I love them. Not the job I would do, but when I have, do I do it? Yeah. And the great thing about this hotel is that we host a lot of business meetings, but we also host a lot of weddings. Sweet 16, quinceaneras. And they did in the past, it’s just the spaces are now enhanced and reimagined. So we have indoor outdoor spaces ’cause of course South Florida. But the beauty of it is that we do have a courtyard that it’s right next to the pool where you can have a small cocktail at a small event, but also you can have corporate games. We’ve done everything you can get married in the beach and come into the ballroom for the party and we have a great terrace in the middle of the two towers that we have that is space for whatever you want it to be. Whether it’s a wellness event. We’ve had a food and wine festival in the terrace before as well. And then the sales team will walk you through everything. We have a sales team that helps with the group. We have a director of events that help with all the event planning and a catering manager as well. So really everybody comes together to ensure that they event goes perfect from the moment the guests walk in until they walk out with so many different spaces. Actually, where we’re sitting right now is a meeting room that overlooks the water. Which is my favorite spot.
Ryan Embree:
Another place for a potential alumni mixer, right?
Leslie Weil:
Yes.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, let’s talk about where we are right now in the season, wrapping up the summer that we’d love those snowbirds coming down, enjoying our sunny Florida weather. What do you have prepared for those in the fall and winter time?
Leslie Weil:
Excited to get into that. Summer is always, it’s slow season. I say it’s slow because it’s not ever really slow. But we are getting excited to really our first season as our reimagined property. A lot of programming. We’re working to have music series DJs in the coffee shop. We are really trying to do everything to be a hub, not just for our guests but also the community. And what I found over the last few years that I’ve got to work everywhere is that for the guest experience, the best you can do is mingle them with locals. Because that’s how you really know what’s going on. We want them to stay at the resort, but they wanna know where the best, you know, play to go snorkel is or if there’s a surf lesson and then the locals will give you the best ideas. So really as we move along end of summer and beginning of fall, it’s easier to do a lot of things outside too. You know, the rain is always giving you, oh my God, what do I do to change it? So we’re working on a lot of activities for families as well where at least an hour a day the kids could be outside painting while the parents are having a cocktail by the pool bar or the beach. And really curating programming at least monthly where we will have a DJ, liquor sponsor partnerships where when you can have and try different cocktails while, you know, refreshing yourself outside by the pool and also inside.
Ryan Embree:
And that’s what you were saying, Leslie, is you were like, I wanna get the local community involved because this does have a lot of history with maybe some locals and staying in this area, but it also is a completely reimagined place. And also paying homage to those, that local community. So incorporating that such a smart idea, social media obviously a great place to put that programming out, encourage all of our sweet spot listeners to obviously follow the property onsite. How does that play into social media and online reputation? How does that play into like when, when you do a re-imagining like this?
Leslie Weil:
It’s huge and honestly, especially when you’re a brand and there’s a lot of photography guidelines. We rely a lot on social media for what’s happening now, right? Like it’s very immediate. So social media to me right now is really how we show the world what we’re doing real time, right? There’s a person having a drink at the pool already ’cause we just opened, right? And it’s there. So the speed and really aesthetic, right? What message are you trying to portray? For us, it was really important to start from scratch because the property doesn’t look at all like the prior property, even though it’s the same. So I think social media is huge nowadays as everybody knows and being able to respond and show guests, we do care. This is what we’re doing. You’re not always gonna get great feedback. So I always say it’s how you react to it. But really right now, if you go to social media, you’ll be able to see real time what’s happening on property and what’s able to happen in on property, right? You can look back for a wedding and then you’ll find the pictures. So as we build up, we have new social media for the hotel, but also for the restaurant. So we wanna make sure we showcase both. And like you said, we wanna be a part of the local community and that is the easiest way to get to everybody around because they’re not always gonna be guests.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so disappointing when, you go to a social media profile for a hotel, it’s the middle of the summer and the last post is about, you know, happy New Year, right? Because that real time aspect and the authenticity is lost. And that’s a real opportunity for guests both far and locals like we’re talking about to really get to know you and the property a little bit better and show your, your hospitality and care for us.
Leslie Weil:
We also were delayed so many times, as with every renovation that I really feel a lot of people were losing face on the fact, are they really going to open? So for us it was very important to showcase it in social media as soon as it was done. Like, hello, we’re really here. I know it took a while, but see us, you know, we’re beautiful.
Ryan Embree:
And to tell your story as well, I think you get a lot of people invested in that, right? The local community have been, wow, this has been under renovation for months on in and now we get to experience this for the first time and people loving it.
Leslie Weil:
One of the big things here too is that, like I mentioned, like an inspector would come and say, Hey, you know, my daughter had her Sweet 16 here. Like a lot of people from the local community did things at this hotel. So for them to be able to see it come alive, and the most immediate thing to do is social media.
Ryan Embree:
So cool. So cool to see. Well, as we wrap up here Leslie, as general manager, you know, as you see those guest experiencing this, this reimagined almost brand new hotel for the first time, what is your hope that they say and feel about their experience here as they leave the Fort Lauderdale Pompano Beach Resort?
Leslie Weil:
I think the best thing I heard this weekend that makes me realize this is what I want, is that it felt upscale yet approachable. You know, I want you to feel like you’re at home and that you can have a great time and be yourself, but really have memories that you’re building while you’re staying with us. I think that in hospitality, one of the most beautiful things is that we get to be a part of everybody’s life. Sometimes in their best moments and sometimes in their worst. But you want them to create a memory that they always can look back or come back to. And as we are reimagined those that were here before, we wanna wow them by feeling like they’re family and that they had a great time, but also those that have never been here to have that same feeling and that same approachability to the space that the others.
Ryan Embree:
I love that. It’s truly one of the best answers I’ve heard on that question, Leslie. So thank you so much for hosting us here at your beautiful Property. Encourage all of our Suite Spot listeners, come check it out. Come check out Pompano Beach, see what Leslie and her team have done here in this incredible property. Thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot.
Leslie Weil:
Thank you so much for having me, and I look forward to having you back and all your listeners soon.
Ryan Embree:
All right, awesome. We’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the next episode of the Suite Spot: Independent Hotel Show series to catch special guest Nicholas Gold, who takes center stage on the podcast!
As Managing Director of Black Desert Resort, Nicholas shares the early beginnings of his hospitality journey, the one-of-a-kind appeal of independent hotels, and how the newly opened Black Desert Resort is accentuating the guest experience in hospitality.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, or Ryan Embree here for another edition of our Independent Hotel Show series, episode #3, and we are getting closer and closer to September down where we are gonna have the largest collection of independent hoteliers and network. We are so excited to hopefully see you down in Miami Beach, September 17th and 18th. We’re gonna talk about that a little bit more, but I’m gonna bring in my guest right now, managing director Black Desert Resort and Red Mountain Resort, Nicholas Gold. Nicholas, thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot.
Nicholas Gold:
Ryan. My absolute pleasure. Cheers.
Ryan Embree:
Well, we’re gonna have a fun time on this episode talking about your beautiful resort in Utah. I’m so excited. But before we get into that, before we start talking about the Independent Hotel show, which we’re both here for, let’s talk about your hospitality journey and the story that led you to a Black Desert Resort.
Nicholas Gold:
Yeah, sure. You know, it’s, I started when I was too young to know any better in the hospitality business. I at a fairly young age, I was working in a restaurant in London. I was the guy, you know, I’m relatively old, so we did a lot of tableside cooking back then, and I was the gang who worked the Gary Don, and that really spoke to me because it led me to, it fed my love of storytelling, which I’ve just been able to expand upon as I’ve grown in the industry, and that that juxtaposition between service and storytelling really is what the Independent Luxury Hotel is all about.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it absolutely is. Nicholas completely agree with you. Every amazing independent hotel has a story. You know, sometimes, sometimes it’s challenging in the, in independent hotel space. Give our listeners a little bit, you, you say you love storytelling. Give our, our listeners a little bit of story about the property that you have the privilege of, of managing over there at the massive Black Desert Resort.
Nicholas Gold:
Yeah. So we are in about 600 acres just by snow Canyon State Park, and we do a really good job of blending luxury hospitality with golf, wellness, dining, a huge residential living component. We’re building right now, we’re about to break ground on a 24-court world championship pickleball complex, which is certainly the wave of the future. And we just finished working on the designs for a four and a half acre waterpark, which is not gonna be open to the public, only open to our members and hotel guests.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely incredible. And I think, it’s funny, we’re talking about storytelling here in, in independent hotels because you, you’re able to write your own story sometimes and be able to adjust and adapt to trends that you see out there. I see you mentioned wellness, a huge trend in hospitality right now, being able to do some unique things in that space. Pickleball, even on the amenity side, being able to do that and who doesn’t love, I’ve got a couple young ones, who doesn’t love a nice little waterpark to relax at as well.
Nicholas Gold:
I would also be remiss in missing the fact that I think we’re one of the only courses in the country to host both an LPGA tour and a PGA tour.
Ryan Embree:
Incredible.
Nicholas Gold:
It is pretty good.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Listen, when those young ones are at the waterpark, you know where I’ll be, I’ll be on the links with my buddies. It seems like that you got every something for everything over there at the Black Desert Resort. Its a massive property. It’s picturesque. If you’re watching us on YouTube, you can see Nicholas’s background right now. But it, if you’re not, and you’re listening to us on one of our platforms, I encourage you, this is a background that you do not wanna miss. For those who aren’t familiar with that area, Nicholas, that you’re in, paint really a picture for us of where you’re located.
Nicholas Gold:
Well, as I mentioned, we’re just outside Snow Canyon State Park, which is just north of St. George, Utah, about 25 minutes from Zion National Park. But we’re right underneath the Red Rocks of Snow Canyon. Yeah, I spent seven years in Hawaii and I spent a few years in Sedona. And when I got here, when I landed in Ivans, which is where the resort is, my first thought was, this is where Kona and Sedona met and had a baby.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And it, it certainly looks like it, it’s absolutely picturesque. Like I mentioned, encourage you to go check it out, we have had the privilege of talking to several independent hotels with Black Desert Resort, certainly being the largest one. And I think, you know, when people think about independent hotels, sometimes they think about this kind of small little mom and pop hotel. Certainly not the case for you, but I wonder with being such a large resort, how has being an independent brand benefited the property and given it the freedom to offer it some of its unique offerings to its guests?
Nicholas Gold:
I’ve worked for some smaller corporations, and I’ve worked for a lot of independent hotels. And for me, I found certainly for here, for Black Desert, being independent, you know, I’m not beholden to any legacy of any brand. So we can really speak of who we are, who Southern Utah is, and you know it’s rare, it’s rare in your career to be part of something like this that’s going to help redefine a complete region and do it with a purpose. And I think we would struggle tremendously to do that with a flag and to be part of a brand being independent gives us the flexibility and the ability to pivot if we needed to on a much faster basis than it would be if we were part of a larger organization.
Ryan Embree:
Its a common theme we’ve been hearing in this series, Nicholas. And I think you’re right. The community is almost able to embrace and support you differently than it would a major brand because it feels more connected to your property. And I think a lot of independents do a great job of embracing that community feel and make it, you it’s not just a flag that you can find in this city and in the city, 30 miles, 50 miles down the road. This is a unique story. You talked about storytelling and one of the places where independence certainly shine, I think, in an opportunity to, is their F&B experiences. Talk to us a little bit about Black Desert, how you’ve embraced the F&B experience and how that plays a role in the guest experience there.
Nicholas Gold:
Ryan, you’re right. I mean, food is a, food is basically an emotional connector, right? And it plays a huge role for us. My signature restaurant, the Salt is ostensibly a steakhouse, but it uses a lot of seasonal ingredients. It uses a lot of local ingredients. All our beef all comes from Utah. Most of it is grass fed. We try and use as much local product produce, as well as protein as entirely possible. 20th Hole, which is our, let’s call it sports bar for a better, better use of the phrase. We have some things that our members and our homeowners will find comforting as well as something to explore for those visiting. So what we try and do is balance what is familiar with what is interesting whilst using as much local product as possible.
Ryan Embree:
I love that. And that’s part of the story too, is local sourcing you, we got on the wellness trend, but also sustainability and local sourcing. Such a huge hospitality trend right now that I feel independents have the freedom to maybe dabble in a little bit more than maybe your brand standards, of a flag, a property under a flag would be able to, so cool that you’ve implemented that into the F&B experience over there. We were talking off camera about how the pictures, the background that your property sits on your resort sits on, Nicholas, it kind of speaks for itself and it’s, I’m sure social media, you’ve got a huge social following tens of thousands of followers, fans online. How has that like user generated content and digital marketing impacted the property success and really helped tell that story that we’re talking about here?
Nicholas Gold:
It’s absolutely amazing. And talk about how powerful storytelling is. Yeah, we’ve, we’ve only been open for a few months and yet a lot of our followers and content creators are rabid. I mean, it’s just such an easy, easy thing to shoot and shoot well, that it’s so picturesque, it’s amazing. Our guests do an incredible job of capturing and sharing the absolute awe of the plate. From the sunrise yoga shots to drone footage of the lava fields. This authenticity has been our best marketing tool. So instead of us telling the story, our guests are replacing us and telling the story themselves. And that resonates so strongly. It’s incredible. It’s, been our best marketing tool. It really has.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to hear and it’s so cool when that happens, because it’s not something that you can force Nicholas, a lot of the time. It has to kind of grow organically. That’s how the best social media stories are kind of told is organically, authentically, that picture used to be, let’s go ahead and get the professional photographer out here and get the most the best looking picture. And now people wanna see what things look like in real time. They want to see what am I going to experience? ’cause I might not catch that sunset at the, at just the right time. I wanna see what that Salt Steakhouse looks like on a busy Friday night. I want to feel like I’m there. And that’s where that true user generated content can really come into play. And you were talking about those rabid fans online. I also think there’s something to influencers and followers of the independent hotel community that just have a passion for that space, maybe more than they do for branded hotels sometimes. And I think it’s because it is one of a kind. It’s unique and they relate to that, you know, and they wanna embrace that and help tell your story. So very cool to see. You mentioned it before, Nicholas. You’ve worked, you’ve had the privilege of working at several independent and lifestyle properties. You know, we try to always, both me and you kind of have a similar so background in the sense of we fell into hospitality, but we’re trying to build some more bridges for young professionals to say, Hey, you don’t have to fall into this career. You can make this a lifelong career from the get go. What advice would you give to a young hospitality professional listening to this podcast, and what would be your pitch to them? I’m gonna put you on the spot to say, why don’t you gain a little independent hotel experience at some point in your career?
Nicholas Gold:
You know, when, when I say I fell into this, you know, I fell into it when I was 17, so I realized I absolutely loved it from a very early age. You know, the advice I always give people, and we work with the local universities here as well, so much so that we actually have a practice facility on our golf course for just designated for them. But my advice for them is always try and be doing the next job without being asked. Always assume that you are going to get it. Always assume that you’re going to be doing more. And the odds are you probably will if you wait for it to happen, especially in the independent space, it probably won’t. The other piece of it is work for somewhere that matters. Work for work for a company or a site or an independent hotel that is making a difference either in the world or in the community. Life will be so much more rewarding for everybody if you do.
Ryan Embree:
It aligns perfectly with what we’re hearing about this, younger generation, gen Z workforce that’s coming in, who is prioritizing that in their career. They want, they want something that’s intrinsically rewarding to them. I think the independent hotel space can offer that. And it’s exactly what you said, Nicholas. You get, you can be everything on an independent hotel, right? Especially a smaller one where you could be the head engineer for a couple minutes at trying to fix a property. You could be a head housekeeper really embracing that as a way to get a plethora of experience in a short amount of time. But I love that advice you gave. I wanna do some rapid fire here to get to know you in the Black Desert Resort a little bit better. This one might be difficult ’cause you’ve got a lot of great views, but what’s your favorite view on, on the property there, Nicholas?
Nicholas Gold:
We have a roof deck on Oasis, which is one of our food and beverage outlets in the middle of the golf course. That’s, obviously very, it’s a roof, so it’s elevated and the, the sunset over the lava fields into Snow Canyon from the roof of Oasis is unparalleled. It’s extraordinary.
Ryan Embree:
And I’m curious ’cause I’m sure you see, I mean, obviously very seasonal over there, right? As far as, you know, the snow capped and then you know, the picture behind you where, where people are playing golf and gonna be enjoying that waterpark. Well, what, when you do that view, what, what’s in, what’s in your head? Are you in the winter, the winter or the summertime?
Nicholas Gold:
What in my head? You know, if you’ve seen my career at all, this is actually the furthest north I’ve lived in some 30 years. So winters are definitely not my friend.
Ryan Embree:
Gotcha, gotcha. What about favorite fact, fun fact about your property, Nicholas?
Nicholas Gold:
You know, it’s funny. We have a thing about threes here when we are doing some planning, when we’re doing, some development work on, it gets a little complicated because we’re actually owned by three different municipalities and owned by, we sit on three different municipalities, St. George Ivans and Santa Clara, which makes doing things a little more interesting. But we also sit on the conversions of three geologic regions, the Mojave, the Great Basin, and the Colorado Plateau.
Ryan Embree:
Wow that, yeah, I’m sure, I’m not sure if you looked into that, I mean, but that you’re probably the only resort to be able to make that type of claim that’s very impressive. Favorite signature dish? You talked about some of the F&B experiences over there.
Nicholas Gold:
So probably our aged rib from UT47 and UT47 is they’re based out of Logan, Utah. So it’s local meats, it’s grass fed and then finished on corn. But the beef is absolutely extraordinary.
Ryan Embree:
Love to hear it. Favorite guest experience or amenity at the property?
Nicholas Gold:
Again, this is a very silly one, but when you come here to check in they offer you a welcome spritzer, essentially, which is a local prickly pear lemonade, refreshing drink on arrival. And they actually make the ice cube out of the prickly pair lemon syrup, and it’s just you know, after a long journey to get here. It’s just a really cool, refreshing sparkling drink.
Ryan Embree:
Hey that’s a great first impression. When you walk into the resort, first thing you’re handed is a drink. I’ll take that for sure. It’s so funny though, it’s exactly what you’re mentioning is every single aspect I think of one of these questions has some sort of local tie to it, and I think that speaks to that, that bigger that bigger theme that we found kind of in this episode here. Last one. Favorite piece of art at your property?
Nicholas Gold:
So the property is designed to really take advantage of the views and what’s outside. So it’s really tough to compete with the big picture windows encompassing the landscape. It’s, you can’t get away from it.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I mean, listen, you gotta use, you gotta use what you got, right? A lot of properties don’t have that view outside. So they gotta kind of put, I’m sure there’s probably some a lot of portraits inside of these other hotels that might have this region in their background. You get to see it right outside your window. A nice little privilege you have over there at the Black Desert Resort. I wanna shift gears. Independent Hotel show. That’s what this series is all about. Nicholas, happening September 17th and 18th in Miami Beach at the Miami Beach Convention Center. Don’t forget listeners, Embree25, that’s E-M-B-R-E-E 25. Get yourself a complimentary code. Hope to see you there with me and Nicholas. Nicholas, you recently joined the advisory board. Congratulations. What kind of inspired you to get involved with this event and how do you see it supporting independent hoteliers?
Nicholas Gold:
Thanks. I was incredibly honored to be asked to join the board. It’s one of the few shows, one of the few events that actually really champions the independent hotel industry. And I wanted to be part of that conversation, how we move the industry forward, how we elevate the guest experience. And then as you were talking about earlier, how we inspiring the next generations of hoteliers to really dream big.
Ryan Embree:
I absolutely love that and I think your resort is a great example of this. The wide spectrum of voices and property that are gonna be at this event. You know, something from the massive black desert resort all the way down to the smaller, independent hotel hotels that we might see right there on south Beach in Miami Beach. So we encourage you, all of our Suite Spot listeners, hope you’ll be there. Hope you will join us as we wrap up today, Nicholas would love to get, we always like to end kind of looking forward, looking into the future. what’s your vision for the future of the Black Desert Resort in your mind?
Nicholas Gold:
The vision is to become the most sought after luxury destination in the west. You know, as I said, we’re building the pickleball complex, which is a world championship complex. I’m building a $55 million water park that’s only gonna be open to guests and members. We’re looking at three more golf courses bringing in to the fold, as well as another clubhouse. It’s going to be an absolutely extraordinary adventure where golf wellness and that base camp for adventure, for all the national parks that surround us come together.
Ryan Embree:
Got a feeling we’re gonna be able to, we’re gonna be seeing Black Desert Resort, in hospitality news and in the, social media profiles, and of travelers all over the world. Nicholas, I want to thank you for taking the time. We covered a lot of ground on the episode. Appreciate you taking your time. Any final thoughts before we wrap up?
Nicholas Gold:
Yeah as we’ve said, hospitality is about connection. It’s about, it’s the connection to the place, the people and purpose. And that’s what we’re building here and that’s what I’m hoping that next generation of hoteliers understands. It’s about purpose and the legacy.
Ryan Embree:
Love to hear it. Great message for those young hospitality professionals. Thank you Nicholas, for taking the time to join us and share your beautiful property with us and some insights.
Nicholas Gold:
I really appreciate it today, Ryan. Thank you for your time. Appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
All right, thank you. We’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot Spotlight Series takes viewers to sunny Key West in the newest episode, featuring the lavish and beachside resort, Casa Marina Key West by Hilton!
Special guest and Hotel Manager at Casa Marina, Evelyn Summer, joins the podcast to share the property’s rich history, insight on the $90 million hotel renovation, and how a strong digital presence on social media and guest review platforms plays a pivotal role in connecting with travelers worldwide.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embee. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. We are here with our Suite Spot Spotlight series, and what I would argue is going to be the southern most episode we ever do on this Spotlight series. We’ll explain in a moment, I’m gonna bring in my guest, Evelyn Summer, Hotel Manager of Casa Marina, Key West Curio Collection by Hilton. Evelyn, thank you so much for being with me on the podcast.
Evelyn Summer:
Thanks for having me, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Well, thank you for inviting me here to this incredible property. We’re gonna talk all about it, but before, as tradition on the Suite Spot, we’d love to hear from hospitality professionals, their journey, their background. This is like every hotel professional’s dream to be at a property like this. How’d you get here?
Evelyn Summer:
Ryan, you said that it’s your Southern most broadcast, but it’s also the best broadcast. You’re gonna have to. That’s true. I mean, come on, look at where we’re at. How did I get here? Well, fun fact. I am from Key West. Okay. Yeah. So my family originates from down here. My grandfather’s from Key Largo, my mother’s from down here. And I’ve been here my whole life. Not to say that I haven’t moved and, you know, went to college, worked in a couple of different areas, but I’ve been in Key West for about 90% of my life. Yeah. And started working here at these two properties probably in 2008. However, fun fact is that all of our high school proms and homecomings and family worked here. There’s a lot of it. It was further back than 2008. Sure. When I actually officially became employed. So I can easily say that I grew up here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. We hear that all the time from hoteliers is like them actually living in the hotel sometimes. And you have like your entire history here and now here you are making more memories for guests all around the world. Very, very cool to see. And this property is iconic. It’s got a history dating back to the 1920s. We’re gonna talk about the recent renovation and transformation that it just had, but talk to us, to our listeners about the origin story of this property and its history.
Evelyn Summer:
Sure. Yeah. So Casa Marina was built, opened in 1920 New Year’s Eve, 1920 to be exact. It was built by Henry Flagler. He was an industrialist that built the railroad that connects essentially New York all the way down to the southernmost point. And interesting fact is that Henry and his partners were the first to create the, and I’m not a railroad specialist, but the railroads that could connect to other railroad lines way, way, way back. Whenever someone would built a railroad, that was it. That track was just their track and you couldn’t interconnect it with someone else’s track Yeah. And use theirs. And he was able to create that. And then his dream was to build a way to get people all the way down to Key West. So he built us one, the old bridges that you see when you’re traveling down to get people on a train all the way down to Key West. And then of course, once he figured that out, they needed a place to stay. So Casa Marina was it. And that’s about 105 years ago.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, I think that’s absolutely incredible. I mean, the fact that we’re talking about the origin of connecting railroads and aligning with the history of this, of this space, but there’s been certainly a bridge from its past to where it is right now. With these transformations and recent renovations. Talk to us a little bit about the work that’s been done, some of the feedback you’re hearing from guests.
Evelyn Summer:
Yeah, of course. So we recently finished, a $90 million renovation of the entire resort. Incredible. And that included everything from our food and beverage outlets which we’re sitting in now to our guest rooms. Every facility in the hotel was addressed, and it’s just absolutely fantastic. They did a wonderful job of making sure to not get away from sort of the old charm that is caina. It is one of the oldest buildings on the island, but to add in some newer touches that really make it elevated and make the guest experience really wonderful. So we have brand new restaurant, which we’re sitting in now, ADA, which is just absolutely fantastic. It’s here right on the ocean front as you can hear it in the background from sitting on the beach to have dinner, to sitting at the bar, to just having a regular lunch and lunch if you were out on your pool chair or beach chair. It’s just really, really fantastic. And then of course, our guest rooms like just, I mean, I might be biased, but they’re the best on the island. They’re the best on the island. We have some brand new ocean front suites where you can be in your suite and then five seconds walk out directly from your room to the beach. And the ocean is, you know, 35 feet away. You really can’t, there’s, you can’t compare it to probably anything else in the United States. It’s absolutely wonderful.
Ryan Embree:
It was incredible. Again, I had the, the privilege of of going on a tour and to also see a note to its history, local flair. There were some artists that were curated some art for this recent renovation as well.
Evelyn Summer:
So our architecture and design team, they partnered together and did such a really nice job with touches. As you’ve mentioned, there are about three or four local artists that ended up having their pieces either in every single guest room or sprinkled throughout the hotel. And then we also of course, allow the guest an opportunity to be able to purchase or promote those artists here in our gift shop or around the hotel. And like Key West Pottery, is one of the gentlemen. He does some really great art pieces that’s not just pottery, but also he paints and things like that, and everyone sort of knows about them. And so it was really cool to be able to get his stuff, a couple of his paintings. And they’re really funky. Like, whether it’s a rooster that’s kind of like weird cartoonish looking, or something to that nature that are in every single guest room. And it just sort of really add into the flare of Key West, but fits the architecture and charm that still keeps it, you know, as such an old historic and cozy, if you will, building.
Ryan Embree:
And I think that’s the brilliant piece about it. I mean, you think about a property that’s been around for over a hundred years, you have families that have generations that have been coming to this property and being able to say he wanna modernize this building, but also not lose its charm and local art and flair. It’s so amazing and Key West, just an incredible historic location. For those listeners, viewers that haven’t been to Key West before, kind of paint a picture of where this property is located in comparison Key West.
Evelyn Summer:
Of course. So Key West, well, we can start out by talking about like, what’s the vibe of Key West? I feel like a couple of people, you know, if you asked a few different people, they would give you a totally different answer. And it depends on maybe when was the last time you visited or what you were coming here for. First of all, we’re in the Caribbean. We’re at the southern most point of the United States, but we’re in the middle of the ocean and the stones throw away from a couple of Caribbean islands. And so that’s perfect. Right? If you’re looking for a place to go, maybe you don’t necessarily have a passport or wanna travel too far out of the country, you’re gonna get that Caribbean feel here, but you’re still in the United States. But Key West has, over the years, and I can confidently speak to this being that I’ve been here a long time, we won’t say how old I am, but it’s probably older than you think. It is such a well-rounded, whether you’re coming here to party on Duval Street, whether you’re coming here to just relax on the beach, whether you’re coming here for art and food, whether you’re bringing your family. And that doesn’t matter if they’re young kids or teenagers, there’s so many things to do. It’s such a welcoming place. Like Key West City motto is one human family. Like, you know, it doesn’t matter what walk of life you come from, whether you’re a southerner who just likes to come down and check out food, or you’re from New York City or, you know, it just doesn’t matter. It’s something for everyone down here. And everyone always has a really good time and sort of goes back thinking, I can’t wait to go back. Yeah. The area of the island that the Key West, the Key West the hotel is in Key West, which is just a couple blocks off of Duval Street, which is nice because you might think like, I wanna be down in the mix. Like I don’t wanna have to walk too far. Right. But we are on the Atlantic side of the island. It’s about a 10 minute walk to get to say the southernmost point or the West east end of Duval Street and makes for a perfect getaway. So you can still be close enough to walk quick, Uber, rent a bike, you can do whatever you know, we still have all the fun get around Key West ways that everyone’s used to, but you’re away from the hustle and bustle. You’re not in the middle of like, let’s say you don’t enjoy the 3:00 AM crowd. Right. You’d come here and you would have no idea Duval Street’s just right around the corner. Right. But you’re still close enough. We have the largest backyard. I like to say in Key West, some of it is behind us. There are very few, if any, hotels that actually have a real beach in Key West. And I think that that might deter some people that maybe have never been here and are looking into traveling to Key West, but not realizing that we actually do have a beach and it’s the largest one outside of, you know, a city beach or something like that you might travel to. And double benefit about staying here is that you have access to our sister property as well. The reach resort. And the Reach has the only natural beach in Key West. Which means it’s naturally made sort of maybe more used to what you might visit in, say, along the coast of Florida where it, although we don’t have a lot of crashing waves down here in Florida in Key West, we have a natural sand over at the Reach, which is wonderful as well. So you can get the best of both worlds.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I think you’ve done a wonderful job of painting a picture, again, whether you’re here with your family, whether you’re here for group travel, whether you come down here to you know, get crazy on Duval. You really can kind of have it all just at the, you know, couple steps away from your hotel room and this beautiful property. I wanna talk about some of the amenities. You already mentioned the largest private beach on Key West. What are some of the other amenities if a guest did want to kind of stay on site?
Evelyn Summer:
Well, we have some really great options. You could come here and check in, although I don’t recommend it. You could never leave. Like you could just stay at the hotel. I mean, and the reason I say I don’t recommend it’s ’cause you gotta go see Key West. I mean, you can’t come and say and see a few different things around the island. It’s such a unique place. But we have a spa here on site, which provides a lot of different services. I highly recommend setting up a massage on our beach side, cabanas in the morning. It’s just like unreal. They’re about 25 feet from the shoreline and you know, you just hear the waves crashing. It’s before, you know, it’s not so hot and not a lot of people are awake yet and you’re just laying there getting a massage and the birds are chirping. No sound machine needed. There’s, you can just hear the natural. It’s absolutely wonderful. And they do have indoor options as well for people that would be more comfortable inside the spa. We also have a water sports vendor here on property, barefoot Billies. He provides everything that you could possibly wanna do, whether it’s on the water, on the shoreline. He has bike rentals, scooter rentals. You can rent golf carts to get around the hotel. You can take snorkeling tours or sunset tours directly here from our dock.
Ryan Embree:
We saw a couple snorkelers out here. A couple jet skis fly by in the background too.
Evelyn Summer:
Yeah, and Billy is the originator of the world famous island jet ski tour, which takes you, it’s 90 minutes and takes you all the way around the islands. It’s a guided tour. Highly recommend doing that because it’s really the most fun way to see the entire island, if you will. They take you all the way around. It’s really, really cool. So that’s a huge plus, right? Because you definitely wanna try and get out on the water, be a part of the ecosystem while you’re down here. Let’s see. We have, we already talked about Dorada a little bit, a wonderful restaurant which offers you lunch and dinner. Of course, Flagler’s breakfast is fantastic in the mornings and our pool and beaches. So you could stay here for several days and never hang out in the same spot. Every, like, you could choose a different spot to be your hangout spot, whether it’s at one of the pools in one of our cabanas, at one of the end of the beach and a daybed. And then the next day you could go down and you know, get a couple of chairs in the umbrella by the ocean. You really, there’s a lot of space to hang out and not feel sort of like it’s repetitive after so many days and that you’re doing the same thing.
Ryan Embree:
And to speak to, you know, the variety again of traveler that can accommodate here. You’ve got two pools here, right? Family pool doll only pool. Yep. So again, you know, it’s exactly what you were saying. And then when you’re done here, you can just go head down to the sister property and not too far and enjoy.
Evelyn Summer:
Yeah. And the food over there is fantastic as well. The Reach is really a hit and it’s nice. It’s really nice. And the same goes for both proper. We are sister properties, so, you know, a lot of us that work here, cover both hotels, which really makes for like an added amenity. For either guest that you can go over and you can charge back to your room over there. If you were to spend the day at the pool and have drinks and lunch, you can charge back to your room. Billy has a small setup over there as well, which also has some different sort of beach toys, if you will, that you can use. So it’s really nice. It’s really nice that we have the partnership.
Ryan Embree:
You mentioned some f and b options. Personal favorite, Evelyn, or what would you say? Where are we going?
Evelyn Summer:
This is hard because it’s, our menus are relatively new Right. But recently from renovation and opening everything up. Oh my gosh. Okay. So let’s see. Well, the key lime pie is a must have to, and everyone says that if you go anywhere in Key West and interviewed anyone, they would tell you to have their key lime pie. But I’m telling you, there’s something about ours that’s just like, it has been voted best on the island. It has won that award. So I can confidently say that. Let’s see, Chef has a nightly fish special and so I can’t tell you what it is ’cause it’s different every night. But he gets local fresh seafood from local commercial fishermen every single day delivered to the hotel and does just absolutely mind blowing things with this fish. So whether it’s swordfish grouper or mahi, sometimes you can’t even believe some of the ingredients that he used to make these dishes. Because you just wouldn’t think to put it in that dish. But it’s so unique and so delicious and different every night, which is another added benefit. And then I’m a big pancake girl.
Ryan Embree:
Okay.
Evelyn Summer:
And I think the pancakes of Flaglers, I had them this morning, are really, really, really good.
Ryan Embree:
Well if you ever want to feel really inspired to travel, go to your social media profiles. Instagram, Facebook, over 90,000 travelers already following it. No shortage of views, no shortage of great content to be sharing. I’m sure your guests are sharing every single day. It’s probably hard to keep up with. Talk to us about social media strategy and how that kind of played into the role of the, the hotel.
Evelyn Summer:
We of course we found it extremely important to sort of deep dive into the social media world, particularly after our renovation. We had so much to show off. Yeah, absolutely. Great point. And our marketing team right now is just fantastic. You spent some time with Abby, of course, had plenty of conversations with Liz, I’m sure. And they really have just honed in on kind of like, and what is grabbing people’s attention and how to highlight sort of what the mood is like or what, what are the kids saying the vibe is nowadays for people. So we really just try and capture that and highlight sort of maybe things that people maybe aren’t even thinking about or don’t even know that we have to offer. But staying relative to whoever we’re after, right. So you talk about a lot of corporate and group stuff going on. We have a ton of weddings over 150 weddings a year take place. Between our two properties. It’s a lot. Yeah. And the team does a really kill our job. And then just different demographics of people that stay here.
Ryan Embree:
That’s what I was gonna speak to. I mean, I think in just the short time that we’ve had this conversation, I mean there has been so much that you’ve been talking about between this property, the renovations, everything. So Sure. Again, the no shortage of content. Definitely encourage our followers, subscribers, make sure you follow on Instagram, Facebook to, to keep up there. You talked about the weddings and group travel. And I personally, I need some more of my friends to get married. Let’s do a Key West. Let’s get the company down here. I need to get back here. Talk through that process of group travel, you know, weddings how that’s done and how it’s really kind of a white glove service for you.
Evelyn Summer:
Of course. So our sales and catering team, I mean really what just absolute killer team. I mean you can imagine it’s, it’s seems easy when you look at it, particularly on social media, but to put off some of the events that they do and really coordinate a number of attendees, whether we’re talking a wedding or a corporate meeting quite literally in the middle of the ocean on an island. It’s not an easy feat and they really do a fantastic job and give a lot of confidence to these group contacts. And we just have stellar reviews. I mean something in the 90 percentile of feedback that we get just from our corporate groups alone. But the process is fairly simple. I mean, no one ever argues about coming down to do a site visit, right.
Ryan Embree:
They’re always raising their hands. Right. I’ll I go check it out.
Evelyn Summer:
They’re arguing over who’s gonna come. We do a lot of incentive group, you know, a lot of people that wanna come down here and celebrate their teams because it’s, you know, there’s such a versatile place to bring them and different things that they can do. Key West has a golf course. I think a lot of people don’t realize that, which also helps with sort of course, you know, it, it seems it’s either people wanna be in the sun in at the ocean doing something active or on a golf course and that really helps. But as far as the process goes, I mean, our sales and marketing team and events team is either out on the road or in contact with different individuals and getting the site visits scheduled. People come here, they see what’s going on. And we have a crew, I mean a crew of people that help from start to finish. It doesn’t matter whether we’re talking about the smallest detail or the largest. I mean, the team really works well together in making sure that we put on a really great show for them.
Ryan Embree:
And a number of different spaces at the property as well where you can be flexible, whether you’re a smaller group, massive group can accommodate.
Evelyn Summer:
Well let’s face it, we’re in the middle. We are in the middle of the ocean, as I’ve said a couple of times. So there’s weather and that can be a nerve wracking factor for people if they’ve planned something totally outside. So we do provide backup space for every single event that we have. So I think that creates a sense of relief for maybe some folks who really aren’t, really don’t know what might happen. There are so many different options of space, but not only the space, but the feel that they can provide, like whatever that event might be. That it really allows us, we might not have hundreds of thousands of squares foot of meeting space, like, you know, so we maybe a larger hotel in a larger city, but outdoor space is not counted as as meeting space, but we use it as meeting space. And so it allows us to be able to offer so many different options. I mean, if someone wanted to come and take over a whole side of the, be like everything behind us, including the lawn, they could, they could. And that provides just so many different options and fun.
Evelyn Summer:
Right. Even down to a very intimate, you know, setting to where you feel like you might be the only ones on property. So, and that’s what you look for is, is that flexibility when you’re planning to accommodate, you know, no matter what your vibe is as you’re speaking to
Evelyn Summer:
We’re so, what is it? Gen Z or Gen z, Ryan, my kids would be so proud of me.
Ryan Embree:
And you and your team have done a great job, Evelyn obviously nationally recognized by Forbes, Travel and Leisure. You have a number of Hilton Circle of excellent winners. What does this mean to you as hotel manager, to kinda see these recognitions?
Evelyn Summer:
Ryan, I say it all the time. I don’t do anything here. I don’t do anything. I really don’t. I, these people that work here have so much passion. They love their jobs. They put each other and the guest first. And I don’t mean to say this in a, it doesn’t surprise me. Yeah. Like the number of things that we have. And I don’t mean that in a cocky way, but more in a, like, it is so special to be in one a place like this, but to work with people who function like a family, a good functioning family and genuinely love being here and doing their jobs. And I think that everything else that happens as a result of that is just icing on the cake and somewhat like easy. Does that make sense? I mean, absolute their job isn’t easy, but listen, we have, I think the highest number of Circle of Excellence winners out of most of the Hilton hotels. It’s incredible. And they’re recognized. They get to go on these fantastic trips as a result, which is really always so exciting for them. Because they work really hard all year round. And then they get to go do something fun with their colleagues. But then Hilton. And then of course, you know, the awards and recognition that you mentioned earlier, whether it be Forbes or the list goes on of places that we’ve been either nominated or won. It’s very humbling.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a great testament to, you know, especially with you, you talked about the financial, $90 million renovation put into the testament to see that guest feedback come in and see that that love kind of shine through online and you know, through word of mouth too. Because again, this is a historic property probably holds a special place in a lot of people’s hearts. Both locals like yourself and people traveler, you know, travelers all over the world where this might be their first time. So speaking of it, it is the summer season. The kids are outta school, people are ready to travel. Sure you’re ready to host them. So you’ve got this Passport to Paradise package. Talk to us a little bit about that and what guests have to look forward this summer at Casa Marina.
Evelyn Summer:
Well, you don’t need a passport to come to Key West. All you have to do is go online and book Casa Marina resort.com. Passport to Paradise is a summer portion that we have going on. Summertime’s a really great time to come down here. I think a lot of people maybe have more options of where they could travel, especially within the United States ’cause most of the country is warm and they could travel a lot of different places. But if you are looking for somewhat of a Caribbean field, but maybe not wanting to have to use a passport or go too far on an airplane or maybe you’re in Florida and it’s just a quick drive, we do have that promotion going on. It’s 20% off. And then you also get a $50 daily resort credit added to your room. So could use that for some drinks by the pool or any of the amenities that we have here on the island that we’ve talked about. There you go. And then key lime pie. Yeah, key lime pie. You could have, I don’t even know how many key lime pies with that credit, but you could. And then you can’t beat 20% off. I mean, really, it’s really kind of the best time to travel down here from a rate perspective.
Ryan Embree:
And you don’t just have to travel by car either. If you’re in Florida, we flew down here, you know, pretty quick. A lot more flights coming into the airport that seems to be growing. I’m sure you’re gonna be welcoming a lot more guests as the summer. And then, you know, even we get those snowboards a little bit later in the year. So, you know, as we wrap up today’s episode obviously Hotel Manager for Casa Marina, you know, what do you hope and feel when travelers leave? They check out, they’re headed back to wherever they are. What do you hope they say and feel about their experience here?
Evelyn Summer:
I hope that they feel like they experience something truly special because Key West is truly special. And I hope they go talk about it. If you wanna know what they say, I hope that they say that that was one of the best vacations, if not the best vacation they’ve ever had. I hope that some of our team members left some lasting impressions with them that they’ll carry with them. We have so many special, special people that work here that truly care. And I think that shows, and there’s really no place like us. There’s a reason why some of us don’t leave. I hope that they are able to take a little bit of piece, a little piece of that with them and book a return trip because this place just keeps getting better.
Ryan Embree:
Well it’s such a historic place and you know, again, hopefully those stories shared, you know, becomes a part of the magic that is down here in Key West. And, and, you know, congratulations to you and your team on, on the recent renovations. Thank you for welcoming the Suite Spot too. Casa Marina, you have a wonderful property here, incredible staff as we talked about. Uh, any final thoughts as we wrap up today?
Evelyn Summer:
No, I appreciate you guys coming down. We’re so happy to have you. Um, and uh, looking forward to seeing the show broadcasted. And, uh, again, you said this is the Southern most broadcast, but it’s definitely gonna be the best one you’ve had. ’cause this is the Suite Spot, Ryan. Yeah, this is it right here.
Ryan Embree:
I love it. All right. Well, Evelyn, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot. Thank you for listening and we will talk to you next time To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embee, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The next episode in the Suite Spot: Road Trip series takes the podcast to Central Florida to visit the incredible Homewood Suites by Hilton nearest to Universal Studios!
In this exciting episode, the brand leader of Homewood Suites, Rick Colling, and the General Manager of the property, Carlos Sotillo, sit down on the podcast to discuss the Homewood brand, the evolution of the extended stay hotel segment, and the future of hospitality.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, a part of our Suite Spot 2025 Summer Road trip series. We are right here in our backyard in Orlando at the Homewood Suites by Hilton Orlando nearest to Universal Studios like I said, right in our backyard down the road, out of our TMG headquarters out here with Rick and Carlos who have been both here at this amazing property. We’re gonna talk all about it. Now, Rick, we have met up with you earlier this year, and we have, yeah. One thing we haven’t done is done a proper, you know, hospitality journey. We love a good story in hospitality, right? All of our humble beginnings where we might’ve started at the front desk. Bellman for myself. Give us a little bit of background in our audience, background into your hospitality.
Rick Colling:
Got it, Ryan, with pleasure. And it’s a fun journey, Ryan, mate. So, we’re like you. I started at the front desk, at the Kalamazoo Residence Inn, right after graduating from college. And I walked into the hotel and I said I’ve graduated from college. I think I should be the GM of a hospitality hotel. And the GM said to me, do you know anything about the business? I said, nothing. So he became my mentor in the business. So I started at the front desk and worked my way up through the ranks at Marriott. Spent 10 years with Marriott and I’ve been with Hilton now for 27 years, and been a GM and property director of sales on property, but I worked all the disciplines and it’s just been an incredible journey to finally end up leading a brand like Homewood Suites over the course of the last five years, which has been, you know, certainly a career highlight for me. So, a fun journey to get me here today.
Ryan Embree:
But yet a familiar one; one that we hear all the time, a lot of college students, you know, maybe just taking here a summer job, end up falling in love with the industry. But another piece of your story that we’re hearing so often is mentors. Yeah. And I wanna highlight that is because there’s so many hospitality professionals out there mentoring the next generation of hospitality professionals. So important in our industry right now. And Carlos you have a background here in this area, this campus? Of hotels. Give us your hospitality journey.
Carlos Sotillo:
Well, actually, funny story, when my parents first came to America, they actually started working at a Homewood Suites. Oh, okay. I was, came out, yeah. My mom was a housekeeper. My dad was a houseman. And I was 11. So during summer break, they would take me with them to work sometimes. And so I grew up in a Homewood Suites during my summer break.
Rick Colling:
Which is where you needed to be, right.
Carlos:
Right. In full circle. But officially, my career started, I was a breakfast attendant at a small hotel down on I-Drive. And then the opportunity came out to be a night auditor. So, you know, I went for it. And now, low and behold, here I am. I went through four different Hilton brands. I’ve gone through Hampton Hilton, Garden Inn, Home2, and now here back at the Homewood. So it’s been a fun, fun journey.
Rick Colling:
No, we’re glad to have you mate. One of the best in the business right here.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s incredible. We always say sometimes, hospitality runs in the blood, runs in your DNA sometimes, and you grew up here, you had family members that worked at this specific brand. It’s an incredible story again. So, Carlos, let’s talk about your incredible property. What makes it special? Obviously a huge renovation. Talk to us a little bit about that.
Carlos:
Yeah, so one of the things that makes this hotel special, I think is the staff. So we have staff that’s been here for, I mean, many, many years. You guys have met some of them. Yep. They’ve been here almost since the hotel opened originally. The other thing is we have such a diverse staff too. I have people from in housekeeping that are from Haiti and Jamaica. And then at the front desk I have people from Colombia, my food and beverage supervisors from Morocco. My GM is British, one of our Ds is a Puerto Rican. And I’m Venezuelan, you know. So being in an international tourist hotspot like Orlando, I think that really helps get to know when guests arrive, we kind of know what they’re feeling. And it kind of helps us create that sense of welcoming, you know, as far as renovation, I mean, it was definitely, there were some growing pains for sure, but I mean, like any renovation. Yeah. But the end result was worth it. You know, it was seven hard months of renovation, but the end result, I mean, we have a beautiful property now. We get nothing but good comments on the modern touches of the rooms and the lodge area. So, I mean, it’s really something to be proud of.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a beautiful property. Had the opportunity to open space. All of the modern touches, like you talked about, a lot of the things, to be honest with you, the upgrades that I saw when giving the property tour, I recognize based on our conversations, Rick at Hunter.
Rick Colling:
That’s correct. Yeah, exactly.
Ryan Embree:
So talk about how this renovation really speaks to that vision that you had for the brand.
Rick Colling:
Well, and this Ryan is a perfect example. A 22-year-old property opened in 2003, runs incredible numbers. So you can imagine the volume of guests that come through an asset like this. So at 22 years young, this product needed a full complete renovation. We launched a new prototype in 2021, and to be able to bridge a 22-year-old Homewood Suites with a prototype, the new 10.0 prototype has been amazing. So it starts with the suites. When you look at the suites, whether it be the color palette, the productivity tables, the accentuation of lighting, natural light, all of those things have been accentuated here at the property. And then if you go through the public space, the public space is absolutely beautiful. What used to be dark cabinets are now bright and light and lively. Natural light flows through the whole property, from the entrance to the breakfast area, to the kitchens, the outdoor kitchens, to the swimming pool. So it’s just a beautiful example of how you take a 22-year-old asset and literally bridge the gap between the new prototype. This is a perfect example, and thanks to the team of Buffalo Lodging and Carlos for giving us such a fantastic product. It’s beautiful.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s incredible because the obviously, the average night stay is gonna be a little bit longer at a Homewood Suites. And, you know, just based on the trends of people working from home, working remotely, you need those open spaces. You do. Now you need those spaces where people want to have the flexibility to say, Hey, I’m gonna go work for a couple hours in the lobby. Absolutely. After, you know, making my own breakfast taco, which we’re gonna talk about.
Rick Colling:
Well, I hope so. Yeah, right. I eat too many of them.
Ryan Embree:
And then come back to, you know, a very spacious room where, you know, again, you can enjoy your time whether you’re here professionally or here, leisure, obviously, we’re gonna talk about the location here in a minute. But ton of feedback coming from here, and especially in a unique location like this in Orlando, where you probably see visitors from not just nationally, internationally, but to be able to see the review and feedback. I’m sure that goes a lot into what you and your team are talking about of how you can improve and enhance the guest experience. But it also speaks to what you and your team here are doing, Carlos. So let’s talk about this location. We’re locals, we’re right up the road in Maitland. But for those maybe listening or watching this podcast that aren’t familiar, you’ve got an incredible location. You were talking to me about something you might be able to see on the fifth floor there.
Carlos:
Yeah for sure. I mean, there’s, honestly, if you’re coming to Orlando, I can’t think of a better place to stay. Sure. Right. And I’m not being, you know, bipartisan, I mean, partial on that. But you know, we’re we’re five minutes away from Universal Studios. Islands of Adventure, Volcano Bay, I mean, literally on the fifth floor, you can see Harry Potter’s Castle right off the window. And we’re five minutes away from the new park from Epic Universe. So, we have tons of restaurants on the iDrive corridor. We’re right off of I-4. So if you’re planning on going to the Beaches or towards Disney World, we’re right there. I mean, I honestly, this place is very, very, very good location.
Ryan Embree:
It’s amazing. You know, we were walking up and I could smell the sunscreen on everyone getting ready for a long day at Universal or some of the other theme parks now. And this is an official Universal partner property. Explain what that means and the benefit value that adds to the guest experience.
Carlos Sotillo:
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So with being a universal partner hotel, we have an onsite concierge every morning. He is able to sell tickets, print tickets, give you advice and recommendations, what to do in the park. We also offer complimentary transportation to and from Universal Studios. And now they added Epic Universe as well to the bus route. So definitely a lot of perks with being a partner hotel.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s fantastic. You know, really seamless. I think that’s what we’re trying to. Hospitality’s really embracing that personalization, seamless ease of transition. I mean, listen, it’s getting into a hub like Orlando is gonna be tough enough. You want to get to the property and just wanna feel like everything’s right there at your fingertips.
Rick Colling:
Well, I think, you know, I think what Carlos team have done a really good job. When you align yourself with, for example, at Disney Park, the expectations of the guests are high because usually it’s a leisure guest. They’re paying for the vacation themselves. So the expectations are high. And what Carlos has done, I think, in partnership with being a preferred property, is that the expectation starts at the property. It doesn’t start at the park when you arrive here, you expect the same level of perfection that you would get from going to a Disney Park. It’s amazing to me how you’ve managed to execute that as a partner. Yeah. But in a hotel that has such tremendous volume, because Carlos is a humble guy, but when you think in terms of the stay score, satisfaction ratings of this hotel, it’s one of the top of the brand. So it’s amazing what they’ve managed to replicate here in respects to not only physical product, but also service. I mean, it’s just, it’s amazing. It’s a truly a fantastic story.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a great point. because Orlando is unique in the sense of, you know, you might have, you might save years for one trip to come to Disney, to come to Universal Studios. You’re right, the stakes are much, much higher when you get here. It’s up. And to have that, you know, I’ve seen the feedback too, Carlos, like to have the property mentioned as a part of that experience as a whole. It’s a very, very special thing. And that’s the essence of hospitality there.
Rick Colling:
It’s fantastic. It’s just compliments the garlic.
Ryan Embree:
Rick, let’s talk about, you know, this market, and I think really, a lot of markets that the Homewood Suites brands are in, it’s ultra competitive, right? I mean, you can throw a baseball and probably hit about five hotels from here, but yet guests continually choose this specific brand, in Orlando, this specific property. What do you, what’s the draw here? Why do people continue to choose it?
Rick Colling:
Yeah, it’s a great question, Ryan. So, I would say the reason it’s so appealing as a product to the consumer, you mentioned it earlier, space. You bring a family into Orlando, whether you are on business or on on leisure space is a precious commodity. So when you are walking into a suite, like Homewood Suites, for example, you’ve got a separate kitchen with everything that you need to prepare a meal if you wanna prepare a meal. But to reheat a meal, if you wanna reheat a meal or just to put a pizza in the, and a six pack of Coke in the refrigerator, you’ve got a phenomenal living room, which gives you separation from not only the kitchen, but an area that you can kind of relax at the end of a busy day. And then you’ve got a separate bedroom. So I think space is, is a primary benefit to the product. But then I’d also say the amenities that we’ve got, if you think in terms of the food and beverage ecosystem, which we’ll get a little bit into, I suppose, is you’ve got everything you need. So whether it’s you wanna cook in your room, you’ve got a phenomenal breakfast that we provide you in the morning. We’ve got a welcome home Wednesday reception where we get to meet, greet our guests who are staying for a long period of time. We’ve got an outdoor kitchen, we’ve got a partnership with GrubHub. So anything that you need as it relates to a food and beverage ecosystem is taken care of. So it’s kind of your home away from home. And we use that, you know, all the time. But it kind of is like, it’s everything you need to continue the rituals of life, whether you are in Orlando for leisure, whether you’re in Orlando for business. Because ordinarily people stay just a little bit longer with a Homewood Suites, it’s five or six or seven nights. This product provides you with the space and atmosphere and energy you need to stay and relax and enjoy for 5, 6, 7 nights. It’s a beautiful product.
Ryan Embree:
It is. It’s incredible. And I want to go, I wanna dive into that food and beverage experience. Because you’re right with something that has an your longer than average stay. You don’t want to be eating the same thing. You want that variety, you want those options, those choices specifically, right? You got a build your own taco bar, We were stopped multiple times in our tour. Carlos from people raving, we even got stopped by a guest that had a Mickey Mouse waffle. A waffle there that they had made there. So talk to us a little. Yeah. Talk to us a little bit about Carlos, the maybe food and beverage experience here and how that variety and guess feedback from that.
Carlos Sotillo:
Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, having that variety when it comes to, you know, breakfast, all the toppings that we provide, and all the breakfast options. I think you mentioned it, you know, people are staying here 5, 6, 7 nights, they don’t want to eat the same things over and over and over again. Sure. Us having that gives them that variety and you know, our food and beverage team works hard to make sure to change things up. Every time, every Wednesday during the welcome home reception, we have, you know, different, whether it’s the cheese and soups and veggies, and we have pour my beer and wine and, you know, it gives people the opportunity to really enjoy not only the food, but also that space out there, you know, and spend time with the family maybe before going to the parks, you know, kind of huddle, huddling up before the parks, getting a game plan for the day, or just coming back after the parks on Wednesdays and chilling out for a little bit.
Ryan Embree:
Hey, listen, we know, I’m a family of four. If we can have a nice breakfast here, the Homewood Suites before going out to, you know, you need that energy in the morning. We also know how much that costs sometimes. And to have that here provided is a part of the experience that goes a long way. Even that Wednesday, you know, you can guarantee I got a two and a 4-year-old, four hitting those parks. I’m gonna need a cold one after.
Rick Colling:
Absolutely right. Absolutely. And something Carlos has done a phenomenal job of also is you can provide a great physically renovated product. So the environment in which you’re having breakfast is beautiful. You can provide a great breakfast product. So whether it be the make your own taco bar, whether it be the overnight oats, whether it be the chia pudding, if you’re on a healthy restricted diet sort of thing, there’s something that appeals to everybody. But I think what Carlos has really tapped into here is the ability not only to serve a breakfast, but host a breakfast. And there’s a difference in hosting a breakfast than serving a breakfast. And I think he does the same on Wednesday night because the scores would indicate he does, is he hosts the event. So it’s not, please come on down and enjoy. It’s please, come on down, engage with us, tell us your stories. Let us learn a little bit about you so that while you’re here for five or six or seven nights, you become part of the family. And these guys are humble, but they do a really good job of it. I mean, you do an awesome job, brother.
Carlos Sotillo:
Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
What’s that old GM trick we heard, right? You ever want to know what guests are really saying about your property? Come to the lobby during breakfast?
Rick Colling:
Absolutely.
Ryan Embree:
Listen to those conversations. I mean we ran into a couple guests checking out after months here. They’ve been here since January. Incredible.
Rick Colling:
Absolutely right. Miserable that they had to leave. Which I would be too, right? I mean, who’s gonna serve me breakfast? Who’s gonna clean my room? I mean, I don’t wanna leave. Why would you wanna leave a Homewood Suites?
Ryan Embree:
Well, and you know, that’s just one of the many examples. Like I was mentioning, you know, the reviews, the guest feedback speaks for itself. You’re right near the top of this highly competitive Orlando market. Carlos, congratulations. You know, was this, how do you leverage an online reputation like this? And what does it mean to you to get this much guest feedback?
Carlos Sotillo:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, having over 2000 reviews on TripAdvisor is, I mean, we’re definitely giving people something to talk about, you know, and it’s good that it’s positive reviews, you know, that really speaks about the efforts. And you know, it’s good. It helps for me to show it to our staff and see that their efforts are coming through and, you know, where it’s not all in vain, right? So you know, and obviously that drives bookings. You know, people go on TripAdvisor, they see, oh, this hotel has nothing but good reviews. Why wouldn’t I choose that hotel? You know, on top of everything else that Hilton or the Homewood Suites Brands offers. I mean, like you said, it might be just a building without us. So I think the service culture is strong and it’s what drives those reviews and those bookings. So we’re really, really, really proud of all that.
Rick Colling:
The sense of entry, Ryan, you know, I’ve always said that as a brand leader, when I walk into a hotel, when those doors open, you can tell instantaneously whether it’s an engaged team or not. And the experience of walking in here this morning, it’s an engaged team, mate. I mean, they’re just alive and ready to go. And this is on the tail end of a breakfast where they’ve probably served, I don’t know what, 800 people probably. To have the energy and charisma to continue the hospitality and the hosting nature of breakfast is you know, it’s just a compliment to the leadership team here. And again, to Ron Kendall and his team at Buffalo. They’re a great group.
Ryan Embree:
It’s absolutely incredible. And, you know, sending all these people out, like I said, to the parks, you know, with a little happy, a full stomach. Yeah. A lot of energy. Big piece of getting them through their day, which is really cool. Yeah. Rick, you know, how do you, we talked about feedback on Carlos’ side, obviously that’s so important from the guest perspective. Obviously have weigh that with some of the vision and brand vision, but you also have to balance the owner feedback that you’re hearing. Sure. How do you balance those two things and make sure that when you make a change, when you make a new prototype, you do a renovation to a property, it matches and is mutually benefit?
Rick Colling:
Ryan it’s a great question. You know, we do the creation of the prototype, and I think we hinted at it during our conversation at Hunter was done in partnership with five owners. So we invited five owners to the party to say, Hey, listen, we’ve got a beautiful brand that’s 30 years old. If we were to create a new prototype, how would we do that? And these owners were in partnership lockstep, shoulder to shoulder with us as we created the new prototype. What they were avid about was the brand’s been successful for 30 years, let us not depart from the pillars that made it successful. Now we can modernize the pillars, which we have, but the pillars have stayed the same. So think in terms of a full suite, a complimentary breakfast, the outdoor kitchen, the phenomenal activity in the yard, things along those lines. So we stayed true to the brand. And then any changes that we make, for example, you mentioned breakfast. That was a big change for us. We elevated the breakfast with the taco experience. Everything was vetted through owners. So we have a very lively owner advisory council. That we’ll do calls with every quarter. And what we bring to our owner advisory council is not solutions. We bring opportunities and they become part of the solution of opportunities that we bring to the table. So they keep us within our guardrails of, okay, is it going to be phenomenal for the operator of the business? Is it gonna be phenomenal for the consumer, but also from a profitability standpoint, from an ownership perspective, is it going to net what it needs to net? And if you can complete those three buckets, I think you’re in the right journey. So our owners are very vocal. I encourage it as a brand leader. They’ve kind of, you know, while I’ve been, I guess, the spokesperson of the brand, there’s a lot of people behind me that have helped me get the brand to where it is today, our owners being one of them.
Ryan Embree:
And that’s so key, Rick. And I think, you know, something we preach on this podcast all the time about embracing feedback. You know the one thing it should be very scary to hotel, you know, operators, owners is silence, right? You don’t hear anything. Even those negative experiences are opportunities, like you said, to improve, enhance and this prototype, this renovation, Carlos just speaks exactly to that of listening to not only the guests, the owners, and making sure it’s a win-win for everyone.Carlos, we’re here in the busy season. Obviously summer kids are out of school. Talk to us about what you’re preparing for. We’ve obviously got a big new announcement in the Orlando area about a new theme park. What are you looking forward to this summer? What do guests have to look forward to this summer?
Carlos Sotillo:
Yeah, I mean, summers in Orlando are hot. You’re waiting in line, you’re doing all over. So there’s a lot, you know, there’s a lot that goes in the operations of the hotel. You know we try to stay proactive, make sure that everything is guest ready. Buffalo Lodging has done a great job at prepping us as managers to ensure that the hotel is guest ready, you know, by 8:00 AM by or by 6:00 AM when, when guests start coming down for breakfast. So you know, I make sure that the team is trained. I make sure that everything is workingm properly for our guests. The last thing they want is to come here and, you know, not get some of the amenities they were promised. And yeah, I mean, the Orlando area is booming that this new theme park is just gonna drive so much business over our way. And yeah, we’re just proactive, patient positive. You know, I think I mentioned that during the branch, one of our brand calls is the important of being positive out there, you know, as leaders, because as you guys know, in the hotel world, you know, things don’t always go according to plan, you know, so you have to be prepared for worst case scenarios and you know, show the staff that, Hey, it’s okay. We’re, we’re gonna get through this and this business as usual, and, you know, let’s move on.
Ryan Embree:
And the good news is we saw a little bit of a bounce back from the international traveler like that we were talking about hearing about that we were just at NYU last week covering that, hearing some good news about, it’s gonna be a very busy summer season. Booking window has kind of shortened, but it seems like everything is still looking as a positive outlook, which is something we built on in March. I’m wondering Rick, and you know, as we zoom out a little and kind of wrap this up, you know, being that we have, I think the theme last week was don’t believe those big headlines. So, you know, there’s a lot of uncertainty out there, but, you know, why is Homewood Suite still a really smart investment in today’s climate?
Rick Colling:
It’s a great question and something I pond around all the time, right? And I think for us, it was interesting that and I hate to bring it up, but the period of COVID for us was very interesting because the brand did extremely well, and it did extremely well because it’s a niche brand that is dedicated to extended stay business. And it’s served us really well during COVID, if you can think in terms of traveling nurses, medical professionals, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. They looked at Homewood Suites as a safe haven to stay during one of the worst hospitality periods in our industry. What that taught a lot of people is that it’s an evergreen great performer, and it is, it’s an evergreen great performer. So when you think in terms of the investment of Homewood Suites, if you want to diversify a portfolio, so let’s say you’ve got a beautiful IHG, you’ve got a beautiful Hampton, you might have a great Embassy Suites. If you want to diversify a portfolio with a product that will perform regardless of economic environments, Homewood Suites Home2 suites are two brands that would do that for you. So I just think it resonates with an owner. It’s a great, it’s saved them during COVID. So many of them have told me, if we didn’t have a Homewood in our portfolio, where would we be? I’m not quite sure, Rick. So today I think the brand just resonates, and I think as an extended stay segment, I mean, it’s kind of the darling of the industry. I fell in love with it 27 years ago. I knew it was the darling of the industry. And I just think there’s a lot of folks getting on board with the beauty of an extended stay product, and Homewood being the upscale representation for Hilton, and does extremely well, very proud of the brand and proud of folks like Carlos who are in the field doing it every day because they’re literally making our vision come true. So it’s a beautiful place to be.
Ryan Embree:
It’s incredible. And it’s part of the brand story. You know, obviously, like you said, we don’t like talking about those times, but it happened, and it’s one of those things that we’ll show you, and I’m sure you’ll learn, we’ve learned so much from that time period right. And, you know, obviously have some lessons that we’ve enhanced the guest experience through we’ve learned some things, how we can, how guests can adopt technology. Absolutely. And how receptive they are to some of these fast changing things where hospitality really not known for making very fast changes at points. But we had to be flexible and versatile. But it’s a great story to see that Homewood was performing so well during that time and is such a staple and can be a staple and an investment, hospitality investment portfolio.
Rick Colling:
Without question, Ryan. Without question.
Ryan Embree:
Great. Well, we covered a lot. As we wrap up here we always like to kinda look into our hospitality crystal ball, look into the future. Carlos, we’ll start with you. Any final thoughts about kind of your vision for the property? And what’s ahead?
Carlos Sotillo:
Yeah, no, I mean I think, you know, we just have to keep turning on. I want us to keep succeeding the way we have. I think we have a beautiful property here. I know we have a beautiful property and our staff does a great job. You know, I’m just looking forward to more success and more money our way.
Rick Colling:
Well, you’ll get it. You’ll get it.
Ryan Embree:
For sure. And Rick, what about you?
Rick Colling:
You know, I’m a rose colored glasses glass half full kind of guy. I always have my entire career, that’s why I look at the world. So I don’t worry to your on earlier on about the headlines. I think if we are dedicated to this beautiful industry that we’re in, this is the hospitality industry. And when I get out in the field, I get out of my office in Memphis and I get out in the field. It’s where I get my inspiration. And we have some beautiful people who are leading phenomenal products, not only in the home with brand, but across the category and across the enterprise for Hilton. We should applaud them. It’s a great career to be in. It’s tremendously rewarding and very proud of where Homewood is, proud of the enterprise, proud of the category, and it’s a great business.
Ryan Embree:
And it is. Travel is in hospitality, one of, if not the best, one of the best industries to be a part of. And, you know, and I would, I’d challenge our hotel, your listeners. You know, something we heard that resonated with me last week when we were covering that is if there is that uncertainty, if you’re a little nervous getting back down to the fundamentals, you know, something that you’ve been doing over here with your team Carlos, observing the guests, and I guarantee it, if you do that at a high volume, at a high rate, you’re gonna see it and you’re gonna, and you weather these potential storms if they ever come to fruition. So Carlos, thank you for hosting the Suite Spot here. Like I said in our backyard, Rick, it’s always a pleasure to catch up with you.
Rick Colling:
Well, I challenged you at Hunter. I said, I’ll see you down in Orlando. So thank you for making this come true for me. This is, it’s an honor to be on your podcast. So, well thank you. Cheers to you for making it happen.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much. Thank you Carlos. And thank you to our listeners. We’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the most recent Suite Spot: Independent Hotel Show Series episode to hear from the founder of Salt Hotels, David Bowd, as he discusses the origins of Salt Hotels, founding the Salt School, hospitality industry trends, and the next generation of hotel professionals. Be sure to follow and subscribe to the Suite Spot so you never miss an episode, and be sure to check out our Travel Media Group YouTube channel as well.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, for another edition of our independent Hotel show series. I can feel the anticipation, the excitement building up. We're just a few months away from September where we're gonna have independent hoteliers from all over the country coming down to Miami Beach of the Convention Center. And one of those hoteliers and guests is my special guest today who I'll invite into the podcast for the very first time. David Bow, founder and CEO of Salt Hotels. David, thank you so much for being on the podcast.David Bowd:Thank you for having me. Great to be here.Ryan Embree:Yeah, we're excited. We're gonna talk Independent hotel. We're gonna talk about your beautiful portfolio that you have over there at Salt Hotels and everything about that. But before we do that, we always like to get a little bit of background for our hospitality guests. Talk to us a little bit about your hospitality journey, David, and what led you to ultimately founding Salt hotels?David Bowd:Yeah. My story began crazily 40 years ago now, back in the UK. I started when I left school, and I left school very early at 15 years old. And I became a bellman in a local hotel and absolutely loved it. I realized this was the career for me up to sort of, during my school years, I'd played, my mom had a cafe/restaurant, and I really, really thought I wanted to be a chef, and so I started to go towards that department. But I was too young to go into the kitchen, so I started as a bellman, and then I finally got into the kitchen, and funnily enough, I got into the kitchen and didn't enjoy it as much as I did front of house. So, which is often the case, I think, for a lot of people, they have this dream, and then it's not as, it's not, the reality's not the same. So I sort of spent the time in the kitchen. I did a couple of years in the kitchen, and then I went back to front of house and I worked through all departments and then moved to London where I was working in the more traditional hotels, the more, you know, Hiltons, Marriotts, holiday Inns. And actually at the turn of the century, Ian Trager had just opened his first hotel in the outside of the U.S, in London. And I was out invited to go and to meet with his team. And I met with the team and loved it. And, you know, his first hotel St. Martin's Lane was an absolute masterpiece, as was his second, which was Sanderson. And I was fortunate enough to get the job, and I was hotel manager of one for a period of time. And then I took over as regional general manager of both properties. And I ran those through 2000 through to 2007, which were the phenomenal, phenomenally good years in London. And so we were making a lot of money at that time. And Ian invited me to move over to the US and to take over an operations role focusing on a lot of openings for what had then become Morgan's hotel group. And I did that, moved over to New York, loved New York, and loved the lights in America, and spent some time with Morgans. And then Ian had actually left to go and start addition and public on his own. And so I ended up leaving Morgans and going to Ian and to work on those projects with him before moving on to Andre Bola, sort of the other, what I would consider the other genius celebrity hotelier, you know, who is one of the founders of our sector of the indu...
Vice President of Brand & Marketing at Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, Loay Nour, joins the Suite Spot podcast to discuss the launch of Fairmont’s global campaign - “Make Special Happen”. Tune in now to learn more about the brand and the campaign only on the Suite Spot.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We have a very special episode for you today. Gonna tell you in a minute why that is so telling. But first, I'm gonna go ahead and introduce a first time guest with me today, Fairmont Hotel and Resorts, vice President of Brand and Marketing, Loay Nour. Thank you so much for joining me here on The Suite Spot.Loay Nour:Thank you for having me, Ryan. Looking forward to our conversation.Ryan Embree:It's gonna be a great conversation. We're gonna talk a lot about some exciting things on Fairmont Hotel and Resorts, things you and your team have been working on over there. But before we do that, since you are a first time guest, I always love to just hear everyone's hospitality background, unique journeys to where they got there and for you at Fairmont Hotel and Resorts.Loay Nour:Absolutely. So my name is Loay Nour, and I've been in the hospitality industry for more than 18 years actually now. My background goes specifically in luxury hospitality brand. It's a passion that started for me, although I haven't done hospitality school. But I ended up in the hospitality by passion, not by education. My background is actually goes very much into guest experience, brand and marketing, loyalty marketing, partnerships marketing. So I've got around like a 360 degree on marketing. And today, myself and my team we're in charge of the Fairmont brand globally, proudly managing a portfolio of 95 hotels worldwide, and a very strong pipeline of around 28 hotels coming up in the next few years. And today, really looking forward to tell you about the chapter of that. We have just recently launched with a new campaign of Fairmont Presents Make Special happen.Ryan Embree:Yeah, it's a massive global campaign. We're gonna jump all into it. But before, let's give our sweet spot audience maybe a little bit of a history lesson. We've had some iconic brands on this Sweet Spot podcast. This might be the most iconic. It's got a rich legacy of timeless hospitality as it's described. Share with our sweet spot audience, a little bit about the origin story behind this incredible storied luxury brand.Loay Nour:It's actually one of the brands that has a great legacy and history since 1907 with the first property that opened in San Francisco. Fairmont took its name actually from the vision of the foundries, the two first sisters which was the first half of the name. And then the mont was actually because the San Francisco was built on a mountain, and that was the first property that was open for us. Since then, we actually, our hotels has been social epicenters in the different destinations where they operate. And we were able to actually host a lot of key defining history moments like the black and white ball, like the bed in peace with the John Legend and Yoko and Fairmont Queen Elizabeth in Montreal. So we've always been a place where if we always like to say if it happens in a city or it happens in a destination, it happens at a Fairmont. And until today, we actually continue to host those great moments. We became a truly international brand back in 2002 when our first property outside the America opened in Dubai. And since then, our portfolio has accelerated. Today, we're a proud member of a core group that manages more than 42 brands globally. And we are one of the very well known and very well beloved, luxury brands globally.Ryan Embree:It's incredible growth and we're gonna talk about that a little bit later in the ep...
Check out the latest TMG Hospitality Trailblazers episode featuring the Founder of Aligned Hospitality, Bryan Tubaugh! Bryan joins the podcast to discuss founding Aligned Hospitality, the meaning behind the brand, technology in hospitality, improving the guest experience, and much more. Tune in now.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, with another edition of our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. This episode we head west to bring in my next guest from Aligned Hospitality, Brian Tubaugh, founder, and CEO. Thank you so much, Brian, for being on the Suite Spot.Bryan Tubaugh:Hey, Brian, I appreciate it and glad to be here.Ryan Embree:Yeah, exciting. We're gonna talk all about Aligned Hospitality. Talk about the journey where you guys are, you guys have seen some explosive growth, which we're gonna talk about, but first, since it's your first time, love to get people's background stories journey. What ultimately led you to Aligned Hospitality, but founding Aligned Hospitality as well. Yeah, absolutely. I'm one of the I guess, rare breeds. I grew up in the industry. Both my parents, were both general managers. Both of them started in the hospitality industry, line level, housekeepers, bellman, and then, you know, the typical hospitality love story fell in love, one became a front office manager. The other became a GM. Then they started traveling and they had me. So, yeah, so both my parents were in the industry. I, to be honest with you, it's all I've known. It's, you know, all I choose to know. Anytime I try to take away or get away from the industry, it brought me back. So yeah, so I was born into it. And then my business partner, Helinda, my mother, she raised me, my parents divorced. She raised me in Tucson, Arizona, where, you know, our headquarters is still at Tucson and Phoenix. And so, yeah, so we just I grew up in the industry. I started off in operations with Hilton. Went that route, started in housekeeping at 14. We won't tell people that though. So I was a houseman summer job. It was an exterior corridor hotel. So I got to feel that $120 heat. And, yeah, I mean, quickly worked my way up to the front desk. And you know, I may have had some back push on that help as my mom was the general manager at the property. And then the fun part of the whole story, the twist was when I was 18, I had an HR director at the DoubleTree that I was working at. It was a full service, DoubleTree. And the HR director called me into his office. I'll never forget him, love him to death, Eduardo. And he said, Hey, Brian, do you like this industry? I said, well, yeah. I mean, is there anything else in the world? And he said, well, if you like it and you love it, you need to leave Hilton. And I was like, whoa, did I do something wrong? I mean, I, I love Hilton. I'm at a double tree. This is what I've known. I eat a cookie a day. Like, you know, what, why? And, you know, and he kind of looked at me and he said, listen, because of who your parents are, you're never gonna be able to progress in your career. And you're never gonna be able to take that next step because everybody will know you as Rick and Helenda's son. And if you truly want to make your own staple in this industry, then you need to, you need to, you need to move on. And, I tell that story too, and I'll tell you where that leads, but I tell that story because I do think that's a gap nowadays in our industry, is that that mentorship, that line level to that middle management to management, right? We go rockstar front desk. You're now a general manager. Figure it out. So anyway, so he shipped me out. I found Starwood at that point. The four Points by Sheraton. I became an SRSA, I don't know if you remember that position. Sales Reporting Systems analyst.
Check out the latest episode in the Suite Spot: Independent Hotel Show Series, to hear from the COO of The Indigo Road Hospitality Group, Gabriel Perez! Gabriel breaks down the intricacies of F&B in hospitality, how the Indigo brand is evolving, and what attendees can look forward to at the 2025 Independent Hotel Show Miami. Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embry, and we are part of our Independent Hotel show series. This is the second edition of this new series that we're kicking off in collaborating with the Independent Hotel Show. This is your first time we're bringing on advisory board members, team members of the Independent Hotel Show, getting us geared up for that show here at Miami Beach this September. We cannot wait. Uh, and I also cannot wait to bring in my guest, so I'll bring him in. Gabriel Perez, COO of lodging at The Indigo Road Hospitality Group. Gabriel, thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot.Gabriel Perez:Well, thank you. Happy to be here.Ryan Embree:We're excited. We're gonna talk some independent hotels. We're gonna talk mm-hmm
The Suite Spot travels to Howey-in-the-Hills, Florida, to visit the historic Mission Resort + Club as the next stop in the Road Trip series. This property is renowned for its prestigious golf courses, natural environment, and rich Florida history dating back to the early 1900s. Tune in to hear from General Manager Cindy Staley and Director of Agronomy Danny Parks as these two join the Suite Spot.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. If you're watching us on YouTube, you can tell we are not in our Suite Spot podcast studio, but instead, right in our backyard at the Mission Resort + Club. It's such a privilege to be here. I just got off a tour. It was fantastic. We're gonna talk all about it today. And now we're joined here by Cindy Staley, General Manager of the Mission Resort + Club. Cindy, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot.Cindy Staley:Well, thank you for being here. We appreciate you coming out to the resort.Ryan Embree:It's an incredible property you have here. Before we talk a little bit more about it, get in depth about its amenities, the guest experience here, talk to us a little bit about your hospitality journey and how you ended up here at the Mission Resort + Club.Cindy Staley:How far back do you want me to go? Just kidding. I actually always wanted to be in the hospitality industry, even in, believe it or not, high school. I wanted to be a chef. Went to college for it. Really just saw what the hotel arena and resort arena could bring to me. You're never bored. Yeah. There's always something new or something different to do. So I worked my way up. I've been in the central Florida area since 2005 working more in the Orlando market. This opportunity came up roughly three years ago. And that's when the prior owner purchased or sold the property and sold it to MMI Hospitality Group. With that, I was hired before they came to the hotel, and they actually took it over in December of 2022. So we've been through this transition of the prior owner to the new owner, both families and have been through the transition of what MMI has accomplished in the last two and a half, almost three years.Ryan Embree:It's incredible, and we're gonna talk about that today. But getting back to that point, a historic property like this with such a rich history, that's not something that just can hand over to something. It requires a lot of care, and I think that's a real testament to MMI hospitality that they're entrusted in this, this really, you know, jewel that has been around for, for so long. It's really, really cool to see. Talk to us a little bit about, we, we heard about the golf side. Obviously that in itself is, makes it a destination, but you know, as general manager, you're obviously managing over the guests that you host here. Talk to us a little bit about the property, the guest experience, and some of the incredible amenities outside of golf.Cindy Staley:Absolutely. MMI had had owned it for I think, 60 plus years, the King and Prince Resort, which is on St. Simon's Island in, in Georgia. So they're good at managing historical properties. Mission Resort, it has been here since 1964 when the prior owner purchased it. And they really recreated the property from the golf course that was built in 1917, which is El Campeon. And then throughout the years, created the resort building by building, creating 176 guestrooms. We also have suites and villas included in that. They built three restaurants very good reputation restaurants from La Hacienda, the Breakfast Restaurant, La Margarita is our lunch and dinner restaurant. And then the Golf Clubhouse, which is just going through a name change called the Grove House. And it was formally Knickers Golf Clubhouse.Ryan Embree:
The Suite Spot was live at the 2025 NYU IHIF conference last week, covering the event to bring hoteliers exclusive content and insight on the most prevalent topics and trends in the hospitality industry currently. Tune in now to get the pulse on how investors, owners, hoteliers, and guests are feeling about the industry and where they see it heading in 2025 and beyond as Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree, shares the 2025 NYU IHIF key takeaways.Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. We are back here at our Travel Media Group headquarters in Maitland, Florida. Fresh off an incredible 2025 NYU IHIF. Uh, the conference theme was engagement drives returns. There was a ton of engagement. It was everything as advertised. And more. 2200 delegates, 400 plus investors, 20% of those being new investors. Almost every single brand, uh, major hospitality brand represented there, uh, with C-Suite leadership. It was an incredible couple days up in New York City. It was our first time covering the event. We got some incredible, amazing footage, exclusive interviews and insights, uh, and we're gonna share it all with you today. So, uh, thank you for joining me here on the Suite Spot for our five key takeaways. Uh, like I said, it was just an incredible couple days up in New York and really gave some perspective on how hotels are performing almost at the midway point of 2025, and what we have to look forward to. And that's really kind of my first takeaway, uh, is, you know, is is it really as bad as advertised out there? You know, one of the key sessions and, um, interviews that we spoke to was STR President, Amanda Het, uh, who, who really, uh, her message to the, the crowd out there in New York was, um, really don't read into the headlines as much as, uh, it's being said. Uh, you know, o obviously there are some, some, uh, outside major factors that are having some impact on our industry and, uh, will continue to impact the industry. But really year over year, there isn't too much of a difference there. Um, international travel did dip, uh, but there is a, a lot of, uh, positive sentiment that that seems to be returning. And hopefully in the future, those bookings will, will return here. 'cause that's obviously a major, major part of our, uh, domestic, uh, hospitality inventory and demand. Um, obviously there's also a lot of dependence on what market you're in, right? Amanda shared some incredible insights in our interviews of which markets are performing really, really well. She was talking about, um, San Francisco being one of those, uh, markets that little bit slower to recover last year. We've seen some headlines there, uh, but it seems to be, uh, really popping this year in 2025 up in the northeast. Some major bumps in New Orleans, obviously with the Super Bowl, uh, will continue to have to watch it, those big events as people can con continue to prioritize travel. But there is this bifurcation of demand between segments right now, and I think that speaks to maybe those headlines that of, of what's happening, um, tariffs, inflation, things of that nature, really impacting, uh, the economy and lower, um, lower middle class. Uh, maybe they are, uh, keeping their tight, their wallets a little bit tighter this year as far as travel goes, but the luxury, the ultra luxury segments are really, uh, enjoying those thousand dollar rates as we, we talked about, um, earlier in the year. Um, they're continuing to see growth. They're continuing to see, uh, incredible demand for their product, um, which is, which is fantastic. Now, hopefully, again, we can get a little bit, uh, more clarity and what our economic situation looks like so that people continue to prioritize travel. Um, but really, again, it, it's, it's not, it might not be as bad as it's made out to be right now.
Be sure to catch the debut episode of the all-new Suite Spot: Independent Hotel Show Series. Suite Spot first-timer, and special guest, Kat Woods of NYC Women of Hospitality, joins the podcast to discuss critical topics including: The Importance of Women in Hospitality 2025 Independent Hotel Show Miami Social Media and Its Impact on the Hotel Guest ExperienceAnd much more.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, introducing a brand new series. We are here at the Independent Hotel Show series. Now this is a series where we're talking to independent hoteliers, advisory board members, and really getting geared up for Miami in September, all leading up to that incredible show that the Suite Spot is gonna be a part of. And so will my guests that I'll bring on with me right now, Kat Woods of Bridgeton and New York City Women of Hospitality. Kat, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot.Kat Woods:Thanks, Ryan. Excited to be here.Ryan Embree:Yeah, we've got a lot to cover, including that independent hotel show, uh, which we're gonna talk all about. But as it is tradition here on the Suite Spot, this is your first time. Would love to learn a little bit about your hospitality journey. What led you to Bridgeton in the New York City Women of Hospitality?Kat Woods:Sure. Thank you. So many years ago, um, I started my career with W Hotels. I actually started with W Barcelona in college and fell head over heels in love with the brand. I worked for about five years in rooms operations between the w New York Union Square and the w New York downtown here in New York City, and got a really great foundation for operating hotels in a nice corporate structure. But in the mid 2010s, the boutique lifestyle hotel scene in New York was really starting to grow, and 11 Howard was one of the hottest hotels opening at the time. I was able to join that team shortly after opening, and that was my first introduction into truly independent boutique hotels. I fell in love with it. There was so much creativity in the operation, so much creativity in the branding. Um, and that really started my career in independent and lifestyle hotels. After that, um, I was able to continue with, uh, l Howard up until the pandemic and throughout the pandemic I helped with a couple projects here and there, but ultimately landing with Bridgeton as the, uh, assistant general manager of their Walker Hotel, Tribeca Property, which is an incredible lifestyle property located in Tribeca. Um, and I've been with the Bridgeton team now in a variety of roles for about four years.Ryan Embree:That's awesome. And creative freedom is, you're right, such a draw for independent hotels and why some people like yourself Kat. Sounds like once you get a taste of that and the ability to really express and tell your story, which we're certainly gonna cover, and one of the, the foundational reasons why a lot of people are not just working, but also guests choose independent hotels is because of that, that story and creative nature. So it's, it's so cool to see. And again, this, this series is all about independent hotels and that that massive show that's gonna be happening in September. Now you're also the executive director of the New York City Women of Hospitality. For those who aren't familiar, talk to our audience a little bit about this organization and its mission.Kat Woods:Sure. So the New York City Women of Hospitality was founded in 2018 by Jolie Feld and Tiffany Perra. And the goal upon the initiation of the group was to create a supportive, safe space for women in the industry. It's no surprise that women are facing some battles that maybe their male counterparts don't. Um, and the idea was to create a community where we can bounce som...
The Suite Spot travels to the heart of Orlando, Florida, to visit the luxurious and one-of-a-kind property, Conrad Orlando! This hotel and resort is unlike any other with its sensational amenities, lavish suites, breath taking beaches, and centralized lagoon right in the middle of the resort.General Manager at the property, Sean McCarron, joins the podcast to discuss the stellar guest experience offered to travelers, the Conrad brand, social media, and why this hotel is a must visit the next time you are in Orlando. Tune in now.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree and I hope you are watching us today on our YouTube channel because as you can tell, we are not in the Suite Spot podcast studio. We are instead at the beautiful Conrad Orlando here with me, Sean McCarron, general manager of the Conrad Orlando.Thank you so much for being with me today.Sean McCarron:It's a pleasure to be here and thank you for coming and seeing us today.Ryan Embree:Yeah. Thank you for hosting us at this incredible property. We're gonna talk all about it today. This is our Suite Spot Spotlight series showcasing some of the most unique hotels. This one certainly fits the bill. But before we get talking about the property, what I love talking about, this is your first time on the podcast, hospitality people come from all different places. Sometimes they're born into the industry, sometimes they're jumping from brands. Tell us about a little bit about your journey behind the scenes.Sean McCarron:Well, I've been in the business for over 30 years, believe it or not and all in luxury. So I went to hotel school out in Switzerland, and once I graduated from hotel school, I came out and went back to the States and started with the Ritz Carlton. So I was with the Ritz Carlton Hotel Company in various different areas and opening hotels for about six years. And then went to Four Seasons and spent about 16 years with the Four Seasons hotel company, opening other hotels and again, you know, variety of different locations. And then started with Hilton Luxury at the Waldorf Astoria here in Orlando about nine years ago, and been on this project for the last three here at the Conrad Orlando.Ryan Embree:Incredible. And that taste of luxury from different brands, I'm sure that certainly gave you a unique perspective as your journey led you here at the Conrad Orlando.Sean McCarron:Oh, it certainly did. You get different viewpoints from every location that you, that one works in from urban environment to a resort environment to, you know, Las Vegas I spent some time in as well. Opening hotels, all of it kind of lends to a broader experience in order to open this beautiful property.Ryan Embree:Let's talk about the Conrad brand, right. It's unique, known for its design and how it's built. For those that may not be familiar with the Conrad brand, what's the flavor? What makes it unique? Why do travelers love this brand?Sean McCarron:Their main pillars for the Conrad as a brand itself, one of them is bold design, as you had, as indicated. Experiences are also a big part of what we do from a Conrad brand perspective. This hotel is no different than any of our others. I think it's quite unique in the fact that a lot of the design element is based upon water. So lots of blues and refractive lighting, very contemporary feel throughout the resort. Lots of natural light, floor to ceiling windows from a design element. From an experiences element, I mean, you walked around this resort, there's a stunning lagoon right down the middle of it with beaches surrounding it and a lot of activations and a lot of activities from a resort perspective here in Orlando that make it very, very unique.Ryan Embree:
The Travel Media Group digital solution has hit the monumental milestone of responding to over 2 million online guest reviews for our hotel partners. To commemorate such a major achievement, Chief Technology Officer, Jason Lee, and Director of Product - Respond & Resolve™, Jackie Avery, join the Suite Spot to discuss this accolade, what it means to the organization, and the future of review response. Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, here for a very celebratory episode. Today we're gonna have two guests with me, our first Jackie Avery, director of Product - Respond and Resolve. Jackie, congratulations, as the title says of TMG hits over 2 million online guest reviews. Thank you so much for being with me on the Suite Spot.Jackie Avery :Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. It feels so good to be here. Just really excited to celebrate this.Ryan Embree:Yeah, I think it was August 2022, where we were actually in our older building, before we moved into our podcast studio. Hopefully you were watching us on YouTube and celebrating 1 million guest reviews responded to, um, which just seemed like unfathomable to even think about that amount. So now here we are at 2 million in 2025 before the summer, which we're gonna talk about that, that flux of reviews that come in during the busiest time of the year for hoteliers and for travel. But talk to me a little bit about what this accomplish means, to you and, and your team and network of professional writers.Jackie Avery :Yeah. I mean, honestly, this is just one of the many milestones for the team this year. So I guess, like full of transparency, what it means is continued momentum. I think, you know, we're feeling pumped up. We're doing what we love, and it feels so good to, you know, help our clients and really just connect, you know, in a really authentic way with travelers all over the world.Ryan Embree:Yeah. And when we talk about a number, again, like 2 million, that is reviews, online reviews from across all different platforms. Recently added Medallia surveys as well for some of the brands. But obviously it's not just you and a couple people doing this. You've got a huge network of US-based writers that do this. Talk to us a little bit about the training that goes into this, Jackie, because I don't think I've heard one GM, or front desk manager, whoever is responding to those reviews saying that I got into hospitality because I wanted to respond to reviews. Right. They're more focused on the people and guests as they should be on site. What type of training and nuances goes into responding to specifically an online hotel guest review?Jackie Avery :Alright, well, I'll tell you a little bit, but you're not gonna get all my secrets. Well, the team, when they join us, they come already with extensive education. I feel like that's talked about a lot, but in reality, that's actually just like the baseline. That's where we start. And then from there, right, they need to know about hospitality, they need to know about different hotel brands. But there's also extensive training in, specific person to person communication to be able to connect with someone, in a genuine way. Of course. Like with the main focus being in the written form. Because, you know, the team of writers. But yeah, so I'd say, you know, being highly educated and having those degrees and level of experience with different forms of writing is really where it starts. And then we build off that.Ryan Embree:Yeah. And we've been hospitality specific Travel Media Group that is for 40-plus years. Again, there's a lot of nuances that if you're that US hoteliers kind of take for granted things like, taking it a deposit at the beginning of a stay and maybe that deposit not hitting back or get o...
On this special episode of the Suite Spot, Managing Director at Green Key Global, Anick Levesque, shares insight on several new programs and initiatives that hoteliers can leverage to bolster their sustainability efforts across their portfolios to make a significant impact on the environment. This episode emphasizes eco-friendly implementation to clarify how seamless the integration of these processes at the property level can be. Tune in now.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you for joining us today, recording here on Earth Day. Obviously not the day of release, but a very fitting day to be recording for this episode. In particular, I am very excited to welcome on our guest, Managing Director at Green Key Global, Anick Levesque. Anick, thank you so much for being with me, celebrating this 2025 Earth Day.Anick Levesque:Thank you very much for having me, Ryan.Ryan Embree:Very excited to talk about Green Key Global. We've gotten an exciting announcement that I've, that I've seen all over the hospitality circuit. You and your team have been doing a great job of putting that out. But before we get into that exciting announcement, this is your first time on the Suite Spot. Love to hear from our guests kind of about their hospitality journeys and what kind of led you to your role there as managing director at Green Key Global.Anick Levesque:Absolutely. Well, it's been an interesting journey as I embarked upon the next phase of my career, just about over a year ago now. I really wanted to leverage the experience that I had in helping businesses grow, which is essentially what I had done for the previous 30 years of my career. And apply that to purpose driven work. And so when the opportunity came to lead Green Key Global, an organization with an ambitious and socially driven mission, a strong legacy and deep roots in the hospitality sector, I just knew that it was the right fit for me. Green Key is a social enterprise that's focused on sustainability. It contributes to the ongoing well-being of our planet and our communities. While at the same time, companies who commit to sustainability and to certification, they benefit through tangible results. They benefit from increased bookings, lower operating costs, and higher property valuation. So that duality of being able to help businesses grow while also contributing to the wellbeing of our society, that's something that was very appealing to me.Ryan Embree:Yeah, I'm sure. And we're gonna get into detail about this, but it really is just a win-win for all parties with sustainability and really the way the future. It's very cool to, I'm sure be in a position. We talk about it all the time where, obviously there's equity and compensation out there. But you know, more and more people are now looking for that sort of fulfillment in their career. So to be able to be a part of a industry and program and organization that does such great work that obviously has such an impact on our world, I'm sure that means a lot. And it's very cool to and an honor to have you on and talk to us a little bit about Green Key Global. What I love about Green Key Global is there's so many just win-win scenarios in everything from the guest wins, with the sustainable practices, they feel a part of something. The hotel wins both with that intrinsic value, but also sometimes financially too, right? And savings and even just the expectations that it's setting now. Green Key Global's been around for decades, definitely heard of it being in hospitality, but didn't really know to the degree at some of the amazing statistics you and your team shared with me For our hotelier Suite Spot audience, share with us a little bit about the history of Green Key Global and ...
In the latest Suite Spot: Spotlight series episode, we travel to Atlanta, Georgia, to showcase the one-of-a-kind, AAA Four Diamond Hilton hotel - The Signia by Hilton Atlanta!Director of Sales at the property, Julia Austin, sits down with the Suite Spot to give travelers a keen look at why this newly built hotel not only broke new ground, but is also breaking records and setting the bar for guest experiences, being hospitality forward, and incorporating excellence in every square foot of the property. Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, and we are here on our Suite Spot Spotlight series at the beautiful Signia by Hilton Atlanta. I'm so excited to be here. We just got a tour of this incredible property. I'm here with the Director of Sales, Julia Austin. Thank you so much for having us here and hosting us at the Signia by Hilton Atlanta.Julia Austin :Absolutely. Thank you so much for being here.Ryan Embree:So before we get into this amazing property, and there's so much to cover, by the way, it is a history lesson just walking in, I love the term that was used during the tour of this is a love letter to the city. We're gonna talk all about this amazing property, but in hospitality, we know it's a big small world, right? We typically work for sometimes different brands. Sometimes we work for the same brand. I love hearing hospitality leaders and their journeys through their experience, and what led them to a new property like this.Julia Austin :Yeah, absolutely. So it is, it is such a small world and hospitality and, you know, I kind of came into the world by a dear friend of mine from college. I graduated and was trying to figure out what exactly to do next, and she introduced me to the world of hotels and I fell in love. And 15 years later, here I am miles away from home. I'm born and raised in Arizona, living in Atlanta, Georgia, and getting to be a part of this amazing signature hotel within the Hilton brand. It's been a wild journey, but I can now, looking back, can't imagine the last 15 years doing anything else other than working in such an amazing industry that the hospitality industry really is.Ryan Embree:Yeah. So many pieces of your stories echoed with industry leaders. I talked to first, sometimes a lot of hospitality industry people don't know what they're gonna do right outta college, fall into it, but fall in love to it and also heard that wild journey, to get you here at this incredible Signia by Hilton Atlanta. Let's talk about this for those, audience members that might not be familiar with Signia, because this is the first new build Signia, and for this brand. Talk to us a little bit about the characteristics, that make up what a Signia by Hilton is.Julia Austin :Yeah. You know, so when Hilton was really looking on how to expand the company and what we were going to do next, we really kind of reached out to the people, you know, what are you looking for when you travel? What are you looking for when you're planning meetings and events, when you're hosting galas or social events? And the resounding, you know, feedback that we as a company received was, we want something that is elevated, yet still approachable. So, you know, we wanna have these beautiful views, floor to ceiling, glass windows, you know, state-of-the-art meeting space and high level guest rooms. But we still wanna be able to feel like when we come to this hotel, even with just under a thousand rooms that we're family and that, you know, we belong here and, and we are really embracing ourselves not only in the brand and the hotel, but the community and the city that we're in at the time as well. So, and that's really kind of how Signia became to be.Ryan Embree:I mean, it again,
In this episode, Alexi Khajavi, President of Hospitality, Travel & Wellness at Questex, joins the Suite Spot to give listeners a preview of the upcoming NYU IHIF 2025 event taking place in New York City on June 1-June 3, 2025. This industry event is one of the most elite hospitality investment forums in the world, so tune in to find out why you should attend and get your finger on the pulse of hospitality.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining me. We've got an incredible, amazing episode with a very familiar face. If you're watching us and subscribed to our Travel Media Group YouTube channel or hearing us on any of the streaming platforms. That's Alexi Kajavi, Questex President, hospitality Travel and Wellness. Alexi, thank you so much for being back on the Suite Spot.Alexi Khajavi :Ryan, good to be here. Nice to see you.Ryan Embree:We almost have to credit you now as a co-host. You've been with us so many times. We've got even though it's a familiar face, a new topic, which we're gonna go get into. You've been on the Suite Spot before. We've had a couple conversations talking about your hospitality journey, some of the mentors along the way. I figured we'd start out today talking about your role. I see you, follow you on LinkedIn, your jet setting, all over the place, thought leadership everywhere. It's gotta be pretty cool in that position. Give us a day in the life of your position and what you do.Alexi Khajavi :So Questex is a medium sized information services company. We're B2B media at our core. We inform and we connect buyers and sellers, professionals across six industries. So the three that you mentioned, hospitality, travel, and wellness, are the markets that I have the privilege of running. And then I've got a counterpart that runs our life sciences, healthcare and technology. And we do that by publishing, daily editorial, writing about the industries, the trends, the topics we research. We have over 6 million first party data records. So these are individuals, names, titles, emails, contact information, but also really more importantly, their demographics and their behavioral, information. So what content they read, what are they engaging with, what are the premium pieces of content or research that they're downloading. And we use all of that to inform us as to what are the trends and topics that are impacting that industry, or different segments or categories of businesses within a vertical. And then we use that in turn to develop our programs at our events, to develop our content strategy, whether that be in digital or print. And we then work with the brands, the sellers in those industries to connect with those buyers. So, you know, prime example in hospitality would be investors are, you know, looking for, you know, enhanced guest experiences. So what are the technologies and the solutions in, in hotels that can do that? We'll position those brands specifically to buyers with buyers intent in the marketplace, looking for things like that. So that's what we do, and it's a really incredible industry to be in, and very exciting. And at our core, it's a noble pursuit of informing and connecting professionals in these industries.Ryan Embree:Well, I'm sure, Alexi, you have a very unique perspective, getting to see really a 360 view of travel, hospitality, and wellness between all the data, the conversations that you're having with you know, some of these buyers and sellers. And that's really, is a great segue into what we're gonna talk about today. 'cause we're gonna turn our attention to the NYU IHIF event. Questex got involved with this event recently. You just preached the importance of using feedback and data. I'm curious,
Tune in to the latest Suite Spot episode featuring TMG’s very own Chief Technology Officer, Jason Lee, as he gives listeners the latest update on our newest innovation, SMART Response powered by TMG AI.Hear about the development, successes, and challenges of building a guest review response solution with the ingenuity of artificial intelligence.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. As you can see, if you're watching us on our YouTube channel, we are here in our Suite Spot podcast studio in Maitland, Florida, here with CTO, Jason Lee at Travel Media Group. Jason, thank you so much for being back on the Suite Spot.Jason Lee:Yeah, thanks for having me. In the seated position.Ryan Embree:Yes. I feel like we should be celebrating maybe like a 10th or 15th milestone of you coming on the Suite Spot or something like that. It's been a lot, but we're here to talk about a really important topic, something that's been bubbling up in conferences, conversations that we're having something that you're not a stranger to. You've been doing some research on this and, and have some updates for us. But AI, I mean, it seems to be the, obviously the, the hot topic, like I said, at these conferences or just in the industry, outside of the industry in general, and then pairing it with guest review response, something that Travel Media group obviously known for. We're coming up on the 2 million guest review mark. Which Is a fantastic milestone, really exciting milestone, but I figured we could start the episode by just kind of talking about how Travel Media Group got into guest review response. A lot of the stuff and solutions that we've talked about on this podcast have been through hotel your feedback. Talk to us a little bit about this journey in review response, and then we'll get to maybe where the state of the industry is now, and AI and guest review response.Jason Lee:Well, you know, working with hotels the way we have for a lot of years, almost 10 years ago, we were getting a lot of requests to do review response. And so, we're like, yeah, I think we can do it. And then as we got into it, we realized like, wow, this is complicated because every hotel's different. The vibe of the hotel is different, but also the amenities and policies, the quantities, the types of sites that are, have more text or less text ratings and like, I think even getting deeper into, you know, how a hotel wants to use language. And so like, it's even beyond voice, you know? So it's like it's literally grammar and also types of words. And so I think, so we started in this very simple place, very innocent, like, we can do this. This is gonna be awesome. And I think the first offering we had was 20 reviews. It was an SLA of 20 reviews a month. It was TripAdvisor only and
Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree, breaks down the key takeaways from the 2025 Hunter Hotel Investment Conference, which took place in Atlanta, Georgia, from March 17-19. This prestigious annual industry event provided valuable insights, numerous panels, and notable speakers from all across the hotel industry.Learn what critical factors are shaping hospitality in 2025 and beyond by tuning in now.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, fresh off our trip of covering the 36 Hunter Hotel Investment Conference. So excited to be, first of all, covering the event. It was an incredible couple days up in Atlanta, Georgia. Some exciting announcements, which we're gonna talk about that on this podcast. Some industry trends, insights, interviews. We brought it all to you. We came jam packed back with content, and really excited to share some of the key takeaways and issues that were raised. You know, we've talked about this before on the podcast. Love attending these events where we get all types of brands, owners, developers, hotel owners, individual GMs at these events, because all the ideas, topics, really important topics in our industry really float to the top. And, you know, you get a really fresh perspective about how everything, how everyone's feeling about our industry and this year maybe a little bit darker clouds than we hear in your years past, but also just how amazing our industry is. And, and, you know, I'm gonna start with my first takeaway. The theme, we talked about it on the episode with Sarah Moss, was Elevate your game. Love some of the programming that was involved. Molly Bloom, the poker princess who ran high stake poker games. The theme was incredible. Jesse Cole of the Savannah Bananas, everybody was wearing jerseys. He'd certainly brought the energy. If you've, if you've ever seen one of those games, there's a wait list now for a, a long amount of time to try to get tickets to those. But I think the, you know, there were, there were some receptions all around that, you know, gaming style and theme. But really, you know, my takeaway was that we're at a place where hotels really have to elevate their game too, and we're seeing it which is the really, really cool part. Hotels are getting creative with their f and b experiences, right? Utilizing different things sourcing because the cost has risen, the operational costs, the margins are becoming very thin for hoteliers right now. Whether it's the price of, of goods, whether it's the prices of wages right now hoteliers are elevating their game to get creative. They're getting creative to get deals done right? And it's events like Hunter and these investment conferences where you're in the room, so to speak, shaking hands, that really can be the difference between a deal getting over the finish line and not certainly a lot of talk about AI technology. You know, looking back on last year's takeaways and reading and, and listening to kind of some of my thoughts, I felt like we're in a much more comfortable place than we were a year ago. I still think our industry is still trying to figure out the best way to use ai, but I think what's happened is now our grand illusions of the transformation that AI can bring to our business, the expectations of those have maybe been just reeled in a little bit. And we're starting to take those baby steps in AI technology, and we're looking for things like operational efficiency to empower our employees, and even AI used by guests and travelers are becoming more frequent and prevalent. And really what that speaks to is the importance of a IO, right? And the what type of content about your hotel is out there. That's why UGC user generated content is so critical. It's so important because travelers are using this information on othe...
Tune in to the inaugural installment of the Suite Spot: Road Trip series! In this episode the Suite Spot takes a drive to SpringHill Suites Jacksonville Beach Oceanfront to meet with Area General Manager, Alex Reitter, and Area Director of Marketing & Sales, Samantha Pritchard. Alex and Samantha give viewers an inside look at the property’s signature restaurant, The Sand Bar, and why this hotel needs to be the next destination on all traveler lists. Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. If you're listening to us or watching us on our YouTube channel, you'll see that we are not in our content creation studio in Maitland. We have hit the road for a new series, the Suite Spot Road Trip, and we are here at the Spring Hill Suites, Jacksonville Beach, Ocean Front. And I'm here with two wonderful guests joining me today, general Area General Manager Alex Reitter, and Area Director of Sales and Marketing, Samantha Pritchard. Alex. Samantha. Thank you so much for hosting us on the Suite Spot at your beautiful ocean front property.Alex Reitter:We're happy to have you. Thanks for coming out.Ryan Embree:Very excited to be here. As it is, Suite Spot tradition. One of the coolest thing about hospitality, we were talking about off camera is just our, the history, the DNA that gets built over the years. Maybe different brands, different management companies that you've been a part of. Everyone has a unique story, but it all leads us back to people serving people, right. That that's why we love hospitality. So love to hear maybe your backgrounds in hospitality and what let you here to a brand new property, which we're gonna talk about here shortly. Alex, we'll go ahead and start with you.Alex Reitter:Okay. Well, thanks Ryan. Thanks for coming out. Of course. Again. So, yeah, I think I have an interesting start in Hospitality fell into actually start out on small cruise ships. Intercoastal, I'm not even sure if you knew that Samantha.Samantha Pritchard:No. New Skills.Alex Reitter:So it was definitely a interesting start. You know, uh, intercoastal cruising, seven night trips up and down the, uh, east coast after college. You know, we did trips in Maine, Chesapeake Bay, all the way down to Florida. It was, you know, amazing experience. But when you're working six to eight weeks on a boat, nonstop, you kind of look for other options. And hotel kind of was a natural fit for me. From there, I've had a chance to actually work a courtyard down the street from this Spring Hill. And then actually a little time in the Florida Keys, uh, most recently in a Marriott in Durham, North Carolina. The weather got a little cold. It snowed a couple times on us, and we said, let's get back to Florida. So excited to be here. And excited to work with Samantha. I've only been here a couple months and ready to get the ball rolling.Ryan Embree:Well, I think you're our first guest that has got their hospitality start. I've, I've heard behind the front desk I've heard bellman. I don't know if I've ever heard on a cruise, so that's very, very cool. But it's a story that resonates probably with a lot of our hotel audience, and listeners sometimes just kind of jumping from place to place. But again, people serving people, hospitality. Samantha, you've had kind of a different journey here. Talk to us a little bit about that.Samantha Pritchard:Yeah, so I started my hospitality journey in the Convention Visitor Bureau with Visit Jacksonville. It was, it was some of the best years just learning the business, being around people that have been doing it a long time. So then I left the CVB and went out as a director of sales. So my first job on property was a director of sales, just from some of the hotel connections made dur...
Tune in to this quarterly episode to hear from Chirag Shah of the American Hotel & Lodging Association to get the state of the hospitality industry. As EVP, Federal and Political Affairs & Counsel, Chirag, gives immense insight into challenges, patterns, and trends impacting the hotel industry and how the AHLA is helping hoteliers overcome the economic environment.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. As you can see, we are here with another industry check-in with AHLA. And we have a first time guest with us Chirag Shah, Executive Vice President, Federal and Political Affairs & Council at the American Hotel and Lodging Association. Chirag, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot today.Chirag Shah:Absolutely. Thanks Ryan. Appreciate you having me.Ryan Embree:Well, welcome to the Suite Spot. This is your first time. Before we get rolling, talk about some of the topics that AHLA and issues that AHLA is obviously advocating so ferociously for hotels all around the country. Maybe give us a little bit of background, your journey to AHLA and give our Suite Spot audience, just a brief glimpse of the role that you do there.Chirag Shah:I appreciate it. So I've been in the lodging industry, lobbying on behalf of hotels and hoteliers for about a decade and some change, 12-13 years. And previously my background is actually as a campaign and elections attorney. It's what my training is, and not perhaps a skill that folks are, a ton of folks are always looking for especially when you get relatives that want help getting outta a speeding ticket or something. But I spent time on Capitol Hill, worked on a number of political campaigns, and 2012, 2013 after finishing up my last campaign, got a call from a group. They were looking to open a DC office. And when I was on Capitol Hill, I used to meet with them quite frequently, and it was a group called AAHOA And, uh, they were looking to, to open their DC office. And it was great because I, uh, literally spoke the language that many hoteliers speak and, and figuratively spoke the language, of Washington DC. And so, uh, it, it was a, it was a great fit. And I came in and opened their DC shop and worked there for, for eight years. And, uh, then came over to AHLA and has been fantastic to represent a lot of the same people physically, actually the same people, but also the industry. It's such a wonderful industry where hotels, everybody loves going to hotels. Most public officials don't fully understand what the hotel industry is all about, but they love talking about their travel experiences. And so now at AHLA, I get to oversee the federal affairs shop, the political shop where we meet with members of Congress, have got one of the greatest jobs where we tell the story of the lodging industry to members of Congress, their staff, the presidential administration, every single day. And so getting time to understand what the challenges are that hotel leaders are facing, where the industry is going, what the economic footprint is, that's what we do. And so it's been a lot of fun.Ryan Embree:You know it's funny, Chirag, we have so many industry leaders on this podcast, and we talk to them about their kind of beginnings and they talk about maybe jumping from brand to brand and still having that tight-knit family. Because it all comes back to hospitality. It seems like a very similar path with you and the associations, right, starting with the AAHOA and then transitioning to AHLA. But at the very end of the day, it's all about hospitality and the hotels that you're advocating for from those small, independent hotels all the way up to the major brands. And here we are at the Q1, beginning of, 2025. Great time to reflect on,
A familiar face returns to the Suite Spot in this special episode. Richard Alberigo, CEO & President of Alberigo Hotel Management, joins the podcast to discuss what his hotel management group has been up to over the last couple of years, how the hospitality industry is rapidly evolving with AI technology, new guest preferences, and how to acquire top talent for your hotel staff. Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. So happy to be sharing an incredible episode with you today. Whether you're listening to us or watching us on our official Travel Media Group YouTube page you will see and hear a familiar voice. It's been a couple years, but really excited to welcome in our guest for today, Richard Alberigo, President and CEO of Alberigo Hotel Management. Richard, thank you so much for joining me back on the Suite Spot.Richard Alberigo :Yeah, thanks for having me on, Ryan. It's gonna be fun.Ryan Embree:It's been a couple years. We're gonna cover a lot. You know, last time we heard a little bit about your hospitality journey, so fascinating to hear in our industry. We've hosted tons of industry leaders here on this podcast. Everybody got kind of have different pieces of DNA, whether it's, you know, they've worked for different brands, hotel management companies. You ended up founding your own Alberigo Hotel management company. But I want to kick off this episode, Richard, about talking about, you know, one of the common threads that I always hear when talking about hospitality journeys, which is the mentors or influences that really rose to the top for you and your career and really has lasted the test of time in your career.Richard Alberigo :Absolutely, Ryan. So I have a couple of mentors. My first one, the first manager job I, I received it was at a college station, full service Hilton Hotel, 303 rooms. And I was just a front desk agent. And I'll be honest with you, at the time, being a CEO of a company was not even in the realm of possibilities. And I really didn't even seek it. I was doing it for quote unquote beer money. That's what I worked freshly outta college. And so I had my mentor, her name was Kim Chapin, and she was the rooms division manager there. And she would, you know, recognize my accomplishments. She kept saying, I think you could do something with this job if you really put it together and you really focus. And, you know, she was very supportive. And I remember my promotion, we went to a team meeting, a front desk meeting, and she lined everybody but me on one side of the, of the field. We were playing volleyball. And then the other side of the field was just me. And she goes, you were looking at your new front office manager. So that's how I got the promotion. Believe it or not, there was no indication at all. There was like, this might, this announcement might happen. I was in total shock. But, you know, it was really cool that she saw something in me. And so obviously at that point I couldn't disappoint her. And then, you know, the rest is history. My next mentor later on in my career, I was a general manager of a Homewood Suites in Houston, and this gentleman's name was Mark Boulevard. He was the district manager for Reson Hospitality. This guy was rough. I mean every time he drove up, I just felt like I was gonna quit or I was gonna be be fired. I mean, he didn't take no, he was no nonsense and nothing positive. I would go to our team meetings and the other managers would be there and they'd be like, I'm so sicking of hearing about how great you are. And I'm like, what are you talking about? This guy beats me up every time, they'd go, no, he needs to say, you need to be more like Richard. Do you need to be more like Richard? And I mean, if I was 1 cent over in housekeeping costs,
Sarah Moss, Chief of Staff at Hunter Hotel Advisors, joins the Suite Spot to discuss the upcoming 36th annual Hunter Hotel Investment Conference and give hoteliers a look at what they can look forward to from the event. Tune in to this episode to learn more about the live sessions, panels, notable speakers, and on-site entertainment at the 2025 HHIC.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining us. Wherever you are, listening to us, or maybe watching us on our official TMG YouTube channel. Got a fantastic episode for you, kind of becoming a little bit of an annual tradition. Uh, really excited, uh, to talk about this topic, subject, and, uh, one of the most prestigious events in hospitality. Um, hopefully we're not, uh, well, hopefully we are introducing this to our hotel audience, but you should already know about this event because it, it blows up. LinkedIn really shuts down that social media 'cause you hear everyone is there in Atlanta. I will introduce our guest, Sarah Moss, chief of staff at the Hunter Hotel Advisors. Sarah, thank you so much for joining me back here on the Suite Spot once again.Sarah Moss:Ryan, I'm so excited to be back and talking about one of my favorite subjects, the Hunter Conference today.Ryan Embree:Yes, we're excited. It's that time of year we're ramping up, right? It's everybody. There's hotels thawing out right now, right now in the, in the winter as we get ready for that busy spring travel season. Uh, really a perfect time for, for the conference, uh, in March. But before we get into the conference, you know, last year we kind of heard a little bit about your background. Um, and your shared kind of the journey that led you to Hunter Hotel Advisors and the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference ultimately. But I wanna kick off this episode. You know, last year we did a hospitality campus cross series and we talked a lot about mentors, right? We know hospitality, still struggling with staffing a little bit, but we talked about mentors and influences in our hospitality careers and journey. Wondering if you have any, you know, major mentors that have, that have, you know, really influenced you in your career or just people in general that have, have made an impact. Well,Sarah Moss:Thank you for having me on again, Ryan. Sure. I love telling my story about hospitality, especially here at Hunter. And I think everyone's journey is so unique in hospitality and the seasons that they go through in their life. I think there are many mentors that they find throughout their seasons, whether they're in new jobs, you know, life changes, new cities, whatever it may be. And so, um, throughout my journey, I think I've had many mentors along the way and I'm so grateful for them. I think about my time at Sea Island with Melinda Lasky and teaching me, you know, what excellence was and how hospitality at the highest standards should be held to at a Forbes five star resort. And I think about my time back at Georgia State with, uh, Dr. Debbie Cannon and Esther E. And just their wisdom that they imparted on me and their, you know, they just believed in me when, you know, I was a student and just gave me so much courage to go out and try to pursue my dreams. Um, and the opportunities to do that. They introduced me to Hunter. And so I'm so grateful for them to provide me this job here and now. I think, you know, in, in my job now here at Hunter, I have these other influential people like Rachel Humphrey and Lisa Lombardo in my life, who, you know, whenever I have the question or the, you know, the thing I'm stuck on, I, you know, go to my circle and I can ask them what's, um, in their infinite wisdom, what, what they would do or what advice they would have.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we welcome Micajah Sturdivant, CEO of MMI Hospitality, as the newest addition to the TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. With a background in hospitality and hotel management spanning generations in his family, Micajah gives audiences a unique take on how hospitality has evolved over the decades and how MMI Hospitality has cemented itself as a pioneer in the industry. Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. Happy 2025. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We are here back in the new year with a great new episode at continuing. I think we've been doing this for about two years now. This TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series, as a reminder of this is your first time, this is all about the hospitality trailblazers that have been blazing a path in hospitality. Our guests has been doing it for over five decades, we're gonna talk about in a second, but it's about those people and management companies and brands that are pushing our industry forward. As we get into a new year, I think this is the best way to kick it off. So without further ado, I'm gonna bring in our guest today, CEO of MMI Hospitality, Micajah Sturdivant. Micajah, thank you so much for being with me on the Suite Spot today.Micajah Sturdivant:No, it's a great honor. Thank you for having me.Ryan Embree:Yeah, we're excited. We're gonna, we're gonna talk a lot because we got a lot of history to cover with your hospitality group, MMI. But before we do that, this is your first time on the Suite Spot. First time guest, hopefully first of many visits, but as, as I always like to do as is tradition. Talk about a little bit about your background and hospitality and the journey that led you to MMI Hospitality.Micajah Sturdivant:No, I appreciate the invitation and opportunity to share about our organization that originally was founded in 1956 when Kemmons Wilson was conceptualizing Holiday Inn. My grandfather and his roommate from grad school were early adopters to the idea of what the Holiday Inn and Internet Interstate system expansion could really provide, not only for the travelers, but from their perspective and specifically my grandfather. The opportunity for a Mississippi workforce that was going through a major transformation in the late 1940s and 50s where primarily agriculture focused economy was modernizing. In many ways, technology was being brought in and it was negatively impacting opportunities for workforce to have a quality meaning of quality lifestyle. And so saw that the opportunity within hospitality could be a great employer and so was one of the first Holiday Inn franchisees. That company has since grown to work with all the major franchisors as owner and operator, as well as adding a contract food service management company and a restaurant brand as well. So it's a mixed bag across the spectrum hospitality. But in many ways, they're businesses that were born out of one another or very much build off of the knowledge and information that our corporate shared services team is able to provide across the entire enterprise.Ryan Embree:Yeah, absolutely. Well, you know, hospitality, I mean, even 50 years ago, it was definitely a profession. I mean, we talk about hotels being the oldest profession out there. So a lot of rich history, storied history there. I'm sure you've seen a lot of evolution. I mean, there's been tons of changes just within the last couple years with this being part of your family. Talk to us a little bit about how you were first introduced into hospitality and how you ended up where yo...
Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree, and Travel Media Group Director of Product - Respond and Resolve™, Jackie Avery, break down the top 5 guest sentiment tags of 2024 and give explain what insights these tags hold for hoteliers. Tune in to the first episode of 2025 and learn how to leverage this data for your hotel portfolio to kick off the new year.Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening or watching wherever you're joining us from, hopefully watching in our brand new Suite Spot podcast here in Maitland, Florida. Very excited to bring you another great episode, a very popular episode with a lot of hoteliers, wanting to know some of the top five sentiments of this last year. So it's one of my personal favorite episodes and a personal favorite guest, Jackie Avery, our Director of Product Respond and Resolve™, which is our review response solution, award-winning review response solution here at Travel Media Group. Jackie, thank you so much for joining me back on the Suite Spot.Jackie Avery:Yeah, thanks, Ryan. It's so great to be here. I look forward to this every year. I'm so passionate about this and just spending the time reflecting on the past 12 months and what really resonated with travelers.Ryan Embree:Absolutely. What do you think of the new studio?Jackie Avery:I love it. It looks so good. So comfortable here. You know, I am so happy to be back.Ryan Embree:Awesome. Well, we're happy to have you back. Let's get into it. Let's start talking some numbers. If you've heard this before, this isn't kind of an annual tradition that we do at the end of the year, but we look at all of the guest sentiment that travelers left. For those that might, again, this might be their first time listening to this style of episode, give us a quick definition of guest sentiment and reviews and maybe some numbers that go along with that.Jackie Avery:Yeah, absolutely. So, if it's your first time here, you just wanna refresh. Thanks for listening. You know, we love that you're taking this time to really, dig in and learn some, some of this stuff and kind of, you know, again, reflect on what travelers care about. So guest sentiment, these are things being mentioned in reviews, right? So, as Ryan mentioned, I'm overseeing the review response team here at Travel Media Group, and my team to kind of put it into perspective number wise, during our slower months, we're processing and looking at 25,000 reviews ish, during peak travel season. That number jumps up to mid to high thirties. So, as we're going through this and kind of sharing reflections and really, you know, deep diving, the information that we're going over today is coming from right around 41 million sentiment tags.Ryan Embree:WoW, that's absolutely incredible. You think about that 25,000 per month to about 30, you know, high thirties, but 41 million in sentiment tags. So not only are guests leaving the reviews at a record pace, but they're also talking about so much about the guest experience. And I think that's really important when we talk about this type of episode because there's so many elements to a guest day, things that can go right, things that can obviously go wrong that we hear about in these reviews and see in these reviews. And today we're gonna review the top five sentiments. Let's go ahead and start at number five.Jackie Avery:Yeah, absolutely. Before we jump in real quick, I wanna say, because you said there might be some people listening this year who weren't here last year.
Catch the 2024 TMG Year in Review episode with Travel Media Group President, Dana Singer as she joins the Suite Spot to discuss all the milestones and monumental achievements this past year and what hoteliers can expect from TMG in 2025.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embee. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining us. Wherever you’re listening or watching us from. If you are watching us on our official TMG YouTube channel, you will see that we are in a brand new space. We’re in a brand new area. I’m so proud to launch and announce our very own Suite Spot podcast studio. This is a long time coming, my guest here in a second, we’re gonna talk about it. We’re really excited. You know, we put a lot of time and effort into this podcast studio to bring you the listener, our hotel audience, the best quality and video, and hopefully we can have more and more guests come in studio and do these podcasts with you today. But for now, we’ve got a very familiar guest, an annual tradition, one of my favorites, President at Travel Media Group, Dana Singer. Thank you so much, Dana, for being on the Suite Spot once again.
Dana Singer:
Absolutely. Good morning, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited. We’re here to, as the titles talks about, talk about 2024 TMG year in review. Again, one of my favorite annual traditions that we do here. We cover a lot of ground in 2024 as a company, as an organization, but more importantly for our hotel partners who’ve had a lot of success. Talk to us. We’re gonna talk about 2025 and, and maybe some of the foundation that’s been built for moving forward, but this is a great time of year to also reflect back on all those successes. Talk to us a little bit about 2024 and the journey for our hotel partners.
Dana Singer:
Absolutely. I mean, 2024 has truly been a special year for travel media group in so in so many ways. Most importantly, for the hospitality partners that we work with every day. You just mentioned the success that we were able to experience with all of them. And one of our most important milestones though, was really moving into our new headquarters. And it’s not just about a bigger building, it’s about creating a collaborative space that supports the growth of our teams. So we can continue to innovate and serve our partners at the highest levels of support and expertise. Internally, we’ve developed a number of exciting new solutions. We’ve enhanced our services and support, and we continue to find ways to better understand and meet our partner’s needs. And to do that, we’ve intentionally dug deeper, into the challenges and opportunities our partners face, and we’ve created resources around them. We’re so committed to giving hotels the tools they need to achieve their goals and succeed, especially as guest expectations evolve.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and that’s key. We’ve talked a lot about on this podcast, you know, almost feels like technology in our industry is moving faster than ever. Something that maybe took a couple years to implement is now changing within the quarter that’s due to technology, AI all sorts of different factors. Guest expectations certainly have changed over the past couple years. We’ve talked about it on this particular episode, over the years. Let’s talk about those ever changing guest expectations and what Travel Media Group continues to do to innovate and kind of keep pace with those changes.
Dana Singer:
I mean, guest expectations are constantly shifting, so it’s crucial for us to not only keep up, but stay ahead. And at TMG innovation has been at the heart of our adaptation. One of our significant advancements this year was the introduction of the Guest Experience Snapshot. And this tool has really been a game changer for our partners, giving them an in-depth but very clear look at guest feedback trends and enabling them to make smarter, faster, transformative decisions to support their reputation. But innovation isn’t just about technology, it’s also about our people. And when we think about all of our teams across the business, everybody plays such a key role in that. But our client success team, for example, has maintained a world-class NPS score of 75 or above over the past three years. That consistency reflects the dedication and care we bring to every interaction. We don’t just provide a service. We build aligned relationships that support our partners ongoing success. And beyond that, all of our teams are constantly working to find new ways to enhance our solutions. Whether it’s refining how we respond to guest reviews or evolving our social media strategies. The goal is always to make our partners lives easier and their businesses more successful. And it’s so exciting to see how these efforts have made a real impact on so many hoteliers. It makes our job that much more meaningful and enjoyable.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I think one of the key themes of this episode that we’re gonna start to uncover is the communication that lies between our team and our hotel partners and the alignment there, right? The guest experience snapshot. We heard from our hotel partners that they felt that they weren’t implementing AI in their everyday operations to the degree at which they wanted to. So the guest experience snapshot gives them a great view, a different view with the power of TMG one view AI to really dig in and see what guests are actually saying and having those meaningful conversations. A lot of the new solutions and enhancements come from the conversations that we have from our partners, which is really, really cool to see. Obviously we have our CTO Jason Lee on this podcast lot, and he talks to us about the origins of some of these updates. But I have the pleasure of doing this podcast, hosting this podcast, which is coming up on its seventh year, which is crazy to me in 2025. But we have all sorts of channels and ways that we can communicate with our hotel partners, whether it be our award-winning educational webinars that we put on on a monthly basis, and we hope to up the amount of webinars we’re doing in 2025, whether it’s this podcast, whether it’s physical events, right? That that was something that was taken away from us in 2020 and now has come back stronger than ever, which I’m sure the hotel audience loves to hear. So getting a lot of corporate and business travel, talk to us a little bit about all of those ways of communicating and that interaction between our hotel partners and travel media group.
Dana Singer:
Yeah, I mean, as you mentioned, it’s the only way to really understand what our partners are going through, right? First of all. But no matter how we do it, talking to them deepens our understanding of how to better serve them. And so we did that this past year, by attending the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference, the Independent Hotel Show, most recently the Hospitality Show. But we also continue to educate hoteliers about new trends through our social success series webinars, our Hotel Marketing Insider newsletter on LinkedIn, our FAQ Friday videos, and of course, our continued Suite Spot podcast to ensure that we do this as impactfully as possible. We unveiled a brand new podcast studio, as you already mentioned, which our viewers are seeing right now. And we did this so that we could continue to raise the bar to provide top of the line content to hoteliers worldwide and be a leading voice in the hospitality industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s so cool to see and be a part of and hear our hotel audience, really appreciate because things like social media, technology, reputation management within the hospitality, I mean, Booking.com just rolled out an update that’s gonna be implemented in 2025. These are fast changing things. They don’t stay the same. So being able to have a direct line of communication to our hotel partners is vital. But that line of communication works both ways, right? And that’s what’s really cool to see is when we hear feedback from our hotel partners about either the things that we’re putting on or the things they wanna see and that we can implement in our every day. And I think that’s one of the reasons. I mean, our goal is obviously, you know, TMG to be the premier solutions reputation solution provider for the hospitality industry. So Dana, looking back at 2024, how do you think a lot of initiatives you covered, so many of them have impacted TMGs reputation as a leader for hospitality and moving forward for its hotel partners?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, I mean, it’s inspiring to see how our work this year has helped solidify our reputation as a trusted leader and partner in the hospitality industry. Earlier this year, we reached the milestone of our hotel partners collectively having over 1 million social media followers. And that number is a direct reflection of how our strategies are helping hotels connect with guests in meaningful ways. We’ve also been fortunate to gain recognition within the industry. The Suite Spot was ranked among the top 40 hospitality podcasts. These accolades mean so much because they demonstrate that we’re not just producing content, but we’re creating resources that resonate with hoteliers and provide deep value. It’s also worth noting the diversity of voices on our podcast this year. We welcome guests from multiple hotel brands and numerous management companies, which allows us to give attention to different perspectives and ideas within the industry. And this kind of collaboration, it just reinforces TMG as a go-to resource for hotels and the impact of all of these initiatives. It boils down to the feedback we’ve received, whether it’s from our partners, listeners, or industry professionals. It’s clear that our work is making a difference, and that’s what drives us to keep innovating and pushing boundaries.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool. I was obviously able to take part in that 1 million social follower celebration and to reflect on that, to think that over the course of all of our hotel partners out there that we’re partnering with their social media, that there’s 1 million travelers seeing the content that our hotel partners are putting out. So impactful, right, to think about. So cool to think about. Obviously, like you mentioned, we had some really cool first time guests here on the Suite Spot, including a couple major brands. Just had a collaboration with Booking.com and their giant, worldwide rollout of their guest review, score update. These are the type of things that I think hoteliers look for. I mean, it’s such a tight knit community out there, hospitality in this world. So to be able to Provo provide a resource for all hoteliers out there is really cool to see and be a part of. So obviously this episode is called TMG Year in Review, right? We take a look back, but, let’s talk about the future. Let’s talk about 2025 because it’s right around the corner and it’s moving faster than ever. What can we look forward to? What’s on the horizon for TMG, you know, looking forward?
Dana Singer:
Well, I don’t wanna give too much away just yet, but I can say that our teams are hard at work brainstorming and solidifying new initiatives for the year ahead. Every conversation we’re having is centered around one question, how can we better serve our hotel partners in the industry as a whole? And 2024 has been a transformative year, but we’re determined to build on that momentum in 2025. And again, while I can’t share a lot of specifics right now, I promise we’re gonna continue to innovate, find creative solutions, and introduce tools and strategies to help our partners continue to succeed. And there’s just so much to look forward to. We’re very excited for the year ahead.
Ryan Embree:
There really is, and you’re right. I mean, 2024 transformative year, 2025 looking even better. Great outlook for the hospitality industry. We’ve already got, you know, sneak peak. We’ve already got some amazing guests and Suite Spot podcast initiative. So make sure if you’re subscribing on YouTube, follow us on LinkedIn as well so you can, you’re not gonna miss a second of the action and everything that we’re gonna be bringing to you in 2025 as we wrap up here. Dana, one of my favorite things that we do with this episode, and I think we started this back in 2020, is kind of give just a message of inspiration and hope moving forward for the upcoming year. Any final thoughts as we kind of wrap up today and look towards the future?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, I’ll leave everyone with this. When I look back at this year, what makes me the proudest is seeing how everything we did, it’s really resonated with our partners and helped them achieve their goals. We’re consistently receiving feedback about how our services and support have helped save time, improve guest satisfaction, and ultimately drive more bookings and strengthening reputations. And so that’s what it’s all about for us, making a positive difference for the businesses we serve. And we look forward to continuing that momentum in 2025 to our listeners. If you’re interested in learning more about what we do at at TMG, this is a great time to reach out. We’re getting ready to kick off the new year. There’s no better way to do that than to ensure your online reputation is in good hands. So I wanna thank all of our hotel partners for their continued support and trust in us. And thank you Ryan, for letting me sit in on the Suite Spot today. I always love being able to spend this time with you.
Ryan Embree:
Well, thank you for your time. I think it is one of my favorite episodes of the year that we do, reflecting on all the amazing things, that both TMG and our hotel partners have accomplished. Here’s to an incredible 2025. As you mentioned, we’ve got a lot of stuff teed up, so thank you to our listeners, thank you to you, Dana, for joining me today. I hope everyone has a happy new year, and we will talk to you next time on the Suite Spot To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, the head of marketing at Springboard Hospitality, Jason Pirock sits down with podcast host, Ryan Embree, to discuss the incredible Springboard Hospitality brand, exciting hotel developments, social media strategies, and much more.
Tune in now to learn more about what makes the Springboard Hospitality brand one-of-a-kind.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embee. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. We’ve done quite a few of this, but if this is your first time hearing it to set up the series, this is all about those individuals, brands, management companies, all paving a way forward for our hospitality industry. Trailblazing a path, and we have a great guest with me. It’s certainly an embodiment of a TMG hospitality Trailblazer, Jason Pirock, head of marketing at Springboard Hospitality. Jason, thank you so much for taking the time.
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree:
Now, I asked this on every single Trailblazer episode. Always get a different answer. But since this is your first time being on the Suite Spot, we love to hear stories about how you made it into hospitality. Sometimes we just fall into it as a career. Sometimes we went to school for it. What was the hospitality journey that led you to Springboard Hospitality?
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, absolutely. So I probably have more of a non-traditional background when it comes to hospitality here. A lot of folks have sort of been in the industry for their entire career for a very long time. I actually started my career in retail coming out of college. I was recruited to work for Target Corporate in Minneapolis. And so I started off in merchandising there actually merchandise presentation, which was at the time their entry level marketing. They didn’t really have an easy way to get into the actual marketing department, but that was the closest point. And then spent some time with Target and moved into marketing and then found my way through a, a few other companies throughout the years, Sears Corporate. I worked for a company called Brookfield Retail, formerly, uh, General Growth Properties. And then I had sort of a reflection point in my career where as much as I was having fun with retail and liked it that’s all I knew. And that’s all I had done. And I knew that I was super passionate about travel, I loved hotels, all aspects about it. The experience, the design just always gave me such a great feeling. And so I thought, I wanna try out hospitality, I wanna move into that space. And I was very fortunate to find an opportunity with Hyatt Hotels, their corporate office out of Chicago. And so spent some time there, then moved over to a company called a Perim Hotel Group and helped them build their marketing department and marketing team. And that actually is part of what led me to Springboard. Springboard was looking to sort of revolutionize their, their marketing department, really rebuild it, take it to the next level. And they found me as someone who had, had done that with Perim. And so here I am today.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And let’s talk about that role that you have of head of marketing, this being a digital marketing podcast, I’m sure there’s a lot of hotel marketers that are just getting started in their career. Talk to us a little bit about your role as head of marketing and really the story as marketers. We love telling stories, right? Of Springboard Hospitality.
Jason Pirock:
Yeah. Well, I’ll start with with Springboard Hospitality. We own, operate, and develop hotels, restaurants, and bars all around the country. We’ve got about 50 hotels in 14 states, and we’re predominantly in destinations, sort of urban environments as well. And we’re truly across the whole U.S. we’ve got, we’re about 80 to 85% independent. So we really lean into that sort of boutique, independent, non-branded space. A few brands here and there. But again, that’s what makes up a majority is is that independent. So in my role, my role is sort of all encompassing when it comes to marketing, brand and communications. I oversee those functions that impact not only the Springboard brand, the brands within our collection. So we’ve got some independent brands within the portfolio, and then all of the actual hotels themselves. So that role is everything from traditional to digital, to social media, PR, communications, lifestyle, and experiential. So it really is a gamut, creative, you name it, all folds under me.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And so important too, especially with a portfolio where you do have a lot of independent hotels, because it’s just so crucial that travelers might not know that story. I’m sure there’s a lot of creativity that you and your team can bring to that to be able to tell that story of the independent hotels in the portfolio. We’re gonna talk through some of those methods a little bit later in this episode. But you’ve seen scrolling through Springboard Hospitality’s LinkedIn, so much impressive growth. And you’ve touched on the variety of properties, both branded and independent. You know, this is a time we’re in November right now. We were just talking about how the end of the year is coming up quick, typically a time of reflection. Looking back, can you share with our audience maybe this past year, Jason, some of those notable hotels, whether they’re rebrands, acquisitions, some of those 2024 projects you’re most proud of?
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, absolutely. So, a few that stand out for me, one is Luana Waikiki, really, really great property in terms of where it’s situated. We’re sort of at this, this crossroads of, you know, the hustle and bustle of the shopping district of Waikiki, but nestled in this park that’s really close to the beach. And so I love the, the juxtaposition of being more in this serene environment, more nature focused, but being so close to everything that, you know, Waikiki has to offer. So that’s been a great project for us and a great property that we brought into the portfolio. We actually have undergone a light rebranding, um, in terms of just refreshing the brand and really leaning into what is there and how we sort of cascade that across the, the different customer touchpoints. Or the guest touchpoint. So that’s one that stands out. Outbound is a collection of ours, Outbound Hotels. And we’ve got, um, there’s currently four hotels within that portfolio, one of which opened earlier this year in Stowe Vermont. And it’s a really neat property. I mean, Stowe is absolutely stunning. It’s a, it’s a really beautiful destination and not just a ski destination, but sort of all year round for outdoor enthusiasts. And this property is converted sort of older motel, but that we added some other buildings to and created these cabins, created more of these sort of apartment style lofts, if you will. And so it’s a really great property. That one definitely stands out. And then finally another one is Paia Inn in, Maui. So this is a smaller footprint for us with 17 keys, but great restaurant that’s getting ready to relaunch right on the water event space. It’s absolutely stunning. All different and unique room types, which is kind of fun too. So this is, this is gonna be a really exciting one for us as well.
Ryan Embree:
You certainly paint a great picture. We can tell that marketing background there with the terms like, you know, nestled in the heart or serene and stunning views. So it’s all about telling the story, right? And, you know, some of those, I think you also make a a great point too from a marketing standpoint. Sometimes we think of whether it be a refresh as a giant renovation in a giant project. And sometimes those little touches to a project can make all the difference, right? To a property. And if it’s told that story is told the right way to your, to your guests, you know, because we’ve also seen major renovations that sometimes is lost on the guests. They come in and they don’t even notice that. So being able to communicate and use that messaging is so important when telling that story. You know, we talk on, on this podcast, Jason, a a lot about reputation management, right? And the importance of a strong reputation, Springboard Hospitality, obviously no stranger to reputation success has seen a lot of fair share, especially in 2024, recent recognition in the Michelin Guide, TripAdvisor, traveler Choice Awards all over the portfolio. Talk to us a little bit about these incredible recognitions, what they mean to springboard hospitality, and then in your position, Jason, how you can use these awards, accolades, recognitions to grow the SpringBoard’s reputation within the hospitality industry.
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, first off, thanks for calling those two to the attention of the audience. I mean, we’re super proud of the awards and accolades that we received this year. And a lot of that goes to the caliber of products that we have in the portfolio and, and really the caliber of the teams that we have so super grateful for, for all of those that come our way. But I think for us, it really is about showing what we’re capable of, what we’re capable of to guests and putting their trust and their investment into us, in terms of, you know, wanting to stay. There’s a lot of choices out there, right? That they can, they can select from. And so I think those help us stand out a little bit more. So it’s really important for us to kind of get that stamp of approval. And then I think, showing owners and investors what we’re capable of too. Like not only are you coming into our portfolio and we’re here to offer the services that we have to provide you and, and making sure that you are running smoothly, efficiently, and profitably, but that we can get you a lot of exposure and engagement from folks through awards and accolades like this.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, I’m glad you brought that up, Jason. ’cause you’re right, you know, we think about these reputation awards and obviously these, these were made for travelers, right? Sometimes they’re picked by travelers like the Traveler’s Choice Award, but I think it’s a great point you make about ownership and investment and assets these owners are looking for. Reputation is a great place to be able to kind of wave your flag and say, this is a huge differentiator. We’re gonna take care of your asset. We’re gonna win these awards, these recognitions, and make sure, you know, that’s going to be our, that’s gonna be kind of our seal of approval, that we’re doing the right things, right. Uh, there. So let’s get into that a little bit about hotel management. It, it’s certainly becoming a crowded space in 2024 became even more crowded. There’s tons of consolidation that’s happened recently. I feel like there’s either some sort of strategic partnership or merger happening every single day on LinkedIn that I’m seeing a new hotel management brand erupts, uh, you know, every, every week. How does Springboard Hospitality differentiate itself? You talked about the reputation, but how does it differentiate itself to owners and investors for hotel management company?
Jason Pirock:
Absolutely. So I think the first way that we differentiate ourselves is we’re really focused on independence, as I said, at the top of the podcast, right? And there’s not a lot of management companies that are really leaning into that space. And so I think that does make us stand out because a majority of our portfolio is independence, and we know them and we know how they, they operate a lot of times it’s not a one size fits all. It’s very tailored and, and customized. So I think that’s one way that we differentiate. I think also the collaboration we have with our owners, there’s a lot of calls that you are getting our CEO you’re getting our leadership team. You’re not just getting your your day-to-day contact. You’re getting access and you know that accessibility to a lot of the strategic minds that have a lot of experience and knowledge in all of these different areas. And just to prove the point that we’re here to support you and it’s not just selling a deal or whatever it may be from the CEO, but he’s actually involved in revenue strategy calls, right? So I think that’s a way that we differentiate. I also think our focus on, you know, everybody’s talking about data and reporting and, and those are all important and, and should be expected in a management company, but we try to take it a step level and focus on what we call hospitality intelligence. That is not just reporting out on numbers, but talking about the why and the how and what we’re gonna do differently in order to improve the business. So I think that’s another thing that sort of stands out to me in terms of what we offer. And then finally, with from a marketing perspective, you know, we offer a lot of the, the different services that you’d probably see at a number of different management companies, but we also have capabilities and expertise and things that you don’t traditionally see. You know, we can run brand marketing workshops. I’ve, I’ve hosted several of them, two day immersive workshops to really get to the bottom of, you know, your brand architecture and your pillars and those types of things. We can run PR, agency RFPs, we can run influencer, you know, management campaigns. There’s a lot of different things that maybe go above and beyond what you typically see out there. So I think all of those are just ways that we help to set ourselves apart.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you make a couple great points there, Jason, especially about the data. We talk about it all the time. We’re seeing it all over the place, is how can we use AI, how can we use data to improve the guest experience? Numbers are just numbers until there’s actionable insights that are created with that data and being able to track that whether it’s social media analytics, whether it’s guest feedback, sentiment that you’re seeing trends over time, it’s really gonna be those hotel management companies, as you put it, hospitality intelligence, right? That really use the data to their benefit. And then as far as far as the power and numbers go, that’s also fantastic for independent hotel owners as well. Sometimes they don’t have the leverage that a big brand does. We’ve heard that from time to time. We visited the independent hotel show. We go there annually in Miami and hear that from, they’re just like, I, I just don’t have the resources that these big brands do. So being able to have kind of that white glove service approach certainly helps those independent hotels and can pack a punch too when you’re talking about marketing and some of the trends that you were talking about, you touched on social media and that’s another topic obviously we’re very, very passionate about on this digital marketing podcast, as you can imagine. What’s the relationship with social, with Springboard Hospitality and social media, and what role does it play in your overall marketing strategy?
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, for us, social media is extremely important. And I mean we’ve really, we really try to follow the, the trends and the data that are out there. Expedia had released a report not too long ago, I think it was earlier this year, showing sort of the, the guest journey and how social media ultimately dominated the inspiration phase. And that was a really powerful statistic for me, which helped us to further double down on evolving our model. We went from more of a centralized social media support effort to now being more of a in-market kind of cluster. So we look at, you know, contractors, in some cases, agencies where it makes sense to really be there to provide more content, more frequent posting, more real time types of actions on our social media accounts to ensure that we are staying relevant in that inspiration phase, that we are discoverable. And we know that that’s such a big part of that guest journey in terms of planning their trip. And so just making sure that we’re very front and center on on those channels.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you touched on it and it carries throughout that, that traveler journey too, Jason, we’ve talked about it before. I mean, think about how excited you might be to go on a trip and you’re anticipating, you know, you’ve booked already, you got that pre-booking phase where you’re getting excited, you follow them on Instagram, you’re looking for events that might be popping up that they might be sharing on their Instagram feed, maybe, you know, some seasonal drinks by the pool or something like that that you’re looking forward to. So it really follows you social media from inspiration. Huge great place to obviously be discovered, but also to carry it throughout the entire journey. Even asking for advocacy at the very end of, you know, make sure you follow us for any deals, specials, promotions that we might have running, you know, if you, if you’ve taken any pictures, please share that with us so that we can repost and use that user generated content to how help our, our guests tell their story, right? Because sometimes they’re our best storytellers if we’re giving them the tools.
Jason Pirock:
I think one thing, you know, it’s important for us as hotelier to meet people where they are, right? And social media is a great place to do that. And I think that it’s ultimately you’re putting yourself out there and it’s a reflection of your brand. So the more that you are engaging with that channel, the more that you are sort of taking care of that channel, it’s gonna take care of you, right? Because ultimately to the point we’ve both made is that a lot of people are looking there for that inspiration. They’re looking there after they’ve looked at the website or maybe even before the website, right? But it’s probably the second most visited next to the website where they’re doing that additional research. So if you’re only posting once a week and you don’t have a really clear vision on what you want to get in front of the guests, they’re gonna notice that. And that’s gonna be reflected in their purchase decision
Ryan Embree:
Sometimes in itself tells a story, right? The inconsistency there, outdated information on your social media profiles you haven’t posted in the last six months. You’re posting a picture of a beautiful swimming pool when it’s the dead of winter and it’s not matching what the experienceis like today. This is a great way to reaffirm booking confirmation in a time where, you know, over the last couple years with the pandemic guests have come accustomed to saying on the fly, if I don’t like what I’m seeing, I can make an easy switch to a hotel across the street. So keeping them engaged during all the way up till they walk into your lobby and then some more, right? Follow us. Because we’re gonna be doing some really cool events and we’ve got some great programming that you can follow on our social media. So obviously me and you are in agreement there, social media, if you’re not on it certainly need to be. This is a great time going into 2025. We’re just doing a webinar this afternoon on doing conducting social media audits for hotels and make making sure that you’re set up for success in 2025. We’re gonna switch gears a little bit. Talk about an unfortunate headwind for our industry over the last couple years has been staffing unfortunate as it’s been, it’s really risen. I think the creativity level of brands, hospitality management companies that are looking for hospitality workers, whether it it’s more flexible schedules, they’re doing some different style of recruiting, what have been some maybe ways that Springboard Hospitality has recruited and retained talent and continued really to thrive and grow your portfolio in a time where it’s really hasn’t been that easy for most?
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, absolutely. I think from a retention perspective, I’ll sort of start there. We do an engagement survey, which I ultimately think is a really intelligent move on our part in terms of checking in on team members all the way across the organization, right? And really getting a sense for how they’re feeling, what they’re thinking is working and not working. And I can tell you as sitting on the leadership team, that we really do take that feedback to heart and discuss it and look at ways to better improve the organization. So I think just by listening and hearing, what our team members have to say is a way that, you know, we do keep that engagement. I think things, we do have some unique incentives that I think are help with that retention piece as well. And I also think that like, at the end of the day, sometimes what makes people happy and what keeps people there is not always monetization or it’s not always truly a perk or a benefit. I think a lot of it is about leading with empathy. I think being grateful, showing appreciation, a simple thank you, and a text or an email goes a really long way. And so all of those things I think are ways that you keep people engaged, you keep them retained and you kind of keep that workforce or, or that team sort of motivated.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, absolutely. And one of the common threads that we’ve been hearing in this series is mentorship. And I think to your point about the monetization, sometimes you hear stories sometimes of saying, you went across the street, just for a little bit of a pay bump, but having someone that they feel like is a mentor to them is a really, really strong incentive to keep someone in a position. So making sure that you have leaders, that you have really, really transparent path to success stories within your organization as well, I think is really big for you and sharing that with your employees. So yeah, fortunately we’re hearing that this is hopefully slowing down and, you know, the staffing issue, but I do think, again, some good will come out of this because it really has turned our industry upside down on where we’re recruiting and the opportunities that it’s created for some. So this is my favorite part of the episode and I typically save this line of questioning for our spotlight series, where we typically will look at a one particular property, but in seeing your portfolio. Jason, you guys have such a fantastic portfolio. I want to quiz you on this, so I apologize in advance if these are tough, but favorite view at one of your properties. We’re gonna do some rapid fire questions here.
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, I would say Pacific Edge in Laguna Beach, just staring out at the Pacific Ocean is pretty magical.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure very Instagrammable, as we were talking about those social media, there’s tons of photos that come outta that view there. Fun fact about one of your properties.
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, so this one’s interesting. One of our property in Anchorage, Alaska, there’s a retaining wall that holds up fourth Avenue and it runs underneath our hotel. So it’s almost like our hotel is holding up the street.
Ryan Embree:
That is a fun fact for sure. Favorite signature dish at one of your properties.
Jason Pirock:
I’m gonna actually, I’m gonna go with cocktail kind of in the same realm, but Green Lady, which is a speakeasy that we have in in Waikiki at Honolulu. Every cocktail is incredible there. A great old fashioned and great Manhattan. Shout out to Maddie, the bartender there. She’s incredible.
Ryan Embree:
And then last but not least, favorite piece of art at one of your properties, Jason?
Jason Pirock:
So at Hotel Irwin in Venice Beach, there’s a lot of great artwork scattered throughout the hotel in terms of the history of Venice Beach, but within one of the meeting spaces, it’s called Larry’s Loft, there’s a lot of really neat old photography in there. Lots of movies have been shot there from, from years and years ago, and so it’s just sort of, sort of a time capsule. So I think that one’s really cool.
Ryan Embree:
As we wrap up, I’d like to say you’ve taken us all over the country with this portfolio and this those line of questioning, I don’t think you duplicated any of the properties there. So, again, a fantastic portfolio. You have really cool, fun facts about that. As we wrap up as marketing professionals, you know, we’re always excited for the next thing, right? We’re ready to market and advertise that next big project or announcement or milestone as 2024 comes to a close. You talked about some of those acquisitions what are you most looking forward to for Springboard Hospitality in 2025 as we look to next year?
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, so there’s a couple of things that stand out for me. We have a project in Palm Springs that we just transitioned, so look for more to come on on that one in particular. I’m really excited about this property. I think internally really a couple of things that I’m excited about. One is shifting a little bit more into that commercial mindset and really bringing our disciplines together to solve problems. I go back to that hospitality intelligent piece and I think that having siloed data doesn’t benefit anyone. And so really it, it is a shift because it’s a way we haven’t done things before, but, you know, really getting everyone’s buy-in to start thinking about these properties holistically and thinking about them commercially. So I’m really excited about that for what’s to come in making some shifts.
Jason Pirock:
And then I think the other piece from a marketing perspective is having been with the company for about a year and a half, there’s a lot of foundation that’s been built, a lot of groundwork that’s been laid and going into 2025, we’ve got a lot of that in place now. And so we can, we’re now in a great position to sort of take it to the next level and do some more testing and learning, do some more creative and cool things to really help take these properties to a new performance level. So that’s super exciting.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well it sounds like you got your hands, you and your team got your hands full for 2025. We’ll keep an eye out for Springboard Hospitality and its continued success. Any final thoughts as we close out today, Jason? We covered a lot.
Jason Pirock:
Yeah, no, I really appreciate lots of great questions and appreciate the conversation.
Ryan Embree:
Well thank you so much for joining us, Jason, on the Suite Spot. Thank you all for listening and we will talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to the the latest Suite Spot episode to hear from Senior Product Manager at Booking.com, Laura Xhaferaj as she breaks down the guest review score update being rolled out by Booking.com and how this new innovation will impact travelers, hotels, and hotel management groups alike.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Very pleased to bring you another incredible episode here, a unique episode, exciting episode. As you can tell from the title. We’ve got an update with one of the major players in hospitality, Booking.com and with me today to kind of break down this all important update is Laura Xhaferaj, Senior Product Manager at Booking.com. Laura, thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot with me.
Laura Xhaferaj:
Thank you for having me. I’m excited to be here.
Ryan Embree:
We’re excited to share this news. I mean, this is a huge update that Booking.com is about to roll out that has a huge impact on hoteliers and travelers alike. But before we get into sharing this news, I’d love to start, since this is your first time on the Suite Spot, share a little bit about your hospitality background and your role at Booking.com as Senior Product Manager with our Suite Spot audience.
Laura Xhaferaj:
I am the Senior Product Manager for user-generated content at Booking.com. And you may hear me refer to my team as UGC, I have been leading initiatives that improve how we showcase guest review across the platform. My journey in hospitality started years ago, even before I joined Booking.com, and I’ve always been passionate about enhancing travel experience, whether it’s helping hotels connect with guests or finding new ways to elevate guest satisfaction through reviews. Working with UGC, I got to build features that bring authentic travel voice into the booking experience globally.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I think this is one of those, I’m sure, an amazing role that you’re in to be able to kind of look and see what travelers are saying about their experiences with the hotel partners that you’re working with. Making sure that information is as accurate as possible so that guests and hotels alike can make the best booking decisions, make sure hotels are making the best operational decisions to improve the guest experience. So I’m sure it’s a really cool role to be in. You get a lot of feedback probably from both hoteliers as well as guests. At Travel Media Group we do a lot of innovation and, and updates and rollouts, sort of like what you’re going through and what we find is there’s always typically a why behind making these changes. Right. So I think maybe the best way to understand and update like this is to maybe talk about the guest review score update and the why behind it.
Laura Xhaferaj:
Of course, we initiated this change based directly on partner feedback partners highlighted that on our previous system, which calculated overall score using a simple average of users from the past three years had some key limitations for those who had made significant improvements such as renovations, upgrades in services or new guest facilities. The all the reviews still had too much weight slowing down the reflection of their progress. In response to this feedback, we are introducing a weighted review score where recent reviews have bigger influence. This adjustment means that hotels actively enhancing guest experience will see those efforts reflected more quickly in their scores, rewarding their commitment improvement. And it’s an update designed to encourage continuous progress and ensure travelers see the most relevant and recent experiences.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean this is what we talk to hotel partners all the time about, when they come to us and say, how can I improve my reputation? And maybe they have those reviews that just have been plaguing them for years. Obviously we’ve been having a staffing shortage in this industry for a while. You know, maybe there was a time where you were short staffed years ago that could still be having a really bad, uh, impact on reputation and you’re trying to play a little bit of catch up. So I think this is such a cool update needed. We spoke previously about, because with a rollout like this, Laura as you know, can’t just flick a switch. Right? I’m sure there’s a ton of research, ton of testing that’s done. We had spoke previously about the pilot markets and the comprehensive rollout of this update. Can you walk us through, give us a behind the scenes look of what that rollout looked like and really all the things that you did prior to officially announcing this guest review score update?
Laura Xhaferaj:
Certainly we took a phase approach to this rollout, starting with pilot countries to ensure a smooth transition. Our goal was to validate the concept with real data and learn directly from our partners about their needs. We began with smaller markets like Mountain and Iceland, and then expanded to larger regions such as Greece, Brazil, and Australia. During this pilot phases, we conducted interviews, sent surveys, and kept a close eye on how the change impacted partners and guests alike. One major insight was that partners prefer the preview period of two to three months to see the upcoming score change before it went live, which allows them to prepare and understand how their recent efforts are impacting their score. Another takeaway was the importance of clear accessible information about the change. Partners want detailed documentation, so we are committed to providing them with all the support they need.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and we’re gonna talk about a little bit about that support. Because obviously with a rollout like this, there’s always questions, right? There’s always a little bit of anxiety that comes around with any sort of change. So what would you say to those hoteliers that are wondering, listening to this podcast, maybe hearing about this guest review score update for the first time on this podcast? How is this gonna impact their score as this score update is rolled out and implemented?
Laura Xhaferaj:
This update is all about recognizing and rewarding effort for hoteliers. It means that they have a real opportunity to influence their review scores more quickly by focusing on guest satisfaction. The more you invest in the guest experience, the sooner you will see that reflected in your score. It’s a powerful motivator to keep listening to feedback and continuously improve, not just after the stay, but even during it. As guest share their experiences by addressing feedback during the trip hotel have a chance to make adjustments, real time turning potential issues into positive experiences that are reflected in their scores sooner than ever.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we talk about that all the time on this podcast, Laura, about trying to keep a close ear to your guests. That every touch point in the guest experience, it doesn’t, we don’t just have to wait until afterwards till we get that feedback. If you’re able to meet that guest where they might be having an issue or a positive experience too, that could be a great opportunity to encourage them, we see that you’re having a great time here. We’d love if you left us some comments and feedback. When you get that request for a review or solicitation for a review. Going back to the pilot, you know, we spoke about one of the things you looked at was seasonal properties, and I think this really demonstrates, Laura, when you do a rollout like this, just the meticulous planning of this rollout. You talked about seasonal properties and you talked about properties with fewer rooms that really could see a smaller review flow, right? I mean, a property with 500 rooms gonna see a lot more review flow than let’s say a 32 room bed and breakfast. Talk to us about the pilot results for this segment of properties and those that might be concerned, Hey, I’m a seasonal property, or I don’t get that many reviews. How is this gonna impact me?
Laura Xhaferaj:
Great point. Seasonal properties were definitely a focus. Imagine a beach villa in south of France that only operates in the summer. Reviews will likely peak during the season while the rest of the year it’s quieter. Through the pilot, we learned that partners of seasonal properties sometimes worried that a single negative review in the off season might drag down their overall score. In order to address this, we designed a system to weight reviews by recency. So even if you get a lower rating in the off season, it won’t have a major impact. Those fresh high season reviews will carry more weight and reflect the experiences that guests are having in your busiest times. Also, having the score logic be more sophisticated enables us to make the score more fair to different review volumes and distributions across the seasonal home and chain hotel properties.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we saw some of the results from that pilot and some impressive stats when it came to seasonal and even smaller volume of review properties still not having an impact, but not having a negative impact on their scoring. I think it really comes down to what you said, Laura, at the top of the episode. It’s gonna be for those hotels that are focusing on the guest experience today, how can they improve that today that are gonna really see the benefits of this rollout? And I think overall it’s gonna be great. We’re gonna talk about that in a second, but what about those properties that are a part of a hotel group or chain?
Laura Xhaferaj:
This update is especially positive news for hotel chains. We know the chains often maintain high standards across their properties and work hard to ensure consistent experience for guests. With a new weighted review system change that are actively improving guest satisfaction, we’ll see those efforts reflected more quickly in their scores. In fact, through our interviews and feedback sessions, we have found that many chain properties are genuinely excited about this change. They’re eager to see their score more accurately reflect the experience they have been they’re delivering today for change. This update means that they can make swift strategic adjustments and see the effort rewarded in their scores. This visibility into recent improvements is valuable asset for change committed to providing great stays globally.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I mean we’re hearing the same sentiment from our hotel partner our reputation hotel partners as well, Laura, that really put a lot of effort. I mean, think about how encouraging this will now be to, we just talked about it, a staffing shortage to say, Hey staff, let’s go out. Let’s get some five star positive reviews and now all of a sudden you can actually see an impact a lot quicker to your overall score than you might before this rollout. So this should be a really exciting and motivating time for hoteliers and their staffs to say, “Hey, we can make some major jumps on our score on Booking.com.” So really cool. But we really focus a lot on the hotelier and obviously this is a hotel marketing podcast, but ultimately I think this is gonna be mutually beneficial. That’s the beauty of our industry, right? We’re hoteliers as well as travelers. We do our own traveling and I think looking from a traveler’s perspective, this is gonna ultimately benefit them as well to put them in the best decision to make an informed booking decision based on recent review data.
Laura Xhaferaj:
Exactly. It’s a win-win for travelers. Recent experiences are crucial when choosing a stay. Research shows that travelers are more influenced by recent reviews than those from years back. So by focusing on recency, this update ensures that guests see an accurate reflection of the current guest experience at the property. For hotels, this means that guests will see the results faster, leading to better matches between traveler expectations and actual guest experience. This in turn, will trust and boost satisfaction for everyone.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. We talked about set the importance of setting proper expectations prior to a guest arriving. Some of those properties that have been performing at a four or 4.5 star service rating, but really in their overall store has been reflected a little bit lower because of maybe historical data. Should be really excited about this. I think this is a great way and way to look about this guest rollout, right? What advice, Laura? One of the biggest questions we get at Travel Media Group from our hotel partners is always looking to improve, right? Nobody’s satisfied with where they’re at. What advice would you share with hoteliers looking to improve their score on Booking.com, 2025 when this, this new rollout happens and beyond.
Laura Xhaferaj:
There are a few practical steps that hoteliers can take. First, make sure your property information is always accurate and up to date from photos to room description so guests know what to expect during their stay, provide helpful resources and ensure that you are available for any urgent issues after checkout. Encourage guests to share their feedback on Booking.com and remember, small gestures can make a big difference. A welcoming touch or a quick response to feedback can elevate the guest experience and boost satisfaction. Your score now reflects those efforts faster. So every improvement counts.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. I love that you brought up the speed of reaction, responding to a guest, the quicker that you can do that we even talked about even before leaving the review and trying to meet them at the guest experience to try to solve any issues or even solicit feedback during that time, I think is gonna be crucial during this rollout. Another thing I would say is just to be mindful of the score at all times. I mean, with something that can change so quickly now and you can have such an impact on it so quickly, it could be very fast changing. So making sure that you’re aware of getting notified, checking Booking.com of any recent reviews and feedback that are coming in. It’s gonna be very important to keep a close eye here because now those impacts can happen at a much faster pace. As we wrap up, as I mentioned at the top of the episode with a rollout like this, a global rollout like this, Laura, I’m sure you’re getting questions. You know, people want resources, they wanna find information. Where can our Suite Spot audience go if they still have questions about this rollout and the impacts that it’s gonna have?
Laura Xhaferaj:
We’ll provide extensive resources on partnerhub and through our review management platforms, partners can access documentation, best practices and guidance on these channels to understand the full scope of the update. Our support team is also on hand to answer any questions and guide partners as they adjust to the new system.
Ryan Embree:
And Laura and I will be conducting a webinar in early December as well to hotel partners to kinda roll through this, this guest update, make sure everyone has their questions answered. But overall, this is super exciting. Congratulations to you and your team. I’m sure this is a long time coming and I’m sure you’re anxious to get this rolled out for everyone. So as we wrap up today, Laura, any final thoughts, anything to share with our audience?
Laura Xhaferaj:
This update is all about valuing continuous improvement and enhancing guest satisfaction. We believe that we believe and have heard from partners that their system is fairer for everyone from partners to travelers, and it fosters healthy competition in the marketplace. For partners, it’s a chance to show their commitment to guest experience and see that care reflected in their score by focusing on creating memorable stays, staying engaged with guest feedback and keeping property details up to date partners can build strong reputations and attract even more travelers.
Ryan Embree:
Which is what everyone wants here listening to the podcast. And Laura, we appreciate you and your team, listening to that feedback from hoteliers and implementing these changes so that again, really a win-win situation for both the hotelier and the traveler. Thank you so much for joining me, Laura, explaining and understanding this new guest review score update. Thank you again. And we’re excited to be collaborating with you on a webinar like I said, next month with Booking.com.
Laura Xhaferaj:
Sure. And thank you for having me. We are super excited to see this change go live and thank you.
Ryan Embree:
All right, awesome. Thank you so much and thank you for listening to the Suite Spot. We will talk to you next time to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this special episode, Suite Spot Host, Ryan Embree covers 5 key takeaways from the 2024 The Hospitality Show that took place in San Antonio, Texas. The industry event was one-of-a-kind and featured incredible panelists, vendors, guest speakers, interviews, and much more from the hospitality industry.
Tune in now to get the latest details from the event and why you should be excited for next year!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Ryan Embree here with the Suite Spot. Thank you so much for joining me today. Today is episode 151. Just want a moment to recognize 151 episodes. Wanna thank our audience, uh, for being with us, uh, whether this is your first episode or 151, thank you so much for all the support and we are so excited to bring you another incredible episode. This, as you can see from the title The Hospitality Show, are five key takeaways. We just returned from San Antonio. In fact, again, just like last year’s takeaway episode, I haven’t even had the opportunity to do my laundry to get in my normal Travel Media Group attire. So, I was just so wanting to get these takeaways to you from the episode. First off, an absolutely incredible event. The Hospitality Show, this is the second annual one put on. The first one was last year. Inaugural show was last year in Las Vegas. This in San Antonio. Want to thank the city of San Antonio for hosting to our A HLA Questex. They put on an incredible show to all the sponsors. If you have not already looked into or are thinking about attending the hospitality show, it is a must attend event. So many interviews, so many insights, content. They had some incredible keynotes, guest speakers, so many cool activities. And of course, hospitality. You have to be able to throw a party and host people, right? And they absolutely nailed it in San Antonio, celebrating Dia de DEOs. Just did a fantastic job. So let’s get into some of these takeaways that I got, and it’s gonna start with one of the most prevalent topics and patterns, ai, in fact, in these top five takeaways, two of my key takeaways have to do with ai. The first is, from a hotelier’s perspective, seems to be this just battle right now of where AI is best utilized with our industry. And there’s this push and pull, whether it’s for efficiency, reducing costs, which we know right now is really, really hurting a lot of hotels across the nation, whether it’s rising construction costs, operational costs, staffing and wages continue to grow, uh, and get more costly. So is it for efficiency that it’s best use? Or is it to drive revenue? Right? Top line revenue. And, and there was kind of this, this little just debate of, of what is AI best used for right now? And, uh, you know, there was a, a incredible panel on ai. There were several of them, but the one I had the pleasure, uh, there was one guest speaker who kind of talked through the stages of AI and where we are and actually broke it down into three stages. And we’re on the precipice of, of the third right now. So go through the first one, which was predictive, right? That’s your chat, GPT just kind of giving us maybe, hey, write me an email answering sort of questions for you. Uh, and then we kind of slowly moved into this co-pilot. You know, you see a lot of these big companies kind of roll out this co-pilot that was really supposed to do actions for you. And now the panelists has had kind of challenged that were into this third, which is assistive and, uh, autonomous and agent kind of stage of ai where this would be kind of the human touch mix with ai. And I think he’s, he’s definitely onto something as far as, you know, some of the things that we really could make more efficient portfolio requests, right? That was the great example of how many portfolio requests. And yet there still has to be human touch involved. And if we can just figure out a way to kind of use AI to really, you know, help us expedite that process and become more efficient, think of how much time that’s giving back your staff. How many times, uh, we’re answering that phone call, answering that email, text message for a portfolio request, right? You know, in fact, one of the panelists was talking about kind of the, the gap in technology in our industry specifically and saying that we’re definitely making progress, but are we there? And, and her cited example was, was ordering room service, right? So we’ve got this great QR code, you look at the menu and everything like that, you still have to pick up a manual phone or your cell phone to order it from the hotel. So we start there, we start at this technologically, you know, sound place with the QR code, but then at the very end we’re, we have to get these, we have to get that human touch involved. And if there’s a way to automate that process, again, how much smoother and efficient and for the guest side that’s gonna feel and impact the guest experience, which what we’re trying to do, you know, I was talking to Alexi Kajavi president at Questex Hospitality and Wellness about this in our interview, which, um, all of the interviews that, that I’m gonna be talking about today on this episode, you can find on our YouTube page, we’re gonna be releasing them over the next couple weeks. And I was talking to him about, there’s gotta be a feeling of this fomo when it comes to AI for hoteliers. You know, there was someone from Salesforce on a panel talking about how they have implemented AI into their work processes and order to essentially get a year’s worth of rollouts and updates into one quarter. And you hear something like that from a hotelier standpoint and you say, am I really taking advan full advantage of what AI is? And I think we have these grand ideas of when we hear ai, when we hear, you know, technology within the hotel industry. I think we go straight to maybe some sci-fi esque type things where, you know, you’ve got the robots delivering things, you’re going ultra speed when it comes to your operations to processes, you can cut down on staff. And I certainly think that there’s going to be a time where we get there, but really right now it’s becoming small steps. How do we implement the power of AI in our everyday lives as hoteliers? You know, one of the things we did at Travel Media Group was launch the guest experience snapshot, which looks at your guest reviews. AI gets that information and kind of summarizes that information, gets it back to you, not just with emojis or a thumbs up or thumbs down, but actually blurbs bullet points into what guests are actually saying about their stay. And then it actually provides you with suggestions and recommendations on what you can do to improve the guest experience. So, small example there, but a very powerful way to implement AI into your everyday operations so you can feel a little bit better about when that question’s asked of, are you truly taking advantage of AI and it’s power and capability? You can at least say, yes, I’m on the path to doing that. ’cause I think right now we’re at that place where a lot of hoteliers, if you ask them, are you taking full advantage? They’ll probably answer no. But if you ask them what pieces of the hotel operation have changed since you implemented ai, I think there’s a lot of hoteliers that can say yes. You know, we have implemented some AI into our everyday operations, and if we can just take those baby steps, you know, hospitality, we love it as an industry, but we’re very slow to implement technology. You know, COVID, uh, certainly accelerated that path. AI’s gonna continue to do that, but overall, there’s a whole panel and session on this is how can we accelerate technology into our industry? But it really should be about empowering, uh, your employees. So how can I use AI to again, assist with portfolio polls a request when guests are are asking me, how can I summarize my guest feedback like the TMG guest experience snapshot, these little things. And, and with a younger generation kind of coming into the workforce, a lot of these college kids right now have had chat GBT for the last two years, right? They’ve probably been told not to use it in their college courses, but as they graduate and get to the workforce, guess what they are going to be used to working with these AI and new technology. So if you don’t have something laid out or if you have an inefficient process, a manual process, it really could hurt you in the recruiting front too. Your younger generation, that younger generation coming up into the hospitality, that new generation that we’re talking about on the college campus call that we did at the Suite Spot, they’re ready for that. They’re, they have an appetite for new technology. Make sure that you’re providing that for them. So AI from a hotelier’s perspective, number one, key takeaway number two, FMB is the place to be. Okay? So a lot of talk about FMB in the hotel. Now, FMB has always been ingrained in the guest experience, the hotel. And in fact, we had an amazing guest that we interviewed at the Hospitality Show from Hampton by Hilton, uh, sharing some really tasty news about a, uh, brand new waffle that was just introduced at Hilton. But now hotels are starting to think beyond breakfast. You know, there’s a reason why that is. On our guest sentiment reports at Travel Media Group, there’s a reason why breakfast and f and B always find its way into the top 10 and sometimes even top five most mentioned tags in guest reviews. It’s a major piece of a hotel experience. And hoteliers are seeing that. The hospitality show really leaned into that this year for the first time, they had an outdoor hospitality showcase where they were showing really creative ways that you could use your outdoor space for f and b, whether that’s bar, whether that’s food. You had, uh, uh, an incredible keynote from Jose Andres, the, uh, famed restaurateur and philanthropist who had just some incredible stories with some recent natural disaster and how food and hospitality, he was also really grateful and thankful for those hotels that stay open during those natural disasters so that he and his team can go into these disaster areas and provide food for those that are most need at that time. But it goes beyond that, you know, hotel restaurants, you know, I had Paul Cory on from Cory Hospitality, he mentioned it. Hotel restaurants are now becoming community gathering spots. We’re seeing at Travel Media Group more interest than ever on hoteliers and properties that we work with that wanna manage their online reputation and, and respond to their, uh, guest reviews that are leaving reviews about their restaurants because they know that that’s a powerful differentiator for their property. This is also a really amazing opportunity for you to showcase your local area, your culture, personalization, hotels, new developments. I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing multiple GMs, managing director of brand new developments. And the place where I really hear the passion shine through in those episodes is when they’re talking about their f and b and the meticulous planning that goes around those restaurants, hoteliers, developers, they’re seeing this as a, a revenue generator. It’s a differentiator. And it’s also, again, a way for you to really embrace your local area, your culture. I mean, San Antonio, we had the Chief Strategy Officer from Visit San Antonio, another interview we conducted at the Hospitality Show. He was talking all about how they’re really focused on Michelin’s coming to Texas for the first time, how they’re really focusing on cuisine and, uh, f and b travel, which is, is is a growing, growing trend right now. So f and b, certainly the place to be. My second key takeaway at the Hospitality show. Third key takeaway, sustainability. I love these conferences be, I love the hospitality show in general because all of the brands, all of the power players from management companies are present at this show. They have a a, a really big presence there. And what you find is in hospitality, obviously there’s a lot of differences, but there’s a lot of the same. And those big issues like sustainability, responsible, uh, green travel starts to rise to the top. You had multiple brands making commitments that we’ve seen over the last couple years to green initiatives. One of the panelists kind of use the phrase little to bigs. So over the years, if you’ve traveled anywhere, you’ve probably seen those small shampoo or lotion bottles, body wash, and now those were used to be those little plastic containable. Now we’re in kind of a dispenser mode, right? So you’re little to bigs. There was some incredible stats shared of the plastic and frankly, the savings that were, uh, monetary savings that were associated, uh, with that trend and how more and more ho hotels are adopting this. But one thing I would challenge the ho hotel and hospitality industry to do is to really educate the guests on why we’re making these changes. I think one of the best things that really became popular, you know, three to five years ago was the housekeeping rule, right? Keeping your towels up versus throwing ’em on the floor knowing if you wanted a fresh towel or not, right? That was effectively communicated to the guests and there was a real reason and kind of responsibility around it as your guests to make that decision. You almost felt accountable for that. If you were keeping your towel, you know, you felt maybe a little bit like you were doing a little bit of good, right? A little bit of green travel there. Some of these changes that we’re implementing are fantastic for sustainable travel. They just have to be properly communicated to our guests, right? Recent example for me personally was at a a, a great hotel in San Antonio. The water pressure was a little bit lower than I preferred, right? But as, as I’m sitting there thinking about that, wishing that water pressure was a little higher, I started thinking, well, maybe this was a, a something implemented from the hotel for a low flow, uh, water system for green as kind of a sustainable initiative for the property. But I didn’t see any sort of cards talking about that. You know, I didn’t see anything that communicated to me that that was the case. Now, I knew that because I work in the hospitality industry and I knew that that is a sustainable practice that hotels do, but for a lot of guests they don’t know that, right? So challenging hotels to really communicate any from anything locally sourced food at your f and b, if that’s locally sourced, that goes a long way. Your guests will appreciate that. Any green initiative, make sure that’s communicated. It makes for some great social media posts. Goodwill could be a differentiator for you, especially with the younger generation, which we’re gonna talk about. You know, corporate travel, they’re gonna start looking a lot closer at this. I heard, you know, the other day talking about monetary budget and a carbon budget on corporate travel. They are going to start really focusing in on those properties, those hotels, cities in general that have really green sustainable practices that they’re implementing at their properties. You know, some of the questions that were raised on the sustainable panel, things like renovations, right? I think a stat was brought up where there was actually more of an environmental impact on bringing in all the materials that they needed for that renovation than it was actually the efficiency savings that they were gonna get post renovation. So how do we manage that? Sourcing our materials for renovations? What do we do with the waste Best? Western was talking about how they implemented something where there needs to be 50 inch TVs in all of their hotels by a certain date. Some of the franchisees were asking, what do we do these existing TVs, right? Isn’t that creating more waste? So these are important questions that our industry has to answer for the most part. The good news is, is that we’re getting there, we’re making progress. A lot of commitments. A HLA, there’s some amazing things with Green Key Global, which they just announced this past year, absolutely amazing to see. It’s gonna start impacting bookings. I talked about this, especially younger travelers who prioritize this. This is something that’s important to them, right? We think of when I pick a hotel location, a price, we could see a day where a traveler looks at price, location reviews and they also could look at what’s the green initiatives? What’s my carbon footprint? We’re already seeing that on airlines that will show you the carbon footprint that you’re taking. Which one is most efficient as far as your flight goes. So I it is, it is not within the realm and it’s also gonna be, IM important to recruiting employees, right? When you’re talking about hiring someone and you’re able and, and they’re looking at a job, a front desk agent for your property or the property next door, very similar pay, very similar location. Maybe opportunity for growth is a distinguishing factor that you prioritize sustainability in your operations at your hotel. That is absolutely something that someone would find as compelling and could be a, a positive differentiator for you in your recruitment efforts. So again, keep all of that in mind as you move forward and start to implement these practices moving forward. We had credible idea that’s being implemented right now. One of the Suite Spot guests that we had, uh, I believe a year ago said along with the physical invoice, you know, monetary invoice for your stay, you also were included a carbon invoice. So you know, the carbon footprint that essentially your stay cost quote unquote. I just think really, really creative idea. There could be something where, you know, people get competitive showcase that online could make for some great marketing. So sustainability, uh, my key takeaway number three from the hospi, the 2024 hospitality show. Number four, back to ai. This is where we started the episode. We talked about AI with hotels, hotel owners and and management and operations. What about AI and the travelers journey? Really, really cool things that we heard could be coming down the pike. Travel planning with ai. You know, one of the things that the panelists was talking about, how the younger generation has shown that they are prioritizing experience, overt material. That is fantastic news for the hotel industry. They are gonna continue to do just as much research as you would do on Amazon. If you’re buying a new car. Think about the amount of research that you do when you’re buying a new car. So this younger generation that is prioritizing experience over material. They are going to do their due diligence, they have the channels to do it, and they have maybe different channels that we’ve been prioritizing as a hotel industry, right? Social media, we’ve seen completely be a place where TikTok right now is more of a search engine than Google. For some hotels, that’s a scary thought, especially if you don’t have an account. Instagram is someone where they’re sharing information. But with that, a big thing that they were talking about AI and maybe some of the kind of caution flags for hotels out there in hospitality is we’re gonna fake feedback is gonna become a real problem here soon. Whether that’s deep fake images, fake blog posts, fake guest reviews, we know that that’s a huge problem. This is gonna continue to be an issue for hotels and it’s really going to impact those that really rely too heavily on AI to create content for them online authenticity is was the word of the year last year, right? And it’s only going to become more powerful. If you can create authentic experience that guests share a trusted guest share on credible sources out there, you will have an advantage because this fake feedback is limitless. Really. If you wanted to create as much fake imagery about your hotel, you can, there’s ai, generat, uh, image generators out there, but it’s gonna negatively impact your business. In fact, one of the suggestions was actually to hire a team and that we might see this in the future, a team to audit your online presence to look for fake feedback, look for fake images, fake blogs, anything that looks inauthentic online. The more we see this, the more especially younger generation who’s coming up, they have a lot of money now. They’re getting into the workforce, they’re starting to travel more. They are able to see this with a different eye than we were five years ago. ’cause it just wasn’t as prevalent. So number four, key takeaway AI in the traveler’s journey. I’m excited every, everyone on this listening to this podcast is a traveler. So there, there’s some really cool, innovative ways that you can start searching for travel, but it’s going to be the hotels on the other side that are leveraging that properly and authentically that are going to have the competitive advantage there. Last and final key takeaway, this is the first year that they actually conducted these on the main stage was the GM of the Year awards. And the reason, this is my fifth takeaway. We just work in such an awesome industry. Some of the nominees, winners and their stories. I would absolutely encourage you look up that GM of the year and hear some of the stories and you will just be moved by the hospitality spirit in some of these people. Um, from everything for people that have been in this industry for 35, 40 years and still have a passion for it and have, you know, we talk about in sports how coaches typically have coaching trees and the amount of managers and hospitality leaders that one person can impact is absolutely insane to think about. And when it’s, when it’s recognized, it’s such a powerful thing to, you know, helping people in natural disasters. You know, one of the GMs was recognized, you know, had to go through those fires last year in Hawaii. And to hear the stories and how that hotel opened its doors to its employees, to the local community and the impact that that hotels and hoteliers have on their, their local community can’t be understated. And it was a very, very powerful piece. I’m so happy that that was on highlighted and showcased on the main stage this year. I hope they continue to do it again. We just have such an incredible industry. We had the pleasure of interviewing one of the GM of the Year nominees, Michael Milon, and we have an interview with him. He’s also an FIU professor, so we got to talk about our visit there in the Suite Spot college campus cr. But yeah, my fifth and final takeaway, it’s just, we just are in such incredible industry. It’s to hear, uh, some of those stories was just so inspiring. So happy that they do that because that’s really what makes our industry great, is the people that work there. So those are my five key takeaways from the second annual Hospitality show. So happy that I was able, that had the pleasure of, of joining Plan on being there in Denver next October. Plan for it as well. Again, if you haven’t been thinking about it, definitely make the trip. It is well worth it. Thank you for listening to The Suite Spot and we’ll talk to you next time.To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Guest Experience Snapshot powered by TMG Oneview® AI is here!
Tune in to hear from the Chief Technology Officer at Travel Media Group, Jason Lee, on the latest technological innovation being offered to hoteliers as a part of our digital solutions for hotels.
This new offering uses generative AI in a unique way to help hoteliers interpret guest feedback and dial in on how they can improve the guest experience at their properties
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. If you are watching us here on YouTube, we have a few announcements to make. First, we’ve hit an incredible milestone. This is Suite Spot, 150 episodes. Thank you all. I just wanna take a moment before we get started on this great episode that we have today to thank everyone for taking the time to listen to us for all of your support. You know, 150 episodes is something absolutely insane saying it out loud. So again, thank you. And we have a very familiar guest who I feel like we’ve been on quite a number of these episodes. Jason, our Chief Technology Officer at Travel Media Group. Jason Lee, thank you again for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee:
Thank you, Ryan. Really excited to talk to you about this today.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re super excited. And if you’re watching us, like I said on YouTube, if you’re not, first of all encourage you go to our YouTube channel, you’re gonna find some exclusive content there that you’ll only find on YouTube. But if you are watching us on YouTube, you’ll see we might have a little bit different feel and vibe. We have moved into a brand new Suite Spot. We are so excited to showcase this new space. It was custom built. You are gonna see all types of new looks from this space. New, exciting content, so be sure to follow and subscribe The Suite Spot. We’ve got so much jam packed for you. But speaking of innovation and new, that is exactly what we’re here to talk about. Jason, we have had a number of episodes talking about the incredible developments that you and your dev team here at Travel Media Group and some of the innovation that you’ve put out there. This might be one of the most innovative, the guest experience snapshot powered by TMG OneView ai. Before we get talking about it, what we’ve come to learn is with these innovations, there’s always kind of a story or a why behind it. Walk us through that with this guest experience snapshot.
Jason Lee:
Well, for a long time, I mean, we obviously accumulate reputation data. So we’re, we get data from all the sites, we get it from all the hotels. And so we have been, anybody who’s seen any of our stuff knows, we have lots of numbers, lots of ways of kind of creating different types of metrics, and showing those metrics in various forms. And I think that’s really sort of industry standard where we get a metric or a KPI, we sit on that, we manage to that. And in some ways you sort of lose like what that KPI is for. So you’re sort of like almost the purpose for your improvement of a KPI is the KPI. Instead of for what the KPI was originally for. And I think with reputation, we sort of get into that where you have so much data that you sort of lose, you lose track of what is most important. And so what we wanted to do is even going deeper than sentiment analysis. So sentiment analysis really was this natural language processing that we have been doing for quite a while where we take sentence chunks and we look at word modifiers and things like that to create positive, neutral and negative statements inside of a review and then take those down further into the various aspects of a guest stay. With this though, with generative AI, we have an opportunity to actually pull even further than that and take, it’s not just the metrics. So what you’ll find is when you look at the guest experience snapshot, there is no metric on it. It’s literally the text of the guest. It’s the experience a guest had and the text that multiple guests had. So the text that of that experience. So for example, if a bunch of guests really loved the experience at the front desk with, with the staff at the front desk, you would see most guests mention an amazing front desk experience. And then there might be a front desk clerk’s name called out inside of that sentence. And then you’ll see maybe 17 mentions. And so what that’s doing then is it’s saying, here’s sort of like, it’s accumulating all of this text and saying from that, here’s this thing that went right. And then the same thing for thing, something that went wrong. And in the industry we really don’t have anything like that. I think TripAdvisors sort of went out there and created sort of a summary of guest sentiment that they put out. They’re like, oh, this is AI generated and it’s a summary of guest sentiment. But inside of like the ops side or where I’m maybe even evaluating what’s going on at this hotel from a management standpoint, all I have is metrics I don’t have unless I read one review at a time.
Ryan Embree:
Well, to put it in perspective, Jason, the educational webinars that we put on with reputation and social media, one of my kind of best practices was to physically print out some of your reviews and start highlighting those keywords that you’re seeing over and over again. So this is obviously the more technological next step to that, but also can give you some insights on how to improve on maybe the things that you’re falling short of.
Jason Lee:
No, absolutely. And I think that’s again, what makes this so powerful is that you’re coming out of maybe the emotion of a number, you know, and the emotion around the number to a KPI that you’re now getting into actual guest sentiment. The other issue with single review analysis, let’s say, is that it’s easy, very easy and common for you to take an issue, a single issue that a guest had and discard that as a one-off to say that this was circumstantially, this series of events happened, that this guest had a bad stay or they had a bad experience here, but this only happened to this guest, not to anybody else. So what we sort of see it, we see it in aggregate. So we sort of, of, as we’re responding to reviews or even looking at review data as a whole, we can sort of see this bigger picture. But as you’re sort of ingesting review by review either through alert system of your brand or through one view with TMG, you’re still just getting these little snippets instead of all this together. So what the other big purpose of this is to create this thing called interrater reliability, which basically, so in order for there to be a sentence chunk in the guest experience snapshot, multiple guests are, have to have had the same experience. And so that’s another big, the very, it’s a key point of this. So this is also something, so that’s why we start with positive and then go to negative is that you have a bunch of guests that are having great experiences. Here they are. Right. And then here you have the same, you have another bunch of guests that are having experiences that, that are really an opportunity operationally or an opportunity from a service standpoint, but you can now see them and you can’t discount it as a one-off.
Ryan Embree:
And sometimes that’s tough to do because, one of the things that now I challenge hoteliers with this, with this guest experience snapshot is say, what do you think are issues at your property? And match them up against what people are actually saying in your reviews, or what do you think people love about your property? And see if there’s alignment there. I think as hoteliers, we tend to think that we know our hotel better than anyone else, but our guests are really telling us at a moment’s notice what are the positive and negative things that they are experiencing at that time. And as we know, not every single person is going to a review site to leave that feedback. So if your inner rate of reliability is 6 or 7 mentions on an issue, that could really be three to four, five times more than what you’re seeing and guests are experiencing.
Jason Lee:
Correct. I think you take really, like probably the key pieces of sentiment, right? So probably the most looked at piece of sentiment is cleanliness. So you look at cleanliness, often we will see positive and negative cleanliness sentiment, and they will, they will be the top numbers. They’ll be the most people mentioned cleanliness, and the most people mentioned dirtiness. So it fits into that cleanliness, positive negative. So you have the same thing actually in the guest experience snapshot, but what we find in the guest experience snapshot is different types of mentions of cleanliness. I loved how the pool area was clean and beautiful. I loved the lobby. Right. And then there might be another mention there, then there’s multiple mentions of a bathroom issue. So when you see that you can, it’s way more you can diagnose that so much easier than saying, well, some of the guests like cleanliness and some of ’em don’t. It’s a 50/50.
Ryan Embree:
And it’s one of those things where if guests are reading reviews about your cleanliness in a negative light before they’ve even stepped on property, that has lowered the bar for what they think clean is for your property, they could come in and see if they’ve been reading all day reviews on multiple sites about, Hey, this room is dirty, you’re gonna come in naturally with a different eye than if you would’ve come in and not known that information. So this is really good to kind of take from an operational standpoint, but the AI doesn’t stop there, which is giving you that information. It actually gives you some ways to improve the guest experience too, which I think is really, really cool and unique.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. So we didn’t want to just leave it at that. And that’s why we also have these bundled in months. That’s why it’s a month at a time. And so we added something called recommendations, and it’s a really cool part of this, and it probably was the trickiest piece of training that we did by far. Because if you kind of leave generative AI to its own devices, it kind of, it says a bunch of crazy stuff. So we had to really reign it in and take real world scenarios and real world fixes. But what’s kind of cool about this is that things that you sort of go, you look at that are, that are maybe causing guest friction, but you as a hotel, you look at and you’re like, eh, you know what, how am I gonna change that? My hotel’s near a busy road? How am I gonna change roads? I can’t do that. So some of the recommendations that we have are really more, maybe not as much about how do you fix that? How do you fix the physical plant of your property? But it’s more about how do you inform guests? How do you create a situation where guests know the situation they’re walking into, you put them in the best possible position to set an expectation for their stay. And so some of that has to do with that. It’s about training your front desk to handle these situations in a different way.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And you know, it’s educating the guests before they arrive. We’ve talked about that. By doing that in things like review responses, social media makes for a great way to do that. You know, one of the examples would be if someone says the lack of variety of food within your breakfast, right? Instead of maybe just talking about your breakfast on social media, show exactly what that breakfast looks like. And then all of a sudden, now I know what to expect when I come on property. I’m not expecting this breakfast buffet, this giant breakfast buffet. I know exactly what I’m getting. Might not necessarily turn it around and say, this is a great variety, but it actually will lessen the blow and maybe improving your reputation on a few points. But it could be something where that recommendation also says maybe add variety. Right? And talk about that. And we’ve heard stories. I mean, we talk to hoteliers every single day and encourage them to make little tweaks and changes like that. And the guest experience snapshot, month over month looking at that will give you a good indicator of the sentiment of what guests are feeling about those changes.
Jason Lee:
Absolutely. It’s that kind of like, interesting thing. So it’s not like we’re telling you how to run your hotel. It’s just giving you some, like, some ideas that these little irritants that are happening. I’ll give you an example. We had a hotel, that we sort of were looking at from the beginning. And so we’ve had this now live for three months, and in the first month we noticed that they were having issues with their shower doors, like the doors specifically. There was a bunch of mentions in the first, in the first time we looked at it. And so the next month came, and again, there were mentions of the doors and it had a little bit of a different text, but it was the same mention. The third one had the same mention. And so, you know, so the recommendations are sort of like varying a little bit, but still trying to be like, Hey, you know, I wanna look into this. And I do think it’s those kinds of things, is keeping it top of mind. You’re not gonna fix everything all the time. You know, there’s things that, that are gonna be stuff that maybe are part of your renovation or they’re part of other things, but it’s about awareness that they’re causing guest friction. And talking to that, one thing that’s sort of hard in operations is you’re, you’re balancing so many other things and just getting to that space where you’re saying, yeah, this is a problem. And admitting that to yourself and saying, yeah, this is a problem. But then being proactive about it. I guarantee any hotel you’re listening to this podcast right now has rooms at their hotel right now that they rent last. It’s like the last rooms I rent because I know there’s problems. So I know there’s gonna be issues down this corridor. But that’s what this is really about. It’s about taking this data and making it very accessible, very usable.
Ryan Embree:
And we’ve spent a lot of time on this podcast episode talking about the negative things. And one of the things is it also provides all the great sentiment that guests are saying, and this could be a great gameplan and blueprint for you for a social media strategy if you are seeing that people love attractions, restaurants, location, start sharing the businesses that are near your location to just even further amplify all the things that guests love about the property. So I know we’ve talked a lot about recommendations and fixing things and obviously the things, the low hanging fruit that we can fix to improve the guest experience, we’re always looking to do that. But it’s also a great guidebook on using what people, what guests love to market the hotel. Right?
Jason Lee:
Yeah, absolutely. And there’s a lot of really great points inside there, and I think social media is a great place to use it. So, you know, we have really friendly people at our front desk and our guests talk to us about it all the time. You know, why not, why not mention it?
Ryan Embree:
And there’s also some really cool use case and potentially using competitor data, right? We’ve talked about that on this podcast, on educational webinars. Sometimes when you’re reading those reviews about guest cleanliness and you don’t happen to have a cleanliness problem highlighting things like a housekeeper for the month, talking about your cleanliness protocols, subconsciously, when you see that and your competitors have struggling with their cleanliness scores, now all of a sudden you have the upper hand competitive advantage. And we’re always looking for that, especially in a really crowded competitive market there.
Jason Lee:
But I think this type of data to your point where you were just talking about, I think you can print this out and bring it to your front desk meeting. Talk about the positive things that are going on. Really praise people for the, the positive comments that are coming in and then say, Hey, and then we also add some stuff we need to work on for this month, you know, and let’s, let’s, let’s do it. We will revisit this next month. So it’s a, it’s kind of a cool way to, you know, same thing with housekeeper maintenance, but it, I think it’s a very kind of portable, cool thing you can use inside of these meetings to help make things better.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s so cool. And, and be mindful also of the season at which you’re looking at this, right? I always talk about summer being the ultimate stress test for a lot of these properties. You might be able to keep that room that you were talking about unoccupied throughout the winter just because your occupancy isn’t there. But all of a sudden, on summer you’re renting that thing every single night. And problems maybe that were like minor issues are now starting to bubble up into major problems during those summer months. We saw an influx, a huge influx. I mean, you guys were on pace for responding to reviews to what, what was the number?
Jason Lee:
Like over 40,000 a month.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. An incredible amount of reviews, which is fantastic, bcause a lot of hoteliers saw those guests. And that made for a very busy travel season. But it also can really uncover some things looking year to year, month to month, all of those variables there are gonna really create some cool patterns and trends. Give you some extra insights into the, the property.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. We launched this in summer, so we did see a lot of, like, to your point, we saw a lot of AC climate control stuff. You know, because it could be going back to a stress test. It’s your first stress test, with a full hotel and everybody using the AC.
Ryan Embree:
Let’s talk about AI because I feel like one of the things that we’ve been seeing, whether it be on social media or reading and publications and stuff like that, is the use case for AI within hospitality typically in an industry that I would argue is a little bit slower to get to technology, implement technology, but we respond to reviews. Right. Super important. We’ve talked about the importance of responding reviews, hit some milestones with, I think we’re closer to 1.8 million guest reviews responded to. Maybe there’s some hoteliers on here that are saying, well, why not use AI for responding to reviews? What would you say to those hoteliers?
Jason Lee:
Generative AI has come a very long way, and it feels like almost like weekly. New models are coming out, new pieces to this puzzle are coming out. So not just text, but also image and other stuff that it’s just unbelievable. Just incredible. But we’re still kind of in this weird space, I think, and especially when it comes to review response. So I think you get to this space where you can, there’s spots where you could use it but not yet hear. And the reason why we have not gone there and, and we’re actually really careful about this and very deliberate about this. We’re using it in tech summary and some of these other places to create better analytics. But when it comes to communicating with the guests, we’re very deliberate in that space. And the reason why we are is because we see that as actual communication. We don’t see that as some sort of throwaway platitude from AI. We see this as, this is a, this is a human being who stayed with us, and we want to be as part of that conduit between the hotel and their guest. Our responsibility is to represent them in the best possible way, not just to the guest who wrote it, but to all the people that read it. And we think, you know, the primary pillars of of review response have to do with communication. It’s authentic communication to the guest who wrote this review. And if you do that correctly, you do that in a really sincere way, it resonates with the guest who’s reading it. And guess what, you get some dividends with the OTAs for responding to all your reviews and other things on top of that, you know, you get three really powerful pieces of ROI out of review response. But I think if you don’t have that first part, if that is insincere and that’s funky, and AI uses very specific language. And you’ll see vocabulary that is not normally used in the course of communication that a lot of AI uses. You could spot it in emails that you get sometimes you spotted in these various spots. And, and I guarantee an insincere, verbose response is probably AI or template. And so we don’t use either at this point, you know, in the foreseeable future, especially for negative reviews, I don’t ever see that happening just because you have to be, I think in the moment, sincere acknowledging the issue and looking to create recovery.
Ryan Embree:
And what I would say to that is, if not in hospitality, then where, right? I mean, as far as we are looking for a human to human, as we’ve learned, this is the oldest industry out there hosting people. What have we heard over the years of, oh, well at one point we’re just gonna have a virtual check-in and that’s never come to pass. And how many times are we seeing that sometimes a experience is make or break at the front desk because of another person behind the desk? And I think that is a great illustration of why this human to human communication, can it be done? Sure. But it’s not gonna be as impactful. And as you mentioned, as more inauthentic communication begins to rise. And we’re seeing that in our emails every single day. The authenticity is gonna start to bloom out of these organizations and companies and businesses that really embrace that. Well said on your end, this guest experience snapshot, it’s so cool to see AI come to Travel Media Group and this be the first way that it is because it goes back to where Travel Media Group started, which was to help hoteliers. Help hoteliers improve the guest experience. And that’s exactly what this cool innovative tool is doing. So congratulations to and your team Jason, on this. Any final thoughts before we wrap up?
Jason Lee:
Yeah. You know, I will say, just one last thing. As I always do.
Ryan Embree:
That’s why we have the question in here.
Jason Lee:
I think all of this is really what Travel Media Group does or what we try to do. What I aim for on a regular basis with our review response team, our social media team, our development team, is that what we’re able to do is we’re able to focus here, we’re able to focus on reputation, we’re able to focus on the information, we’re able to focus on responses, we’re able to do that because we’re not operating because we’re not doing these other things. And so we’re able to really care about this. And we do. And I think that, you know, really is what all of these tools are about. It’s about giving you the information in a way that’s palatable, giving you the information in a way that’s accessible, but also helping, helping in a way that you might not even be able to help yourself just because of the level of care and focus that we have on it. And, and I really, I mean, I passionately believe in this part of the guest experience that this is their final experience with your hotel and we are just so committed. I know this is a sales pitch, Ryan, but I’m gonna say it anyway, but we are so committed to making sure that that experience is meaningful and impactful.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Well, it certainly felt and the way that you talk about it and the solutions and innovations that you and your team are developing over in development. So congratulations again, any hotelier listening to this or your hotel portfolio of hotels, this is something that if you reach out to us, we can give you a guest experience snapshot. We’ve got a live demo that we are putting on together. Would love to get you this information. If anything, like I said, make it a challenge. I think these are the five things that issues with my property right now. Here are the five things that people love, see how many of them match up. And, you know, it’s just cool information to see and how AI is continuing to kind of change our hospitality world. So thank you Jason. And thanks for joining me on The Suite Spot for 150.
Jason Lee:
Thanks Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, thanks. And we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot visits the Hyde Midtown Miami in the next episode of the Spotlight series. General Manager of the hotel, Henry Martinez joins the podcast to give travelers an insightful look into the guest experience and what makes the property one-of-a-kind for travelers.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We are not here at our Travel Media Group studio. Instead, we are live on-site for another incredible and amazing edition of our TMG Suite Spot: Spotlight series. We’ve got such an exciting property to showcase today and an amazing guest to do it with. Henry Martinez, General Manager of the Hyde Midtown Miami. Henry, thank you so much for being on the podcast with me.
Henry Martinez :
Well, thank you for hosting me.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited about it. Before we get into this incredible property that I just had the pleasure of touring all around and seeing, let’s talk about your hospitality journey. This is one of the most unique things in our industry. Everyone coming from all aspects of maybe not starting in hospitality, but ending up there. Uh, what made you fall in love with hospitality? Where’s your journey and, and led you here to the Hyde Midtown Miami?
Henry Martinez :
Excellent. Absolutely. Well, first I’d like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to share with you and your audience a bit about our hotel. So how my journey started, I went to college unsure what to study and with very limited knowledge of the English language. So I took a career exploration test. Now I think it’s called a career workshop, which is an aptitude test. And that test is designed to determine a person’s ability or propensity to succeed in a given activity. Meaning there’s really no right or wrong answer, and to no surprise hospitality came on top. So my career in hospitality truly expands over two decades, working at seven different properties and opening four hotels, beginning as a front desk agent. I quickly advanced through various roles within the rooms division, and eventually stepping into leadership positions such as director rooms and director of operations. In April of 2022, I was honored to take the role of general manager of Hyde Midtown Miami. Each step of the journey has prepared me to do what I love the most, which is interacting with people and trying to make a difference in their lives.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. It’s a common story that we hear, is a lot of hospitality leaders didn’t really think about hospitality as a career, and then once they get into it, they really find a passion for it and a love for it. So fantastic to hear. I came from very similar beginnings, front desk, work your way up. You know, that’s what the stories that we love to hear about with this. So let’s move on to this incredible property that we’re at right now. Had the amazing privilege, like I said, to tour it with you this morning to show me the grounds. But before we get into talking about specific amenities or the room types, talk to me a little bit about the history of the project and how the Hyde Midtown Miami came to be.
Henry Martinez :
Absolutely. Hyde Midtown Miami is a true gem. It offers an intimate, welcoming atmosphere. Our location couldn’t be better right in the heart of Byron City activity and only a 15 minute drive to the beach. Designed by the renowned architect, David Rockwell. The hotel reflects the essence of local art and culture, creating an ambience that resonates with both young professionals and leisure travelers. And it’s really the only property of its kind in the midtown area, making a tough choice for those looking to truly engage with the lively Miami community.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re gonna talk about that incredible location here in a minute, but it really is an immersive atmosphere. I mean, we walk through those lobby doors, everything that you just said about the art from the art being in the lobby, just the feel and the vibe of this hotel is fantastic and I encourage my entire audience to check it out for themselves. But let’s talk about the hide brand. You know, locations all over the world, very fast growing. Maybe share with our Suite Spot audience who’ve never stayed at Hyde before, what they can expect from this brand.
Henry Martinez :
Sure. At any Hyde location, the guest experience comes to life through key touch points. Guests can look forward to an experience that goes beyond the typical hotel stay, Hyde is designed for those who appreciate art, culture and community. Just like the one that we’re sitting in right now, the moment you step into our expansive art filled lobby, you’ll feel the vibrant energy of the space. We pride ourselves on hosting social events and providing unparallel amenities. It’s all about creating connections here. Hyde is about embracing a fun lifestyle that encourages both relaxation and social connections.
Ryan Embree:
Well, speaking of connections, we are right at an intersection of art and decor, and we went out onto the seventh floor. You were able to point to me to the design district where Wynwood was the airport. I mean, the old adage is location, location, location. And you have it right here. Paint a picture that you painted with me right outside of these doors of where everything and how centralized this property is when it comes to the different areas of Miami.
Henry Martinez :
Absolutely. I’ll be happy to. Hyde Midtown Miami has an unbeatable location. As I showed you earlier this morning, in the heart of some of Miami’s most vibrant neighborhoods, just steps from the hotel, you can immerse yourself in the colorful murals of the Wynwood Art District and indulge in luxury shopping at the stylish boutiques in the design district. This neighborhood has so many restaurants, cafes, and even a Dog Park that I showed you earlier, I’m sure that there’s always something exciting to discover. Again, it’s all about embracing Miami culture.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, absolutely. And it’s felt through these doors. And a big part of that and a big part of the guest experience is art. You know, I want to talk about kind of the relationship of art in this hotel because it seems like it’s really ingrained in the hotel experience. You want people to leave these lobby doors and really appreciate the design, the architecture, and the art associated with Hyde Midtown Miami.
Henry Martinez :
I’ll tell you Ryan, a feeling that I got from the moment that I joined Hyde Midtown Miami, I recognize the immense potential of incorporating art to enrich our guest experience. We wanted something that will not only enhance the attractiveness of the property, but also connect with a cultural excitement of Miami itself. This vision came to life through our collaboration with Steven Manes, the founder of the Manolis Projects Gallery, one of South Florida’s most renowned contemporary art spaces. After visiting the gallery with my assistant general manager, Robinson Rodriguez and Marketing manager Capri Crescio, it became clear that this partnership will be perfect fit for us. The gallery’s bold, modern look aligned seamlessly with the creative energy we wanted to foster a high midtown. The result is the big picture exhibition that you saw in the lobby earlier, a carefully curated collection that invites our guests to experience art as part of their state. This collaboration has elevated our property without a doubt, transforming it into more than just a place to stay, but an immersive artistic experience.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. It is an experience. We walked into that lobby and your eyes, you just can’t take your eyes off the incredible art, and I’m sure that this is something that really is a part of the guest experience and definitely something I wanted to bring up today. We talked about all the things there are to do outside of the hotel, right? We’re talking about some of the art inside, but there’s also a ton to do with the amenities that you shared with me. I mean, everything, we’ve got almost 90% suites at the property each with a balcony, a giant balcony mind you, overlooking some green space. You’ve got a tennis court out there, which was recognized as one of the best tennis courts by Conde Nast. Talk to us a little bit about the amenities that you have here at the Hyde Midtown Miami.
Henry Martinez :
You know, very fortunate, to be leading a team at Hyde Midtown Miami. We created a home-like comfort that blends perfectly with our upscale accommodations. Our suites with stunning floor to ceiling windows and most feature outdoor balconies that offer views of the Miami skyline. We have equipped each guest room with modern conveniences, including a kitchenette and spacious bathrooms with premium bath amenities. One of the highlights of our property is the seventh floor rooftop area that I took you earlier this morning, which truly feels like a private retreat. Here you can enjoy an Olympic-sized swimming pool surrounded by large gardens, tennis, core pot and green. And our state-of-the-art gym not only features the latest fitness equipment, but also a stunning bay views. Salva Miami, blends global flavors with the creative fresh approach, serving up the dishes that are as bold, as vibrant as the city itself. Every detail is crafted to make dining an experience to remember.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. We were up there at that space that you were talking about Henry, and it really puts into light all of the things that there are to do at the property, but you can also see everything that you can experience off property. So it’s a perfect blend there at this place, at this special hotel. Let’s do a little bit, a rapid fire quiz you a little bit on the property. Let’s talk about your favorite view at the property, Henry.
Henry Martinez :
Wow, good question. I have quite a few, but I think if I have to pick one, you know, the view from the rooftop pool area, it is absolutely amazing, especially at sunset. Truly a moment to remember while looking out of the Miami skyline.
Ryan Embree:
So private too. You were telling me, we both walked out on the pool deck and you’re like, it’s hard to believe this is on the seventh floor. And it absolutely was. I was like, it’s very private, very immersive, really relaxing atmosphere out there. So fun fact about the property. I always love to hear these.
Henry Martinez :
I think that besides the stunning pool that you saw, which is heated all year round, there’s not really that many properties here in Miami that have that feature, but we also have a fully equipped tennis court and putting green, which is perfect for active customers. And you know, you mentioned Conde Nast Travelers, one of the top four hotels as well in the world.
Ryan Embree:
What about a favorite piece of art at the property?
Henry Martinez :
Another hard to pick. You saw our lobby and the many art pieces that we have and we also have an incredible selection of art from all star artists in our hotel. If I really have to pick one, it will probably be a piece for my friend from Steven Manez, Title Citrus.
Ryan Embree:
One of the cool things, Henry, is that you also change out those pieces of art, right? It’s not something that’s constant the entire year. You’ll actually have different exhibitions within your lobby, correct?
Henry Martinez :
That is correct. Actually, this is the fourth exhibitions that we’ve done since I got to this hotel and we actually, there’s another one coming out for Art Basil pretty soon.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited to see it. Henry, you know, as a general manager, I’ve had the pleasure of sitting down and interviewing a lot of hospitality leaders and general managers, but one of the most important pieces and task of a general manager is really keep a close pulse on your guests, right? You have to know the feedback, the sentiment they’re feeling about the experience they have, especially somewhere like this where there’s so much to experience, right? As general manager, as they walk out those doors, whether they’ve immersed themselves on the art, whether they’ve explored the design district, Wynwood, whether they’ve gone to the beach, which is again just a couple minutes away from this property. What do you hope that they say about their experience at the Hyde Midtown Miami?
Henry Martinez :
I take a lot of pride in my team as well on what the guest feedback is, but for the most part, the guest feedback has been very positive. Many highlight the engaging atmosphere and comfort of our suites and balconies. Our staff engagement and genuine appreciation receives praise consistently as well. Since the hotel opened in 2018, we rank among the top 10 hotels in Miami. In fact, in 2022 we were the number one ranked hotel in Miami on Triple Advisor. Currently we rank in the number four spot, but this achievement is just as a great testament to our team’s dedication and ongoing efforts to enhance the service we provide. But Ryan, Hyde Midtown staff are really the difference makers.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I mean the hospitality was felt when me and my team walked in here, so we really appreciate you hosting us here. We’re looking to wrap up here. Any final thoughts before we wrap up Henry?
Henry Martinez :
Absolutely. I invite you to discover, the unique charm of Hyde Midtown Miami firsthand. It’s more than just a destination. It’s a vibrant, immersive experience that represents the very essence of Miami’s culture, creativity, and energy. Whether you’re visiting for the art, the atmosphere, or just to unwind, we strive to create moments, that are memorable and meaningful. And of course I encourage you to go to Instagram, find Hyde Midtown Miami and scroll through our feed. It’ll give you a taste of the dynamic lifestyle we are so proud to offer.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely, Henry. And yeah, check out Hyde’s Instagram, give you a great taste of some of that art that we were talking about today. Give you a really good look at the location, some of the award-winning amenities. So thank you so much Henry, for you and your team being so gracious and letting the Suite Spot showcase this incredible property here.
Henry Martinez :
No, thank you. Thank you again. We hope that to see you again soon.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much Henry, and thank you for listening to The Suite Spot. We’ll talk to you next time to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot is spotlighting the beautiful and newly renovated Regent Santa Monica Beach with special guest and General Manager of the property, Younes Atallah!
This episode covers all the exciting things travelers can look forward to from their stay at the property including dining, amenities, local attractions, and much more.
Tune in now!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, with another amazing episode for you today. Very excited to feature this episode. We are gonna be continuing our TMG Spotlight series, and if this is your first time hearing this, it’s one of my favorite series that we do on this podcast. It’s, it’s taken us all over the world at this point, right across the country, and today we are headed to beautiful Santa Monica Beach. With me today is my guest, Younes Atallah, General Manager of the Regent Santa Monica Beach. Younes, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Younes Atallah :
Thank you, Ryan, for having me. Good to be here.
Ryan Embree:
And this series, if this is your first time hearing, this is all about highlighting and showcasing some of the world’s most unique new properties that we’re gonna be talking about. Younes, your property over there, the region, Santa Monica Beach certainly fits the bill. But before we get talking about that, share with our audience a little bit about your hospitality background. We’d love to hear these stories and where we started, where we end up, and, which led you to becoming the first GM of the Regent Santa Monica Beach.
Younes Atallah :
Again, thanks for having me. It’s great to be here and I was born into travel and hospitality. My family owned a travel agency growing up. And, I’ve told this story a few times. It was a rite of passage for all the kids to work at the travel agency as part of our indoctrination. It was about a 50/50 success rate and the kids sticking to hospitality and travel. But I certainly did and went the hotel route, went to hotel school in Florida. My first job was, picking up the phones at what was then the Orlando Marriott downtown. I don’t even know that hotel still exists. But that was probably 30 ish years ago. I kind of jumped in with both feet and never looked back. I’ve been very fortunate. My career has taken me to some amazing places in the country in North America, actually. I’ve lived in Florida and Texas. I lived in Canada for a few years. And then more recently I was in Hawaii, in Arizona and then landed in California just about four years ago. So not terrible places to live, overall. So it’s been, it’s been a fun ride.
Ryan Embree:
Well, certainly. And that hospitality has taken you all over the country. We talk about all the time on this podcast how transferable, skills are, and I think that’s one of the beauties that is lost in our industry is that people serving people, you can do that in Florida, you could do that in California, Hawaii, even in different countries there. So to be able to take your talents across the country, I’m sure you have some incredible experiences in the hospitality and started your hospitality roots right here where we are just north of Orlando, Florida. So that’s, that’s incredible to hear. But before we start talking about your journey to the other side of the country, let’s talk about the Regent Hotel and Resorts brand. We got locations worldwide, but this is actually the first one in the Americas. Introduce our audience to this brand and what they can expect from it.
Younes Atallah :
Absolutely. This is really, an exciting time for region. Some of your listeners, Ryan, may actually be familiar with the Regent brand, especially if you’ve watched one of the most iconic movies of our time, which is Pretty Woman, which was, filmed at Reach Beil the region, Beverly Wilshire at the time. And that was the last region in the Americas. It’s really not a new brand. It’s a brand that’s being reintroduced and reinvigorated as we speak. Region has been around since the early seventies and has gone through various iterations throughout its history, but most recently in 2018, IHG Hotels and Resorts added region to its luxury and lifestyle portfolio. And we’re very much in Regent 2.0 land, if you will, in the last few years, we’ve added and opened some amazing properties in, like the region of Hong Kong, the Carlton Khan in the south of France. The region in Shanghai just opened a few months ago. And so to bring back region to the Americas and to Los Angeles specifically, it’s a little bit romantic because the last Regent was left the Americas from Los Angeles. So to bring it back to the LA area is pretty great and lots of growth in the pipeline for Regent and what IHG is doing with the brand and really growing. It is pretty, pretty impressive and very exciting. So keep an eye on it.
Ryan Embree:
It sounds like it, and it’s cool to have a history to a brand like that and then to reinvigorate, reintroduce it here like this in such a spectacular form with your property, which we’re gonna talk about in a minute. Have you had the chance to visit any of the other regions?
Younes Atallah :
I have. I’ve been fortunate in the last year to actually stay at the region, Hong Kong and the region, Carlton Kahn, and both pretty impressive properties, not just from a location and physical product, but really the heart and soul of what we do, which is the people in the service. The brick and mortar is a brick and mortar, pretty building is a pretty building wherever it might be, but the level of service and engagement is really quite special.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And we’re gonna talk about that in a minute and kind of how you’re telling your story as you’re set to open here and invite your first guest into the property, to your incredible Regent Santa Monica Beach. You know, you talked about it, uh, as, as a romantic journey. I’ve learned with new build & renovations, it’s typically a labor of love, sometimes there’s those missteps along the way, but at the end, it, that’s what makes it special, right? So tell us the story about this project, what made it special and how it came to be.
Younes Atallah :
Absolutely. So, this is a transformation. It’s not a new build. The, the building has been, really an anchor in Santa Monica for 30 years. I personally have been involved with this project and, and have been working in this building for the last four years. And so Santa Monica is one of those cities that is very close knit. People know people, people know each other. The community is very passionate about itself and about its iconicness. And so to have the support of the community is really kind of the first thing that was very important for us. As we embarked on this pretty lofty project, we closed the hotel in its previous form, if you will, in March of 2023. So about a year and a half ago, as you mentioned, we’re going to reopen in just a few weeks. The coolest thing about this transformation is that the vast, vast majority of the employee base who worked for many years in the building have stayed on, which is really great. Just so when we go back and we say, yeah, it’s an impressive project, and it’s a beautiful building and a beautiful location, but the heart and soul of of it is the people are all still here, which is great. But talking about it being a labor of love, we’re about to really bring luxury to Santa Monica for the first time in a long time, just to share a few stats with you. But the property is going to open with 167 keys, which includes 34 suites. It’s going to be the largest room offering in the market, really, probably in greater LA area at 720 square feet is our entry level rooms, which is a suite for a lot of our other friends and competitors. Not only will we have, obviously incredible views, which is very much a region brand distinction, if you will, as kind of these picturesque views and of the Pacific Ocean and the Santa Monica Pier. But we’re gonna have an amazing food and beverage offering. We’ve collaborated with Chef Michael Mina to have one of his concepts in the hotel. It’s called Orla. I love saying this. It kind of goes back to the romance. It’s Michael’s love letter to Egypt, which is his roots. So it’s a Mediterranean eastern, middle Eastern cuisine, which is amazing. We have a really great collaboration with Ayesha Curry for Sweet July, which our cafe concept. And then last but not least, we also have a 10,000 square foot spa that we’re working with Urla, out of Paris to bring, to bring their first West coast flagship, if you will, as far as a spa and well wellness facility is concerned. So lots, lots on the go.
Ryan Embree:
I love the collaboration between where you started that conversation, talking about the community and the people, and the people that stayed on and, and that are gonna know the property and in and out. And then the new concepts that you’re blending that old in the new and staying local, but also looking for inspiration worldwide. I think is gonna make this, and correct me if I’m gonna make a really unique experience for anyone that goes there. Now, there’s a common expression in our industry, location is everything. It certainly helps when you’re right, the located right in the middle of the most, one of the world’s most famous beaches. But for those who haven’t been in that area, Younes, could you paint us a little picture of the location, what’s around the hotel? What really makes that location so prime?
Younes Atallah :
The first thing I would say is if you haven’t been, this is an open invitation to come and visit Santa Monica ’cause it truly is one of the most amazing places in the country and very iconic. And, whether you’ve watched, Beverly Hills 90210 or whether you’ve watched Arnold Schwartzenegger training. This is our backyard. It’s really, it’s really pretty cool. But the property itself, the resort itself is located right on the beach, toes in the sand, just south of the Santa Monica Pier. We are, if you were to, I always like to say Santa Monica is a city on its own. We are our own city. We’re surrounded by Los Angeles on three sides and the beautiful Pacific on the fourth side. So, you just have to look west, just look at, look at the ocean, don’t worry about what’s behind you. So, the most amazing sunsets are very much can be witnessed from our pool deck with the Santa Monica pier right in the forefront. And after the sunsets, that Ferris wheel, which is probably top three postcards out of the country is lit up. You can see the reflection of the light on the ocean water. It’s really pretty spectacular. Whether you’re coming to do a little bit of shopping or whether it is to do a little bit of body surfing, a little bit of tanning, it’s all right here, literally in, in front of the hotel.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I was gonna say, I don’t think you’re gonna have many problems with getting some pituresque things for social media, which we’re gonna talk about here. Being a digital marketing podcast, we love to talk about, you know, sharing experiences, but it helps when, you know, your guests are doing the majority of the sharing, right. We can, as businesses try to put out photos and all these pictures and sometimes we pay a lot of money to have things framed up. But when your guests are sharing authentic experiences, sometimes that is the stuff that’s most powerful out there. So that sunset that you’re talking about by the pool, having hundreds of pictures out there on, on Instagram and, and social media, I’m sure is gonna help already just help propel the reach of this incredible property. And we’re gonna talk about that in a minute, but you mentioned some of the partnerships, renowned chefs, celebrities that you’re pairing with. What are you most excited about? You know as those doors are yet to open, right? I’m sure there’s a lot of anticipation, excitement. What do you want those first guests to feel and experience when they walk in through those doors?
Younes Atallah :
This is not rehearsed. This is truly how I feel. Being in an urban area, the one thing that I think you get out of your car, look, Los Angeles is a busy city. LAX is a busy airport. We are not necessarily the closest destination for a lot of people. So it’s a commitment to come out here and sometimes it takes a long time or have to deal with traffic. And so the one thing I’m most excited about, as soon as our guests walk through the doors or really get into the driveway, it’s this elevating them above the noise. It’s this feeling that they’ve arrived. They don’t have to worry about all the noise in the background. We wanna take all of their worries, all of their stresses, regardless of why they’re coming to visit us and really have them step into a haven of sorts.
Ryan Embree:
I absolutely love that. That’s the type of experience that you hope, again, talking about digital marketing, you know, you hope that shared and you see those feelings and sentiment shared on online reviews, feedback from your guests, whether it’s face to face through to your employees of just being like, feel like I’ve kind of escaped here. A really, really cool to hear, and, you know, you can’t, can’t really spell luxury anymore in hospitality without incredible food and beverage. I think that’s part of the experience and the escape. And you mentioned it before your Mediterranean cuisine style, Orla, I’ve been seeing a lot of it in the press and the news. Share some details of what guests can expect for this one of a kind dining experience.
Younes Atallah :
Absolutely. And not only can I share it conceptually, but I actually have experienced Orla now twice in the last week because the Santa Monica location’s actually gonna be the second location for Chef Mina with Orla. The first one opened just a few months ago, in Las Vegas. And I happened to be there last week for work. And I got to, got to experience it twice. And I have to tell you, not only is the service on point, the cocktail programming is, is on point, but the food is very flavorful and very authentic. And I should know a thing or two about Mediterranean cuisine having grew up in, in that part of the world. That’s really such a wonderful takeaway. The restaurant itself, the outlet itself was designed by a roco and they really captured the essence of the beach, but also some of the aspects of that Mediterranean design that you would kind of imagine if you were to step into a restaurant in Egypt, for example. Or something like that. So when you take the design, you take the beverage, and then you take the flavorness and execution of the food, and you sprinkle it with Chef Mina’s love and passion. You just really can’t go wrong.
Ryan Embree:
This is why I love this series so much, Younes, because it, everything in these types of hotels are so purposeful from the design to the, the programming like you were talking about. And high praise is when you can come out of a food and beverage outlet and say the term authentic. That is what we are craving right now in a world that unfortunately, you know, AI is, we love it, technology is great, but it is also causing some inauthenticity. And so when people see authentic, they feel authentic, that little piece of home. And so really, really eager, excited. Thank you for sharing that. You’ve done a couple interviews that I’ve followed leading up to this grand opening and one recent interview you said, we’re eager to share this incredibly special property with the world and welcome guests to indulge in a modern evolution of traditional luxury. And that was the part that really stuck out to me, that modern evolution of traditional luxury. Can you speak what that means to you and how you’ve implemented it into the guest experience and operations at the region? Santa Monica Beach?
Younes Atallah :
Yeah, absolutely. This is what I love about these podcasts subtypes, that it’s, it becomes so natural because we did not rehearse this. And, and you just kind of gave me a perfect segue talking about AI and authenticity. I think, and I believe that these days are very dependent on technology. No one can argue that, obviously, whether it’s with our phones or whether it’s with but inherently, especially in for a luxury traveler, we still want to have those authentic moments with other humans. Technology, AI has to be in the background. It has to make things easier. It doesn’t have to be in the forefront. You know, it has to create conveniences, not stresses. You know, sometimes you are, you know, you’re trying to order something and there’s 16 buttons to push and there’s stand in this line and then pick up in this line and then do this, and you’re just like, oh my God, I just want a coffee.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Trust me, I’ve been in front of my hotel door trying to open with that remote key, right. Which was so convenient, and now all of a sudden it’s not working for me.
Younes Atallah :
No, exactly. Absolutely. So it’s really kind of understanding what the other thing is, the word luxury has evolved tremendously even in the time that I’ve beendoing this. And then more recently, even in the last 5-10 years, really, I think the pandemic has allowed a lot of people to experience luxury and want to experience luxury in a different way. And it’s no longer pinky out and tea with the Queen type of it still exists, and it’s still wonderful. It’s no longer just that. And with Regent, we take a lot of pride in saying that the way that we behave and the way that we execute on luxury is in a modern way, it’s modern luxury. It’s bespoke, it’s really not a one size fits all. You know, I mean, when you look at statistics and studies that tell you that Gen Z they’re going to be the biggest spenders on luxury in the next X number of years, well, you gotta pay attention because you can’t continue to cater to not even their parents, but their grandparents, which I think is the more traditional way.
Ryan Embree:
No, you’re, you’re absolutely right. And to your point about the AI and technology and we talked about this at the top of the episode of what you’re trying to cultivate over there at the Regent Santa Monica Beach, as you said, you wanna remove the noise, the outside noise. And sometimes that can be physical noise, and sometimes that can be digital noise. And sometimes when you elevate guests and customers above that digital noise, sometimes that’s when the authenticity really blooms and you create some really memorable experiences there. Now, all that to say we are a digital marketing podcast. And so I’m gonna talk about a little digital because as you mentioned, I mean Gen Z, and sometimes this is good and sometimes this helps. I mean, this was something that 20-30 years ago in hospitality, when you’d introduce a new property or brand like this, you didn’t have the benefits of social media or online digital marketing like you do today. And it can help propel and accelerate the pace. I look at your Instagram, I follow your Instagram, follow your social media. You guys already have 3000 followers on social media and you haven’t even opened, had that first guess yet. And that can do a lot of things for a property. And we talked about that. So how have you used social media or digital marketing to introduce the new Regent Santa Monica Beach to travelers?
Younes Atallah :
I mean, it goes without saying that it was probably one of the very first things that we did was to make sure that our handles were correct and we had the right ones and go through that process, both Instagram and Facebook. You know, the two big powerhouses that we’ve leaned into at the moment. It’s been incredibly instrumental for us to showcase the brand’s identity as the big brand, but also also the resort itself. We’ve been really sort of teasing for the last year and a half because to your point, we want to create excitement and that I want more so that you can continue to come back and see what we have coming. Social media is a way to, for a new brand, is to share really a visual story of what guests can anticipate when they arrive, whether it’s teasing through looking at the views or certain angles of the accommodation or the restaurant. You know, that being said, as our audience continues to grow across the various platforms, there’s gonna be a lot more to share. You know, you start having more user generated content, you start having more actual photography and more relatable programming that that is being executed. And that’s really what people want to dream. And social media, Instagram especially allows us to do that. It allows us to dream. I mean I’ll share something personal. I booked a trip for a year from now to somewhere that I’ve never been. And literally it’s like in August of next year, and I’m already looking at, oh my God, what am I gonna do? Oh my God, look at this. Oh my God, I wanted to, you know, heart this and favorite this and all of that because I’m already dreaming about it. And that’s really what people that’s the sense that we want people to feel before they get here.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And building anticipation, setting expectations. I love the way that you that you’ve used social media over there as a way to tease, we talk about it all the time, but that is a great strategy. It wasn’t just to throw everything out there give everyone, you wanna build that excitement, build that anticipation just like you’re doing for your own personal trip. And we continue to do so. Very cool to see. We’ll continue to follow. We’re getting closer to the end, but wanna do some rapid fire questions. This is always something we do for the Spotlight series to get to know you and the region. Santa Monica Beach a little bit better. Best view at the property?
Younes Atallah :
It’s the ocean front rooms with a fire pit and a big terrace.
Ryan Embree:
Alright. Yeah. You can’t really argue with that one there. Yeah, fun fact about the property. I know you have already shared a couple, but any any fun facts?
Younes Atallah :
Funnest fact is our atrium suite used to be open air. It actually was two stories of nothing, two floors worth of literally air that we have now built into a two bedroom, two bathroom suite.
Ryan Embree:
Whoa. I think that was probably some fun blueprinting and construction there for that. Most anticipated dish at the property? You mentioned you were at Orla in Vegas. Have you had the chance to try anything over there?
Younes Atallah :
I have. I will tell you, I’m gonna go with my favorite, which are the lamb chops, the harissa grilled lamb chops. They’re pretty delicious. I’m not gonna lie.
Ryan Embree:
And then finally favorite piece of art at the property?
Younes Atallah :
That’s, that’s kind of an easy one. I’m gonna say probably an 800, maybe a 1000 square foot area in the restaurant. And the floor is a handcrafted mosaic piece of art, an ocean scene with an octopus being kind of the highlight of it that was constructed by 15 artisans in Italy and shipped to Santa Monica in pieces. And witnessing it being put together by hand was awesome. I didn’t my video, but then seeing it being put together on the floor has just been amazing. I can’t wait for people to see that something else.
Ryan Embree:
That’s so cool. Again, just to put this in perspective, if you’ve been counting or playing bingo at home, we’ve talked about artists, chefs, celebrities, designers, all a part of this, and we’re just talking about one property. So Absolutely fantastic. You know, I’ve, I’ve had the pleasure of, of interviewing a few GMs and leaders of brand new, new properties or introductions to properties like the region as they prepare for travelers for the first time. And you kind of walked us through today, but how you want people to feel as they walk in. Give me a sense of what you want travelers to feel as they check out. What, what is that as gm do you want them to say about their stay at the region, Santa Monica Beach?
Younes Atallah :
I want them to say that they want more. I think that’s, that’s the first thing I would want them to feel is when do I get to come back? I think we all hopefully have had chances, whether it’s at hotels, destinations, restaurants, any kind of experience to say, I can’t wait to go back. And so if someone says, if a guest says, I can’t wait to go back, I’ve done my job, my team’s done their job, we’ve arrived. Right? We’ve accomplished what we need to. And I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. We’re in the business of creating raving fans. We want people to our guests to become our biggest ambassadors. And you kind of touched this on this a little bit earlier. I can say whatever I want about myself, we can say whatever we want about our hotel, but until people, until others are really talking about us and are our ambassadors, that’s what we really would love to have happen.
Ryan Embree:
Well, from today’s episode I certainly, do not see that being a problem for your property and your team over there. Younes, thank you so much for joining me. We covered a lot. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today?
Younes Atallah :
You know, again, open invitation. Please come to Santa Monica, please come visit us. We’ve got an amazing destination. I’m incredibly passionate about this city. I’ve been coming here for many years before I moved here. It’s a wonderful place to come and visit year round. We’re opening here in just a few weeks, just under a month from now. And have an amazing introductory offer for our guests, sort of our opening offer that will be, available really for anyone who wants to book from now through the beginning of next year, like now, I encourage on, RegentSantaMonicaBeach.com. Follow us.
Ryan Embree:
There you go. It’s spirit of the today’s episode. Well, Younes thank you. I encourage all the listeners and audience, check out the Regent Santa Monica Beach. A wonderful addition to our incredible hospitality industry we have here. We’re very excited. Be sure to follow and hear all of those ambassadors praising their experience, that they had there. So congratulations to you and your team. Younes we will look for those doors to be open. Just a couple of short weeks. I’m sure you cannot wait to see those first guests arrive on property.
Younes Atallah :
That’s right, that’s right. Thank you, Ryan, for the opportunity.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much and we’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Check out the latest Suite Spot episode where President – Hospitality, Travel, & Wellness at Questex, Alexi Khajavi, sits down on the podcast to discuss the highly anticipated Hospitality Show 2024 in San Antonio, Texas!
This special episode will cover what attendees can expect this year from the event, some urgent issues facing the hospitality industry, and how this event is bringing all the major players of hospitality together in one room.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining me today. We have another incredible episode continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series, but we have an original TMG Hospitality Trailblazers, one of the first. Joining me again for the second time. Alexi Khajavi, President, Hospitality Travel and Wellness at Questex. Alexi, thank you so much for joining me once again on the Suite Spot.
Alexi Khajavi :
Great to see you, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’ve got a lot to cover. Lots change since we spoke just last year. We’ve got a very fast moving industry with travel, a lot of positive changes, and we’re gonna get to some of those a little bit later. But with this being the second time, we kicked off last episode talking about your hospitality and travel journey and what led you to Questex, but I wanna talk about mentor, right? We’re still kind of combating this staffing shortage right now, and we wanna talk about maybe some of the mentors or influences in your career, and then speak to maybe the importance of mentors right now as we try to combat this staffing shortage, especially in an industry like hospitality.
Alexi Khajavi :
Yeah. I would love to. It’s an important topic.
Ryan Embree:
You wanna go ahead and share some of maybe the mentors in your hospitality career, or influences in your career?
Alexi Khajavi :
Yeah, you know, I’ve had a really diverse career in travel and hospitality. I mean, it started out in San Francisco in the sort of the “.com” era of 1997 to, you know, 2001, 2002. And I had the fortune of joining an early stage OTA. There was three OTAs that launched ironically in 1997. One was booking.com and one was Expedia. And I joined the third one. <laugh. But you know, it was filled with talented people from MIT and Stanford that were, and there was, I think there was about 40 of us in the beginning, and it was just explosive growth. And I at 25, 24 years old, just coming outta college was really given a seat at the table for which I was not, deserve it and was not prepared for, but it just gave me an incredible opportunity to sit amongst some of the most really intelligent, innovative and creative thinkers, that were applying that knowledge, which, you know, in our industry often, we don’t get that type of talent, particularly back then. And because it was this merging of technology with travel, one of the world’s largest in industries, it was just a really exciting time. And so there was a group of folks there that I had the pleasure of working with, and it really taught me, uh, some of the fundamentals that I, that I still carry with me today in my career. And one is just surrounding yourself with really great creative people, and there’s something special about all being tuned into and aligned around the same strategic goals and allowing for a sort of an idea meritocracy to take place. But as long as all of that energy and all of that thinking and all of that hard work is geared around the same northern star, bringing that diverse set of thinking and individuals or personalities to the table really does create magic. And it creates, I think a sense of belonging as well. So from a very young age, that was, that was really important. Since then I’ve had the pleasure of working with individuals like Paul, a lair who, you know, unfortunately has since passed away, but he was the former CEO of Xerox. He was the chairman of our board for a company I worked with down in Costa Rica, and who taught me, frankly, things that again, running a company like Xerox, a public company, which I haven’t had the pleasure of doing in my own career, was a really incredible experience for me to apply those fundamentals, understanding really the importance of being able to read, present, and understand the drivers of different financial statements, balance sheets and PnL’s, of course. But really the importance of cash. We were a travel company. It was an integrated travel company, an airline, hotel company in a tour operator. And we were profitable, but it was a very seasonal business. And so, we came very close to being, chapter 11, not because we were not profitable, because we just, we had a cashflow issue to based off cyclical. Yeah, which is very sort of travel related. But again, that was, I mean, it sounds simple now, and it sounds almost naive now when I when I say it, but, you know, I really didn’t, I didn’t understand the importance of cash and cash flow management at that point in my career. So I’ve had the real privilege and honor of working with some incredible leaders, certainly in travel and hospitality and in some other markets as well. We really have good people in hospitality. And I look at the CEOs of some of our hotel companies, some of the airlines, but also the associations, whether that be AHLA or USTA, I mean, there are some really incredible minds and thinkers that are not only just very intelligent, but are also very passionate and incredible advocates for the industry. So we’re really, I think, blessed in travel and hospitality that we’re now attracting, I think, more talent, to that. But at the lower level, to your point, or at the entry level, let’s say, we still do have a labor issue, and I still think we need to, per our conversation the last time around, we need to find a way to attract more talent into the industry. And you and I had a great vociferous, debate, if you will, on this. We need to mentor them, and we need to help them grow their careers within travel, not just treat it as a summer job or a way to make cash in between sort of two different careers. So it’s a challenge, but I fortunately, personally, have had the honor of working some really great minds.
Ryan Embree:
And I think that’s where mentorship comes in, right? Is you can show a story to this younger generation of hospitality professionals and say, this is what a career could look like in hospitality 5, 10, 15, sometimes 25 plus years down the line, right? And, and there’s a path there, and it’s gonna also fall on our shoulders to make sure that there is a clear path there, because that’s what this younger generation or maybe even pools that we haven’t explored before, and going to them and saying, this is what hospitality looks like. This is what a career here is. And that’s why, again, I call on our audience. You might not think of yourself as a mentor, but there is someone, and, you know, doing 20 plus of these interviews with industry leaders in this TMG hospitality trailblazer series, one of the consistent thing other than saying, “Hey, I didn’t think I’d be in hospitality”, is there was an impactful mentor a part of their journey that led them to where they are. So you could have a severe impact on someone’s professional and just growth in general as a person. So thank you for sharing that. Another topic we covered last year around this time was the continued resurgence of business and group travel. Every post I see on LinkedIn or social media from Questex, it’s announcing another record breaking attendance at your events that your amazing events that you guys put on. So what’s your feeling on group travel, business travel? You can continue, it’s still bullish on it, still continuing to see this, and maybe how has it changed, right? The sentiment, the energy at these events changed then maybe five years ago, pre covid?
Alexi Khajavi :
Well, first of all, group and corporate travel is back, and it’s been back, it’s been somewhat, I think overshadowed by just the incredible growth on the leisure side, right? So, travel for recreation or for holiday that has come back, frankly quicker than anybody thought it would. I mean, people were traveling in the summer of 2020, and it’s just continued to soar as more and more markets open up. Certainly domestically in the US 2021 and 2022 were record breaking years. And then 2023 last summer, you know, Europe really felt the return particularly of the US traveler still incredibly, Asia is not back either from a leisure or a corporate side, meaning outbound from Asia. But corporate and groups have been really performing incredibly well. And they continue to, as we’ve seen in some markets, leisure has started to taper off and to, uh, sort of, uh, flatten in some markets, not down, but certainly sort of coming back down to sort of smaller growth year over year.
Ryan Embree:
It’s hard to follow a Taylor Swift concert tour around the country.
Alexi Khajavi :
That did have a direct impact on RevPAR, as we saw some from some of the industry data, which is incredible in and of itself, and could warrant a show on its own that one individual drives an entire market’s RevPAR. So beyond Taylor Swift, and thank God we have Taylor in our industry, just speaking from what we see, we have seen both incredible pockets of high demand and high growth. And then we’ve seen pockets, where it’s been a little bit more challenging. Life sciences and healthcare and technology were absolutely booming from 2020 on through about 2022 & 2023. Life sciences and healthcare continue to do very well. And I’m, again, just speaking from a Questex perspective. Of the markets that we serve, technology has been frankly challenged job losses, you know, challenge in terms of stock prices, but also market demand. I mean, AI, as we have seen is an incredible trend and will change, our lives, but also the trajectory of those companies. But it hasn’t translated into profits for those companies yet. And so our events in those markets are a bit more, I would say normal, right? So, you know, still growing, but not seeing the explosive growth that we’re seeing in life sciences and healthcare. The markets that I have the privilege of running hospitality, travel and wellness, really since about 2021, 2022, have been on an explosive growth. And we returned back to really kind of 2019 levels, which is normal if you will, as early as in some cases, 2021. But certainly by 2022, we were higher than 2019 levels in all of those markets. One we’re fortunate in that each of those markets in our portfolio, in each of those markets has both events and media. And so focusing just on the events side, to your question, where it is a market leader, so it is the CES of that industry, you know, the consumer electronic show in Vegas. So it is a tier one or a tier two, so it is a must attend event. It’s already in people’s calendars, it’s already in people’s budgets. And so it just benefits off of being sort of built within the fabric of that sector. So we’re certainly benefiting from that. And as more people, there have been a flight to quality versus quantity. What we’ve seen to answer your second part of that question, is that because of the work from home or the hybrid working, so for example, today I am working from home, but some cases people are working from home full-time, or in many cases we’re seeing this sort of hybrid element, which means not everybody is in the office at the same time. Typically, the purpose that we serve as an information services company is we inform and we connect buyers and sellers in the five markets that we serve. Well, what we’ve seen is that our events have not only become platforms for connecting those buyers and sellers, but they’ve become platforms for connecting our own customers. Typically, an exhibitor or a sponsor that was coming to one of our events to meet clients that we would bring to that event, yes, they’re still coming for that. And yes, corporate travel’s absolutely rebounding because of that very same premise. I mean, if you just found out your competitor flew to Dallas to meet your top account, you better get on that plane and get to Dallas. And that is absolutely, zoom is great, this is incredible. It’s very practical. It does not build business. It does not strengthen, share of wallet, and it does not drive the bottom line. At the end of the day, you’ve got to build those relationships, and those relationships are built in human to human touch. So corporate travel is definitely benefiting from that. But we are seeing more and more this theme and this enthusiasm around bring the team, which is actually one of the mottos around the Hospitality Show. Which you joined us last year in Las Vegas, and we’re seeing our customers bring their team together. So using our event platforms as the opportunity to not just meet their clients and new clients, but meet each other. And so conduct their own incentive meetings or their own strategic meetings or their own cultural touch points around our own events. This effective model of sort of treating it as a multi-sided platform that we don’t just meet our clients, but we meet each other from a company perspective. It’s really interesting and we see a lot of opportunity for us to deliver more value to our communities and the sectors that we serve in that trend.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I absolutely love that. I think it’s a win-win when you bring your team, right? Because not only are they able to participate in things like, if you’re a supplier exhibitor, but you also get some incredible insights that we’re gonna talk about some for some industry experts and leaders, and then you get that connection, right? And that’s where I was trying to pinpoint, because I feel like the events that I’ve been to post Covid, there’s a different energy, and I think you might have hit the nail on the head about talking about how the way we work now with it being hybrid or sometimes just working from home constantly, there just seems like there’s an energy to these events that wasn’t there. And, and it’s probably because what you’ve said, those misconnections of seeing everyone in the office every single day, now all of a sudden you’re traveling out for work, you get to see industry leaders, you get to connect with your teammates, exhibitors, suppliers, that energy and that connection is palpable. And again, speaking from personal experience at the Hospitality Show last year, which we’re gonna talk about. But before we get into that, I wanna talk about a topic that’s always brought up, no matter what event you go to technology, right? It’s certainly risen to the top of these agendas and seminar programs at these shows. Where do you see, I’m gonna put you on the spot here. I want to get your opinion. Where do you see the biggest opportunity for travel in its leveraging technology? Is it on the guest and experienced consumer side, or is it on the professional side, operations side to help maybe with combat staffing challenges and things? Where do you see the biggest opportunity right now?
Alexi Khajavi :
That’s a great question, and I’m not going to cop out by saying both, but I’ll also step back and give a broader answer for a second. One, our transportation infrastructure is in disarray, whether that be the air control towers that helps power our airline, our aviation industry which is partly due to a labor issue as well, but also our visa and our immigration. I mean, to wait four years for a visa, and then when you just got off, after waiting four years and you just got off an 18 hour flight and you wait four hours to get through immigration, you’re not coming back to the US. You know, and other countries are competing for those same travelers, and they’re expediting those processes at every touch point. The visa maybe not the transportation, but you know, the wait times to get into the country. So technology, and look, let’s face it, most of the border patrol agents, that we’re bringing into that, that field are going at down to the southern border. I mean, that’s just where the, based off of the immigration and and so forth, that’s where they’re being sent, not to JFK, not to LAX, not to Atlanta. So technology is really the solution there, and biometrics, which we know works, or the global entry, which we know works that really needs to be improved because we are competing for travelers. I mean, I know that sounds odd, and I know that we’ve been very bullish and very confident that, hey, everybody wants to come to the US, that’s true. but a lot of people wanna go to France, and a lot of people wanna go to Spain, and a lot of people wanna go to Cambodia and other places around the world. And those countries are really improving their infrastructure, IE their technology in order to facilitate a better visa traveler entry and reentry experience. That’s one. And that affects us all. I know that, whether it’s in the hotel industry or the events in industry, we can sort of think about that as a tangential part of the ecosystem, but has a direct relationship. I mean, we are in markets that we need travelers and business people from Asia, from the Middle East, from Europe, from South America, from Central America. And if they can’t get here, then that is a, a real great on our ability to grow and our ability to sell hotel rooms and our ability to, to drive the industry forward. So that’s a real problem. To answer your question a little bit closer to home, is it guest facing or is it on the business side? Honestly, I think it’s on the business side, because the reality is, is that a tech enabled business ultimately provides the ability for us to deliver a more human powered experience. So I don’t think that that guests are traveling and making travel decisions because your app is better than their app, or your keyless entry is better than my keyless entry. Is it important? Yeah. But it’s really those intangible experiences that are human powered experiences, that is what travel and hospitality is all about. And really where I see technology having an indelible impact on our industry is when you’re tech enabled, it actually frees up time for your people to do other tasks. And if we think about what drives real enterprise value in hospitality, at least, and travel for that matter, it’s about someone having a human powered experience that is personalized, that’s authentic, that’s sincere. And they can only do that within the infrastructure if AI or tech in general is powering the infrastructure of that organization, the procurement, the ordering, the planning KPIs, the logistics, the data, manipulation. There’s a lot of stuff that tech obviously can play a part in. So I think that, not to say that, it’s a zero sum game, you can do both. And in fact, we have to do both. But tech has largely been a vendor to hospitality. It’s not been a strategic tool to drive change, but drive strategy, and to enable more human powered experiences in the industry. And I think we really, we are at a fulcrum point in the industry where CIOs or CTOs are at the executive board table, they are making decisions reporting directly to the CEO and that is a wholesale change in the industry. And we have hundreds, if not thousands of really strategic creative suppliers in tech that are running all throughout the various touch points back of house, front of house. It’s a great moment in the industry. We’re not there yet. But, again, to answer your question, I could say both, but I would say if you had to put it somewhere back of house, because it will free up your front of house to really deliver those truly memorable experiences for life.
Ryan Embree:
Well, we’ve got a generation that’s on the way up and coming into our industry that’s gonna expect those things. And I heard this the other day, which I thought was absolutely brilliant talking about it, what an opportunity for the industry when we have new people, maybe outside of hospitality coming in to introduce some of these new technology. Because at the time, the way I used to check in guests is a whole heck of a lot different than it is today. And sometimes they’re digitally checking in themselves. So if you have this new cohort of employees, it’s gonna be easier to train than maybe the, the hospitality veteran that’s been doing it this way their entire 20 or 30 year career. So I definitely think it’s an opportunity, I guess if there’s any silver lining maybe with this staffing shortage, we are having new people come in, new voices, and they’re gonna tell you exactly what they want, where the inefficiencies are. And hopefully, like you said, leadership and travel kind of listens to that feedback and acts upon it. And that’s how change happens. So as you know, this is a digital marketing podcast at heart, even though we talk about other subjects, but we always are trying to educate hoteliers, just travel industry really in general, how important things like social media, having a strong digital presences online, we know your background, you have a strong background in marketing. Can you just speak to, give some advice maybe to our audience on, or preach maybe why it is just so critical, especially today to have that social media presence or online reputation?
Alexi Khajavi :
Yeah, I mean, you’re right. I mean I’ve worked in advertising and creative agencies and been in sales and marketing, you know, the majority of my career. I mean, look, when we first got started, or I first got started for that matter, 25 years ago. I mean, there was five channels you could choose from, right? From marketing. And it was, it was as Hal days, I mean, you still didn’t know it was 50% of your advertising was working, but you knew it was working, right? And so, but you only had five channels to manage. Today you’ve got 500 channels to manage. So I really feel for marketers these days. I mean, I feel for them from a sort of a, it’s a difficult environment, but it’s also a really exciting environment. The one channel that is unquestionably critical to making and influencing travel decisions is social media. There’s no question that when you look at the demographics of who makes travel decisions, let’s separate leisure from corporate, or groups, but focusing on leisure, it’s typically the wife and increasingly the kids. I mean, it is in my family. I mean, my say is very minimal. It’s probably based off of what airline we’re gonna fly because I’ve got points. So where we go when we go and what we do is largely driven by, by the wife, spouse, and the kids. And increasingly kids are making purchasing decisions and influencing purchasing decisions based off of what they see on social media. So a common question in the Casa de khajavi is, what are your top five destinations you’d love to go to? And we’re a traveling family. All of that’s influenced by Instagram and by social media. So the ability to not only influence and really kind of manage all the way through that buyer’s journey. So dream, plan, purchase, experience, share, and then back around again, that is the buyer’s journey in travel and social media not only is a massive part of that because you’re posting whilst you’re on vacation, but it’s influencing the dream stage. It’s influencing the plan stage. You can even buy now through some of these social media channels. You can experience it hence the authenticity and the human power. Fortunately, I don’t think, your Apple goggles or your Oculus will replace that for some it will. I don’t get that. So social media is, um, is a critical part of the buyer’s journey, and that’s where marketers are trying to enter themselves, their brands, their products, into that buyer’s journey. And to be able to do it on one channel throughout that buyer’s journey, for the most part, is an incredible power that social media holds. The challenge with it is that it, there’s so much noise in these channels, and so it doesn’t replace the need one to be in other channels. It also really puts the onus on brands to try and capture first party data, as we’ve seen, if you don’t own your own customer, then somebody else does. And that’s where, again, we at Questex feel so privileged. I mean, we publish every day. We’ve got 5 million records across the five markets that we work in. And being able to know what John Doe reads when he reads it, what are the things that he’s searching for, and piece together a strategy around that is really what all brands should be doing. And again, that part of that can be done on social media, and part of that can be done through your website, through content marketing and even through advertising. So all of it still matters. It’s just where I think we’re at is that I see a lot of marketers these days, again, and it goes back to your question, Ryan, about labor. I see a lot of leadership in marketing that is still using a marketing playbook from 2002. And it’s not only ineffective in driving the business goals forward in achieving the KPIs of that business, but I think it’s, it’s frankly turning off a lot of these younger smart potential creative marketers that come in and go, this is not how I engage with brands, and these are not the channels that I believe in or that I’m in. And I think we’ve, when that shoe drops and this, some of this generation of, of marketing leadership exits, there’s gonna be a dynamic shift in the marketplace. And I think that’s a really interesting, we’re at this really interesting moment right now. And ironically not to throw too many elements into it, but I think it’s really interesting is that you’re starting to see CIOs or CTOs, in some cases, even in hospitality, take over the marketing function. We saw it at Wyndham where the CTO took over from the CMO, and it’s because you’ve got this massive blend of MarTech with marketing, with tech to create MarTech. And that, I don’t know how that plays out because despite MarTech and all of the marketing technology channels that you can use, and you need to be a data scientist, and you need to know data, you still need a strong brand. It doesn’t replace the importance of brand. A brand is a promise. And whether that’s in social media or that’s in a full page ad in the New York Times, if you don’t have a brand, it’s gonna cost you a lot of money to try and move that needle. But if you have a strong brand, but you don’t tactically execute well, it’s also very ineffective. And we’re seeing kind of both right now. So there’s just a lot of noise and transformation in the system, and I don’t think that’s played its course yet, but I think we’ll see that in the next five years.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s super interesting to see how these big brands deal with this. Again, keep talking about this next generation coming up. You think about, especially, starting from I’ve got a couple toddlers myself, they’re seeing more ads than we’ve ever consumed by the age that they have purchasing power. So they will have seen, I mean, you think about when the only ads we might’ve seen might’ve been on the tv, talk about YouTube, talk about social media. They are seeing ads constantly all over the place in this visual video form. So if your content is not attractive, engaging to them, they will ignore it very, very quickly. And you have to be, have your ear to the floor to see if they’re listening and what they’re telling you, because I think you are absolutely right, Alexi, you look at some of that data, they will tell you exactly what they’re engaging with, and it’s all in the data, but you gotta be able to keep your ear to the floor and listen and, and look for those patterns and trends. So let’s dive and get into the Hospitality Show, right? This is also talking about this incredible event. I do not envy you in having to top what you did last year, but looking at the agenda, looking at the press releases, some of the speakers events that are gonna happen there, I’m very excited about this. So talk to us a little bit about what attendees can expect for the 2024 Hospitality Show.
Alexi Khajavi :
Yeah. Year one was top five launch around the world in terms of new launches. It just got nominated for the best new show in 2023 by Trade Show Executive. So we’re very proud of that with our partners, AHLA, but more importantly than the accolades and the success of year one is the purpose of the hospitality show. We launched it with our partners, the American Hotel and Lodging Association, because running hotels and all of the amenities, whether that be the spa, food and beverage, the gym within a hotels is becoming much more complex and much more challenging. And despite the fact that, as we said a few moments ago, we’ve been operating in this really growing top line, RevPAR, ADRs, occupancy coming along with it, environment, profit margins have been challenged. And that’s because one inflation labor and then just the complexity, running all of that under one roof and paying for the utilities and all that, it is really, really challenging. You have issues like insurance. You’re seeing investors sell portfolios of hotels, not because they’re not performing well, but because the insurance premiums from climate change largely is making it unsustainable. Forgive the pun, to run those hotels profitably. So we’ve got this really challenging environment in which owners of which own a small branded or independent hotel in on the side of the road are challenged, as well as some of the largest REITs and private equity and sovereign wealth funds that own blocks of hotels around the world. So that’s why we launched the Hospitality Show, because there wasn’t one show that brought the entire industry together to look at all of the levers for growth with a focus on profitability and optimization of hotel assets. And that can be revenue and that can be costs. And it can be all of the things in between on that classic P&I. So this year we are seeing incredible growth. I’m really pleased to say, and I’m really, the teams at Questex and the teams at AHLA, I mean, they are doing yeoman’s work. They’re doing an incredible job of working with our advisory board, which contains some of the sharpest minds across the industry. Owners like Mitch Patel, Vinne Patel, big funds like M-C-R-K-S-L, capital operators, like as I said, Scott Strickland from Wyndham Asset Managers like Chad Sorenson, and then suppliers from Oracle to Honeywell to Encore to Worldview. So I mean, this is like, this is the ecosystem that really is, why this is AHLA’s show as much as it is ours, because it is truly where we’re collecting the industry. So this year, San Antonio, October 28th to October 30th, and we’re projecting over 5,000 attendees. We’ve expanded our general manager or our GM awards. That was one of the sort of most exciting, enthusiastic parts of last year to truly celebrate the backbone of our industry those GMs that will be followed by the age and a GM summit, which is content specifically tailored for GMs to discover those innovative ways, again, to drive profitability at their properties. The expo floor, we had so many, we had over 300 exhibitors last year. Were now over 400 exhibitors this year. So that’s grown as well. We’ve got interactive showcases on the show floor for our attendees. So the smart outdoors, the outdoor sort of element really became kind of almost an accelerant from Covid, and it’s really continued. So how do you activate those areas outdoors to make them one, you know, enjoyable, but second tournament into profit centers, interim hotel entertainment sponsored by DirecTV. And then also how do we activate the lobbies with our meet me in the lobby activation. We’ve got a lenders alley as we know, debt has been expensive in this environment, but it’s critical to the capital stack for hotel owners. So that’s designed specifically for our owners that are attending, again, per that advisory board feedback that we’ve got on helping owners find the right debt partners. We’re also now partnering with Clean the World, which is our partners on our sustainability initiative. And that’s helping our attendees build these hygiene kits made from recycled soap, donated to a local homeless shelter. And all that comes from hotels. So, last year I think we built 500 kits and our goal this year is a thousand. So a sustainability and a goodwill component as always. I mean, this is part of the fabric of our industry. And then the networking we’ve got, last year, I think everyone came out of Vegas saying we had the best party that the industry has ever seen, sort of a James Bond theme, which was very popular. This year we’re coming back with a block party on the river walk, a VIP owner’s reception. And then DirecTV is back with that opening reception this year at the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts in San Antonio, which is a beautiful venue. And they’ve got a surprise announcement coming up. I won’t steal their thunder on that. So, really there’s a lot of excitement on the expo floor in the networking, just in the leadership that that attends. But also the educational sessions are some of the best in the industry. I mean, we’ve got marquee speakers this year from Jose Andress, which is, you know, world Kitchen and the world famous chef to Aaron Andrews and many others that are on our website. And we continue to announce, so senior leadership as well as CEOs from the companies, which are really dealing with some of the biggest issues facing not just the industry, but the global and the US economy. It is an election year, so there’s a lot of stuff going on in the space. And it should just be, again, most industries have their marquee event, whether it be CES in Las Vegas, or you know, the concrete show for the construction industry or the automotive show. Hospitality hasn’t had its own show. And that’s why, again, it’s so important for the industry to be there. And it’s important for us to be able to learn, network and be inspired around how do we drive profits and a better marketplace and industry for hotel owners, operators and suppliers.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you got me fired up about this year’s show. That’s for sure. And I think I can say this ’cause I am a Texan, but everything’s bigger in Texas, Hospitality Show, right? We’re excited to hear it, Alexi. And I love the education. It’s so insightful, so informative, so many great takeaways. I mean, we dedicate a whole episode after the hospitality show to talk about the takeaways, the trends, the patterns, things that we’re hearing. But I wanna focus in on the networking. ’cause you were here at the ground floor when this thing was built last year, and you have a really amazing chance opportunity to network at the hospitality show. And I wanna know kind of the thought process behind the thinking and why it was such a priority to make sure that there were these networking opportunities for hospitality professionals at this show.
Alexi Khajavi :
Well, because it is a people powered industry, I mean, at the end of the day, with all the infrastructure and all the technology there are that are infinitely more important to us, deals are done based off the relationships we have. I mean, that’s just this industry and we’re not gonna change it. In fact, we celebrate it and we build momentum into those relationships. So, that’s really a core component of the hospitality show is to continue to foster those relationships, bring the right buyers and sellers there. And we’re using intelligent meetings to connect specific buyers and sellers that are selling a product versus looking for that same product. But the other really exciting thing about the hospitality show is the extemporaneous or spontaneous connections that are made. And just off the top of my head, somewhat anecdotal, but you know, last year I remember walking through the show floor and I saw Mark Hian, walking around with Kevin Carey, CEO of AHLA. And you know, here you have one of the CEOs of the largest hotel companies in the world going around booth to booth and talking to owners and talking to suppliers and trying to understand what is the thinking and what is the purpose, various products or services that were there. And it wasn’t just Mark who’s, you know, one of the nicest guys in the business. It was also Jeff Baloti was front row of our GM awards and GM Summit and sitting there clapping vibrantly. Yeah, it was so cool to see, again, the CEO of the largest franchise company in the industry celebrating GMs of other brands properties because again, this is the bedrock. So that really is, and it’s not just those two, but it was many, many others which I can. And so it was that real opportunity where the industry, which is, it’s one of the most fragmented industries in the world. So it is a challenge sometimes. And that’s again, that is the purpose of the Hospitality Show. We’ve got investment shows. We have NYU, we have IHIF in in Europe, we’ve got Asia, we’ve got Alice in Lodging Conference and Hunter, great shows. We’ve got the design shows, BDNY, the hospitality design. We’ve got operational shows, we’ve got law, hospitality, law shows. So, there’s plenty of these events in the industry, including our own, but none of them brought the ecosystem together and in order to really understand, but more importantly solve the challenges that we have as an industry, the only way to do that is to do it as one industry, as one voice. And so the privilege, and we really see it as a privilege of being able to do that with our partners, AHLA and bring this industry together from the senior leadership of some of the largest hotel companies or suppliers with a single owner or a new provider to the space is just a, it’s a real honor, but it is critical to the overall success of hospitality in the hotel industry. And therefore I really encourage everyone to make that trip. It’s good for your business, it’s good for your career, but more importantly, it’s good for the industry. And if we’re all together on this, then we will advance our needs and we’ll continue to see the industry grow.
Ryan Embree:
It is really, again, personal experience. It is really inspiring and cool to see rival brands rally around really important topics, human trafficking, that was still an issue that we’re battling right now. But to see everyone in lockstep together, and rallying around a cause like that, sustainability, another one to see that it’s very inspirational. You’re right, Alexi. And it is great for our industry. It gives you that hope that our industry is moving in the right direction. So, very, very cool. So with this being the second year, I’m sure you have some goals after year one, but when all said and done, that final attendee walks outta the Hospitality Show, what’s that one thing, that one goal where you can sit back and say, mission accomplished, second year, 2024 hospitality show was a success?
Alexi Khajavi :
Well, first of all, there’s a cold beer in my hand.
Ryan Embree:
Alexi Khajavi :
It really, I mean, the first thing is just looking around at the team and really feeling a sense of accomplishment for what we’ve done. And we truly, truly are immersed in this industry, and we’re deeply connected with our own personal relationships as well as just our professional relationships in the space. We hear a lot of feedback and some of it glowing and some of it all around how to make it better. But it’s a symbiotic relationship where our customers and our attendees are that are there, they’re invested in it, right? They’ve spent their time, their money, their resources. So we’re in it together. And there is an accretive or an iterative process to make it better. And we get the feedback and we work with our advisory boards, and it’s, I mean, we work on this thing 365 days a year. I mean, there are dedicated resources that work on this show, 365 days a year, that’s all they think about. But in that moment where, the last attendee walks out and the lights are going down, it really is just looking around at the team and the folks that made it happen, which are hand on heart. It’s not me. It’s, it’s a lot of people that are doing much more work and better work than than I could ever do. And it’s seeing that gratitude in being able to do something that’s impactful in an industry that we love, that’s a real gift. And it’s a real pleasure to have that opportunity. And we don’t forget that. So that’s a real nice thing. Yeah.
Ryan Embree:
And then I’m sure right shortly after it, its start planning for the next year, but maybe you could take that moment to enjoy it.
Alexi Khajavi :
That’s what the beer’s for.
Ryan Embree:
Exactly, exactly. Well, as we wrap up today, Alexi, in our industry, we’re always trying to predict the future, right? Just a little bit. We’re looking at occupancy, we’re looking at airlines, we’re looking at how many seats filled up, you know, 60, 90 days from now. So we’re at a really unique time right now. We’ve got a lot of external factors. You mentioned some inflation interest rates, rising construction costs. And by the way, we’ve got an election coming up. What’s your kind of feeling sentiment on the outlook of our industry over the next couple years?
Alexi Khajavi :
I’m wildly optimistic. I’m bullish all the way on travel and hospitality. I do think, however, that the industry needs to look at its carrying capacity to demand, particularly in those areas of high demand or sensitive biodiverse environments, whether it’s Venice or Paris or, you know, Ancor Watt. We haven’t even gotten back to global outbound travel in 2019 levels. And we’re, again, seeing destinations really struggle with the impact of tourism and hospitality. And so we are going to have to really get some critical thinking around that. And it will need to be managed. I mean, we need to manage demand. And I know that sounds strange because we typically focus on managing capacity and letting the demand just hopefully go and rise, rise, rise. But we’re gonna have to look at that demand and manage that demand more effectively. Because look, the new generations are absolutely looking at are completely invested in the experience economy. Tourism and hospitality will continue to grow, whether it’s in the Western world where it’s experiences over things. You’re seeing it, the data does not lie. They don’t want to own a car. They want to go travel. Digital nomads aren’t a thing. It is a generation. And that’s not even including new markets opening up again. China is at 10% of its outbound travel to what it was pre pandemic levels, throw that into the mix and then throw more countries, developing countries. I mean, as people, as middle classes emerge, the first thing they want to do is go travel international. It is the way it is, and we’re very blessed by that. But some destinations are struggling with that demand, and we’re gonna need to manage that effectively. And the positive thing is that we can, we can spread that demand out. So it’s not about tapping the brakes, but it’s about managing it effectively. And I think that that’s, uh, that’s something that we can do. We’ve got enough smart people around and the importance on local economies, but the global economy of travel and hospitality, 10% of global economy, 11% global employment, we have to fix it. So, I think that’s I think I’m very confident and very optimistic of our future. We just have to make sure we don’t kill the goose that’s laying the golden egg.
Ryan Embree:
It’s great observation. And I’m sure some of those creative thoughts and ideas we’ll certainly be brewing at the Hospitality Show in San Antonio in October. So, Alexi, thank you so much for joining me once again on the Suite Spot. We’re very happy to announce it. I don’t think we’ve announced it yet on social media or anything that the Suite Spot is returning to the Hospitality Show in 2024 in San Antonio. We are so excited. Hopefully we’ll run into you along with, it’s a who’s who, as you mentioned at that show, so you never know who we’re gonna be running into interviewing, but thank you again for taking the time outta your day, your busy schedule as we lead up to this incredible show to share with us a little bit about your insights and thoughts about this upcoming hospitality show. So thank you, Alexi.
Alexi Khajavi :
No, Ryan, thank you. Thank you for your support and love your show. It’s fabulous, I listen to it all the time, so thanks again.
Alexi Khajavi:
I appreciate it. And thank you all for listening. We’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Join the Suite Spot in this quarterly series to hear from American Hotel & Lodging Association President & CEO, Kevin Carey, on the state of the hospitality industry and recent developments being made by the AHLA to move the industry forward.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. As always, thank you for listening. We’ve got a fantastic episode for you today. Another industry check-in with Kevin Carey, interim president and CEO at the American Hotel and Lodging Association. Kevin, thank you so much for taking the time and joining me today.
Kevin Carey :
Hi, Ryan. Good day. It’s good to see you as well.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited to have you. You know, we’re gonna jump right into it. We spoke last in the spring season, right before a busy summer travel season. Listen, the travelers have been busy traveling to hotels. Hotels have been busy hosting, but AHLA has been busy as well, advocating for hoteliers and everything that you guys do for our industry. Let’s catch up with some of those big accomplishments and some of the most pressing issues right now. We know we, there’s always those issues that rise up. What are some of those that hotels should be most aware of right now?
Kevin Carey :
Oh as you said, it’s been an incredibly busy period of time. Certainly first and foremost for the industry. The support and the service our member companies provide for guests and the environment they create for our associates and workers is certainly first and foremost, our team here, both in AHLA and, uh, the foundation have been incredibly busy as well. Um, over the first half of the year, it’s been, uh, a, a peak period of activity at a state and local level with state legislators and legislatures in session, uh, and certainly in Washington here, uh, as, uh, the Congress starts to look towards end of the year in the election. So, we’ve been advancing our work, uh, at a state level on short-term rental sets of issues in Washington here around the passage in the house, uh, of the Hotel Fees Transparency Act. Um, and, and also work to ensure that we defeated the, the joint employer rule as well. There’s just a number of areas that we feel proud about as a team and that are really meaningful on behalf of the industry as well.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And but there’s still with all those wins, and congratulations to your team, there’s always work to do as you know, and some of those pressing issues that are at the forefront right now for our hoteliers. What, what are some of those that, again, hoteliers, even though it might be something regional, they still should be aware of because it has, it’s gonna have an impact on the entire industry.
Kevin Carey :
Absolutely. And really to identify two that are certainly getting a lot of our team’s attention and the industry attention. So first and foremost, in New York City, a bill was introduced in the city council several weeks ago, approaching about a month ago at this point. And this bill, the so-called Safe Hotels Act, has been positioned by his proponents as a simple licensing bill. And the bill sponsors have represented that hotels are unregulated, and that there’s an increase in crime occurring in hotels. This bill would do grave damage, not only to the hotel industry, to travelers, to workers, who represent and are employed by the industry and the city economy and the tourism economy itself. So this is bad for everyone. And we’ve been very actively involved in New York several times, meeting with members of the city council organizing the industry to have a strong voice in pushing back, on this ill conceived and flawed legislation. So we’re still working very actively on that and trying to underscore the grave damage that this would represent for the industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and sometimes, you know, these to hoteliers, everyday hoteliers, this might seem like, you know, some complicated issues and things of that nature, but you’ve got some great explainer videos on your social media on AHLA.com where hoteliers can get information to be more educated about this issue because, and show some of the effects that you were talking about there, Kevin, and learn a little bit more about, what this legislation can mean for everyday hoteliers. But, another win that I saw recently trending on ALA’s website was the hospitality law database, which was launched. Could you share with our hotel audience kind of the idea behind this, why there was a need to do this, and how hoteliers everyday hoteliers can leverage this?
Kevin Carey :
Sure. You think about ALA’s role where we promote the industry, we advocate on its behalf, and we also play an important role as the convening entity for the industry and all segments of the industry is how our membership model is designed within that. We provide services around the advocacy that we conduct on behalf of our member companies, whether here in Washington at a state and local level, or even increasingly on cross border set of issues. But we also provide a membership value proposition. And alongside the advocacy work we do, we felt rolling out this hospitality law database would give our members access to the laws that impact their operations on a nationwide basis. So this is a resource for our members. Obviously, it aligns with the work that we do on the advocacy front and felt that this was a natural extension in enhancing our value to our member companies, but also obviously very germane and linked to the work we do on a public policy advocacy basis as well.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And the more educated you can get hotels about, again, the issues that are at the forefront of our industry right now the more support you can get on your end, they’re gonna be able to reach out to their representatives to advocate for themselves as well with the help of such a strong arm, like AHLA. So, fantastic. You’ve talked about the advocacy work, the resource and educational piece that AHLA provides to hoteliers as well, especially around one of the issues we’ve been talking about, which is staffing shortages. And I wanna talk about this. We’ve actually been busy. The Suite Spot has been on a hospitality campus crawl across the state of Florida talking to some of those educators that are getting the next generation of professional hoteliers and hospitality workers out there. But I think one of the ways, small ways we can combat this is creating opportunities like internships, hospitality internships. We have hospitality marketing internship at Travel Media Group. We just wrapped up. I’ve seen a couple social media posts of your summer internship program at AHLA and thanking those interns in the work they’re doing. Can you discuss the importance of creating opportunities like for young professionals to do hospitality and hotel internships and the role of hospitality mentors in our industries could help us combat with staffing shortages?
Kevin Carey :
Certainly, kudos to you and your efforts on that front as well. But we’ve had a intern program here for a number of years. We’ve got a class of nine interns, who are still in their roles as we speak here. I think they’re preparing their, their final capstone presentations for their team, but they’re embedded in each of our key teams from the government affairs team to our membership team, our foundation team, our HR department. So they’re learning about the role of an industry association, learning about the hospitality and the lodging industry structure overall. And they just brought a great energy as well as enhancement to our culture. And they’re doing great work. I’m always so impressed with their poise and maturity, and they really just blended right into the team, and it’s been great to have them around the office. And, and we’re really proud about the program. And internship programs are always something personal level, that I’ve had a lot of time for. I started my career in two internships that were very foundational and exposing me to the business community and creating a pathway to the first full-time job, that I had many years ago. So it’s been great to see our team embrace that and also the response we’ve received from our, from our intern class. And they’ve had some opportunities to play a leadership role actually where they’ve reached out and helped to convene interns from other trade associations and even from some of our member companies, and forged a joint session that was hosted here in our office where they’ve built a rapport and some networking that they’re doing with fellow interns across a number of different organizations. So, we’ll be sad to see them go, but also, really proud about the accomplishments they’ve had and what they’ve contributed to our organization.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to see, and I can’t tell you how many times Kevin, I’ve been across interviewing a industry leader, and you know, how, how they have a very similar path. You know, they started either in an internship or they started as a summer job in college and fell in love with our industry or have a mentor that really guided them to say, “Hey, listen, you’ve got a career in this.” And, it’s always great to hear those stories, and it’s about creating those stories so that young professionals can be exposed to everything that our, our incredible industry has to offer. As, as you already know. And, you know, we had Alexi Khajavi from Questex on the podcast recently, he really set the stage for this year’s Hospitality Show in San Antonio, which the Suite Spot will be there and covering live, which we’re really excited about AHLA partners with Questex to put on this incredible show we’re both gonna be attending. What are you most looking forward to and why is this the must attend event for hoteliers this season?
Kevin Carey :
Well, we just had a joint working team session, earlier this week. And again, the enthusiasm, and the focus on just delivering, an outstanding offering for the attendees from the content that’ll be on main stage, to the breadth and the range of exhibitors will be on the trade show floor. And importantly the experience that’s gonna be created around the entire trade show and conference, including the evening social events, the ability to network, to interact with industry leaders and to really have that deep, meaningful content, that really differentiates the hospitality show. We were thrilled with the year one results that we delivered together as a partnership, and I’m confident you’re gonna see even further strides this year when we gather in San Antonio on October 28th to the 30th. So we’re thrilled to have you there, Ryan, and what we hope is thousands and expect to be thousands of other industry leaders and industry influencers who are gonna be on site to do business and connect with one another.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It looks and sounds to be, record breaking attendance. You know, I challenge, my audience, if you’re a hotelier, out there, check out the seminar and program and agenda that they have set for the, The Hospitality Show full of hospitality leaders, influencers, celebrities, some, it’s gonna be a really, really great show. We’re excited. But, you know, one of my favorite things about The Hospitality Show is you get all the brands together, right? All the industry leaders not just the sector. And you get to see, how some issues kind of rise to the top and you get to see a rallying cry around some really important issues, one of them being human trafficking, right? And the fight against that. And I know AHLA and the foundation and there are no Room for Human Trafficking Campaign, do a fantastic job and work, talk to us for those in our audience who aren’t familiar with this initiative and why is it, so important and should be at the top priority for hoteliers out there.
Kevin Carey :
Yeah, so thank you for that setup. The AHLA has been playing a leadership role, on this effort to prevent, and to combat human trafficking since 2019. We just recently, our AHLA foundation hosted the third annual No Room for Trafficking Summit, bringing together organizations, our industry organizations who were providing funding for via our new survivors fund. All focused around elevating the training, the awareness, and the efforts to support survivors of human trafficking. It’s such a, a powerful event and program. I believe we’re approaching close to 1.8 million hotel industry employees who’ve been trained in just the exponential impact and ripple effect in a positive way that that has a elevating awareness for people who can spot the signs and take action. The Survivors Fund, we announced at the event awards totaling up to a million dollars, for organizations who are on the front lines, of supporting the survivors of human trafficking. So this brings the entire industry together, not only the hotel brands, but owners, the management companies, but also the vendor community is active in this effort as well. So it’s an important and a serious issue, but also one where you can see that this industry making a difference.
Ryan Embree:
No, absolutely. And if you ever have any doubt or want to be inspired to support this cause, I challenge you just listen to one of these incredible stories and the difference that it is making right now. So, again, thank you to you and your organization for all the work that you do. It’s such an important cause for the hotel industry. Kevin, we know you’re boots on the ground, right? You’re traveling all over the country, talking to industry leaders, hotel brands, hotel management companies, and individual hoteliers at these regional hospitality events. We talked about at the top. We’ve got a lot of external factors right now. We’ve got inflation, rising interest rates, construction costs, and all that with an election year at the end of the year. So what’s your general sentiment? You know, when you put your ear to the ground, you talk to these everyday hoteliers out there, I mean, we just came off a great summer. But what’s the general sentiment out there about our industry and what to look forward to in 2025?
Kevin Carey :
Yeah, you touched on it Ryan. I think a number of factors that people would recognize, as creating some degree of uncertainty or some headwinds, and profitability is a challenge right now in the industry because of those factors, interest rates, the consumer health of the consumer, operating costs, even some of the public policy issues that we talked about in New York and Boston, those can create uncertainty as well as translate into real operating cost implications for the industry. So all those things are certainly present, and certainly the conversations I have with our members, acknowledge those. But from a medium and a long-term perspective, there’s still great recognition of this industry’s vitality that the sector of travel and tourism, will grow over time that people value those experiences, whether it’s individual ones for leisure, the group, and meeting events that they attend as well as for business travel. So you still see that long-term opportunity set, and I think that’s reflected through the investments industry is making in new brands, new concept development, investments in key markets. So that balancing between short term challenges, but also this long term growth trajectory is really front and center, in almost all the conversations I have with our industry leaders.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s a great point. I mean, no longer can anyone question the resiliency of this industry after the last few years, but there is, you know, we’ve got the rise in business travel still surging. Fantastic to see, as you said, exciting announcements with new brands, new projects. We talked to some of them on the podcast here. There’s still so much hope on our industry and the consumers they’re still traveling. At the end of the day, we’re all travelers and we love to see it. So thank you again for all the awareness and education that, that your team do. And again for my audience, I really encourage you, visit AHLA.com, get educated on some of these issues that Kevin and his team are really fighting and advocating so much for everyday hoteliers. So, coming up on it now, but wanted to see if you had any final thoughts before we wrap up today, Kevin?
Kevin Carey :
Well, thank you again, for inviting me to join you. We will absolutely look forward to seeing you in San Antonio, the end of October for The Hospitality Show. And also as always just a sincere thank you on behalf of our team on the AHLA and the foundation side for our member companies investment, in AHLA and their leadership involvement and thought leadership involvement in driving the industry forward on the issues we’re active on. So thank you.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Well, we appreciate it as well. Thank you to all of our hoteliers listening out there, and hopefully we will see you at The Hospitality show here in a couple months. We’ll check in with you as well next quarter. Kevin, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot, and we’ll talk to you next time.
Kevin Carey :
Great. Thanks, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In the grand finale of the TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl, we visit one of the top-ranked hospitality programs in the country at UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management. The Dean of the college, Dr. Cynthia Mejia, joins the Suite Spot to discuss the hospitality school and why it is one of the most successful in the world!
Check out the conversation with topics, including:
🎓How UCF Rosen Is Shaping Hospitality Leaders
🤝The Importance of Employer Partnerships
📉Navigating Current Industry Challenges
And much more. Tune in now!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree and we are here with our TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl, and I am so excited for this episode. We are here at my alma mater, UCF, and who’s joining me today is the Dean, Dr. Cynthia Mejia, UCF Rosen College of Hospitality Management, the award-winning UCF Rosen College. Thank you so much Dr. Mejia, for being with me today.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
Wonderful. Thank you for having me here. It’s a pleasure to join you.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so exciting because like I said, this is my alma mater. This is where hospitality was ingrained. We always talk about DNA, but since this is your first time on the Suite Spot, we would love to hear about your hospitality journey and the path that led you to UCF Rosen.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
Wonderful. So, I was recently appointed as the new dean recently in June. And prior to that, I served as the interim dean since October of 2023. But I’ve been a faculty member here since 2013. When I first joined the college, and this is actually my second career, my first career for over 20 years, I ran food and beverage, and I was an executive chef out in the industry, mainly in the lodging side. And I ran banquets, large hotel restaurants, catering and events and operations. And then slowly moved up into operations within the hotel sector, small hotels and such. And so there, there came a point as people tend to know about our industry, that it’s a lot of work. It can take a good number of hours. And after doing that for about 20 years, I took a little break. And I just, I decided to get married and start a family. And then that’s when I began my journey into, to higher ed, getting my master’s and then my PhD, and then thinking about the ways that I love this industry. I have a lot of passion for this industry, and, you know, how can I give back? How can I be part of the industry and help the future leaders of our industry thrive with what I’ve learned, good and bad things that I’ve learned along the way. And then the best practices, of course, that we teach in higher ed. So that’s how it sort of all came together and came in as a faculty teaching food and beverage operations, facilities management, supply chain management. And then I moved into administration as an interim chair of my department, and then finally as the interim dean and now the dean.
Ryan Embree:
And it’s quite a journey. And, it’s the same mission that we have in this series is we’re trying to get more and more people involved in this industry that you can tell by your journey you’re extremely passionate about. I’m extremely passionate about, we’re going through a staffing shortage. We’ll talk about that a little bit in our industry, but 20 years celebrating 20 years at UCF Rosen and this college of Hospitality Management. For those who aren’t aware, give us a little bit of history about this college and where it started to where it is literally one of the preeminent hospitality programs in the world right now.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
So in 2024, this whole year, we’re celebrating our 20th anniversary. And of course, I didn’t join until 2013, but I hear all the stories and know all the lore and there’s so many faculty who are here who came from way back then. We even have somebody here who’s worked 38 years in our college. So the school or the program came out of the College of Business a long, long time ago. And at the time Mr. Harris Rosen, who is our namesake and our largest donor and philanthropist, he donated 20, approximately at the time, $20 million and 20 acres in front of Rosen Shingle Creek, which is his large resort to start this college. And Dr. Abe Pza, who was our founding dean, worked on that project, you know, converted everything over from College of business to start our program. So that occurred in 2004 when this campus opened. And by the end of 2004, we had around a thousand students already. So it went from a, a couple hundred to a thousand at that time, very, very fast, because in this area, of course, our proximity to I Drive and the center of hospitality, Disney, universal, SeaWorld, you know, all of this area and hotels there was a need, of course to train the future leaders who would serve in these businesses. And then in 2008, we established a couple more degrees. So we started out with hospitality management. Another very, very popular approach degree program was event management, which at one time had around 1200 students in it at its peak. In 2012, we established our PhD in hospitality management in 2016. This was, as I was coming in, and this sort of happened as I was a faculty member, we received a very large donation to start our entertainment management degree, which is in collaboration with the College of Arts and Humanities, a very popular degree. And at around, uh, 2016, we had 3000 students here at the college. Yeah. So there’s just really fast growth and hiring fa yeah. Hiring faculty, hiring staff. Of course, in 2017 or so, our founding dean stepped down, remained on our faculty, and we had a new dean, Dr. Wong, and then Covid. It was at 2020. And it was, it was a really interesting time. I was a chair at that time and just devastating for our industry, devastating for higher education. And I will say, kind of looking back, UCF will say, and I want to brag a little bit, I think leads the nation in online learning with our center for Distributed Learning. And so, because all faculty at UCF are really trained on teaching online, incentivized to do so and supported to do so, our conversion to moving online, our programs online was seamless. And so, you know, that, that occurred and what happened, of course, the industry had layoffs and furloughs at the time. And what happens when the economy goes down a little bit or of course, in this time of covid, people want to do something during those times. They want to show that they’re progressing forward and they’ll take the time. So we actually had a bump in enrollments in both the undergraduates and the graduate degree programs. And at the peak we’re at 3,300 students. That’s the most we’ve ever had. And then of course, as Covid waned, everybody rushed to go back to work. So we right sized it down to around 2,900 or so. And, and as with industry, and we’ll talk about that talent shortage and labor and the labor pool, as with that we saw a little bit of that decline, which is consistent with programs across the world, actually, hospitality and tourism management programs across the world. So currently we have 72 faculty across three departments. We have six undergraduate degree programs, seven undergraduate certificate programs, four master’s degree programs. I believe we have more than three master’s certificate programs. I believe we have four or five, actually. And then of course, we have a PhD program. And so that brings us to today.
Ryan Embree:
With a beautiful campus right here in the center of everything. And that’s why I want to talk about next, because location, you know, Orlando, obviously known as the theme park of the world. Passed a couple on my commute when I was a student up here. But it’s gotta be great for students to kind of be immersed in hospitality at this school. So can you talk a little bit about the role of location, where this college is situated and how it sets students up for success as they progress in their careers?
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
So, Central Florida is the most visited destination in the United States and Orlando, and I would dare say all of Florida is unparalleled in our, in our, um, infrastructure to welcome guests and the things that there are to do and to see and experience here. So we have a quite an amazing draw of students, you know, both locally and nationally and internationally to come here, because we are so embedded with industry, we are so supported by industry. You know, guests speak in our classes. They speak right here in our stage. They table, we have the highest job placement rate nearing around 98%. When students are in their senior year, they come and they table here, and there’s not enough students to fulfill the roles, the leadership roles that they need. So it’s an amazing draw. We have them on our advisory boards. They tell us new things that are happening 5-10 years from now, how we should ready our students. We ask them to help shape our curriculum. Our theme park and attractions management degree program was assisted by Universal Orlando and Disney and SeaWorld and many others. We have the iDrive Chamber of Commerce, which is part of this region, and who we and who we belong to and serve right here. And the hotels up and down, I-drive that they’re just, we call them up, we text them, they text us, Hey, we have a role. Who do you know? It’s really, really embedded. And that’s, I think is our success, is to be able to bring that to students.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that’s what I was gonna say, is that it’s not just about location, it’s about forging those partnerships. And on the way into this auditorium, first of all, I got my first job in hospitality right out there in that courtyard at a Rosen career fair. So, you know, I am a testament to those relationships that you have with those partners, but it is about more than location. You have to be able to have networking events, you have to have alumni be involved in coming back. And helping the university. So, talk to us a little bit about, I saw UCF Marriott Day, the second annual is taking place. Talk to us about how some of those relationships have formed with employers and how that really gives a fast track to starting a career in hospitality.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
So our students are some of the most sought after in the nationwhen we have career fairs. We have over 100 companies now coming. Maybe when you were here, it wasn’t that many, but now we don’t have enough room to put all of the companies. And we have around 800 students coming to those career fairs seeking internships. All of our students have to complete two well, actually three internships. One is a sort of a leadership formation, but the other two are actually work experience, that are all paid in different types of roles. I wanna give a shout out to a particular one, which kind of talks about how we are meshed with industry. We have a progressive internship with the Lowes Hotel Corporation. And so similar to how an accounting major will go and work with an Ernstand Young or whoever. And then they get a job after that. We’ve established that with Lowe’s Hotel Corporation. And so what happens is, students in their last two semesters in our program, the first semester, they’ll go and work and they’ll work two weeks at every single Lowe’s hotel. There’s five right now in the chain, and there’s more coming with Universal. They’ll work facilities, they’ll work front of the house, they’ll work food and beverage, they’ll work security reservations, and they’ll do these two weeks just to understand. And then once they select kind of an area that they wanna work on in the second semester, they will become supervisors and work towards more managerial positions. And upon successful completion of that, and the agreement between the student and the organization, they have direct job placement. So this kind of starting your career in college is something we are embarking upon. And our new students, our Gen Z students, this is a very different generation from when I went to school, probably from when you went to school. They want to see a career path. They wanna see ways for continual learning. They don’t wanna be told about it. They wanna feel it. They wanna see it. And so these are the kinds of things that we co-create with partners like Marriott, like Lowe’s, and like many others. Special things that we do that tailor to the organization’s needs. And also understanding how our students want to see themselves, and they’re gonna be the future leaders. So all of us have to work together. We can’t be in silos. We all have to work together, forging these relationships, creating new ways to be in industry, thinking about now inclusion of technology and how that’s gonna look. That’s our next frontier. But all of these things are very dynamic conversations that we have with super open, lovely people in our industry.
Ryan Embree:
Well one of the best things about our industry is the skills are so transferrable, right? So you can be an assistant general manager here in sunny Florida, but wanna move out to the mountains and you can become an GM or AGM out there for food and beverage or in hospitality. It all is rooted in people serving people. And I think, you know, it’s so cool to be a part of an industry like that. But it also creates so many opportunities. And we’re gonna talk about some stories. Which I think is, is really the best way to share that career path that you were talking about. But we’ve got the location, we’ve got the partnerships, but you guys are also doing a fantastic job of the curriculum that you’ve put together. Recognize number one in the nation by Shanghai rankings. First of all, congratulations to you and your staff on this achievement. But one of the things is how do you keep this top spot? You’ve said some of the ways so far, what does this mean to you, and how can you leverage that ranking for prospective students that might be uneasy of about whether hospitality is a career for them, or if they do know hospitality that UCF Rosen is the right college for them?
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
That’s a good question. So the Shanghai rankings follows a research ranking. So, we have faculty members here who are research faculty, and then also who are instructors, research faculty. You know, 40% of their job is to conduct research on, on whatever topics they find of interest, whether it’s, you know, consumer behavior or it’s economics or, you know, marketing or employee experience. So there’s a wide range of topics. And our faculty who are engaged in research are among the finest in the world, for not only the quality of research that they conduct, but for the numbers of papers and grants and things that they’re going after to produce. And, and it’s called knowledge dissemination. So when you have faculty who say, are teaching a class and they’re teaching a group of students, and they’re also conducting some research, and they are having findings because they have to go to industry to collect data or they do panel data, or they work with consumers, they, they might, you know, look at something they did in the morning, and then in they’re in their class and they’ll say, this is what I’m seeing this morning. Some of the findings in my research. And to go a step further, faculty also engage students to help collect data, especially in master’s program and the PhD program. So they are not only learning about the context, but they’re learning about the how and the process behind it. And that I will share an interesting story about one of our graduates who utilize some research techniques to get herself a really, really good job in the industry. So when, when we say the Shanghai ranking, that establishes sort of a research profile and a knowledge dissemination. And that is actually advantageous at an international level to bring lots of talents to UCF Rosen College. It’s also helpful on the recruitment side because people wanna be on a winning team. Right. And they wanna be part of that culture. And we have so much collaboration with our faculty, not only internal, but also internationally. And so when we talk about it, it’s more of a function of that research side. But students gain and industry gains knowledge, they gain knowing the latest trends, they can help make different types of decisions. Our students can then go work in these companies and understand something they learned in class that was based in facts and research, and bring those findings, you know, to how they want to do their jobs, how they want to lead, or making decisions and such. So we do talk about it in that way and students gain the benefits of that. But it’s also can be recognized that, that in our PhD program, many of our students, well all of ’em in their PhD program, go to work in other universities. So they take a skillset, they take a knowledge base, and it just goes on and on and on. They teach others who are gonna teach others who are gonna teach others, both for industry, but also on the research side.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. It keeps you ahead of the curve as far as any trends. You are right there knowing what guests are saying, people that are going to restaurants, trends, technology, a new technology in the way that travelers, the way that guests are receiving that technology sentiment about it. So, absolutely. And obviously, has some very positive benefits on both the education side, but also the real world side. And we’re gonna talk about one of those rows and research focus when it comes to staffing. We talked about it, we alluded to it. There’s a staffing shortage right now in our industry. How are programs like this kind of helping create, as you’ve put it, Dr. Mia the leaders of hospitality for the future?
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
Yeah. So, as we talked about sort of post COVID, we had something called the Great Resignation. There was, prior to COVID, there was challenges in the industry around benefits or pay or hours. And there, there’s always been kind of those, you know, issues. But during COVID, when all of society, we had collectively figured out how much we need people who make food, who will serve food, who will deliver food, anyone in the service industries. We figured that out. And after those furloughs and layoffs, there was a little bit of disheartening, people who worked in the services industry, we won’t just call it hospitality, but in the services industries more broadly, they left because they were valued so much, but they wanted pay, they wanted benefits and all of those things that they wanted. And we’ve seen an increase in benefits, an increase in salaries.
Ryan Embree:
Flexible pay, flexible schedules.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
All of that we’ve seen. So what’s happened was, after the Great Resignation, there was something called the Great Reshuffling. So what I call them are people, those of us who love people, those of us who love service in this industry we’re people. People. And so, if in the great resignation, they all moved to other types of jobs where they weren’t around people, then came the great reshuffle where they started to move into other related services industries to work with people again in the service industry. And what’s really interesting, I hear this anecdotally from large companies that we work with, a lot of them ultimately came home. They came back because they missed their hospitality or their service work family. And so we’re trying to understand that. We’re trying to understand those dynamics. We’re doing a lot of research around it. And again, gen Z wants something else. So we’re all coming to this nexus right now and trying to understand. And one of the things I’ve said before is, you know, we can’t continue to work in silos and think we’re gonna figure this out individually. We have to work with industry, we have to work with high schools, we have to work with parents, high school counselors, and even go into middle schools to reeducate people to listen to their needs, how they want to work, where they want to work. And we have to be more responsive. And so we’re kind of coming into this reckoning. We’re seeing that there was some disengagement, of course during COVID right. This certain last four years. I have a daughter who was also behind a camera for two years in high school. So I saw this at home and coming back and ramping up opportunities to engage with each other, or asking students or supporting students to figure out the ways they want to engage. And so we can’t do things the way we used to do. We have to listen, be still, be empathetic. Mental health is also something we pay a lot more attention to wellbeing. We’re paying more attention to taking the stigmas away from not feeling so great sometimes and needing help and putting more resources there. UCF has done an amazing job on that. And so, you know, it has to be a full force effort among many stakeholders to understand how to better serve our student, how to create more opportunities for them to engage. And industry is right there waiting to do it. They are supporting, they are funding, they’re creating those things within their own businesses. And so we’re kind of going hand in hand right now to understand and kind of recreate what this is gonna look like. But we always have those theoretical perspectives of human behavior that are tested through research. So we understand best practices. We’re kind of at this point where we’re, we’re listening, we’re applying best practices, we’re changing how we teach. We’re including a little more technology. But at the same time, we’re also going back to some old school face-to-face meetings. Going to office hours, bringing dogs to come and pet in the middle of classes. Like for the wellbeing and water balloon throwing or whatever it is. So we’re trying to find the right fit of both ways to go after being responsive to students and also supporting their learning journey. Because they’re gonna be the leaders. They’re gonna be the future leaders.
Ryan Embree:
No, absolutely. It’s super commendable on the versatility and the way that you’re adapting to that. Because I do think you’re right, this staffing shortage has forced our industry to make changes a lot quicker than maybe our industry was ready for. But I think there is any silver lining, there’s gonna be a lot of great things that come out of this.Because there were a lot of stigmas to the hospitality industry. Long hours, sometimes not the greatest pay, always working on site versus remote.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
And that’s, that’s a tough one. Because, you know if you’re HR, marketing, or accounting or whatever, yeah. You can have your two or three remote days or even work from home. You can’t do that when you’re customer facing. So something you had mentioned before about alternative, work arrangements or giving employees more flexibility to create their own schedule. You know, do I wanna work morning, night? Can I switch? And those with families, we’re seeing companies bring more support for daycare and different things like that or continuous education and tuition reimbursement. So it’s changing out there. It must change. And there’s some top companies here in this region that are leading the way and doing that.
Ryan Embree:
It’s really cool to see, ’cause again, it’s going to present opportunities that I don’t think were there in hospitality before. And ultimately it’s gonna do what we want, which is bring in a bigger pool of talent. And we’ve really had to dip into different pools that we haven’t really historically gone to the, well, I mean, think about every time that you’ve talked to someone, whether it’s a hospitality industry leader where they said, I started in this and now I’m here. And we want to try to create paths where its, I started in hospitality and this is where I want to end my career because I love people so much and I love what I do. So, but that’s a story to tell. And that’s where I want to ask you today. I’m sure we live in an industry full of stories, feel good stories. Any recent ones that you’ve come across, whether it’s somebody landing that dream job or just feel good story about our industry.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
Absolutely. I first want to give a shout out to our internships team, and I call them the job whisperers. So they are actually very closely working with industry partners all over the nation and even internationally to understand what organizations want, what kinds of jobs out there, all the different levels, the personality of someone who could work there. And so, you know, they have this very large pool, but they also really help students organize their resumes to be a match. They listen to students about what are your goals? What are your strengths? Because it’s interesting in the hospitality or the services industries, not everyone wants to be in front of a customer or a person. Some people love the industry, but they’re creative in the background. And so they learn all of these details and then they kind of do these job matches and industry trusts us and that’s why they call us, who can you send for X, y, z position? So with that said, I have a couple of success stories that we recently were able to marry together. There is Cory Clancy graduate of 2021, who is the project coordinator with Walt Disney Imagineering, he was on the team that converted splash mountain at Magic Kingdom to Tiana’s Bayou Adventure. So that’s a great story and a little dream job. I guess that, that sounds like a cool job. Right? Absolutely. This person, Emily Broker, so Emily Broker was actually my student, she was a master’s student and she and I did a lot of research together. And my research is qualitative in nature. So worked with her on collecting focus group data and interview data, and she would code things. And she was really good at it. She had a background in psychology. So she was in the Department of Psychology, but she loved people and she worked in a bar. So she came over to get her master’s degree with us. And then we got connected and did, you know, several papers together and a lot of research. Well, she loves people, but she has a very creative skillset and she loves the qualitative work. So she got together with Dr. Jessica Wiki, who leads our internship program. And Dr. Wiki knew someone at Experience Kissimmee, which is a very large destination, marketing organization, management organization, and connected Emily to that company. So now she’s an a research analyst for experienced Kissimmee. There’s several students who are undergraduates who are currently doing summer internships at Okinawa Japan on a multi rotational hotel operations internship. There’s Taylor Armstrong, who is gonna be completing his master’s degree in 2024. He’s the assistant director of safety and security at the Ritz Carlton Hotel here in Grand Lakes. So, different types of people and different types of jobs.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
All loving the hospitality industry. What’s especially lovely to me is when they get out into industry and then we have really strong connections with alumni, and then they call us and say, I need this person or that person. Because they trusted not only what they learn, but they trusted the shepherding process towards their job and the care that we gave them to a right match. And so they believe in us. And so we do the same thing, and it just goes on and on. And in fact, when I spoke with some graduates, we just had a master’s hooting ceremony here, a fancy hooting ceremony on this stage last week, Friday. And I told a couple of them, okay, hurry up, move up in your company so that you come back and, you know, get some of our graduates. And it’s just, this is a trust and an understanding of the quality of, of people that we work with and the care that we have, um, in helping people to find their, their dream jobs.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool. I love hearing those stories. And it’s cool to know that there’s a UCF Rosen footprint on a lot of the major hospitality brands out there, and it is a snowball effect. And like you said, when you’ve experienced it, you know what you’ve learned, then you can trust to call back and say, yes, I know what type of program, extensive program, what type of education that they’re getting, and they’re gonna be a valuable resource for my organization. Such a cool story. Obviously UCF Rosen, this is our final college for this particular series and the campus crawl. But we’ve visited several others, FIU and FAU.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
All good colleagues of ours.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. That’s what I wanna talk about, because earlier in this year, Rosen hosted the inaugural Florida Deans and Director Hospitality and Tourism Summit. So super interested in this. Obviously Florida, tourism is the name of the game for this state. How did this idea of coming of getting together all these deans and directors, and where do you see it moving forward?
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
So I was the interim dean at the time, and because I wasn’t in that deans and directors position very long, I didn’t know any of them. So I went to a conference and I was being introduced and then, we’re drinking coffee and we’re talking about our same challenges and same hopes and dreams. And I would ask, have you ever gotten together? All of you? ’cause they all seem to know each other. There’s eight of us. There’s eight institutions in the state of Florida, and none of them had ever gotten together to meet. They sort of knew each other. Some texted each other. I said, I think we should meet. Like, do you wanna meet? Would that be a good thing to do? And so they said, you know, okay. And they were all over it. And I thought, well, you wanna meet with us because we’re in the middle. Wanna come over? Central Florida. It’s like when you’re a kid, like you wanna come over. So I was like, you wanna come over? And you know, we said, okay, so we set up a first meeting, but we had some conversations about what is it that we wanna meet about? What, why are we doing this? And there is, in the state of Florida, there’s a list of classes and discipline, not classes, but disciplines and majors that are called the strategic programs of interest. And they’re things that the governor and the legislature deems as very important programs to advance the economy in the state of Florida. Things like aerospace is in there, nursing, engineering, those types of tech jobs because that’s something of emphasis, strategic program of emphasis. And I had often looked at this list and I never saw hospitality or tourism. Yeah. And I thought, why don’t they think that’s important? And maybe there’s reasons, there’s probably lots of reasons that they didn’t think. So as we got to talking amongst ourselves, we learned that that was something that’s important to us because what you had mentioned about staffing and industry, and we are the pass throughs for all of this talent that goes out into industry. And so we all decided, well if we are those programs, how can we be supported at, you know, a legislature level with high schools, with all the other institutions? We can put this up as a program of prominence that is recognized. And there’s some ancillary benefits. Nothing major, but it’s mostly this is of emphasis. And it gets talked about. It gets marketed in this way. Parents hear about it, high schools hear about it. There’s potential grant fundings for it to help with scholarship, I’m told. But what it is, is all of us, the eight institutions of directors and deans, we decided let’s work on getting hospitality and tourism management on that list. And so we worked through some of those things. We’re all gonna be meeting again. We email and talk a lot whenever we see each other at conferences. We actually have the governor’s conferences coming up in Tampa pretty soon. And we decided to get really organized to kind of, you know, get all, all of our efforts and lobby for this. And we’ve, we kind of planted some seeds and asked some associations and dmo, you know, would you be interested in coming? And they’re like, yes. Because they need people to work in the industry. And so we all, it turns out that this kind of snowballed. So it’s been very exciting. Yeah. And the other thing is, is they’re just the nicest people. Yeah. They’re just, they’re kind and nice. There’s nobody showing off or anything like this. Right. We’re all interested in students in our programs, so they go out into the industry and they make it change for the better. That’s what we all want.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely, and hospitality, so people serving people, that sounds like a great cause. And you know, I’m sure there were a lot of people shocked when they heard that.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
That we never met before or that it wasnt on the list?
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. That it wasn’t on the list. But it’s so cool to hear that. And again, you know, we’ve had the pleasure of visiting some of these campuses and interviewing some of these directors and deans. So, really exciting to see how that progresses. As we wrap up today, we’re gonna lean on some of your advice and wisdom to a couple different maybe segments of people. So, you know, I was here just over a decade ago in this auditorium about to graduate, about to start my hospitality career, not really knowing what was out there, what advice, you know, we just got done with, with graduating some, some students. What advice are you sharing with them right now as they enter the workforce here in 2024?
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
So, couple of things. One is we, all of us have this idea of how something’s gonna look right. You know, for all us. And I don’t know about you, but for me it didn’t look at all like that. Right? But we have to be open to the opportunities that come. So plan B, plan C, right? To not be disappointed or the world falls apart because it doesn’t go this way. And to understand what our gifts, each of us have certain gifts and our skill sets and how to either leverage those or take positions when they become open. That can build new skill sets or we can meet new people who can help us. So, you know, I had this advice a long time ago. If you can’t, if you can’t go up, up, up, then go lateral. Don’t go down. Go laterals. So, and there’s so many jobs out there now.
Ryan Embree:
Great advice.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
There’s just so many jobs out there right now. So get in somewhere. Do your very best. Stay as long as you can. Be honest and forthright with your expectations. Also know that when you graduate, you, it depends if you come in, there’s, we have a lot of non-traditional students who’ve been managers for seven or 10 years. They’re gonna go out and be general managers or directors. But a lot of students, you know, are sort of entering in lower mid-level supervisory or managerial roles. And it takes some time, it takes some savvy and some emotional intelligence to build, to understand the people side of it and how to advance yourself through the levels. And so rather than seeing this position that you think is yours, or could be yours or should be yours, you gotta understand there’s process and entering into an organization, there’s all these other people who also want that thing. So kind of a good awareness of where you sit and informally how you can advance through the channels. That’s a really important skillset to have. But I would also say that, I always tell people, don’t look, compare yourself to all others. That’s not good for us. That’s not good for our mental health. Look down work, work harder than everybody else, but stay in your lane. Understand your skillset. Maybe you have to go do a little bit of, you know, online training or different kinds of education, or maybe go onto a master’s if you want, get an MBA or whatever it is to build other skill sets. So it’s always learning. And that’s what I love about our industry, especially the food and beverage side, where I come from. It’s always learning. There’s always something to learn. And I recently heard this wonderful advice that if you, if you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room. The graduation speaker said that at our last commencement. I like that. Which means to me is go where you can learn something. And if the opportunity presents itself, do that. And if you think that you’re supposed to be somewhere and an opportunity comes and it wasn’t what you thought, is it something where you can learn something to at least advance? You know, so taking that perspective of being open, constant learning, willingness, I think those are are helpful things for people going out into the industry. And for me, you know, any of us for me too.
Ryan Embree:
I was gonna say it’s great advice and, you know, being that sponge. And just, you know, there’s a lot of things after interviewing a lot of industry leaders, a lot of things we hear is one, the journey is not always the same. You know, you can start in one place and end up in a completely different place than you ever thought. And also look for mentors. Our industry is filled with them and, and they’re willing to help. They’re willing to usher in, you know, that, that next generation. So looking for those mentors and being a mentor.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
And being a mentor is really important. I think that, you know, and that’s what I also try to do personally, but I know we all do this at the college, is we’re always asking others or identifying in others. And even when people look like they don’t need help, but they’re doing well get to know ’em a little bit more because there’s something mutually beneficial that we could teach each other. We could show each other. But you’re right about, about the mentors. And I didn’t think of it ’cause we’re always teaching, so I just assume that. But there’s faculty here who are still in contact with people two decades ago who help and answer questions and, and ask advice. I ask certain faculty here for advice all the time and that’s wonderful. I have many mentors here at this college.
Ryan Embree:
Well let’s go to another stage in life. So those students that are about to start their education journey, those incoming freshmen into the UCF Rosen Hospitality Program, what advice are you giving them day one as they step on campus?
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
Get involved, leave your dorm room, leave your apartment, get involved, join clubs, meet people, make friends, get yourself in environments. Getting a study group if you’re more quiet, find the quiet people if you like band and, you know, color guard and all those things. I’ve heard a lot of students who like that recently. I mean UCF has 68,000 students. There’s hundreds of clubs. There’s too many things for them to do. So go and do those things. Be with people, learn the people skills, practice your soft skills. Take some risks, make mistakes, fail a little bit, but keep going and trying to build your network of friends. It’s really important for the hospitality industry and just life in general. And the other thing I would say is have fun. College should also be fun. We forget that sometimes. I mean, we have a 99% graduation rate and a 98% placement rate. So students are working all the time, 30 to 40 hours. They’re taking four, five classes. Sometimes they’re working in summer, taking class in summer, joining a couple of clubs and such. And so we also have to think about this pressure to go, go, go, go. You know, you’re supposed to have fun too, you know, so carve out sometimes to have some fun. Make time.
Ryan Embree:
Your students are just steps away from theme parks, restaurant. World class restaurants. So you’re right. Easy. Lift your head up and maybe take a walk and you’ll run into something. Well, as we wrap up with the final question, as Dean, what is your vision for UCF Rosen College for the next 5-10 years?
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
It’s a pretty broad vision and I’m about to share it with our faculty and invite them in to think about it, because I don’t, I do think it’s important for a leader to have a vision, but I also think it’s should be inclusive and should be adaptable. But I think very broadly, I want for us to be the pioneer in transforming the way that hospitality and tourism education and research is conducted. And I want in 5 or 10 years for industry, for our alumni, for other institutions to say, you know, in 2024, 2025, Rosen College changed the way that this field is taught and that research is conducted. They were the ones who changed it, made the 2.0 and that’s broadly what I hope to see. We’ll see. Because we must do this. We must make these changes.
Ryan Embree:
Well, thank you so much. Absolutely. Inspired again, as an alumni of this university is, it’s so cool to be able to come here a decade after I graduated and to be back on this stage where I was watching hospitality leaders inspire me to be a part of the industry. So thank you so much for joining me, Dr. Mejia and for all the work that you and your team do here.
Dr. Cynthia Mejia :
Thank you. And it is a pleasure to have you here and I hope you’ll come back and maybe do a leadership seminar.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’d be my pleasure. Well thank you so much. Thank you for the UCF Rosen College for hosting us here at the Suite Spot. Thank you for listening to us, and we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embry, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Check out the latest TMG Hospitality Trailblazers episode featuring the Executive Vice President of Development at Gibson Hospitality Ventures, Joseph Grieco!
This episode takes a deeper look into the Gibson Hospitality Ventures brand culture, hotel portfolio, and company initiatives that are setting the stage for more organizational success.
Get an inside perspective on topics such as:
- The Explosive Growth of Gibson Hospitality Ventures
- How Gibson is Combating Industry Staffing Challenges
- Leveraging Guest Feedback to Influence Hotel Profitability
- The Importance of a Strong Hotel Digital Presence
Tune in now!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining us today. We have a fantastic episode for you today continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. If this is your 1st, 5th, or 15th episode in this series, it’s all about the people and management companies that are pushing and moving our industry forward, the industry that we love so much. We’ve got a great example and guest with me to share his story and the management company that is recognized as an industry leader. We’re gonna talk a lot about that today, but let me bring him in. Without further ado, Joe Grieco, executive VP of Development at Gibson Hospitality Ventures. Joe, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Joseph Grieco :
Thank you, Ryan. It’s a pleasure to be here. I love listening to your podcast and all the other guests you’ve had on in the past. And, quite an honor to be here with you. Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And we’re really excited to talk about Gibson Hospitality Ventures. You guys have a lot of exciting things happening right now at your organization, but before we get into that too much, we love to start these episodes with just a little bit of hospitality background, the journey that led you to Gibson Hospitality Ventures and your experience so far.
Joseph Grieco :
Sure, so I actually started on the food and beverage side. Grew up in a big Italian family where everything was always centered around the dining table. So the restaurant industry was always a passion of mine growing up and started as a dishwasher in the kitchen. Quickly learned that I wasn’t cut out for the back of the house, enjoyed the front of the house a lot more. So I went off and worked my way around to bartending, serving, managing various restaurants. My first kind of crossover position was doing room service for a Hilton in downtown Knoxville. And it was a lot of fun. Had a blast down there, worked with a great group of people. But from there I realized the restaurant industry was always a passion of mine. And I met a gentleman when I was at the hotel restaurant program and the two of us went and opened a restaurant in downtown Knoxville back in 2002. I was 24 years old and very young, but we went off and, and started our first venture down there. So had a great time. The restaurant was called Pasta Trio. We were there for about seven, eight years in downtown Knoxville. But I had a baby on the way and kind of realized that having a restaurant and a baby wasn’t gonna work out too well for me long term. So at the time, I was working commercial real estate and business brokerage focused on hotels and restaurants. That was in 08′ or 09′ when the market started to collapse. So I had a side job working for the Knoxville Marriott as a bartender and working in banquets as a banquet captain, and knew they were looking for a food and beverage manager. So I got back into the hotel side on, in the food and Beverage department, spent a few years working for the big box hotels around Knoxville Holiday Inn and Marriott, as a food and beverage director. And then one of my former general managers called me up and asked me to take on a general manager position for a bank foreclosed property in Sevierville, Tennessee that Gibson Hotel had been asked to manage. And knowing Mr. Gibson’s reputation and knowing the company, it was almost a no brainer for me.To come and work for an organization of this was just such a great opportunity, especially to take a GM role with just my past F&B experience, and to be able to learn more about the industry. So it was a grueling year, getting that property back on its feet. It was a bank foreclosed property that, that needed a lot of work. So I got to be very hands-on, on all aspects of the hotel. We had to rebuild its online reputation. We had deferred maintenance, we had tons of problems throughout the property. So it was a very successful year though. And the, the hotel, the bank was able to take the hotel and resell it. And I was promoted to take over at one of our flagship properties, the Spring Hill Suites in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, where I was GM for. I was there for about nine months before they started piling some other stuff on top of me. I took on some regional operation roles and started overseeing some other hotels we had in the market while I was still the GM at the Spring Hill. And then from there, Mr. Gibson asked me to, uh, to come and join his corporate office team as a regional. Uh, so IO over the next few years, I, I grew from my regional position to vice president of operations. And eventually, back in 2015, Mr. Gibson gave me my first opportunity to oversee the construction of our new Fairfield in Inn in Johnson City, Tennessee. And I kind of caught the bug from there. It was, uh, my first taste of hotel development, new construction, and I, I really enjoyed it. And we did, uh, that hotel has been extremely successful for us. So since then I’ve worked on, uh, about 18 new construction projects with our company. Uh, some of them in-house projects, some of them third party managed developments. We’ve done a, a brand conversion, uh, converting an old Fairfield, uh, gen one hotel to a La Quinta. We’ve done renovations. So a lot of different stuff working here. It’s, it’s been a, a great experience. Currently, I’ve got four hotels that we’re overseeing construction on, four renovations, getting ready to start towards the end of the year. We’re kind of in that same boat with everybody else with the, uh, the renovation influx that’s coming for everyone right now. And then we’ve got a very robust pipeline with, uh, several more hotels due to start in the next six months. So, uh, very excited about the growth in front of us. Yeah.
Ryan Embree:
Well, we’re gonna talk about that explosive growth in a moment. But, you know, just to get back to your story, and I think this is a great piece of advice for young hotel professionals right now, is to listen to Joe’s story. And I’m sure you could attest now, Joe, with that year that you were, you, that general manager and the challenges that you had, probably one of the biggest learning opportunities I would imagine, and taught you a lot, especially even where you are today with development. I mean, that is not right now with construction timelines, everything that you have to get through, I’m sure there’s a lot of challenges within that, but just that year probably just taught you a lot about kind of pushing through. And for those young professionals out there that get an opportunity like that, it might seem like, man, why are they putting me in this, this property over here? But that is such an opportunity for you to learn and could serve you way, way down the line in your career. Joe, would you agree with that?
Joseph Grieco:
Oh, a hundred percent. The things I learned, I mean, the, the things I learned during that year, overseeing that property and, and all of the fact that you just had to touch every piece of the hotel. If you go into a, a brand new Marriott property or Hilton property that was built in the last three years and doesn’t have any issues, you’re never gonna understand all the different components that go into making that the asset, the operation, uh, everything a success there. So, and it’s served me really well on the development side. So coming up in operations, I, I use that knowledge every day in the new hotels that we open. Uh, I go into a project thinking about why and how we’re gonna use certain things when we’re building them, and whether or not we have the most efficient layout in some areas, it, does this make sense for where we are putting the offices or how we’re setting up the laundry system? What are the challenges that that hourly associate’s gonna be facing two, three years from now because of the decisions that we make now? So, you know, seeing that and being there firsthand and seeing other people’s mistakes and, and what they did wrong and being able to learn from those, it’s very important step in any young hotelier’s growth. So I would say take those, uh, disaster hotels, take on some of those challenges. It’s, it’s a lot of hard work, but it’s worth it in the end for, for what you learn from that experience.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And, and here you sit again with a portfolio of over 30 hotels. You know, Gibson has seen some explosive growth over the last decade to its journey to, to where it is today, one of the top hotel management companies in our industry. What do you, what do you attribute your team’s success to? Joe? I know you’ve been with the organization for a while, and how and why has that allowed it to grow so rapidly in a time where, you know, not a lot of management companies have had this type of explosive growth that Gibson’s been able to enjoy?
Joseph Grieco:
Sure, sure. Um, well, number one, I mean, our, our, our staff and, and it’s, it’s a hundred percent comes down to the people that are out there every day taking care of our assets, taking care of our guests. Without them, we never would’ve been able to grow as quickly as we have in the past 10 years. And Mr. Gibson always insists on the importance that we’re always hiring the right people for the right position. You know, our, our corporate office is a prime example of that. Everyone who works in our corporate office, well, nearly everyone who works in our corporate office has worked in an hourly management position in hotels and restaurants. So they bring that past experience and those perspectives to their current positions. Kind of like we were talking about. Everything that I learned at the, the hotel that I spent a year at, you know, those, those experiences they have and those, those line level positions where they were in the field, uh, previously in their careers, it impacts them. No matter what discipline that is, whether they’re in accounting or human resources or revenue management, they have a little more empathy for the people that are on the front lines and, and understand what they’re going through. You know, we’re a small company. We’re not very top heavy. We try not to be overly demanding on, on, you know, our staff as far as paperwork and things like that. Uh, we want them to be out there taking care of the guests. We don’t want our GMs behind the desk sitting there doing forms and filling out Excel spreadsheets. If they’re not in front of our guests, then our hotels are not successful. And the way that we grow and the way that we continue to do other hotels is to run the hotels that we have successfully to operate great hotels for the those owners and to be able to give them good returns on their assets by having repeat customers and, you know, taking care of those guests that come in. You know, the old adage, take care of your, your employees, they’ll take care of your guests, they’ll take care of your, and your guests will come back. That’s, it’s, it’s as true today as ever. It’s, it’s the most important part. Uh, so, so really our staff is probably one of the most important reasons we’ve been able to grow as much as we have. And, you know, we have a very low turnover within our company, and we believe very strongly in succession planning and growth from within. So, you know, we have many success stories in our companies where, you know, I can, I can remember maintenance engineers that ended up being general managers in our company, uh, housekeepers that worked their way up to assistant executive and then executive, and then into a GM position. So that internal growth and that ability to retain staff and, and to have the people out there in the field to operate these properties, when we open them and when we take over new assets, you know, we love having a, a flying squad. Our, our group of people that go out for, uh, when we do an acquisition or a takeover and, you know, they’re, they’re experts in their field and they go out and they, they do great things. And it’s, it’s kind of a privilege for our team members out in the field to get to participate in those things. So they’re a huge part of our success, being able to, to take those employees from hourly positions to management. But as much as we’ve grown, you know, we still always maintain a very personal approach with our hotels and our staff and our owners. We love being out in the field with our hotels and helping our team and our, our operations team. We make sure our operations team is at the property every month no matter what. So at the end of the month, when the financials come out, our operations team gets to the property and does a full property review with our general manager and our, our, uh, management teams. We walk the properties, we review all your KPIs, you know, we go through the financials, we go through the guest service scores, we walk through the kitchen, we check the, you know, we check to make sure the hotel is being run properly, that it’s a, it’s clean, that there’s no deferred maintenance, that everything is being run the way it should be, the way we would expect it to be run if we were coming in as a guest. And that makes a huge difference too, in our success. And, you know, our, our owners see that. Our owners see that in their returns. They see it in the awards that we win for them. You know, whether it’s a torch bar bearer award, or a platinum award from Marriott. You know, it’s a, it’s a tribute to the, the properties that we run. But the other reason, and, and the other true, true inspiration for all our success would, I, I would definitely say would be Mr. Gibson. It’s just a little different when you work for a true leader like Mr. Gibson that has really a passion for the industry and, and drives our team to do better every day. You know, he has so much hospitality knowledge that he, that he shares with us all the time, and he’s just a great mentor for, for all the people around our office. And he makes us do better for our guests, our staff, our owners, our company. And, um, you know, working for a company like a, a company like this and an owner like Mr. Gibson, it allows us to be a little more flexible as a company. So, you know, we get to be a little choosy with who we work with. We’re not, we have grown explosively and we could probably be double the size that we are right now if we were willing to take on some hotels and some other opportunities that really just weren’t right for us as a company and didn’t fit with our culture. So that’s also one of the benefits of, of the way we’re able to growth. We’re able to focus in on strategic growth that, that makes the most sense, both for our company, uh, for those owners too. You know, we’ve had candid conversations with owners that wanted us to hi, wanted to hire us, but it didn’t make sense. The revenues weren’t there. The hotels couldn’t support a third party management with the systems that, that we bring in to, to run a hotel properly. Partners like TMG and the other services. So, you know, we’re very strategic. We don’t just want to be another company like the big guys out there that have 250 hotels and maybe they see them once a year. We, we wanna be very hands-on, and we want to grow and scale as, as our portfolio grows.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, that’s a great point. Growth doesn’t necessarily equal strategic growth, right. And, and picking the right owners to work with, making sure that you can still instill that high touch culture that you’re talking about over there, Joe, to make sure that the projects that you are working on maintain the standard of your brand, which is super important and, and a trend that we see in a lot of these hospitality trailblazers that we interview here. And we can attest to the, to the success. ’cause you’ve got some really excited, you and your team have been really busy over there, Joe, ’cause you’ve got some exciting developments, new properties being, you know, just open. We’ve seen some press releases out there about some new properties being open, new partnerships, which I’m personally really excited about. Can you expand on some of these opportunities right now in the development side of Gibson?
Joseph Grieco:
Sure. Be happy to. So, so in the past, our portfolio’s been predominantly select and extended stay products. We do have some have had some full service products in the past and still do. And, and Mr. Gibson and I always kind of had a passion for those bigger, uh, full service, uh, hotels, restaurants, the food and beverage operations that go along with them. So that’s where our focus is right now on our growth is on the full service side. Uh, don’t get me wrong, we’ve always had a robust pipeline of select and extended state properties, and we still do. We, uh, but we’ve been recently working on a lot of really exciting projects. We have a new partnership we’re working on with Sports Illustrated Hotels and Resorts. We’re working on several new Compass by Margaritaville locations. We have a couple of deals that we’re partnering with Travel and Leisure on right now through our relationships with Margaritaville and Sports Illustrated. And we’re also starting to work with some more boutique and soft brand hotels we hope in the future. So that’s definitely a trajectory that we feel our company needs to take. And it’s really a, a passion for me and Mr. Gibson. It’s, it’s what we enjoy and we love doing. So Sports Illustrated has been really exciting for us. It’s been a a lot of fun working with those guys and getting to work on a new and emerging brand that has, uh, so much potential, especially in today’s market where clients are really seeking more experiential, stays, more adventure, something a little different than you get from the typical Hilton and Marriott hotels. So the potential for a brand like that, we feel is, is limitless. Um, you know, they have, they, they’re backed with so much history and legacy. They have, uh, tons of potential verticals that you can explore with the brand that, that has that experiential piece to it, whether it’s, you know, resorts or beach clubs or, you know, uh, uh, ski retreats. But what we’re real, we’ve been really most excited about and, and see the most, uh, potential in is on the Sports Illustrated University hotel model. And that’s what we’ve been working really strongly at. We’re we’re located here in Knoxville, where we’ve got our Tennessee balls right down the road in Neland Stadium. So, you know, we we’re working with Travel and Leisure and, uh, the Sports Illustrated group, and we’ve been very honored to be able to collaborate on the new Sports Illustrated that’s being developed down at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. That’ll be the first sports illustrated in the country. There’s one currently down in Capa, uh, in the Dominican Republic. So, but this’ll be, uh, along with the university model, and it’s, it’s part of a large mixed use campus that includes condos and timeshares, the hotel, some restaurants, and retail and entertainment. So that’s been a very, very exciting project to work on. And, um, just that being able to have that collaboration with the Travel and Leisure team and Sports Illustrated, it’s, um, it’s just been incredible. And this is just the first one, but with all the potential on these projects, we see a lot of, uh, a lot of great future in, in the, the other developments that can come from this in, in, in different markets that, that we’re in already and markets we’ve been looking to get into for some time.
Ryan Embree:
Oh, I can imagine. I mean, you’re, you’re talking to someone that as a kid would, would wait for that Sports Illustrated, uh, magazine to come through. So as soon as I saw that Sports Illustrated press release come through that newsfeed, I’ve, I’m right on board. And what a place to start in Tuscaloosa. I don’t know if those Tennessee Vol fans are, are excited about that, but, uh, you know, hopefully we see a lot of expansion there, but really exciting projects on that end. But let’s get into location, you guys, Gibson as a massive footprint in the southeast, specifically Tennessee, where you’re located, where your corporate headquarters are in, in Knoxville. What do you like about this market and where do you see opportunity?
Joseph Grieco:
Sure. Well, you know, this really goes back to being a hands-on company, but it’s, it’s definitely worked in our favor. You know, we love the Southeast and, uh, there’s nothing quite like southern hospitality. I’m originally from New York, but I’ve been in Knoxville since 1990 and I love it here. I’m raising my family here, and no plans on moving anytime soon. But, um, you know, many of the markets that we’re in and, and the markets in the Southeast have just seen tremendous growth in the last 10 years. And it’s been wonderful to be able to be a part of that growth and to be able to add more hotels into these markets, you know, as, as they grow, we grow. Pigeon Forge is a prime example. Um, Mr. Gibson was one of the first hoteliers to see the potential to bring a branded product like a Marriott into the Pigeon Forge market that was saturated with just mom and pops and independent hotels for the most part. So back 15 years ago, he had to go and convince Marriott that their product would work in this kind of market. And now if you look around, it’s just exploded. You know, every every brand is is up there already with, you know, more to come and even ones that, that we’re still developing there. So, you know, our residents in, in Pigeon Forge actually won opening Hotel of the Year from Marriott last year. So, you know, for us, it’s important that we’re in these markets, so we recognize who’s coming to the market and we give them what they want. We don’t, don’t try and educate our consumer. We give the consumers what they want, especially in these leisure markets, whether that’s the beach entry pool and the, the bubblers and the splash pad to, to create more of a resort experience for the kids. You know, making sure that we’ve got one of the best in class, uh, complimentary breakfasts that go along with our products in the select service markets. And just making sure that we have hotels that just continue to wow guests that way when they do come back, you know, they’re, they’re repeat customers. They’re always, when they come back to the Pigeon Forge market, we know that they’re gonna, they’re gonna come back and they’re gonna stay at our Spring Hill or our Residence Inn that’s up in that location. But for us, it’s much easier to do that and to recognize those customers right here in our own backyard than it is for us to go to Colorado or Texas. I mean, sure, we have the ability and, and we have, in the past, we’ve had third party management comp contracts in Texas and other other states that were probably a bit too far for us at the time, and we hadn’t really scaled up enough to be able to manage those hotel properly, but we recognized that and we had a candid conversation with the owner. We helped ’em find a company that was more apt to run that asset for them. And, you know, it was, it was the right decision for everyone at the time. Like I said before, we’re not looking to grow in ways that doesn’t make sense for our company, but now as we look to the future, and we we’re looking for other opportunities and we continue to expand beyond the southeast, you know, Mr. Gibson’s bought a small plane that the company has the ability to use, which is, has definitely helped us out a lot. It’s a, it’s a huge time saver for our team to be able to get a property that used to take a six hour drive, and now we can be there in about two hours. It makes a huge difference in, in our team’s ability to, to get outside and a little further from where we normally operate. And, you know, ultimately, ultimately though, this is our home and, and we know these markets and we’re gonna continue to expand, uh, you know, we’re moving towards, uh, further into the Midwest and the the Northeast, but we’re gonna do it strategically like we’ve done our other growth. We don’t wanna just jump off the handle and go open a hotel in California for the fun of it, because it’s just not worth it for us. It, it doesn’t make any sense for us to operate on a three hour times zone difference in a, a market we are just not as familiar with.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, it all comes back to that strategic growth that we were talking about. And, you know, it sounds like you have some incredible white glove service with your mem your, your staff and onsite team members, so it doesn’t make sense to take a property that’s, again, led to the success and it’s actually been recognized. You know, you, Gibson Hospitality has earned numerous recognitions almost every brand on, on your website I’m seeing, but including being that four time winner of Marriott’s prestigious Partnership Circle Award, what do these recognitions mean to you, and how have you been able to leverage them to grow Gibson as a top tier hospitality management company? Well,
Joseph Grieco:
It’s really been amazing, um, especially the Partnership Circle award. That one, that one really means a lot to us. And to win it four times now is just a testament to the teams at our hotels and to our corporate office staff and, and just how much hard work our, our teams really do put into running these assets. But really, I mean, ultimately, we don’t run hotels to win awards. We try to run great hotels, and everyone on our team is on the same page when it comes to that. We take care of our guests, we take care of our assets, we make sure that we have the best product in the market. We make sure that we’re the top in our competitive set, and then if something’s broken, we fix it or we replace it as soon as possible. And we believe in the importance of empowering our staff to solve problems and take care of those guests. A big part of this just goes to our hands-on approach in running hotels and hiring the right people. You know, we expect our GMs to run hotels like they own that property. You know, they have to have that entrepreneurial spirit and the desire to see the hotel and, and the team succeed on every level. So, yes, it’s, it’s, it’s amazing to see our company win these awards and, and, uh, you know, to be recognized by companies like Marriott for Partnership Circle Award or with, uh, platinum and, and Gold Circle Award winning hotels with the Torch bearer awards that we have. But also, it’s amazing to see the internal recognitions. You know, we have, uh, staff within our, our company that routinely wins local awards in the market, like our Polly Awards here in Knoxville with the Greater Knoxville Hotel Association. Just to be able to hire and to, to grow these employees and to see their, uh, career expand and to see them win these awards and be part of the hotels winning these awards. It’s just a tremendous experience for us. And it’s also great for our reputation, you know, it, it definitely does help our, our reputation as a, a natural reaction to seeing us win these awards and the accolades at the Marriott conferences, and to see our name up on the big screen. But really our reputation is more from the way we operate our hotels for our owners and, uh, you know, how we pride ourselves on taking care of those assets and running the best in class products.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I like, I like what you said there, Joe, about, you know, we don’t run hotels to win awards. You know, you run hotels and then hopefully get recognized by awards and that kind of be the thing that tells you that you’re doing a good job, right? Hearing guests, giving you online reviews, hearing things on social media, uh, praising, and then hopefully those awards come really, really cool. And I’m sure it helps with staffing as well, right? I mean, we’re all competitive people in the world. Staff wants to work with the best. So if you’re out there winning awards, you know, I’m sure that you’re gonna win that candidate too. That and, and saying, Hey, I wanna be on, I wanna be on this team. So, but you know, outside of that, like you said, Gibson does a lot, it has an entire section dedicated to its website, to social responsibility and all the incredible causes, organizations that your team supports. Can you share any inspiring stories and maybe why this was a priority for your or organization and Mr. Gibson?
Joseph Grieco:
Sure. Uh, yeah, this, this definitely comes from the top down. This is, uh, this is, uh, um, Mr. Gibson has always been a very strong supporter of a lot of the causes in the organizations that you’re referring to. You know, I’d say most importantly, one of the, the ones that I wanna point out would probably be his work with the Tennessee Hospitality Association and the Education Foundation, something that we’re all very proud of, uh, and an incredible program, uh, providing scholarships. I think, if I remember correctly, I think they gave away about a million dollars last year in scholarships to hospitality, uh, uh, emerging Hospitality Talent. Um, you know, our team loves to participate in the ProStart event that we do here in Tennessee. That’s a, uh, a hospitality event where, uh, students from local high schools come in and put together restaurant concepts and do culinary events. And we have all of our corporate staff loves to go over there and judge the competitions and work with the, the young high school students that are looking to get into careers in hospitality. You know, it’s just something that’s very close to our heart and something that’s very important to us. And it’s also, you know, it’s, it’s our future. These are the people that are gonna be working for, for us down the road. They’re gonna be the people that we’re judging at these competitions that are in high school now, two or three years from now are gonna be working at our front desk or doing our breakfast service or, you know, bartending in our hotels. So, you know, it’s important that we give them the best leg up that we can right now, especially in going into this industry as we face so many challenging time from, uh, staffing and other issues that are coming up. So we feel supporting the, the young hoteliers and the people that are interested in, in this profession is very, very important to us. Additionally, we, we like to get out and participate with local charities. Our corporate office does quarterly, uh, charity events with, uh, you know, second Harvest Food Bank or going out to clean up, you know, local nature parks and things like that. Um, we just feel it’s very important that we give back to our community. And we, we also instill that in our hotels, you know, whether it’s, you know, Fairfield and their partnership with, uh, habitat for Humanity and encouraging our teams at our Fairfield to, to follow along with what the brand’s direction is and how important it is to support those organizations. Or, you know, our early adoption of programs like Clean the World that, you know, we implemented back when they were first emerging back in 2012. And, you know, we saw the potential to take, you know, unused, uh, bars of soap and things like that and, and have it be recycled and upcycled to, uh, third world countries where it could benefit and help people. So we just all feel it’s important that we give back, but really that, that stems a lot from the top down and Mr. Gibson’s commitment to, uh, the community and to, uh, furthering education and, and the young hoteliers that are emerging. So,
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, we got a whole, whole series dedicated to, you know, hospitality Campus crawl, where we go to these hospitality campuses and talk to administrators about, you know, the next, uh, generation of hotel professionals. Right? And, you know, this is something that’s very important to them is, is feeling a part of something, you know, seeing your organization be involved in charitable causes, so they feel like they’re doing, they feel a part of something that, so definitely ahead of the trend there. And, and I’m sure again, it’s, it definitely helping with staffing when you’re talking, uh, to young professionals about the opportunities that you have to contribute to really important causes like that. So thank you, Joe, to you and your team for doing that. You mentioned, you alluded to it earlier, travel Media Group, proud, proud partner of Gibson Hospitality Ventures for quite a while. And, you know, since the beginning, you know, we really recognized the importance and priority that you put to having a strong online presence and reputation. Something that, obviously as a hotel marketing podcast, we preach all the time, right, of having a really strong digital impression. Why is having that strategic digital marketing so critical for hotel management companies today and connecting with owners, investors, and guests?
Joseph Grieco:
Well, I mean, as you know, with most owners and investors, just to, to be blunt, it’s, it’s usually about top line revenue and, and bottom line profit. And so it’s always important that we find a digital strategy that works both for the property and that the ownership group will sign off on. So, uh, not all hotels have the same budget to work with, and, uh, not all digital marketing spend is the same across all of our different hotels. And when you operate a variety of extended stay, select and full service properties, not all strategies can be the same. So it’s important that we craft solutions for each property individual, and we work with the owners and the investors in those hotels to determine what their priorities are and explain to them, you know, the, the benefits of using partners like yourself or the disadvantages if they choose to go a different direction and not spend those dollars. So, you know, obviously today everyone’s booking online through the various channels, but all those same people aren’t just looking at your presence in one place. They’re, they may start on brand.com or hotels.com, but they’re gonna look at your social media presence, they’re gonna look at your reviews across the web, and it’s important that you, you showcase and tell a story of what your hotel has to offer. But it’s also important that that message is consistent across all your channels in order to be successful. You know, at Gibson, we really appreciate our partnership with Travel Media Group to help manage that online reputation on a daily basis. You know, we look at our guest feedback and what our guests are saying about us and our competitors, and that gives us a competitive advantage over a lot of the other management companies out there having partnerships with teams like, like yours. And it’s also important that we work with the brands to funnel more traffic through brand.com, through various promotions and through our online and digital media strategy. So, you know, when you look at the spend that companies like Expedia and hotels.com have to try and get you to, to book your property on their site and take their piece of the pie, it’s important that we’re very strategic with how we spend our dollars. We know we can’t compete with them, but if we are doing the right things and we’re being strategic about how we spend our money, we can definitely push that traffic more toward the direct channels and, and help improve overall bottom line, uh, for those owners and investors. And that’s where we see the true return, you know, being able to, to take care of those assets and to continue to maintain highly profitable hotels for our owners. So that way down the road, they, when when they’re ready to build the next one, we’re the first people that they call. So, you know, very important to us that, like any hotel organization, all those gears need to be running in, in Synchrony. They, they all rely on each other. So if we don’t have the, the correct digital marketing presence and the correct team working on our, our digital marketing, then our revenues are gonna fall. Our profits are gonna fall, our owners aren’t gonna be happy with us, and it’s just a cascading effect from there. So
Ryan Embree:
Certainly a snowball effect, and you know, it, it is about effectively telling your story online, right? For as much effort as we put on the operation side and, you know, service and, and, and experiences that we’re trying to create and memorable experiences that we’re trying to create for our guests, if for some reason that’s not perceived online, that can get lost. And that’s a scary thought for a lot of hotels of putting so much effort and energy to the onsite operations in that story. Just not being told. Can’t wait to see and hear the story being told with those, those Sports illustrated hotels. I’m sure you won’t have to search very hard for some good social media content. So let me know when those are up. We’ll, we’ll make sure to give it a follow. Now, one of the lines from Gibson’s Mission online reads, fostering Professional Growth for our team members. We talked about it on this episode, we talked about it in past episodes. Uh, it’s kind of a, every other news article seems about hospitalized, talking about this staffing shortage, uh, and labor shortage we have in hospitality right now. What creative ways have you been able to combat in this headwind and use the words of your mission for recruiting and retention? Uh,
Joseph Grieco:
Sure. Um, I wouldn’t say it’s really creative, unfortunately, but I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s getting back to the basics and the most important thing that you have to deal with in today’s market with, with the staffing shortages and everything that we’re facing. The, so I would say the most important thing for us when it comes to dealing with the current staff shortage has to be our staff retention. Uh, it’s been critical for us to be able to deal with the current situation with the labor market for us having a very low turnover ratio and being able to, to promote those staff members from within to continue to encourage them to grow their career and to grow their career within the Gibson organization. That’s really been the key for us. Back when I was at gm, I used to always say that the, the best employees that you have are gonna be the ones that your other employees bring to your staff, uh, because they’re not gonna bring somebody on who’s gonna bring the whole team down. You know, they’re gonna want staff members that are gonna be there to work just as hard as they are and to, to make sure that the job gets done on time. So, you know, really that staff retention, utilizing your internal staff and their networks to continue to grow your staff is very important. But promoting from within, that’s, that’s really always been a, a huge key for us when it comes to dealing with the shortages that we have in the industry and being able to maintain solid management and leadership teams. You know, unfortunately, the hourly staff, there’s, there’s turnover there like anywhere else, and you’re gonna have it. But if you can retain your management staff and your key team members and your leadership team and keep that culture alive at your hotel and be able to, to have people who are able to train the new people coming in and teach them properly on the way to, to do things, too often we turn over staff and we just throw people into the wolves and don’t provide enough training to them. You know, we feel as an organization that it’s very important that our team gets the proper training. You know, that staff member’s a lot more likely to stay if they have comfort and are acclimated with the position they’re in before you stick ’em out there on a four to 11 shift by themselves with no help and a hundred check-ins.
Ryan Embree:
So, right. Well, you know, and, and more, more likely to also come back, you know, there’s a lot of staff members out there that might jump at the opportunity to go to another hotel, but if you gave them the proper foundation and training, there’s an, there’s a chance that they might come back to you and serve you better in their next time around. You know, those Boomerang employees that we talk about all the time and, and you got a lot of stuff working for you over there, right? You’ve got opportunity with a lot of stuff in the development pipeline, and you got already a lot of stories of people, you know, even like yourself, Joe, that have started one place and ended up, you know, you were talking about all those corporate members, you know, starting at the line level or on property and making their way somewhere else. Showing and illustrating a path to growth is gonna be absolutely crucial right now during this. And it seems like you guys have done a great job of that. I would also say the social media side of things, just like guests are gonna be trying to hear that story and figure out what it’s like on your property. I’ve talked about it on this podcast, this younger generation. They’re doing the same thing on looking on the employee side. What, what does a day in the life look for me? Look at this fantastic pool look, they’re recognizing some of their staff members on social media. That could be me in a couple months if, if, if I do my job right? So these are all ways that I think, you know, obviously you’ve been able to leverage, but, uh, a lot of hoteliers to be on the lookout for, you know, and, and, and make sure that, first of all, if you, if you had an organization, you’ve got those stories in, in place and you’re sharing them with your employees, but if you’re also a hotel employee, you know, ask for the opportunity. See what, get to know that senior leadership team and their hospitality journey. How did they get to where they were? And if they came up through the org, the same organization that certainly says something and, and should tell you something there. So, covered a lot of ground on this episode. Joe, thank you so much. We know you got, you’re very, very busy over there with all these projects you got that you’re juggling. So thank you again for taking the time. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today? I
Joseph Grieco:
Would just say, you know, we’re, we’re, we’re very grateful for our partnership for you with, with you guys at Travel Media Group and, um, you know, we’re very excited about some continued organic growth that we’re gonna have here at Gibson Hotels. Um, you know, very selective growth as we talked about as we earlier. But, you know, we definitely feel that, uh, working with the right teams, the right owners, the right investors, the right brands, uh, you know, we’re, you’re gonna see some incredible growth from, from Gibson Hotels in the next, uh, in the next few years within the full service, the boutique soft and experiential brands. Uh, look forward to talking to you in the future about some other opportunities that we have and, and the, the additional growth we have coming at Gibson Hotels.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited. All, all eyes are on over there and you know, it, it’s a very reciprocal feeling. You know, we love working with, uh, hotel managements like Gibson Hospitality Ventures that see just such a strategic and amazing growth and being part of their story, right? Our success is your success and vice versa. So we’re really excited for what you have cooking over there, uh, at Gibson Hospitality Ventures. We’ll continue to keep an eye on and hopefully, uh, you know, I can visit one of these new properties here soon and maybe we’ll be doing an episode from one of these, uh, sports Illustrated universities. Uh, fingers crossed. So thank you so much. That was great. Look forward to it. Alright. Look forward to it. Well, thank you so much for Joe, uh, for jumping on the Suite Spot. Thank you all for listening and we will talk to you next time. Alright, thank you Ryan. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host, Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
TMG Hospitality Trailblazers continues with the Senior Vice President & Global Brand Leader of Hampton by Hilton, Shruti Buckley!
In this celebratory episode, Shruti joins the Suite Spot to discuss the 40-year anniversary of Hampton by Hilton by taking a look back on the brand’s origins and where the franchise is headed in the near future with exciting expansion plans and technological innovations.
Tune in now!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We’ve got another great episode for you today continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. If this is your first time, this series is all about the people and groups that are pushing our industry, our great industry forward, and I have such a special guest here to celebrate another impressive and awesome milestone. Shruti Gandhi Buckley brand leader of Hampton by Hilton. Shruti, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot today.
Shruti Buckley :
Well, thank you for having me, Ryan. I’m really excited about our conversation.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it is exciting. And before we get into that, some of that exciting news and the exciting, incredible milestone that this brand has hit. Let’s talk to you, Shruti, this is your first time on the Suite Spot. We love hearing stories from hospitality professionals, the webs and weaves of how people got into hospitality, how it kind of infused into their DNA, as we have heard so much in our industry. Share with us a little bit about your experience and the journey that led you to Hampton by Hilton.
Shruti Buckley :
Yeah, of course. It’s really interesting. I had somewhat of a unique path into hospitality, but at the same time, I actually had some exposure at a very young age. My uncle used to own a hotel in New Jersey, and I actually used to spend my summers there helping out at the hotel, sort of understanding the guest piece of it behind the scenes, stacking the coke machine and folding towels, things like that. And that’s when I was very young in elementary school. Years went by and when I graduated from college, I actually started my career in consumer product brand management and marketing. So I led global brands and businesses in a variety of different industries. So I started my career out in the food industry with Nestle. I then moved to Luxury cosmetics and I worked for Unilever and Estee Lauder and Chanel. And then I loved to joke with my friends that I traded in my Jimmy Chews for Converse sneakers and Birkenstocks and actually made my way back to D.C. which is where I’m originally from, to work for National Geographic, believe it or not. So I went from Chanel to Nat Geo. They had a very large product division where they had branded merchandise and retail, and I had a really great opportunity to work there for many years leading many of those efforts on the product side. And being in DC as you know, it’s known as the hospitality capital of the world, actually had several friends that were in the hospitality industry and for a few years they kept saying, Shruti, come talk to us. We think you’d be a really great addition to the team. You’ve got really interesting strategic brand background. A lot of our folks are on the operations side, and it would be really interesting just to talk to you to see where this might go. And that is actually what led me into hospitality. So I actually started that part of my career with one of Hilton’s competitors just down the street, in fact, for many years running one of Hampton’s competitors. And I did that for eight years. But candidly, after chasing Hampton for that many years, I said, well, if I can’t beat Hampton, I might as well join them. And was really fortunate seven years ago when Hilton called and was able to make my way to this fantastic company and lead, what many would call is the best brand in the industry. And I’ve been doing that for seven years and recently took on oversight for the our newest brand called Spark.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I’m sure you learned a lot competing against the brand too, right? Like I’m sure that gave you a unique perspective to be able to come in and probably gave you some insightful knowledge being on the other side of it. But I wanna go back to where your hospitality career started, and I can’t overlook that enough. The cool part about our industry is we’re all travelers from as young as we can walk, right? And hotels are such a magical place when we’re young and we get to travel somewhere different. So to be a part of that story and to see families which I’m sure Hampton over the years has invited, you know, hundreds of thousands if not millions of guests in to have some of those incredible memories. And that’s what we’re here to celebrate, right? This is a 40 year milestone for this brand. Congratulations to you and your team. I’m sure that the celebrations are not gonna stop, but, share with our audience a little bit about the history and backstory. It’s so unique to kind of talk about these brands and how they come and the ideas and how they’ve evolved over time.
Shruti Buckley :
Well, thank you, Ryan. This is actually one of my favorite topics. You know, being a brand enthusiast, it’s really fascinating for me to see a brand like Hampton 40 years young and how it’s been able to sustain this incredible legacy of leadership for that long. In fact, when you think about the world of brands, right across all industries, there really are very few brands that haven’t had a lot of ups and downs, right? Hampton has been this steady and consistently delivered against performance for almost throughout its entire 40 years of its life. And you know what started out, many folks don’t actually realize this, but Hampton actually started out as a small kind of roadside motel brand, right? With exterior corridors, and and more along kind of the highways of America. And as time went on, Hampton was actually able to move up market and eventually created what we now call the upper mid-scale category. You know, in the eighties when you, you think about that time there were, there were full service hotels, and then there were economy hotels, and there really wasn’t much in in between that. And I had to realize, hey, you know what? Guests actually are willing to pay more for an upgraded experience. We believe that to be the case. And so over time, through years of innovations like introducing free hop breakfast, the waffle free wifi, um, creating more functional and elevated design, and then taking risks, like introducing the industry’s first a hundred percent money back guarantee, and then keeping a really close king focus on service and hospitality, Hampton was able to move up market to create a better product, a better guest experience, and that ultimately drove higher rates and incredible guest loyalty. So, you know, when you think about this incredible legacy, right? It’s, it’s sort of a longstanding commitment of innovation, quality, consistency, and service. And that’s really been kind of the secret sauce behind creating this power brand. And you know, you, Ryan, you asked earlier or you made mention, you know, when you’re running a competitor, you’re always looking at, um, or you’re running a brand, you’re always looking at who your competitors are. And I studied Hampton, right? I wrote right papers on Hampton, um, would have to present to my last company on why Hampton continued to be such a leader. And it was those pieces of the pie that I just, I just talked about, right? That quality, innovation, the commitment to consistency, that, that real sort of breathing life into service and what that meant in that kind of mid-tier product. And that has really created this unique brand that has become a leader and stayed the leader, you know, for almost four decades. And Ryan, what is really great is that’s driven our growth. We are now 3000 hotels strong across four continents, soon to be five and in 41 countries.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s absolutely incredible because right in, in the theme of what this spirit, uh, of the series is all about, which is TMG trailblazers, it really sounds like the brand itself was a trailblazer and pioneer into that upper, that segment there and really kind of carved out itself. And probably is why it is such a staple today. And you know, as you’ve mentioned, Trudy, that you know, 40 years is no easy feat. You have to have buy-in from a lot of stakeholders. And we’ve learned that with the good brand, it has to be the, the guests, the consumers, right? But it also has to be the developers, the owners that are interested in actually building these hotels, right? So why do you believe there’s just been this synergy between this brand and why guests and, and developers and owners alike all love it so much?
Shruti Buckley :
Yeah, you know, it’s interesting, it’s almost creating this balance between all of the different stakeholders. You know, we’re working and as we think about the brand and all the different things that we do to drive brand performance for the guests, for the owners, for the developers, there are many things that sort of come top of mind. I think first of all, there’s been a consistent investment in Hampton’s guest experience, right? Through the innovation that I talked about through marketing and a hyper focus on service. So we invest a lot in our service experience and training of our team members, and that really makes our guests a priority. And that’s really what has garnered unparalleled guest loyalty. And it’s why Hampton has more five star social media reviews than any other brand and why our guests are willing to pay a premium. So that’s the guest side of it. But what’s interesting is that loyalty and that desire, or the willingness to pay more for great quality then has driven really great market share and RevPAR premiums. And that’s why we’re recognized as the number one hotel brand franchise, right? The operational models really strong, the cost to build is favorable, and all of that drives great returns and margin performance for our owners, right? So they work in combination for each other. And on the development side, we continue to deliver efficiency with our prototypes. So in fact, we just launched, we’re super excited, a new North American prototype and renovation package both for the Hampton Inn and the Inn in Suites. And it’s more flexible, more favorable and the cost to build. And so then that drives, the fan favorite from a development standpoint, and so we, our goal is to always set the bar and continue to raise that bar, you know, for all the various stakeholders that we have.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I love to hear, even 40 years later, there’s still evolution, there’s still innovation going with this brand and, and especially adapting to, some of the things that you just said. A lot of developers are probably just, they’re rubbing their hands together because that’s what they need right now. We’re going through unfortunately, a staffing shortage right now. Guests are looking for more flexibility. Developers are looking for different ways to build and obviously with rising construction costs. So to be able to still have a legacy brand that everyone knows that reputation, everyone knows what to expect when you come to a Hampton, but also have these new things that are still adapting to where we are in 2024 today, I think probably puts you in a great position for future success and growth. So, you know, for me personally, Hampton is synonymous with a great stay and equally great breakfast. You brought up the famous Hampton Waffle. I mean, that is so cool. You know, there’s 40 years of a brand, but there’s a couple singular things I think I associate with Hampton, still a lot of guests do. One being this waffle. Can you talk a little bit more about this staple breakfast item that’s really been associated with the brand and how social media has really contributed to its popularity. I know you guys definitely lean into that over there and embrace that.
Shruti Buckley :
We absolutely do. And the waffle is definitely, one of the fan favorites and certainly something that has become very synonymous with the brand. So, while service and consistency really remain the heroes at Hampton, breakfast is something that is hugely important to our guests. We actually have over an 85% take rate on our fabulous breakfast. So it’s really important that we double down on high quality food items like the scrambled eggs, the yogurt, fruit, bacon, other delicious protein items and healthy items that we have. But our famous Belgium waffle was introduced in the industry as an industry first in 2009, but our favorite famous Belgium waffle was introduced as an industry first in 2009. And as I mentioned, it’s become synonymous with the Hampton brand. You know, when you think about a waffle, right, what do you think about it makes you smile, right? They’re fun, they’re warm, they’re tasty, and kids and adults alike, they love that actual ceremony of making the waffles and that smell of the waffles that kind of wafts through the hotel definitely creates an appetite for all of our guests. So, it was really important as we think about breakfast, how do we continue to make the Hampton brand relevant across all of our guest touchpoints? But breakfast being a really important part, we started to focus on the waffle, right? So we always look every year at our breakfast program on, what are things that we wanna remove? What are the things we wanna improve on? And you know, a couple of years ago we said the waffle, you know, how do we invigorate the waffle and do something new with it? And this idea of waffle flavors came up and we said, well, let’s test it out. Let’s see what happens. So in fall of 2022, we actually introduced pumpkin spice, waffle. Pumpkin spice, you see it all over the place during the fall season, whether it’s coffee flavors, all different types of things. And we said, there could be something here. And it was an instant favorite Ryan. People loved it, and it created a buzz. It gave guests and our hotel team members something fun to talk about. And it became an instant hit on social media. So much so that even Paris Hilton came to us and became a fan and now is featured in our social media waffle campaign, which is really great. So since then we’ve been introducing new flavors, several times a year, including red velvet that we’ve done for Valentine’s Day strawberry and apple cinnamon. We currently have the fabulous lemon waffle just in time for summer, refreshing lemon and more to come. So it’s really been an exciting journey that the waffle has gone on for Hampton.
Ryan Embree:
It’s, it’s so cool. I love that we just talked about like waffles for a couple minutes, but it’s so important and you know, hats off to you and your team on the creativity, because you’re right, there is a ceremony there of, as someone who is not the best person at cooking, to just to be able to pour that and be a part of that experience, I think that subconsciously does something for you. And I think it makes it a part of your hotel stay.
Shruti Buckley :
It does. And actually what was really nice is there’s a service element because oftentimes they have a breakfast attendant that’s actually there to assist our guests with actually making a waffle. And that’s a great opportunity to strike up a conversation or ask how is your stay, welcome them to the hotel, thank them for their business. So it actually was a really nice opportunity for us to create a dialogue with our guests centered around the waffle.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, absolutely. Brilliant. So a lot of positive side effects of the Hampton Waffle and excited to see what the new flavor you and your team might have up your sleeve there, but, you know, another trademark unique to Hampton, and you brought this up, Shruti was the one hundred percent Hampton guarantee. And I truly believe that it was this campaign that really went a long way in marrying the Hampton by Hilton brand with the exceptional customer service that you’ve been talking about. Can you talk a little bit more about this initiative and what this means for the brand and its reputation?
Shruti Buckley :
Yeah, sure. Of course. You know, initially, the Hampton, one hundred percent guarantee was launched in the late nineties, and it was really intended to give consumers confidence in a category of hotels that at that point in time wasn’t really known for reliability. And the idea was to create something that essentially communicated that we at Hampton are so confident that you as a guest will have a great experience at our hotel, that we’re willing to refund you a full night’s stay if we don’t live up to your expectation. And what this did is it got consumers talking, it got new consumers into the door, and it gave consumers confidence they could trust Hampton. But more importantly, the one hundred percent hands and guarantee actually became the bedrock of our on property team culture. So the guarantee really motivated our hotel teams to kind of double down on service and cleanliness and commit to creating an experience that was truly best in class. And it really created, you know, what we like to call a service culture movement within the brand that became so strong that we even gave it a name, Ryan, we call it Hamptonality. And it’s really how Hampton has become this beacon of humanity, right? It connects people of all different races and cultures and backgrounds, and our culture is about taking care of each other and also taking care of the guests. Because when you think about it, if your team members are happy and they’re in a great environment and they are well cared for, they’re in a better position to take great care of their guests. And then over time, what we found is it was less about money back. What our guests were telling us is, you know what, we just want you to make it right for us. And so we evolved from a hundred percent guarantee to what we call the happiness guarantee. Making you happy makes us happy. And again, it’s this, it’s creating an emotional experience for our guests and creating a real dialogue and a relationship between the team members and the guests. And it’s been a home run. That’s really what has created a big differentiation for Hampton, is that true commitment by each one of our over one hundred thousand team members around the globe, to delivering against the guarantee.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, another trailblazing. I would say, a point in this brand’s history. I would’ve loved to have been in the room when this idea was pitched or even maybe said to some of those individual stakeholders when this was first rolled out. But I think you’re right, Shruti, two of the things that we’ve learned on this podcast today is, maybe some side effects of these initiatives. It had just as much effect on the guests as it did on the employees of Hampton by Hilton and the brand itself. And then overall, I mean, that led it to a place of success and growth that we’ve seen today. So it’s so cool to kind of see how these little changes here, you think it’s gonna have some sort of impact, but that impact might be much greater and, than you ever could have imagined there.
Shruti Buckley :
You’re absolutely right. And you know, when we rolled it out, we weren’t sure what the reception was gonna be. Certainly from owners, they were really concerned, right? Certainly from the guests, how would they react? But it’s been a home run and it’s something we’ve stayed committed to for the last three decades.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool to hear those stories, and I’ve had the pleasure now of interviewing, several Hilton brand leaders and some of the most key and fascinating takeaways I get from those conversations are the decision to either implement something like we’ve talked about, or sometimes the even more fascinating is when not to change something. When there was a decision that came down that said, you know, what we’re, we’re thinking about doing this and then reacting to either, whether it be owner feedback or guest feedback about like, no, this is one of my favorite parts of my experience or my stay. Do you have any stories like that with the, I’m sure we’ve talked through some of them, but any stories like that about some of these changes based on guest feedback or owner feedback that have really contributed to where the brand is today?
Shruti Buckley :
There are many examples. You know, it’s interesting. There’s definitely a delicate dance between the guests need and the owner need. And, and candidly, Ryan, it’s become even more delicate as costs have increase. So we have to be really deliberate about the decisions that we make. And, Hampton is considered a premium brand, right? That our guests are willing to pay more for. So we really have to do our due diligence to know what guests want, what they’re willing to pay for, and then how that is gonna translate to, market share and RevPAR performance for our owners. And I’ll give you two examples very briefly. One is a breakfast refresh. So it was not just the waffle, but it was sort of the entire program of breakfast. We knew that was one of the most important parts of a guest day, and they actually choose Hampton.
Shruti Buckley :
Many guests choose Hampton because of the high quality breakfast, but the competition was catching up, right? So we said, look, we need to continue to elevate the program. How do we do it in a way that is going to meet our guest needs, but also make sure we don’t drive costs? And so that was something, uh, that we started in 2019, but every, every couple of years we’re, we are actually looking at that program and refreshing it on a regular basis, but we’re, there’s a little bit of push and pull, right? What do we touch, do we not touch? And then how does that, that impact the actual cost? But what we find is when we do those things in a deliberate way, it does drive loyalty and then it drives performance for our owners, which is great. Um, another recent example, I’m really excited that this year for Hampton, we were able to launch a new hotel prototype and renovation design for both the Inn, Hampton Inn and Hampton Inn Suites. And what we were able to do was create actually a more functional design package and more modern decor, uh, which would definitely appeal to guests, but we did it in a more cost efficient way to really drive bottom line performance for our owners. So I think those are two exciting recent innovations that were guest led, but uh, ultimately the operational component and the cost component ended up really being very in line with, you know, owner margin performance and driving revenue for those hotels.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Well, those are the win-wins that you’re, that you’re looking for, right? And, you know, it helps, I will say having over 3000 hotels and, and, and hundreds of thousands of guests coming through your door. So you have a big sample size of if you do need to make a change, if you’re hearing feedback from guests online, whether it be online reviews, social media, keeping an ear, you know, on the pulse of your guests. And we preach that all the time on this podcast, you know, whether you’re a, a giant brand, a collection of hotels, or even a single hotel, you know, your guests are really printing out a, a roadmap to that perfect guest experience, but you have to be open and willing to hear them. And some changes may be easier than others, right? But a lot of it needs to be thoughtful due diligence, uh, and very, very data-driven, which, you know, at Hilton, you guys do a fantastic job of. And I’m sure, like I said, you know, there’s a lot more stories I think every single time I come into a hotel. Now, I’m trying to think through if I, you know, I I, if I’m a brand leader, you know, why was this put here? Why was it everything in a hotel has a reason for why it’s somewhere I’m finding, which is really, really cool to see if you look through the lens like that. So, so I’m sure Shruti after 40 years, you know, you have a lot to be excited about, obviously the big milestone here. But are there any recent projects or developments, you know, you talk about the new prototype, but any projects that are going on right now that really kind of bubble to the top when it comes to Hampton by Hilton for you,
Shruti Buckley :
You know, one development project that I’m really excited about, you know, as I mentioned earlier, we are in 41 countries and four continents. We are actually currently building the very first Hampton in the continent of Africa, which is very exciting in South Africa. Uh, which, uh, we are looking forward to opening a little later this year. So what to me is so wonderful about the continued expansion of this brand is the way that we can continue to really deliver the spirit of hospitality to new people and different people and bringing these communities together. And, you know, whenever I’m talking to the team members, we always talk about not only taking care of each other and taking care of our guests, but also taking care of our communities. A lot of our hotels do an amazing job with outreach and, um, raising money for various charities and not-for-profits within their communities. And by expanding to a new continent, uh, you know, we’re able to now reach a whole new audience, um, and really deliver that spirit of hamptonality to new people, which is really exciting for us.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s in, that’s incredible. Five, five continents. I mean, in the spirit of the Olympics that are going on right now, you know, so many countries, that’s really, really cool. So congratulations to, uh, you and your team on, on that, that achievement. Now, Hilton, like I I mentioned, very innovative company, you know, received numerous awards and recognitions for its innovation and technology. Love to hear how we talked about cost are rising right now. There’s a staffing shortage. Some of these can be improved with technology, whether it’s on the guest side, guest technology, or even on the employee side with technology, implementing that into everyday jobs and tasks. Any technology that we’re exploring or recent updates by the Hampton, by Hilton brand, um, when it comes to looking to improve the guest experience using and leveraging technology,
Shruti Buckley :
You know, we’re always looking for ways to improve the experience through technology. Uh, Ryan, I won’t share some of the things that we’re currently working on, but I am excited to share something that we actually have introduced that is live in the marketplace to support the growing need of, you know, for frictionless travel and introduce easier ways for guests to engage with hotel team members. We are expanding mobile messaging. Um, we’re expanding that platform to all of our over 7,000 Hilton hotels. Hampton being of course, the largest brand, uh, partaking in that. And we are getting really great guest feedback from mobile messaging, right? It’s allowing us to have a dialogue with the guests. They’re able to instantly send us a note. We’re able to respond very quickly. And that’s been really exciting for us. Um, and, and this new system, it was actually developed in partnership with ksu.
Shruti Buckley :
We actually had several hotels that were leveraging it already. And because we had received such great feedback and the, the data supported the need and the desire to have that, both from a guest standpoint and an owner standpoint, we were able to roll that out to all of our brands. So that’s something that for Hampton specifically, you know, how do you take, um, as people are bypassing the front desk with another, yet technology that Hilton was the forefront of with Digital Key, we now have the ability to still have an interaction with the guest through instant messaging, right? So we talked about breakfast as being a really important touch point for Hampton, and I would say digital messaging being another really important touch point, and, uh, just another way that we can, you know, service our guests and provide a really great guest experience in, in, you know, by leveraging technology.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, another brilliant example of, again, adapting to the times, right? I think, I think guests are gonna become more and more comfortable with that type of communication rather than, you know, picking up the physical phone that’s in the, the hotel or even coming down to the front desk. They want maybe that, uh, more seamless communication. So another great example of a byproduct of you create this one amazing guest, uh, technology with the keyless entry, but then that removes a piece of hospitality, which everyone loves, right? Everyone, you know, come to the front desk, you check in, you ask why you’re here, you know, that now all of a sudden that removes and now finding a different way and a different path to get in front of the guest keeps you very, very connected to the guest and I’m sure has profound impact on the brand and its communication moving forward. So as we wrap up here today, Shruti, let’s fast forward, we’ll time travel five years down the line, we’re, we’re celebrating, uh, Hampton by Hilton’s 45th anniversary at that point, obviously in five continents at that point. But what’s your vision for the brand five years down the line? If, if I had to ask you today,
Shruti Buckley :
Oh my goodness, five years down the line, you know, is to continue to deliver the service experience that keeps us on top of the game, right? So our objective is, you know, how do we continue to deliver great product, great experience to drive consumer loyalty, to drive owner returns, so we can continue to be the number one brand for owners from a franchising perspective and the number one brand in the upper mid-scale category for consumers to choose. And my hope is right, as we, in fact, we have the largest pipeline in the industry of over 800 hotels that will come online. So by then, you know, five years from now, I think we’re probably looking at around 4,000 hotels. Um, maybe even another continent who knows. But more importantly, you know, in, in a world that sometimes seems a little divisive, I think what is really exciting about the world that we live in, Ryan Hospitality is, and with a brand that is at the scale of Hampton, is that we truly can make meaningful connections and bring people together. And I think that to me is how all of us in this industry can have a positive impact is by creating these moments, building connection, right? People travel regardless of the background you come from, and they’re often all staying in a hotel together. And, and there are opportunities, uh, to bridge those gaps that sometimes exist. And that to me is what’s really exciting. So continued leadership, continued success, and continue to be the number one brand for owners and for consumers.
Ryan Embree:
Well, very well said, Shruti. And hopefully, uh, a lot more hotels and a lot more, uh, different flavored waffles, uh, as well for us to try for me and, and all of, all of our Hampton by Hilton loyal guests out there. So thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot. What an incredible celebration of 40 years, uh, Hampton by Hilton and this brand. And it sounds like, uh, this is just the beginning for, for you and your team. So congratulations again Shruti.
Shruti Buckley :
Thank you very much, Ryan. Appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
Alright. It’s a pleasure speaking with you. And thank you all for listening to the Suite Spot, we’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star ratingon iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Join the Suite Spot in this episode of TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl featuring Florida Atlantic University!
FAU Professor, Dr. Peter Ricci, joins the episode to shine a light on the FAU hospitality program and tells viewers why it is one-of-a-kind and how it prepares its students for success in the hospitality industry.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, and this is the second part of our TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl series. If this is your first time listening to this brand new summer series, we just launched this, we’ve talked about it before. Right now we’re going through somewhat of a staffing shortage. We’re gonna get into that a little bit into this episode. But what we’re trying to accomplish with this particular series is talk to the people and places that are educating and preparing the next generation of hoteliers, the next generation of hospitality workforce. So, very excited to just move a little on up I 95 North to Boca Raton. Im a bring in my next Suite Spot guest, clinical professor and director Dr. Peter Ricci of FAU’s Hospitality and Tourism Management program. Dr. Ricci, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot today.
Dr. Peter Ricci :
Great. Nice to be here. Thank you. So I started sitting back here so you can see my lovely FAU owl. Now I can, move in a little bit. Thanks for having me. I love to see you and I know you’re a Rosen grad. I did my doctorate there, so it’s great, great to spend some time with you.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you have, you’ve got such an extensive and unique journey and, and I was talking to you off camera, how about that is one of my favorite things about our industry is, you know, sometimes our hospitality journeys take us all over the world. Sometimes we fall into hospitality as a career. Typically we meet a couple mentors along the way. And for your particular journey, you’ve been kind of in and out of academia. Share with our audience a little bit about your journey and the path that led you to FAU.
Dr. Peter Ricci :
You know it’s interesting that I’m spending time with you today. Yesterday was 47 years since I moved to Florida. So I moved here as a little boy and tourism was a part of my life growing up. Always. because we had visited here first. My family also was in California, so we spent a lot of time traveling. And I’ve always had a love and passion for meeting people and traveling. But as a boy, you don’t realize that. You just think Florida’s cool because you can swim all the time and you can go play. And so my experience here growing up in middle and high school was fantastic. And, um, I started working as a teenager in a fine dining restaurant and happened to have an absolute amazing mentor who was a self-made millionaire and owned fine dining restaurants all over South Florida. And this was in the eighties when fine dining was all the rage with the flambe, tableside and fancy cocktails before they were called craft cocktails. And he was all about guest service. And of course I didn’t know what that meant at that time. He was just instilling me like an etiquette. I’m kind of a casual guy, but I wouldn’t say kind of, I’m a casual guy. I don’t like suits and ties, but I’m all about treating people with the utmost respect, welcoming them, feeling warmly about hospitality and inviting you into my environment. So hospitality was like a natural thing for me. Undergrad, I worked food and beverage all through college. I fell in love with what they call trip directing, where you would go on a trip as the liaison to the conference or the convention or the incentive group where they’re rewarding some travelers. And so I just had this passion for travel, thought I would go to law school, got in, didn’t like my first week. I didn’t even give it a chance. And, uh, wound up just doing my grad degree in tourism and recreation and parks and being in there ever since. I think my favorite part was the hotel side of my career, but I actually liked them all. I worked for Delta for about six months after my undergrad. That was the most rigorous, intensive, uh, interview process I’ve ever had in my life. I think I had seven or eight interviews plus an hour with a psychiatrist plus aptitude tests. I mean, it was an incredible thing to work at Delta Airlines in the eighties. And that experience to this day has helped me refine how I recruit and finding genuine hospitality people. So, you know how I wound up here. I wound up doing my doctorate at UCF University of Central Florida when the Rosen School was created. We didn’t say Rosen School for long. It became Rosen College shortly thereafter. ’cause we grew so quickly. But when Harris Rosen so generously offered dollars to create the Rosen School, they were looking for a lodging professor. And I had been teaching part-time, what we call adjunct teaching for more than a decade. And every place I opened a hotel or I would babysit a gm, a general manager or whatever the case was, I would teach while I was living in that community. So I thought I had thought about doing a doctorate, but not really too much. But I did it and I taught at Rosen at the same time for about five years. Um, and then I went back to hotels and I was very happily back doing regional work in the southeast. And FAU asked me to adjunct. I fell in love with it here, and I’ve been here ever since. I think I’ve been here since 2007. So I’m not really good at math. I’m a typical hospitality guy, so a long time. But I love it. And the reason I liked it here and I came here is that we’re in the business school model. So our curriculum’s rather rigorous. And I felt that’s what I was missing in my own journey because I have a bachelor’s in sociology. My master’s is in recreational studies, which is tourism, recreation and parks. And I didn’t get the quantitative training at the University of Florida that I should have because I hated my accounting class. Then I’m thrust into my first hotel job. I worked at Convention Bureau for a couple years, but my first hotel job as director of sales, they were throwing the star report at me and I had never heard of it. I didn’t know how to do data analytics, you know, so I had to learn all that on the fly. So I know it’s a long answer to your question, but I have a quantitative side, but prefer my hospitality side. And I think the future leaders of this industry need both now.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. They do. And, and we’re gonna talk about how you and FAU are preparing that hospitality workforce to have that well-rounded experience before going into hospitality. Because you absolutely do and the trends are ever changing. But before we kind of talk about that, you know, I wanna go back to the beginning of your story. And I think it’s so fascinating when people talk about, because we are in an industry that we experienced before, we’re in the workforce, right? We’re travelers before we work in hospitality. And a lot of those childhood memories might be traveling to that hotel and having that magical experience. And it’s cool to be on the other side now to be able to offer that to people and know that maybe it’s that one hotel experience meeting a GM or a DOS at a property could inspire them on the road to hospitality. And that’s kind of what this is all about. But, you know, from that to where we are today and people that do choose hospitality or what we’ve heard is a lot of people fall into hospitality and we’re trying to change that narrative. We want people to think of hospitality as a career because it is such an amazing industry, as you’ve pointed out with so many opportunities. Share a little bit about FAU’s background and the program that you have at the Hospitality and Tourism program and what it kind of makes it unique maybe from other programs in the state or even the country.
Dr. Peter Ricci :
You know, the most unique feature is our location and in hospitality it’s location, location, location. Well, when I grew up here in south Florida, FAU was a rather young university. It was started in the 1960s and originally it was going to be part of the state university system, the SUS our model for the upper division. So you would go to a two year school now called state colleges, sometimes community colleges, and then you would come to FAU. So in high school, several of my friends wanted to go to FAU because IBM was headquartered here at that time, but they had to go to Broward College first. At that time called Broward Community College. I went away to University of Florida because I didn’t want to go to Broward College immediately and keep my same job. I wanted to try something else. Well, long behold, that two plus two model in the state university system never really materialized. And FAU became a four year school later on. But in my mind, it was not on my radar even though I had grown up here, if that makes sense. Fast forward later in life, they were building a hospitality program. I had the pleasure to get hired at University of Central Florida Rosen when we had 83 students. And I helped build the main campus up when we built the Rosen College and opened it near SeaWorld. And in the midst of iDrive and all the attractions, we were already up to about 1200 or 1300 students. My job was teaching the intro to hospitality courses at main campus and kind of orchestrating main campus to get hospitality awareness where we all started initially and make sure they kept going to the new building. And so I had an office at both of them. And what I liked about Rosen was the living laboratory of the environment. And what I like in particular about FAU is our environment here. Our location is probably the most unique you’ll find in the state. There are more private country clubs within a 30 mile radius of FAU, we’ve run estimates, and I think anywhere on the planet. We have the super high end resorts, yet we have very successful entrepreneurs who own 10 properties and do Airbnb. We have every level of restaurant you could imagine. We have yacht clubs, we have charter fishing entrepreneurs, we have casinos, we have cruise line headquarters, we have Expedia, we have everything. So the affluent Boca Raton community, which is one of the most affluent in the United States, provides this wealth of visitors and this wealth of a training lab to work in. And I look back to where I grew up in south Florida, about 20 minutes from where I’m sitting now. And that’s why I have this guest service inclination was because of the grooming I had in the high level of restaurants that I worked at. But I’ve carried that level of service to every type of environment, whether it was a casual Holiday Inn, an upscale intercontinental, whatever it was. And so I think our living laboratory location makes us probably the best anywhere. I mean, Miami and all its nightlife and success is within 45 minutes. You’ve got the wealth of Palm Beach and the world class breakers and Palm Beach and Four Seasons Palm Beach within 40 minutes the other way. And I see it in our students and our alumni. My alumni are more successful here in a shorter time than anywhere I’ve taught as an adjunct or a full-time. And when I was a hotel general manager and a regional vice president, I had the privilege to adjunct all over the place where we were opening properties. So in Tampa and Tallahassee at FSU and Gainesville, at UF and Miami at FIU I’ve taught all around and I was able to feel the vibe and feel the curriculum as a hotel employee, as a hotelier who was looking to not only teach part-time, but also to recruit. So I haven’t found anything like FAU, I think there’s probably a similar vibe in amenities and opportunities at FIU and Florida Gulf Coast, because Florida Gulf Coast has the affluent resorts and country clubs, but we’re all uniquely different. So that’s my long-winded tell you that it’s comes back to the old saying that you hear time and time again. Location, location, location.
Ryan Embree:
Well, what a benefit for the students to have almost an incubator right outside your classroom doors. Right? It’s almost an extension of the hospitality program. And we’re gonna talk about that, about how those relationships, and we talked about this on a previous episode, how it’s a really a win-win for everyone. I mean, the businesses that wanna hire from your university because of the programs and initiatives and coursework that you’re doing there sets them up perfectly. They’re familiar with the area. It’s truly a win-win. But you offer a number to match your experience. Dr. Ricci, you offer a number of certifications that not just students, but hospitality professionals can enroll in. And you know, some of these, I’ve actually heard firsthand, that you did these during the pandemic, which was very gracious of you and at a time when our industry especially was struggling. So thank you for that. Can you share a little bit about these programs and the importance of continuing education in our industry?
Dr. Peter Ricci :
Sure. You know, there’s a movement, and it’s been occurring for probably 30 years, where the value of a higher education degree has been questioned by many people. Is it worth the money? Should I get a bachelor’s? Is bachelor’s the only immediate pathway to a financial success? And historically, I mean, I grew up in the lower middle class family on government aid. So University of Florida was way outta my reach. If I didn’t get financial aid or scholarship, I never would’ve gone to University of Florida. And University of Florida and all our state schools in Florida are very inexpensive tuition wise. But you’re still gonna spend $10,000 to $80,000 whatever it takes, and is it worthwhile? So certificates and certifications over the past decade have become more and more popular. And then during covid, they just exploded. What I tell people now is buyer beware, you know, whatever the saying is, because you have to really know what the content is. Is it someone who just threw a certificate together and put it out there to profit, et cetera. At FAU, we have had a certificate since I came here many, many years ago. We used to do it in person. And it’s about lifelong learning. So there, the majority of our workforce is probably not going to pursue a bachelor’s. That’s probably 20% to 25% if I were to guess. So what about the 80% or the 70% or 60% that don’t do it? Well, they still need training. They need to feel engaged. They need to feel part of an industry. They need to learn how to do their jobs better. So certificates and certifications became an amazing way to get educated without the expense and the time of a formal degree. Now you think about the myriad ways you can study now online, in person, hybrid mixed modes. So a bachelor’s degree will always be there. It’s always important for those that want it. And it should be your own goal. It’s not a necessary ingredient to success. It helps you create your own discipline and time management. It helps expand your mind and helps you think across different ways of thinking and different subjects. But I wouldn’t say it’s the necessary roadmap to success. Now, having said that, do I feel that my undergraduate and MBA graduates are better prepared for their hospitality jobs? Absolutely. So if you know that you wanna be a chemical engineer, by all means do your bachelor’s in chemical engineering, you know that you wanna work for Hilton or JetBlue or one of the super high number of businesses in our field, get a business degree or better yet, get a business combination hospitality degree. So you’re prepared. Because going back to what you said earlier about our industry, we are a business. So I teach my faculty members here, we teach the business of hospitality. It doesn’t matter if you’re gonna go into accounting or finance, maybe you want to, you like playing with data and you’re gonna go, you’re gonna become the best revenue optimizer that exists. Maybe you are creative and you want to go into architecture and design and do new builds. There’s a job for everybody. So hospitality’s not really a silo thing. It’s everything. It’s marketing, it’s it’s communication, it’s graphic design, it’s travel planning. It’s entrepreneur more, more millionaire entrepreneurs come from hospitality space than any other. And every time I say that, that’s a fact that Carol Dover gave me a long time ago. She’s the president and CEO of the Florida Restaurant Lodging Association. If you think about that, it’s common sense. You’ve got Disney, you’ve got McDonald’s, you’ve got Boley, you’ve got all the brand names. Somebody created Target, somebody created Walmart, somebody created all these, and I lump everything, retail services, hospitality. But what underlies that is you need some business then because we still need to operate at a profit. So that’s kind of what we teach and how we teach, is being the best darn service provider you can be. Whether you’re gonna be a financial planner, whether you’re gonna work for Hilton Hotels and your path is a general manager, or whether you wanna open a chain of travel agencies, you know that it still requires the ingredients of business mixed with service acumen, if that makes any sense.
Ryan Embree:
It absolutely does. And I think that last answer I would clip and really show any perspective student. And we’re gonna actually tap you for some advice later on for some students. But for anyone that’s thinking about getting into to hospitality, I think what you just said over the last couple minutes perfectly describes why we love this industry. And I think certifications and certificates are a great way to just dabble into it as well and see if this is the right path for you, if it’s something that you show interest in. But you know, I would say to any hoteliers, hotel management companies that are, are listening to this, go to your frontline staff right now and ask what those college degrees and might not necessarily be hospitality. So even if you’re a student out there not on the hospitality track, you could find yourself in hospitality, which a lot of people do. And this education, this furthering education really comes into play there as Dr. Ricci’s talking about. So yeah, absolutely.
Dr. Peter Ricci :
And we’re just a fun business. I mean, why not do finance at Royal Caribbean Cruise line? And you know, no offense to my friends who work at banks, but rather than a boring bank or you know, why not do marketing for a zip line company? One of my MBA grads is now working for a cannabis dispensary that’s the largest in Florida, and he has an MBAA bachelor’s in marketing MBA with marketing and hospitality. And it was his service skills and his creativity that got him that job that he loves. So we teach the business of service and that applies to whatever the heck you’re gonna work in. I don’t care if you’re gonna own salons, if you wanna own your own piece to pizza brand, whatever it is, you still need business and you need people skills.
Ryan Embree:
They are such transferable skills. I mean, the old thing that everyone says is, oh, I’m gonna make my kids work in the service industry for a couple years to know what, what it’s like to be on the other side of that. There’s something to that, right? To serve people, whether it’s a restaurant working in a hotel, it just gives you those skills that that will stick with you. It gets you a different perspective and that’s what this is about. That’s what my next question’s about, because this series really has opened my eyes to the innovative ways today. I mean, I graduated more than a decade ago, and you know, I felt like it was, it was really well done at that time. But now the hands-on experience that, that these educators are giving students labs, like you talked about real world experience. Can you give me any examples of, of this within FAU’S curriculum of getting students out there and getting their hands on hospitality?
Dr. Peter Ricci :
Oh my God, that’s what we do best. Another reason we thrive. In order to get tenured in the university system, you must be a good researcher. But even my solid researchers have to have industry experience. So my entire cadre of faculty members, I could put them at a hotel and we would make a profitable. So I have a foodie, I have an analytics person, I have a sustainability person, you name it, right? So it comes from the people you hire. And I had the pleasure to build Rosen from ground up until I left and from here, from ground up until now. So I’ve been able to be very picky. And just like my interviews with Delta, I was very picky. Now the student feedback we get shows that the pickiness goes a long way because they love them, they learn from them. So I am all about experiential learning because if you can’t feel this business and know what it entails, then I don’t want you saying you’re gonna major in it. Right? So our first step was our internship requirement. Instead of what I had to do at the University of Florida, which I did not really find valuable. It was my senior year, I had to spend this is graduate school, not even undergrad. I had to spend a full semester, pay full tuition for 12 credit hours and go work for Marriott Hotels for $10 an hour. Now, at this point in my life, I was 22, I started working at 14 pretty much full time. I had at least seven years equivalent. I did not need to go to a place that would have a checklist every week where the boss would tell me, you fill it out, you put perfect, you fax it. Yes, faxing. because we didn’t have the camera phone then, right? So I found that very useless. So later in life when I wound up here, I said, we are in a living laboratory in Boca Raton. We have campuses in Jupiter, we have campuses in Davie and just outside Fort Lauderdale, we have downtown Fort Lauderdale. Our students are working. So I want them to go out and work in any job that they wanna try to see if the industry resonates with them. And that was our first step is you can either do an old school style internship or you can go out and get a job and count those hours as long as you show me progressive growth. You started as a server, then you became a team lead, and so on. Or you started at a travel agency and then you switched to a cruise line call center because you felt that’s what you learned in the travel agency best. And that’s what you wanna do. That’s fine. So our work requirement here is an initial point that differentiates us and our typical student graduates with about 3000 hours. Which if you’re, if you’re not sure, that’s a year and a half of full-time equivalency. So I know you’ve dealt with difficult South Florida guests or our online students. Wherever you’re living, you’ve dealt with guests there and you wanna still be in this business and you love it. So that’s a first hurdle. The second thing about experiential learning is and I drive my faculty members a little nuts, so with this, but I am, I have a requirement that everything we do resonates with finding your passion, finding your job, and getting your job getting your career off the ground, right? So this week we have a club management class that’s going to Royal Palm Yacht and Country Club. It’s a reclass requirement. You have to interview with the eight other clubs that are there just to practice your interview skills. And you talk to the club people, what do you like about your job? What do you hate about your job? What is fascinating? How much money can I make? What’s your day to day? And you get out of the building and you go play and you have an experience, a lunch, a tour at a world class yacht club. And you say, okay, that’s for me. That’s maybe not, maybe yes. Then we have Harris Casino, same thing full night of tour, meet and greet with the president, meet the VP of finance, tour the casino floor. What does a slot technician do? What does a player’s club attendant do? Or an agent, what does a casino host do? And so we do clubs, we do hotels. We have Sonesta day coming up in September. We have a day in the life co-president this year and next of the Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association International. We have a South Florida chapter. We created what’s called A Day in the Life. They go to the north to Palm Beach. Last year they went to the south to the Carion Miami Beach Wellness Resort. And they spend a day in the life. What does it mean you’re a revenue manager? What does it mean you’re a catering sales manager? What does it mean a BEO, banquet event order? So part of our uniqueness is these opportunities, and I can’t tell you, we invite all students, whether you’re enrolled in that particular class section or not. The feedback from students about finding their calling is incredible. And I attribute this to the fact that I have a sociology, broad thinking as my inherent degree at my undergrad. And I did my master’s in recreation, parks and tourism. So I look at tourism as a big potential business. So you could be a tour operator, you could work for an airline. I have a student right now, he’s a captain of his own fishing boat. Well, he’s in the process of buying his fishing boat. He’s learning from me as a marketing major and a hospitality minor, how to start networking with the hoteliers to do his tours for the guests. And so I just approach everything as this big great industry that we are. I’m sorry, I’m so passionate. I go way off of your question, but that’s what we do different. We get you out, you experience and you succeed. And if you come to me six months in and you’re like, Ricci, you know what, I’m fine going back to school to be a veterinarian. I’m like, great. Then take the guest service class where you’re gonna treat your clients and your people and your patients better human and feline and canine because you need those skills. But now, yeah, go to vet school. I’ll leave you with this one on this. I had a guy who took intro to hospitality with me. He was a biology major here. He was dead set on going to the University of Florida for pharmacy school. I said, what are you doing in a hospitality class? And he said, you know, taking his elective, I’m in love with this. I said, you know what, take my guest service class and take anything else related to your patient client service area. And he’s now been a district manager with CVS in Targets for a decade as a pharmacist with his pharmacy doctorate. And he still uses his people skills every day so that his pharmacy collection outperforms the others in his district. And that’s hospitality.
Ryan Embree:
That is the foundation of a hospitality DNA. We’ve heard that term a lot when hospitality is in your DNA. It’s a perfect transition into talking about FAU and its alumni and a network because when you prepare students like that, you give them those experiences and they’re successful, you can then use their stories to prospective students, right? And share their success. You have a space dedicated on your website talking about and spotlighting and showcasing those alumni and stories that you just mentioned. Talk about the importance of seeing these stories staying connected to your alumni so that they come back and, you know, everyone loves their alma mater, right? You know, you could also come back and if you can hire from the school that you graduated, how great does that feel? You know, that’s a win-win for everyone. So talk about that and the impact that it has on prospective students for your program.
Dr. Peter Ricci :
Sure. So if you google FAU alumni hospitality, they’ll pop up for you. My challenge is finding them and getting them to send me a little description of what they did in college and a photo. And then if we have a photo, I like to find them on LinkedIn or ways I can like every couple years and update their photo and update the jobs so they can tell like a, a story that the students in seats right now can resonate with. So I might have 20 or 30 on that site. I’ve probably had 10,000 graduates. So that’s the difficulty is in getting them back. And it’s funny that you say, you know, everybody loves their alma mater. I am not a UF fan anymore. UF was the end all be all for me. I was on orientation, I worked in admissions part-time, I was the student, rah rah, everything. They’ve morphed into something I wouldn’t wanna attend. Now as a student, I would wanna come to FAU and I enjoyed UCF, but I think FAU has something super special and different that I would’ve liked as a current day student in, in the way that we teach. We were way ahead of the curve and having excellence and rigor, but matched to your style, hybrid online, et cetera. There was a bad perception for many years that online was less rigorous, that it was low quality. We have a place here called the Center for Online and Continuing Education that trains all of the faculty and bar none. I am just as connected with my online MBA students as I am with my face-to-face just as warm and fuzzy with my online undergrads as I am with my face-to-face. It just takes a different way to communicate. That’s one of the good artifacts of covid is that we’re all more adept at dealing with virtual things without making them in inhumane. You know what I mean? Or whatever the term is. It’s just we’re better at it now.
Dr. Peter Ricci :
Well, it gives access and opportunities to people, you know, to attend FAU that maybe didn’t think about it before or other universities. So you’re right. And you see that in the success. I saw a post recently of FAU record breaking applications, enrollment for fall 2024 over 46,000 applications, which is the highest in university history. So again, you know, speaks directly to what you’re talking about today. You know, with so many students looking to attend the college, what advice would you have for those first time enrollees into the program?
Dr. Peter Ricci :
I would say another benefit that we have kind of morphed into creating here is we have the degree that will match what your goal is. So our more rigorous, arduous, time consuming degree is the Bachelor of Business Administration and the BBA. Then we have a Bachelor of Arts and general business, which is slightly more flexible. And then we have a Bachelor of general studies, which permits you to take classes at the junior senior level in quantity in your area of interest. So I have students who will come to me and say, I think I want to do communications intertwined with hospitality. So I’ll have them do a bachelor of general studies. They’ll do 15 hours in communications, 15 hours in hospitality. They’re much better prepared than any other degree would’ve got them. They just have to showcase that when they go out to the world for employers. So our variety is very good. You know, we are bucking the national trend. I have a wooden desk, so I’ll knock on wood, but we are suddenly the very popular place to come. And it’s not only in Florida. I teach the pre-business first year interest group students. And in my class of 25, there are always 8 to 12 that are from other countries, other states. And that was not the FAU that I grew up with. It’s the FAU of now. So when you come, if you come get engaged, get involved, it’s okay to be a fully online student, but set up one-on-one time with me. So I know where you work. I know how I can help you with our job list. I maintain a tremendous job email list. So most of our students find jobs within their first week of wanting to look but be engaged. Whether it’s student activities on campus. We’re popular because we are the second closest university in America to the beach. I don’t know if you knew that little fact.
Ryan Embree:
I knew you could see the ocean from the stadium. I do know that you have to go up high enough.
Dr. Peter Ricci :
We’re very close and outside of Pepperdine, that’s a blessing for us too because we have an amazing marine biology program. So there’s a multitude of reasons to study at FAU. One of the things that shocked me when I came here that I did not know is we’re one of the largest business schools in America. We have over 8,200 students in the college of business alone, which puts us in probably in the top 10 or 15. So we have the resources of this local community that has vibrant entrepreneurs and successful people in it. There are many articles that say Palm Beach is slowly becoming the wealth district of the South with a lot of companies opening second offices here from Manhattan. There’s just a lot going on here. And students feel that. They see that. You know, Ryan, to your point about flexibility and all, I have some bartenders that probably make two or three grand a week and if they wanna study online, so be it. And I don’t care if it takes ’em six years to graduate. I probably shouldn’t say that ’cause we prefer four year graduation rates. But why would I mess with your passion and what you love and your income and your happiness if you find that hospitality is your calling, just get your degree over time or do your certificate or whatever floats your boat. But we have the infrastructure in the university to tackle those varied desires. If you want to come here four years straight outta high school, live in the residence hall, you can do that too. And there’s plenty of stuff to do.
Ryan Embree:
Well, let’s flip the script because over a decade ago here I am about to go into the hospitality workforce out of UCF Rosen, fresh off of a recession around that time. Students here, they’re going into a workforce right now that is, frankly, it’s understaffed. We’re battling staffing shortages. We’ve talked to the AHLA on this podcast about how we can try to mitigate these trends and help our industry right now with staffing, you’re helping produce, you know, that workforce. What advice are you giving to that student that is about to walk across the auditorium and get their diploma and go into the workforce today?
Dr. Peter Ricci :
I’m on a panel this Thursday night for the South Florida Hospitality Human Resources Association, and they floated a statistic that I’m trying to verify. But it says there are more vacant positions right now across the globe in hospitality than there are workers. So it’s a bonanza if you’re a student, the wages are higher than they ever have been at the starting point, which is one of the positive outcomes of Covid. So no more, can you tell me that we don’t pay well, we pay well and we’ve always been an industry that once you move along the pathway to your liking a little bit, you can earn great salaries. I have several general managers slash chief operating officers within 10 miles of this campus who make over $500,000 a year. So are they toward the higher end of our scale? Yes. But that’s what we have in South Florida. So a lot of our students will fall in love with this community, see the opportunity, and then wanna stay in Miami Beach or want to go to the Keys or move to Jupiter. But in this region, but in general, there are more opportunities than ever before. Right before I joined your podcast, I was talking to the recruiter from a hotel collection and from airlines to the Brightline, high speed rail, to Amtrak, to Spirit Airlines. Everybody is looking for hires. So the opportunities are more than they have ever been. And I don’t expect this to change for the next three to seven years. It’s just the way the workforce is evolving and moving. What I will caution the students on is to find what they like and make sure they’re in the right culture. Because there are plenty of cultures out there that will match you and that will make you happy. If you want fully remote, find a company that prides fully remote. If you want hybrid, find the ones that has hybrid. Everybody’s doing something to attract, and you are more in the driver’s seat than when Ryan graduated at the end of a recession. So where you have a few choices. So, take that to your advantage. I mean, because it’s not gonna last forever. Every economy, every business model, every industry is cyclical and hospitality is no different. So this is the time for your ride.
Ryan Embree:
Do research too, right? Social media, what I tell actually hoteliers is, is one of the places that this younger workforce is gonna look at what a glimpse of a day in life might be is looking at reviews, right? Looking at guest feedback and saying, okay, am I gonna have people yelling at me all day with one star reviews? Or am I gonna have people praising me saying, this is an awesome environment, I had a great experience here. So reviews, social media, these are all places that, and this is speaking to the hoteliers as well. That is where students are looking. That’s where they do their research. We just put out a white paper on how social is the new search. People are looking for their information now using TikTok or Instagram and YouTube more than they are on search engines like Google. Make sure you’re insulated there as well and putting the best version of yourself out there because I think you’re right, Dr. Ricci. I mean it’s all about culture right now and finding fits and alignment there. So I wanna get your take on this because you’re an industry expert. Usually I say both sides of the front desk, but you’ve been on both sides of the front desk and the school desk as well. So as an industry expert, we’ve got a lot of these trends on the rise, I’m sure you’re teaching within your curriculum, sustainability within hospitality that is just booming right now. AI and technology, obviously that’s, that’s the hot trend. Guest personalization, experiential travel. How do you see the, the industry looking five years from now?
Dr. Peter Ricci :
It’s funny you bring those up. We update our certificate content every two years to be super relevant. And in the current run we have females in leadership, ai, sustainability, and the experience. I mean, it’s there. So, another, I guess not so shy plug for the program is we update the curriculum so frequently, many programs have stodgy curriculum committees and bureaucracies that they can’t do that. So we update immediately. So the next five years will focus on labor, focus on work life balance, or flexible work arrangements that’s not going away. Smart uses of ai, not just using artificial intelligence because it’s available and it’s there, but incorporating in ways that match what the guests want in your organization. And American Airlines guest is gonna be very different from a Choice Hotel’s guest who’s gonna be very different from a luxury resort in Macau. I mean, it’s just using the AI in the proper ways and also refining our talent acquisition methods and system to have a broader reach. We need people who are without GEDs, with GEDs, with high school degrees, with bachelor’s without bachelor’s. We need everybody. So if you have an innate desire to serve and you find that our industry matches your personality, then fall into the multiple ways of training and development that match you. So whether it’s American Hotel Lodging Education Institute, whether it’s National Restaurant Association, whether it’s Club managers Association, there’s training everywhere. So, you know, just fall in love first and then go with the training that matches and you’ll evolve. You know, like I was never into data analytics as much as I kind of am now to a little extent. I’ve always been an HR guy. So I really look at human resource trends and building cultures because rather than my owners slapping my wrist for spending too much, I would rather overspend on building a culture and make the owner wealthy. Because we have the kick ass service level. You know what I mean? Right. So I’d rather go that route than efficiencies and cost cutting. But I do need the AI and the algorithms and everything to monitor my cost successfully and to stay within parameters. So, you know, technology is the next five years, it’s the next 500 years. Um, using it correctly is where I find some recent graduates and students having a hard time. They have a difficult time telling the story from the data. So it’s analyzing the data very, very well. Granular, the best way possible, but then telling the story and what does it mean for me to change on that side of the desk or change on this side of the desk. That’s where you have to do it. You know, and I learned, like you said, I’m on both sides of the desk here. Um, I learned from the students, what do they need? What do they want from the faculty on the other side? What’s fair rigor? What should we be teaching? What is the best tool to use to teach quantitative analysis? Is it Power bi, is it Tableau? Is it Excel? Is it all of ’em? You know, so those discussions are never ending, always evolving. And they should be because our industry’s always evolving.
Ryan Embree:
Well, you’re absolutely right. And just like you’re talking to the next generation of hoteliers, you’re also talking to the next generation of travelers, right? So it’s like, how are they doing research for their own trips? What are they looking at? What do they wanna do? Is it solo travel? Right? Experiential travel. How are they documenting their travel? You know, Instagram, social media is a big part of that. But it’s funny, you talk about the talent acquisition. I think you’re absolutely right. The way we get outta the staffing shortages, you know, to share stories, one success stories, but also open the lens a little bit wider. We have another series on this podcast called Hospitality Trailblazers. You’d be surprised how many of these CEOs, COOs of successful hotel management companies come from the front line. So my joke is always you want to talk to the next great CEO of a hotel management company. Go talk to your bellman right now. Maybe in 20 years they might be there. But I think you’re absolutely right. Dr. Ricci, it was absolute pleasure speaking with you today and talking about FAU Hospitality Tourism Program. Very educational. So thank you for taking the time with me on the Suite Spot. Thank you all for listening to the Suite Spot, we’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this inaugural episode of the TMG Hospitality Campus Crawl series, the Suite Spot takes a trip down to Miami to visit the Chaplin School of Hospitality & Tourism Management at Florida International University to meet with the Dean of the School, Dr. Michael Cheng.
Host Ryan Embree sits down with Dr. Cheng to discuss the high-ranking academic institution and how it is preparing the next generation of elite hospitality professionals.
Tune in now!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello Everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We are here in Miami, Florida, south Florida, introducing a brand new podcast series. We’re so excited. This is TMGs Hospitality Campus Crawl, and we are here at our first stop at FIU’s Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism Management. And with me today I have Dr. Michael Cheng, Dean of the School. Thank you Dr. Cheng, for being with me.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
My pleasure. Thank you so much for inviting me. I’m very excited.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re very excited to be on here. This is an intro into a brand new series, a summer series that hopefully we are gonna be touring all around the state of Florida, the great state of Florida, where tourism, as we know, is very, very important to our economy. And what you and your team are doing over here, Dr. Cheng, is very important because you’re creating the next generation of hospitality workers and students out there. But before we get into that, this is your first time on the Suite Spot. So welcome. We’re gonna be talking a lot about hospitality journeys in this and the paths that are provided for hospitality students right now. But share a little bit about your story, your journey in hospitality, and what led you to FI’Us, Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Sure. Thank you, Ryan. Yeah, so the truth is, how I got here is spring break, literally my wife and I, came down for spring break one year same year that we ended up moving down here, which was 2014. And we go, man, this is March. And the world is beautiful. We should like relocate. We were living in the Midwest at that time. Yeah, we were living in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and had been in the Midwest for oh boy like 23 years. Yeah. So it’s been quite a while. But coming down here, the weather was very nice, but really I’m an international student. I was born and raised in Malaysia and came here to the US to study and enrolled at the University of Nebraska Lincoln. And my first major was not hospitality, it was MIS And I quickly realized that I’m more of a people person and less of a computer desk person. So I changed major, followed a bunch of friends who said “Hey, let’s try business.” So I did business for another semester, didn’t like it because I couldn’t find a direction. And then my supervisor at that point because I was working in the residence of food service, say, you should look at hospitality, I think you might be good at it. So I said, what is hospitality? Right. And went over and met the professor and goes, well, you know, there’s restaurants, there’s hotels, there’s events, and you work in food service, anything you want, what you’re doing right now is hospitality. I said, okay. I tried it, I loved it. And I found, I think I found my niche, finished my bachelor’s, and she asked me to come for my masters. So I did, became a graduate assistant. And then I started working in the industry for three years as a food service manager. And really discovered, man, everything is true. This is the industry that you get to eat for free. Yeah, never had to pay for lunch, you know, not too bad, which is very nice. At that point, then I kind of got a little bored with what I was doing. So started looking around and found that a community college metropolitan community college at Mond, Nebraska had a position and they were looking for somebody to come in and basically run the kitchens. So I applied for that job, and that was my first floor in higher education. I didn’t start teaching right away because that was not the plan. The plan was to, you know, do what I love, which is hospitality. But there was one semester, like maybe two years in, and they were short, or one of the faculty members couldn’t teach a class, so they were looking for somebody last minute. So they asked me if I would be willing to teach an introduction to culinary arts class. I’m like, sure, how hard can it be? Right?. And there was only nine students in it anyways, a small class. I couldn’t cancel, it was too late. And they say, we’ll guide you. Here’s the syllabus, here’s the content. Week by week before you teach a class. I go through it with you. This is the faculty talking to me, and then we’ll prep you for the class of that week. I say, well, great. So you know what I did the first week of class, I forgot I had class. I was late in my own first class. And I got there like 30 minutes later and they go where were you? I’m like I’m sorry brand new instructor, online stayed with me and finished with me. So I was thankful for that one. It was during the time at a metro community college that the faculty say, you should go to this conference and see what they are about. And it’s called Research Chefs Association Conference. So I went and I found out there’s a very nice intersection between culinary arts and food science and their collegeology. I came back, I was all excited about it, and then the guys who ran the RCA, the Research Chefs Association said we’re looking for a school to develop this brand new discipline. Can you help us? Like, sure, we have culinary arts, it’s a culinary program, and my alma mater has food science. I was like, we combine the two. So I created a curriculum for ocology that was back in 2000. Today it’s in use in over 12 different schools internationally. But what really got me the opportunity to move on in my career was because I created a curriculum and my next employer, which is Southwest Minnesota State University, they were looking for somebody to launch a ology program. So they reached to ask me if I was interested. Of course, I said, yes, you know, here’s an opportunity to actually implement a curriculum that you develop in action. So I said, yes, took the job. And the president, they also said, well, you have a hospitality background, so why don’t you do both ology and hospitality, and of course foolishly I said yes. So there I was running a program creating from scratch, two different programs, and because of that opportunity, I was able to get tenure at Southwest Minnesota State University and became the full professor there. And then and I was serious about whole spring break. My wife and I came and we said, this is gorgeous weather. You know, we should look around here. That same year I was at a conference with hospitality educators and I overheard this group of guys talking about food science, and that got my attention. So I stuck my head into the conversation, asked them why were they talking about food science? And they go, well, you know, we’re the chaplain School hospitality and tourism management at Florida International University. And I said, where’s that in Miami? So my eyes lit up. So suddenly Miami comes up again in the same year, literally within a couple months. And this was the conference. So then I applied for the job, came down here and that was it. Literally three years later I was asked to become the interim dean, and then that was at the end of 2017. So I’ve been in the dean’s role since I guess end of 2017, almost seven years now.
Ryan Embree:
Well, your story it’s an incredible journey, but it’s common in that a lot of the hospitality leaders I talk to on this podcast, they just kind of happen to fall into the industry pretty much. And I think that’s why this series and this school is so important because we wanna change the narrative to say that I wanna get into hospitality. There’s a career for me here, and we stop students from falling into an industry and finding that industry and saying, this is where I wanna start my career. Now, I don’t know if I’ve had anyone that’s fallen into two separate careers with hospitality and teaching.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
You know, the teaching thing wasn’t intentional, it just happened by luck. And then you find that you, you know, you have a knack for it, you love it. And I guess what I really like about teaching is I get to see a person develop. You know, a young adult able to gain new skills and develop and see a mature, and then after that they remember you. It’s so rewarding.
Ryan Embree:
No, I bet. And that’s what we’re gonna talk about today. You know, I had the opportunity to get a tour of this incredible campus, the award-winning curriculum that you’re putting, the experiences, share a little bit about the history of this school, which it’s a lot older than than I originally thought when I heard, and what kind of makes it unique from other hospitality programs?
Dr. Michael Cheng:
So FIU is I guess, relatively young in terms of large institutions, you know? We’re the fifth largest university in the country, and we opened in 1972, so we’re 52 years old today. And the hospitality school opened at the same time, FIU opened. So we are one of the five original academic units that opened in the state of Florida in Miami, actually back in 1972. We were awarded a school distinction in 1978, and today we’re the second largest hospitality school in whole country. We graduate anywhere between 700 to 800 students a year. We also graduate the most diverse graduates in whole country because of population here in South Miami, in South Florida. But also we graduated the most Blacks and Hispanic students with a degree in hospitality management than anybody else. So we’re really proud of our diversity and located in Miami. We’re very fortunate to have a very strong tourism industry down here. But I think more importantly is that FIU and the Chaplin School, were one of the only South Beach Wine and Food Festival in the whole country. Actually in the whole world, probably the most successful one, which to date in its 23 year history, has generated over $40 million in proceeds and scholarships for our students. So it’s been very successful, has certainly made a huge difference in the experience that our students get here while they’re at the Chaplin school. Because of that too, we’re able to recruit talented faculty to come here to Miami as well. On top of that, because of our location and our, our connection with the South Beach Wine & Food Festival, which coincidentally actually started here on campus, our wine faculty where we are recording this podcast right now, created the original South Beach Wine Food Festival. It was called the Florida Extravaganza. And we did it for one day wine food pairing here on campus. And then from there on it just grew. Today it attracts 65,000 guests over a four day period. It’s incredible. But what I was saying is the academic programming here also mirrors the landscape here in South Florida. So we have the only bachelor of arts in global sustainable tourism, but the only one in hospitality school offers undergraduate degree in that prepare students for a variety of different careers with sustainability as offices and sometimes even directors. But we also offer a masses track in cruise lines operations management, the only one in the whole country as well. And then very unique to us because of the South Beach Wine & Food Festival. We have a mega event management track within a master’s program. And I’m very proud of the fact that we award so much scholarship to our students every year. Literally on average, over $1 million is awarded to, to a chaplain school student just from the school itself every year.
Ryan Embree:
That’s fantastic. And I’m sure that money is creating opportunities for students and sending them down the path of a hospitality career and giving them even a shot at that. So, very cool to see and innovative to hear that, you know, you have a global sustainable tourism degree, something that we talk to hospitality leaders all about. We’re talking about how corporations, businesses in the future, they might not be looking at maybe monetary budgets, could be looking at green budgets and sustainability budgets. So you’re setting your students up for kind of the future of hospitality there. And then that master’s degree in cruise line operations, as you said, Miami, such a hub there. So talk about some of these partnership networks that you’ve been able to create over here. Obviously you have the, I saw some learning experiences with sponsorship from Bacardi. Why are these relationships so vital for your program success? And how, how does this really kickstart students’ careers and hospitality with these partnerships?
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Sure. So we really believe in training our students in preparing them as best as we can for the real world. So, as much as possible, we’re always gonna bring in guest lectures from industry as well as we look for faculty members when we hire them to have prior industry experience. So we wanna make sure that students are getting information that’s current and relevant. That’s why we lean so much on our industry partners so they can bring in that reality into the classroom itself. We focus a lot on experience as well, in terms of every single student who graduate from the Chaplin School need to complete a 300 hour management internship, which prepares them for the leadership position. But on top of that, they also have to have completed 800 hours of work experience prior to graduation. That means working in the hospitality industry full-time every summer from the first year to the year you graduate. So that’s a lot of work experience when they bring in when they graduate from the school here. On top of that, one of the things we are very proud of is our unique curriculum. You know, I mentioned some earlier, but about five years ago, we created a way to be able to get information into students’ hands sooner as fast as we can. That’s relevant and current. Your typical curriculum change process takes about a year to go through the whole process at a university. And what we did was created a show a course that’s called Programming on Demand. And then we offer four or five different sections of it each semester. And each one of those sections is a different content. So it’s a one credit hour class. We’ll take ’em on like behind the scenes tours in restaurants, we’ll take ’em to leadership conferences, to the National Restaurant Show take ’em on trips to a distillery. So they’re learning all the while from the real world. So we’re proud of that one. On top of that, two, we have a very robust study abroad program. I think the best time to gain experience is while a college student, we have this thing that we’ve been doing for about 10 years now, is called Hospitality at Sea. And every year during the summer, right at the end of the spring semester, between 60 to 80 students sign up for either a three credit class or six credit class and go on a two week journey transatlantic ship, typically across the sea, and then they end up in Europe someplace, and then they hop around for a little bit. It’s just a great experience. So we really are very proud of the fact that our students get that much variety and different experiences while they’re here.
Ryan Embree:
Well, listen, I was a hospitality student graduate as well, and maybe people hearing this might think, well, they’re going to school. Why do they need those work hours? Those work hours are setting students up for success connections within our industry. How many times have you heard, a student say, Hey, I’m working for this organization, and the next thing they know when they graduate, they have a full-time job, or they have a connection that sets them up for, for their career and journey. So, those things were so vital in my career to even try out spaces. As you talked about, our hospitality is so vast from cruise lines to F&B hotels, events, everything. So this gives you a little taste of everything. So that you can find really where your passion lines and your niche lines. But at the end of the day, it’s all of that foundation of people serving people and hospitality, which is, you know, why me and you probably love the industry that we’re in right now.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
And we see the same thing with our industry partners too. You know, they really do want to give back. Like for instance, we have the only Bacardi Center of Excellence in partnership with Bacardi North America, where they funded the creation of this. And the intention is to give back. Students get scholarships, we have an end adult professorship. We’ve been able to create this learning platform that’s available to anybody across whole world for free. And Bacardi wants to be able to improve the industry.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a win-win. It’s super smart moves. You mentioned the location. I wanna talk about that a little bit more, Miami, right? I mean, I feel like if you were starting a hospitality school and you could pick anywhere, no place else, right?Miami’s probably pretty perfect. Talk about that role when maybe students are looking, prospective students are looking at hospitality schools and you’re able to say, Hey, we are in Miami. We can offer you all of this. What role does that play?
Dr. Michael Cheng:
I think where the school is located is a major factor in the students or the potential students’ choice of where they want to go. For me, Miami is like the hub, you know, quite honestly, you got how many episodes of how many versions of Bad Boys were shot in Miami. So they keep coming back for that one, but Miami is the gateway to the Americas. We’ve heard that. You know 38% of our student population here, the Chaplins who come from the Caribbean South or Central America. We also see Miami continue to grow. It’s grown from back in the eighties to today. It’s quite different, but a lot of multinational global companies have moved into Miami. Now, Citadel moved the headquarters here. The other one is SH Hotels, which owns the one hotel and all a string, I mean a line of sustainable hotels. And then there’s Highgate Hospitality who probably manages, is the country’s second largest hotel management firm. They moved here as well. And then you notice too, that the food scene here is incredible. Two years ago we got the Michelin Stars coming in here, and now it’s like everybody wants to open up the famous restaurant here. And you got major food group opening a whole bunch of restaurants here. Same thing with group hospitality. As I mentioned earlier, Miami is also the home of the South Beach Wine & Food Festival. Nowhere else can you go for that kinda experience. We also host the FIFA World Cup, the F1, the Ultra Music Festival, and we are the Cruise capital of the world. So I think where we’re at in itself and the opportunities that provides to students who are interested in hospitality is incredible. It’s so immense. You can find just about anything you want right here in Miami.
Ryan Embree:
That’s the beauty of hospitality too, is we’re all travelers, right? And we’re all diners. We’re all people that like to go to events. So not only are you studying in a place that has all of these incredible places to eat and stay and attend, you get to be a part of that and potentially give back to it, you know? And you give tons of opportunities for students to do that.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
And there’s no state taxes in Florida. Which is a bonus.
Ryan Embree:
That is very important as well.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
I mentioned our gateway to the Americas, I mean, we have a global, major international airport that can get you any place you want in the whole world. On top of that too, the cultural diversity that we have here in South Florida, in Miami in particular, you’re seeing so many residents of Miami who grew up in other countries. So it’s just, and not only does it bring diversity into your lives, but also the talent that they bring along with it. So now you got a great business ecosystem, cultural diversity, a strong pool of talent, no state taxes. Beautiful weather and beaches.
Ryan Embree:
There’s no question to why it has such a rich history down here and how impactful it is. Let’s talk about alumni. Any school, alumni are important and have an impact. Discuss the significance of FIU alumni and you have some initiatives that you do to get to foster these strong relationships with your alumni.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
So FIU, the Chaplin School too, we are 52 years old today, and the university itself has over, I think 325,000 alumni. The school itself, we have roughly 20,000 alumni worldwide. And as I look at where our alumni are today and where they came from, I can see trends back in the seventies and eighties as we were new. Then we got a lot of alumni who came from the East coast, the northeast coast in particular. And then we, during the eighties, we had a lot who came from Europe. And then Europe’s education system developed. And now they offer a lot of competitive options there. So that the amount for students from Europe has kind of slowed down. And then we opened a campus in China in the nineties. And from then on, you know, we got a lot of Asian international students coming there. But, so you can see that our students do come from all across the world, and some have made major gifts. And when you ask them why they made major gifts towards the program, towards the school, it’s because of the experience they had here. So, one in particular, John McKibbon, he graduated in 1975 and he put in a large amount of money to create the McKibbon alumni experience. He wanted students today to have the same kind of experience that he had when he was a student here. And that’s what we are very proud of, making sure that our students get individualized personal attention. And then also we have other alumni such as the host and I think he’s also the founder for Beyond the Plate, Andrew Kaplan. So he got his start here as a student while he was volunteering at the South Beach Wine & Food Festival. And he met Rachel Ray. And the reason why he met Rachel Ray is because he was wearing a T-shirt that said something like avocado, just one word. And he caught her attention. So that’s how the connection began in person. He was her chief of staff. And then he move on, and now he’s running this, he still runs her foundation, I believe, but he has his own podcast now, which is very, very popular too. So about five years ago we saw that as alumni body continue to grow, and it’s more and more of them, that we needed to make sure that we continue to excite our current generation of students. So the best way to excite somebody who’s younger is to bring somebody about the same age as them. That’s why we created what’s called the Rising Star Award. And that was intended to honor alumni who have quite a significant level of success in their careers and who will continue to climb up the ladder, on upward trajectory. It will help inspire those alumni as well as the current students, but also encourage them to keep striving for more.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that’s what I was gonna say. We walked in and saw this just giant wall of all these faces and awards. And it’s so cool to be able to kind of see, you know, those pathways and success stories, especially for a younger person to say, Hey, listen, in 20, 30 years, you know, it could be you. This could be you. You could be on this wall or you could be giving back to the university. Those, I think, are the strongest testaments. You know, obviously we’re gonna talk about some of the, the awards that the curriculum has been given. But I think some of the strongest testaments of alumni coming in and talking about their experience giving back shows that you’re doing something right.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
The other unintended consequence of having the wall you mentioned is, it shows the current students the breadth of possibilities within the hospitality industry. So you’re not just customer service, you could be in revenue management, you could be in catering, you could be in real estate development. So there’s all kinds of options that are available in the industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And with all of those options, you provide a lot of unique learning experiences and programs. Some you’ve spoke to already, but, you know, talk to some of the resources offered to students here at the Chaplin School of Hospitality & Tourism, you know, academic advisors, hospitality, venue tours, programming on demand. Speak a little bit more to that and how that integrates into learning here.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Well, I think one of the benefits that we have is we are on a campus that’s just paradise. You know, it’s the Biscayne Bay campus. But I think you know, the Biscayne Bay Campus is paradise for sure. And the entire school hospitality is located here. So we’re self-contained. We have our own advisors recruiting career services. And what that means is you don’t have to wait, you know, so you don’t have to wait to talk to somebody at, at the central campus or at the main campus. You need advising, you just go downstairs and you find on any given date is at least two advisors out of four waiting for you. We also offer online services as well to help ’em. So if they, they cannot be on campus. And then I think the other big benefit is the personalized attention. So, you know, we have 1200 students, second largest, but it’s like every advisor knows every student. So anytime I’m looking for somebody, I say, Hey, do we have somebody who missed this criteria for either scholarship award or for volunteer opportunity? They say yes, and they gimme a name. We reached out and they, they’re all in. So that’s really refreshing. And I also like that we we’re able to basically provide everything they need in one location, but we also do a lot to bring them in too. So we do a lot of student engagement opportunities or activities, I guess, such as the welcome back bash. We do a graduation celebration for them, a freshman painting ceremony. So then we make sure that our faculty and staff are introduced to them early on and create the relationship. The other thing that we do different too, is we like our students and also maybe potential non-students yet to know who we are. So we have our advisors and career counselors teaching these freshman orientation classes as well as the career pathway classes. So they know, oh, here’s hospitality. You know, I didn’t have to change major twice like I did to describe hospitality. I was in a class and I learned about it. So those are, you know, what’s great for our school here, what makes us different too.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And you know, one of the bigger trends that we’re noticing, and as we talk to hotel leaders specifically, is, is personalization and how that’s becoming a more intricate part of hospitality and hoteliers lives. But the same applies, I would imagine, to students and, and personalization and their journey, their academic journey here. So being able to provide resources, stories, pathways for them really helps them get their career started on the right foot. And certainly all the work that you’ve been doing is paid off. I mean, I want to get, make sure I get these stats right. Ranked in the world’s top 1% by QS World University Rankings, #1 US online hospitality program as the Dean Dr. Cheng, what do these recognitions mean to you and how do you use them to impact enrollment?
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Well, I would say first we’re doing something right. . So there are only two rankings in the whole world for hospitality and tourism and QS World University Rankings is one of ’em, when they first started looking at hospitality programs back in 2017, we were unranked, we, we didn’t even make the cut. We’re like not on the map kind of thing. But since then you know, we’ve made a considered effort and we first showed up on at number 50 in 2018. And then after that we progressively climbed each year. And today we are number 31 in the whole world. But when you look among US public universities, we’re number six. So now it’s back to like 2017. You’re not even a known entity today in 2024. And now you’re number six in among US public universities in the country. So that has really helped us with our recruitment, not just students, but also with faculty, like I mentioned earlier. They wanna be with the best. And on top of that too, our location in Miami where all these major employers are is also help us with placement, job placement. So now you got employers coming to us saying, Hey, we know you’re a good school. You’re rank highly, we love to hire students. We also very diverse, which is another positive that employers are looking for. So I mentioned recruiting for faculty. Also when you’re ranked consistently and employers do track it, they can tell that you are doing something right, which means you have systems in place of quality control. So they trust us in what we’re doing. They continue to refer other employers and at the end it’s great for the students. We know we’re training the next generation of students. We know we need them to have information, knowledge that’s current and relevant, but we also need to know that they’re gonna be grabbed by the by the employer at the moment they graduate.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. I mean, they are representative of the university. So if you can have these pathways and you know, it’s a win-win for everyone. I mean, these organizations and corporations are looking for top ranked universities. And if you’re right there, it’s kind of that snowball effect that you talked about. So, and then one of the things that is so unique, we’ve talked, we’ve mentioned it multiple times, but the South Beach Wine & Food Festival, major national event gives hands-on F&B experience to your students, put us in the morning of this incredible event, the start of it. Walk us through that experience.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
I can get really descriptive, right. I do remember my first time going to the South Beach Wine & Food Festival. That was in 2015 when I first got here. I had never eaten so many burgers before in my life. So I mean that was the Burger Bash. And then it was not just the amount of food that you could try, but also for one ticket price, the amount of alcohol you consume. So you can be really careful. And then you also have all these celebrities. So I remember the first day going, wait, there’s Giada, she’s like my favorite food networks chef. You know, wait, wait, this’s Rachel Ray. And this is Bobby Flay. I was like, oh my God, where am I?
Ryan Embree:
So who’s who.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Exactly. So it really is the only event where our student volunteers, by the way, 1500 of the student volunteers all come from FIU. They can really get up close and personal with celebrity chefs. And I remember hearing a story from one of my faculty members who was working the night event. It goes, yeah. You know Chef Guy Fieri just came by, said hi to the students, took much selfies with him. And then on top of that he was feeling generous and gave ’em money. I’m like, what? Chef Fieri just paid our students. Give ’em a tip. I mean, that’s incredible. Yeah, but it’s not all just Food Network Chef. We also have other celebrities that who come to, because you’re seeing so many more spirit brands that are celebrity backed. And so Maluma launches, I think it was tequila last year. And then I remember Walking Dead Stars, Brian Cranston and, and Aaron Paul launching their brand. And it was kind of funny, I was at event, and I don’t watch Walking Dead, I don’t watch it. So I had no idea who these two guys were. And he walked up to me and Aaron goes, hi, I’m Aaron. I was like, oh, hi, I’m Michael. I had zero idea there. Afterwards somebody say, Hey, that’s Walking Dead. You wanna take a picture?
Ryan Embree:
You could just run into celebrities at this event. And Well, that’s incredible. I mean, like I said, I’d love to to go, but for those, you know, that haven’t hearing a firsthand account I think is important.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Let me add on too. So there’s the nice consumer facing part, but there’s also the behind the scenes major portion. This festival, there’s an entire team of like 11 full-time staff that work on it year round. And we start recruiting for student volunteers in September and we start getting them interviewed and placed in proper positions. And then they go to training, they go to an orientation, and then they are like on the week of the festival working. Like seriously. Yeah. I mean, it’s great experience. They participate in anything from marketing to culinary prep, to staffing, to logistics event preparation. And these are all leadership skills, you know? So they’re getting hands on experience. They’re getting a scholarship on top of that. But again, this incredible networking and leadership skills that is gonna make difference.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s a big part of, you know,we went on a tour before doing this podcast, and you see signage for it all over. You see the history of the event signatures, pictures everywhere. So it’s clearly just a huge piece of the school and everything that you do. And as you mentioned the numbers, it gives so much back to the students as well. So it’s a great cause for it. And speaking of that, you know, let’s talk about the available hospitality exclusive scholarships that you and your team do. Anything from that festival to donors, that’s a big part of giving students an opportunity to get in the hospitality in the first place that otherwise wouldn’t.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Absolutely. So I myself am a product of a scholarship. Now, if my graduate professor, actually my major professor when I was finishing my undergraduate didn’t offer me a graduate assistantship. I would not have completed a master’s degree and I’d be probably working in the kitchen someplace.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you’re you’re walking testament to it right there.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Exactly. So, I understand the value of a scholarship and what it does to a person’s life. The festival raises every year between 1.5 to $2 million in scholarship proceeds back to the school. I make sure that the majority of it goes to the students. Because we all know that scholarships can remove barriers to success, don’t have to worry about getting to the next shift, don’t have to worry about housing food ’cause it just helps them. And you get more time to concentrate on your studies. When you do that, students really appreciate it. And, but they also then start to think further. So expand their mind. Like, you know, if there’s less to worry about getting concentrate on my studies, maybe I should think about doing a master’s. So to get into a four plus one program, which then gives them another leg up in industry. So we offer a bunch of different scholarships that helps remove those barriers. Like one that’s called Last Mile scholarship. Many times we come across students and they go, and I’m not registered for the last three credits ’cause then I gotta work. So we say, we’ll cover the cost of your three credits. Here, if it’s in state $700, we’ll cover the cost of it. We also have emergency funds. So very seldom do we get students who, if they’re not in a real emergency, will come to us and go, you know, I just can’t make the rent this money. Is there any scholarship that I can apply for? And we’re like, how much is it? If it’s $1,500 here, we’ll give you a scholarship. Cover that right up. And it’s because South Beach Wine & Food Festival made that possible for our students, removes those incredible barriers.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so incredible. And like you said, without those, those stresses, then you can focus on your education and could put you in a position for success is what, what we’re trying to do and how fitting is it in an industry where it’s people serving people, hospitality, that we’re able to do something like that and, and even just furthers our industry. So very, very cool.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
I would add to, when I was an undergraduate student, my major professor also told me I should go to conference. And they said, well, we’re taking a van. You wanna join us to the National Restaurant Show from Lincoln, Nebraska to Chicago, Illinois. That’s a good 10 hour drive, I think. I’m like, sure, why not? And I found so much value in that. So I really encourage our students, if they get the opportunity to go to conference, they should do it and we’ll give ’em a scholarship to cover it. So they get this hands-on experience, they get to travel. Back in April, I took a group of students to Oaxaca and Mexico where we learn all about AGA and as well as Oaxacan food, which is incredible journey.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool. Those experiences, they’re all over our industry. And again, it’s such a great industry. That experience, I’m sure with the students was something that they’ll never forget, but it’s also expanding and exposing them to, you know, a path that they could potentially go down. So as we wrap up here, you know, Dr. Cheng, Dean, you know, what’s, what’s your vision for FIU’s, Chaplin School of Hospitality & Tourism moving forward?
Dr. Michael Cheng:
Well, I’m by nature a very competitive person.
Ryan Embree:
Okay. I think I know where this is going.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
That reason, I need my metrics. And as plus I know what I’m measuring myself against, then I know what goalposts what else I gotta move. So my goal is always to be the best. You know, I’m just competitive in nature. And five years ago I set a vision that we were going to transform hospitality and tourism one learner at a time for a lifetime. Our intention was to make a difference in their lives. Either through education, through scholarship, through opportunities, experience, whatever it is. And we’ve been very successful at that. And we will continue to do so as we prepare the next generation of students with the pandemic. We’ve learned, some habits have changed. So the new learned behaviors, new expectations, the whole concept of remote work and flexible time is very important to them now. So we have to make adjustments of what our vision is. And then on top of that, you have technology and AI driving the industry as well. So those are factors you have to consider. You have as well as economic pressures. So inflation is a big issue for a lot of business owners. So we’re currently working with my executive advisory board and we’ll be having workshops with our faculty and staff to create what I call Vision 2030. We need to take all the learnings we have in the last five years, apply to these factors in it, and then figure out how can we continue to deliver the best experience for our students, for our faculty, for our staff, and provide knowledge that’s current and that’s relevant. And at the same time provide it in ways that they wanted, whether they want it in online, they want it on demand, they want it in person, and then in what format, right. Whether it’s a fast on demand, or is it a longer multi-week type of workshop. So those are kind of things we have to figure out. But we we’re very excited for the workshop that’s coming up in September with the faculty staff and as well as with my advisory.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so fast changing to things that maybe would change over the course of 10 years in hospitality now are changing at a rapid pace. So you certainly have the foundation there, Dr. Cheng with you and, and your school here and everything that you’ve put in place to adjust to those fast moving needs for hospitality and the students that you’re teaching and putting out there into our industry. So, as someone that speaks to hospitality hotel leaders where we have this in what has really been a historic staffing shortage right now. To be able to talk to a leader that’s educating the next generation of hospitality workers. Thank you for all the work you and your team are doing. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today? We covered it all.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
If you are considering hospitality, don’t consider it. Just do it. You know, you have to experience it. I had no idea what it was and I changed my major, never looked back. I mean, it’s just been a great ride. You know, it’s a dynamic industry. It’s very exciting. You get to travel, you get to see the world and eat a whole bunch of different foods. And, you know, you get to create lifelong friendships, you know, and really hospitality at the end of the day is not a product. It’s the experience and how we create the experience matters. Right? And the experience could be delivered through service. It could be delivered through AI technology. Whether it’s just a simple good eye contact with a guest and nodding and smiling at them. Those are kind of experiences that matter. And that’s why we love, and I believe all of you love hospitality.
Ryan Embree:
Amazing food and amazing places and experiences shouldn’t be really a hard sell. So thank you Dr. Cheng for hosting the Suite Spot here at your beautiful Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism. We will continue to watch, hopefully continue to see you climb those rankings, but thank you for, for hosting us here. And thank you for joining the Suite Spot.
Dr. Michael Cheng:
My pleasure. Thank you so much.
Ryan Embree:
Alright. Thank you all for listening and we’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot takes a virtual visit to Turks and Caicos in the latest installment of the Spotlight series, which showcases some of the world’s most historic and iconic hotel properties. In this episode, viewers get a look at the highly anticipated property, Salterra Resort & Spa, which is set to open its doors in early 2025.
The resort’s managing director, Michael Tibbetts, joins the Suite Spot to discuss what travelers can expect from the resort and how Salterra Resort & Spa is elevating the guest experience. Tune in now to hear all the details!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We are here for another exciting episode in our Suite Spot Spotlight series. So, one of my favorite series that we’ve done so far on this podcast. It takes us literally all around the world, which I’m gonna, we’re gonna talk about today. But for those that might be, this might be your first time hearing the Spotlight series. This is where we travel and showcase and highlight some of the industry’s most unique and iconic hotels. This property that we’re gonna talk about today, as it is the most anticipated openings in 2025. And here to talk about it with me is Michael Tibbetts, Chairman, CEO of JEM Worldwide. Michael, thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot with me today.
Michael Tibbetts :
Thank you, Ryan. I’m really grateful to be here.
Ryan Embree:
We’re gonna talk a lot about Salterra in this amazing project that you and your team have going on right now. But before we jump into this, this is your first time on the Suite Spot. We always love to hear kind of hospitality journeys, right? You know, how we got into this incredible industry and ultimately led you to working on this Salterra project, but to JEM Worldwide. So tell us a little bit about your background.
Michael Tibbetts :
I would say I have an unusual background for hospitality and development. Really, my origin story starts way back in the 1700’s, believe it or not, my family is from the Cayman Islands, a British overseas territory. Going back many generations, my great-grandfather was a ship builder, and my grandfather eventually immigrated to the United States. And through that connection in the Cayman Islands, our family started developing resorts there on the small islands of little Cayman and Cayman Brack. Although our family was in hospitality, I chose a different course earlier in my career. I actually went to medical school, studied molecular biology in college, became an eye surgeon, and wove a very strange path back to hospitality. Through some family circumstances, I decided that hospitality development and the team that we were building was just too exciting to forego. So I stepped out of my private ophthalmology practice about eight years ago and devoted myself full-time to helping to lead our resorts in the Cayman Islands, and then also in the Turks and Caicos Islands now. So an unusual path, but I’m really grateful, learned a lot of lessons as a physician that I carry forward now in team building and working together, learning to work hard and follow through. But it’s definitely an unusual path, but I’m really grateful for the journey.
Ryan Embree:
Well, unusual paths in our industry really aren’t too out of the ordinary, to be honest with you. I will say this was the first time that I’ve heard a hospitality journey start in the 1700’s though. So, really unique fact. But that’s awesome. And, and like I said, we’ve had a lot of industry leaders on this podcast talk about how they’ve made their way to hospitality to have that ingrained in your DNA, we’ve said that as well sometimes that just finds you and, and we’re, we’re happier here. And creating projects like what we’re gonna talk about today. Salterra Luxury Resort and Spa, very excited, like I said, one of the most anticipated openings in 2025. You know, I have found, when I talk to whether it’s an iconic hotel that’s been around a hundred plus years or a brand new development like Salterra, there is a story to every single hospitality development project. Sometimes, sometimes there’s some nightmares, and then sometimes, there’s some really great stories behind it. So, you know, share with our audience the story of Salterra and what you guys are doing over there.
Michael Tibbetts :
Thank you, Ryan. So Salter has been quite a journey over the last really four years. As I shared, my family has been in the hospitality business since the early 1980s, and I should have mentioned that JEM Worldwide is, stands for Jessica, Emily, Michael, my sister’s in partnership for a couple decades now. And so we operate, two resorts in the Cayman Islands. And about four or five years ago, we started to think about what would it would be to expand outside of the Cayman Islands, and began looking around the Caribbean for the right destination and came across the Turks and Caicos Islands, which really were beginning to emerge as a leading destination, and really a luxury brand in and of themselves. And so, really through a odd series of connections, we came across this property, on the island of South Caicos in the Turks and Caicos Islands, and really were just captivated by the beauty of the beach, the layout of the property. And it was early in the covid days, and so things kind of went on ice for a few months, and we saw how well the Turks and Caicos Islands were doing through Covid really had been able to open up successfully as compared to some other islands. And so that led to a series of conversations and eventually the acquisition of the property in the summer of 2021. We ran the resort as it was, and for a couple years as we developed our plans. And I couldn’t say at that time that I would’ve ever envisioned that we would be creating Salterra a part of the luxury collection and to the standard and to the vision that we have now realizing. But really we’re really grateful to a number of, of mentors partners, consultants along the way that helped me and our team expand the idea for Salterra. So, I got to know some other luxury hotel general managers. The consultants on our team, the Gettys Group out of Chicago played a huge role, edge of architecture. Our design firm played a role and really just really put forward ideas and, and the project began to expand. So the origin of Salterra itself, the name is that the island of South Caicos for centuries dating back to the native Tahu. Peoples have harvested salt that naturally accumulates on these shallow ponds there. So of course, Sal meaning, or salt, meaning salt and Tara land the land of salt and really, you know, gives life to the entire brand story influencing the name, the design as we’ll. We’ll talk about the names of, and types of cuisine that we offer, the experiences. Really, we want the resort to be of the place and to tell the story of the island, its people, the amazing environment there. And that, you know, once we develop that narrative, that story, everything kind of flowed from there. I was ready to jump in and come up with a design, but our team said, hold on. We’ve gotta come up with a story. What is the narrative here? And then once we did that, everything is, is really because it fits so well. I think it’s, it’s been a natural process that as we’ve thought about everything from the design of the spa to the food and beverage outlets, to the guest experiences, it all weaves back together to that central narrative.
Ryan Embree:
I love talking about projects like this because of the intricate details that you just shared and the journey that it takes even before shovels go in the ground or the first guest walks through the lobby, the care, that’s what hospitality is at its core, is we’re trying to serve our guests and put an experience together. It’s more than just four rooms and a wall. We’ve talked about it, there’s so much that I’ve seen that there is to do from renderings to reading on your incredible, beautifully designed website, let’s both inside and outside of the resort. I want to talk about outside. You talked about the natural rich history of the area. I’ve seen ecological hikes, fly fishing excursions, snorkeling so much more. Talk about the property’s breathtaking location and what there is to experience that guest could look forward to experiencing at Salterra outside of the hotel.
Michael Tibbetts :
Yes, there’s really a lot to do on the island of South Caicos. So South Caicos is a island of about a thousand residents in the Archipelago of Turks and Caicos. And it, it is just a breathtaking location because on one, side of the resort you have deep ocean where we’ll see humpback whales migrating through seasonally. And so during that period of time, guests could go on whale watching excursions. I’ve actually stood on the balcony of one of the rooms and seen whales surfacing in the distance there. And then on the other side of the island, we have this expansive bank which extends for more than 40 miles of very shallow water, and just a other worldly kind of place that is almost inaccessible in many ways. So you need shallow draft boats airboats to access the bank. And so in the deep side, we have scuba diving snorkeling, and, and that’s our company in the Cayman Islands is has the largest dive operation in the Cayman Islands. So that’s something that we can offer. And perhaps similar to other resorts, we’re able to offer these experiences with our team as opposed to having our guest go with a third party scuba diving company. We can really curate that whole experience and really integrate it for the guest. So we’ll have amazing scuba diving on fly fishing side, really on remarkable, remarkable destination for bone fishing which is really one of the most thrilling fish to catch in shallow waters that you’re just waiting in ankle deep water clear, as you can see for miles. And it’s really a hunt to catch these fish. And it’s just, I mean, it, there’s, there’s a great, a great number of bonefish there, but it’s also just an amazing place to explore. So, on, on, that’s on the water side. On the land side, in the center of the island, we have the Salinas stone walls that were laid by hand probably three or 400 years ago which is really a bird sanctuary. So we have flamingos, 60 dated flamingos that you can see from the resort just about every day. And so we’ll do guided birdwatching expeditions there, mountain biking trails around the island. And then we really want to integrate our guest experience with the island itself. And so giving some tours of the history of the island. And also we’ve been able to partner with a nonprofit called the School for Field Studies, which is a, it’s actually a college or university level, study abroad experience that has a campus on the island. And so we have given a grant to the school for field studies and built out a coral lab where we’re growing corals in the lab and then also in the ocean. And our guests will be able to learn from scientists there and they’d be able to participate in the coral studies. And at this time of climate change, it’s, it’s really critical work. So we see it as an investment in the island itself to improve the reef, and then our guests can learn from that. We really want our guests to experience learning while they’re at salt. So they’re not just, they’re relaxing, they’re gonna have a great time, but they also feel it’s an enriching experience while they’re there.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and those are the type of moments that stick with you. I think Michael, from a guest perspective that maybe don’t hit the online review sites like TripAdvisor, Google, but that’s the type of stuff that’s one of the first things you share with your close friends and family about your experience there. So you paint a wonderful picture of everything there is to do. It feels like you almost need to stay there a couple days or maybe even a week to do it all. But what about those less adventurous guests that maybe wanna just stay inside the resort? It’s not just something you can do where you have to get off resort. You’re creating and curating an experience onsite as well. Talk about some of those amenities. You mentioned the spa before.
Michael Tibbetts :
Yes. We have really an amazing spa. It’s really a destination spa that’s just set off the property just a little bit. So it’s quiet, it’s secluded, it’s, it’s structured and kind of built almost like a Bermin village. Ber Muttin. Were actually the first settlers, permanent settlers of the Turks and Kako Islands. And so our spa has expansive treatment rooms, couple dedicated couples rooms, and then what I’m really excited about is an athermal circuit. So we’ll have a steam room, a sauna, sauna having halo therapy, so salt therapy, and then a pool hot tub there. So, and then, and then different experiential showers. So guests will be able to do this circuit between cold and hot and experience that. And really, I think it’s a place where people will hang out for half a day or more. So they won’t just go for a massage, but it’ll be a little kind of quiet respite on our property. So really grateful. Our property expands for about 85 acres. We have about three quarters of a mile of beach. So really there’s, an exclusivity, privacy to the resort for guests to explore without leaving the boundaries of our property. So we have an amazing beach. There’s actually some snorkeling spots just down the beach from the resort. And then a number of food and beverage outlets that will love to describe further. We have a beautiful pool. We’re calling it the Oasis Pool. That’s a lagoon style pool that has a beach entry that you walk into gradually. We have a dedicated kids pool that has a little island in the center as it’s being built. It’s a lot bigger than I thought it was gonna be which is great. And then, there’s a function lawn. We’ll have outdoor games for families. So really we want it to be both an active and passive place so that, so that there are places that are quiet that guests can go and read a book and just enjoy being outside versus active activities for families to enjoy together.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, catering to every segment. Super important. Capitalizing on trends we’ve heard and seen in the news recently of wellness travel and how more and more people are looking for these types of amenities as they travel. So to be able to offer that at that spa is fantastic. I’m sure a lot of people will take advantage of that. Now, you mentioned F&B and any part of a luxury resort, I think F&B rises to the top. It makes it almost more important and elevates the experience when you can not only offer an amazing stay, but pair that with a very impressive culinary experience as well. This resort will feature six unique dining experiences for guests. Talk us through some of these dining options and some of the inspiration I’m finding through this conversation that a lot of this, you know, it’s very pointed with every single decision you’ve made on some of these things. So maybe the inspiration behind some of these outlets.
Michael Tibbetts :
Absolutely. We’re really excited about the food and beverage experience for guests. I read recently that a great food and beverage experience is one of the top reasons, you know, of course people travel. And so again, coming back to that brand story narrative, the, the food and beverage outlets help kind of weave the guest through that experience. So I’ll highlight a few of them. So in the reception in the lobby bar, it’s called Sisal. Sisal is a rope that was once made in the Turks and Caicos Islands. We have this really cool decorative sisal feature with a, a really beautiful view out to the pools from there. And then really amazing space is our Regatta restaurant. So the name Regatta comes from the history of an event on the island that’s held annually, celebrating Queen Elizabeth’s II’s visit in 1966 when she came to this little island. And so annually the community celebrates that. So we have some really cool decorative features there. But what’s amazing is a terrace that I think will be an amazing place for breakfast that looks out over the pools and to the beach. It’s a British Caribbean cuisine, a little bit more casual cuisine, but a great place for breakfast and a casual dinner. And then really excited about our fine dining restaurant called Brine, of course, brine salting something again, tying to our theme of Salterra. So we’ll have brine, meats and fish. Really, it’ll be a curated experience. It’ll be a chef tasting menu there. And on that side of the, of the center of the, of the property, you really have an expansive view out to the Salinas of the Salt flats. So, and it ties, ties to that theme. It’ll be more intimate atmosphere, will have walls of carved coral stone that really give it a, you know, unique feel to the space. And then a little bit more fun and lively atmosphere in Cobo. Cobo means conk in the Tainos language. That’s our beachfront bar and restaurant that’ll tie into the pool, and then also into the beach. It’s a Latin inspired cuisine really it’s gonna be amazing. Cocktails, fish tacos, inspired Latin cuisine there as well. We also have a pop-up called Jack and Jenny’s are male and female donkeys from the island’s history and salt days. They’re actually wild donkeys roaming around the island, which are amusing.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, little mascots.
Michael Tibbetts :
Yes, they, they are, they’re mostly friendly. But they’re great to see. And so Jack and Jenny’s a a popup, we’ll, we’ll have kind of rotating types of outlet there. And then one other final is the Flamingo Cafe, which is a really casual grab and go concept. We’ll have gelato, pastries, coffee, so if someone doesn’t wanna sit down for a meal. They can get a bite there. As you said, we really want the guest experience to be diverse. So the guests are gonna stay for a week, that they’ll have lots of experiences around the property, off the property, and then they’ll feel like they don’t necessarily have to leave the property to enjoy great food and beverage. And we’ll also do some individual activations, you know, throughout the week as well.
Ryan Embree:
Well, very much like the amenities and, you know, location feature it really feels like there’s kind of something for every segment there. And, you know, almost like you could take a trip with the family or just make it as a business traveler and have two almost completely unique experiences there, all at the same resort, which as a developer is exactly what you want. And I love the thought and so happy that you shared, you know, some of those meanings because it’s not just putting a name on a restaurant, you know, there were thought behind it, telling the story. Personalization, that’s another huge trend that we’ve been hearing throughout the hotel experience. So to hear these new developments really put that much thought into detail into the guest experience, it’s, it’s gonna create dividends and create some really memorable stories that hopefully guests are sharing online. Let’s continue talking about trends. One of them is sustainability, right? I’ve talked about it on this podcast a lot. Eco-friendly travel. You know, one of the driving forces behind Salterra is respecting nature and being eco-friendly. You’ve talked about that. Discuss why environmentally sustainable practices was so crucial in this project, Salterra Resort and Spa, and how you’re implementing at the resort.
Michael Tibbetts :
Thank you, Ryan, for that question. As a resort on a small island, we feel that we have a tremendous responsibility to the environment. And that by giving back, by investing in the island itself, it’s ultimately gonna improve the guest experience. So that starts with that responsibility. We think it’s the right thing to do, but it’s also great for the resort and great, great for the business. So to highlight a few initiatives that we have already implemented or in the process of implementing is one, we’ve partnered with a local power company to install solar across all of our room block buildings. It’s the largest solar installation that the power company has done in the Turks and Cacois Island. So about half of our power will be generated by solar. Another investment that we’ve made that we really think again, is, is a responsible thing to do, is we’re eliminating single use plastics in the guest rooms and really as much as we possibly can throughout the resort. So instead of having plastic bottles of water that unfortunately are hard to recycle, especially on an island like South Caicos, we’ve installed water dispensers, triple filter water dispensers and ask every guest room. Guests will be given water bottles, they’ll have glassware, but again, trying to reduce that footprint. And another initiative that we have already started is composting our organic waste. So high temperature composting system. This is a trend, you know, throughout the country and around the world, is to look for ways to reduce the emissions that can come from decomposing organic matter, and then we can use that compost, really great compost we can use throughout the resort and our gardens and landscaping. And then, as I highlighted earlier a investment we’ve made in building this coral lab with our partners at the school for field studies for our guests to be able to learn, experience, participate, I think especially for children, will be a tremendous learning opportunity. I have a couple of children myself who are already excited and engaged and guiding some of the activities for the kids. So a few things that, you know, that we want to highlight, but we really want our guests to feel like we’re on a journey towards sustainability. We don’t have it all figured out, but we want our guests to learn along with us, to be able to experience that. We’ll offer some kind of behind the scenes tours of how we’re composting. We’ll have an organic garden to help supply our kitchen, but we really feel like our product as a resort is the island is the place. And if we’re not making that place better, if we’re not acting sustainably and even beyond sustainability, thinking about regeneration improvement and, and even kind of regeneration, redemption of the place, that’s ultimately some of the best investments we can make. So we’re, we’re very excited about that. We’ll love to engage our guests along that and love to continue to iterate as we go forward.
Ryan Embree:
I think that’s when you get the most buy-in from guests, and guests are actually not just willing participants, but just they want to participate in this. And I love what you said about, it’s a journey and to take the guests alongside you. You mentioned the water bottles that might be have been something maybe a decade ago that could have fallen on a guest and the wrong way of just being like, you know what, I just prefer a water bottle. I don’t, I don’t wanna fill it up here. And now if you explain this the right way you tell this story, I mean, especially the way that you’re passionately speaking about this, Michael, about the how this island is your product. I think guests get buy-in from that. I think they get excited to participate, and you’re gonna see that. So on the guest side, I think that’s fantastic. On the business and maybe corporate acquisition side, you’re seeing more and more of these, these organizations starting to think more echo friendly about travel. I heard somebody say last year at the hospitality show, people are gonna start going away from like physical monetary budgets and start doing carbon footprint budgets. And if you can be a leader in sustainability for your resort to be able to capture that business, I think that’s gonna put you in an advantage, certainly.
Michael Tibbetts :
Absolutely, Ryan, I think there is tremendous momentum towards sustainable development and operations. And you’re seeing that from customers, from groups that are looking and evaluating resorts based on their sustainable practices. And that’s, you know, that’s, that’s starting even with the major, you know, hospitality brands. Marriott has set initiatives to reduce the carbon footprint. And if you think about a corporate group that’s, in a company that’s measuring its carbon footprint, if it’s sending its team for retreats, for company conferences, to places that have a lower carbon footprint, that ultimately trickles back up to their overall calculations. So again, we think that this is a trend that’s only gonna accelerate. And you know we, we don’t have it all figured out. There’s more work to do, but we’re really excited about what we’ve been able to do so far. And many of these things we already have started even before we’ve opened. So they’re not just aspirational, they’re gonna be in practice.
Ryan Embree:
That’s fantastic. And yeah, I mean, it’ll be interesting to see if those questions and RFPs and, you know, hotel planners, those start becoming more and more frequent there. So I agree with you, Michael. I think that’s a trend that’s here to stay and, and is really gonna accelerate. So we’ve talked a lot about the intricate details of this resort and the thoughtfulness behind this development. You know, one of the things we preach, being a digital marketing podcast, your story is only as good as what you can say or how you can tell the story. We know social media, you know, which we preach all the time on this podcast, is a huge way to get reach and awareness, to share something like even the name of Salterra and where that comes from. Website, which you guys have done a beautiful job designing. Talk about how you use resources like social media, your website and online presence to kind of create some excitement, build awareness. And, and what you’re trying to do right now is you’re trying to get some early reservations.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. We are open for reservations as of February 15th, 2025. We’re grateful that we, we already have quite a few reservations already booked. But continuing to build a momentum by telling our story and online, and really curating the brand and thinking carefully about how the brand comes across, what is Salterra we want guests to see, but also kind of feel and understand what the experience will be on property. And so through our social media channels, being able to share a number of animations that have been produced, that kind of take guests through the journey of the resort. We also have that featured on our website. We’ve really been fortunate that we had an amazing couple of guys that did just an inspirational video on bone fishing and that they produced, it’s actually been shown at international fly fishing film festivals. And we had 20,000 likes on one of the posts that was this amazing drone shot of a fisherman casting into this huge school of bonefish in crystal clear waters, just like, you just want to get out there when you see it. And so that engagement for us has been really important. And, you know, we want our guests to be able to skim through our social media profiles and say, okay, I, I can envision myself there. I’m inspired, I’m excited. And you know, part of travel is anticipation. Like we enjoy our time there, but setting a goal for ourselves and looking into the future and, and how we can tell that story online is really important. And so we are, you know, grateful for the opportunity to partner with TMG and look for ways that we can continue to grow that presence. We also think it’s really important to educate our guests before they get there so that they can understand what to expect. We would love for our guests to be able to plan out their itineraries. Certainly they can be spontaneous, but they can plan out their restaurant experiences, their excursions, and then really make the most of their time there. So we are, you know, really also grateful that the luxury collection, I think, we’ll, we’ll talk about really just fits so well with our brand at Salterra and really has guided us to curate the type of presence that we want to have online.
Ryan Embree:
It’s great when you have a really strong sense of who you are as a property, as a voice, because the thing we keep coming back to, and I’ve talked about it, is authenticity In a world right now where there’s a lot of inauthentic images out there, feedback sometimes that we see, unfortunately, if you can be true to yourself, who you are, and if you have a really good understanding of what you’re trying to accomplish from a digital marketing perspective, that authenticity is gonna shine through your social channels, shine through your website, and get to the heart of what you want your experience to be. And you’re right Michael, I think it is about when you have a resort like Salterra, there’s so much to do that you want to expose your upcoming guests to everything, the possibilities of what they can do. So if they don’t do it on this time, they can come back and have another experience, like I said, completely unique from what they did before, but just at that same level. So luckily for you, Michael, I do not think that you guys are gonna have a shortage in the amazing social media content that you’ll be gonna be sharing from that humpback whale on the balcony. I think you’re gonna have a lot, a lot to share from the properties perspective when you have something incredible like you were talking about in the experiences that you’re able to provide. Also the user generated feedback that you’re gonna get is gonna be equally as important to keep your ears and eyes open for when a guest shares something to say, Hey, I just caught this bonefish here this afternoon, and or here’s this delicious meal at Brine. Right? That’s all very important and all part of the social media strategy there. Let’s, let’s talk about the luxury collection. ’cause it was just announced that Salterra was gonna be a part of the, The Luxury collection. Congratulations, that’s huge news. You spoke to a little bit, but expand on why you think this collection was the right fit for the property and what that’s gonna mean for travelers specifically.
Michael Tibbetts :
So the tagline for The Luxury collection, which is part of the Marriott Bonvoy luxury brands in what is classified as a distinctive luxury brand, a soft brand. So Salterra is a brand within the brand. The Luxury Collection taagline is – a hotel that defines the destination. And, and that’s really what we want to be. We want to define our destination in South Caicos and the Turks and Caicos Islands. And the, the other kind of words that could be used to describe the brand are rare, captivating, authentic, and again, experiential. So leaning into that experiential side of luxury, not just passive but active and maybe some folks are drawn to different types of luxury experiences, but we really wanna lean into luxury learning, relaxation, but also, again, offering active opportunities as well. Engagement and one where guests would feel really enriched. They’ll feel like they learned about a place, maybe they gave back to the place through some activities that they do, that they’re rejuvenated restored. And the luxury collection really defines that. And really for us, The Luxury Collection has just been a great fit to help us think through that brand story. That’s part of the, part of the process with The Luxury Collection is really defining that story and then really coming back to how, how does the design of the guest rooms tie to that story? So, so how does the art in the guest rooms tie in? How do the carpets that, the rugs that, that have a design that’s taken as an abstraction from an aerial view of those Salinas and the color palette of the russ colors and some of the blues. That’s, that’s the how we design the rugs. You know, how does that all fit? So it is authentic and that’s, that’s so important to us. And, you know, whether it’s social media and ensuring that we’re using absolutely as much authentic footage as we can, not using stock footage, you know, really just about everything we’ve, we’ve done is, is authentic to, to the island. That’s really important to the luxury collection as well. So it’s been an incredible fit that there’s some amazing luxury collection properties around the world. And really we aspire to be a preeminent, a luxury collection resort certainly for the Caribbean and North America. It’s a high bar, it’s a high standard. But we’re up to the challenge and we’re really excited to dig you as part of the collection.
Ryan Embree:
Well congratulations again, you know, that’s, that’s huge news. I know that was announced. You know, I would, I would add immersive to that as well. You’ve painted a really great picture so far of just travelers being immersed in the culture, the history of this location. So again, hats off to your team. There’s a reason why, again, this is probably one of the, the more anticipated projects in hospitality in 2025. So let’s do some rapid fire questions, and I’m excited about this one. We’re gonna get to know you and Salterra a little bit more before it’s opening in, in February of 2025. Correct. So let’s talk about the best view at the property.
Michael Tibbetts :
Well definitely the Regatta Terrace which is a second story terrace. I think it’s gonna be awesome for breakfast, watching the sunrise over the beach, looking out at the expansive pools. Definitely already my favorite place to stand on the property as it’s coming to life.
Ryan Embree:
We’ll probably see that very quickly on a lot of people’s social media feeds. I would imagine there. Fun fact about the property?
Michael Tibbetts :
You mentioned it earlier, but we’re located on more than 3000 feet of beachfront in the Admiral Cockburn National Park. And so you’re gonna be probably the only person on the beach strolling the beach. And it’s just, it’s just a quiet solitude beauty there. There’s lots of great resorts on very busy beaches, but that expanse is something that we’re really excited to share with guests.
Ryan Embree:
Most anticipated dish at the property?
Michael Tibbetts :
There is a bunch, and I, and I’ll say that our, our Chef Nellogoes, is still developing, refining some, some of our menus. I would say in South Caicos there is a fishery for lobster. And so seasonally, you know, grilled lobster from the Caribbean, an amazing, amazing dish. But there there’ll be really diverse and I think some of the things that we’re gonna do with salt are really gonna be awesome. Tell the history of the journey of salt to both see the salinas and then experience salt as such a fundamental element for our, our cuisine. There can be some really cool salt inspired dishes, drinks, and then storytelling with that.
Ryan Embree:
I would imagine that is probably one of the perks of helping in these projects is being able to taste and try out all these amazing dishes.
Michael Tibbetts :
Absolutely. And I mean, we just have such a great team that even under, even while we’re under construction right now, I was just in South Caicos this week. Our team is operating in kind of a makeshift kitchen as we’re, as we’re getting going. And they like never cease to surprise me with the dishes they’re making out of this makeshift kitchen. And I was like, when we have the full kitchen’s bakery available, like, I can’t wait to see what they’re gonna gonna create. ’cause they’re, they’re doing an amazing job. They, they really spoil me when I’m down there even now.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Well, let’s wrap up with favorite piece of art at the property.
Michael Tibbetts :
A 17th century map of the Turks and Caicos Islands. I’ve collected antique maps. I have some here in my office, both of the Cayman Islands and Turks and Caicos. And again, telling that story, the history of the place through these old maps.
Ryan Embree:
Where is that located or where is it gonna be located?
Michael Tibbetts :
It’ll be in the library. So we have a library kind of sitting room that’s off of the lobby lounge, and so we’ll have some artifacts maps there as well.
Ryan Embree:
That’s really cool. Yeah, I think those, those elements are important storytelling tools that we’ve talked about. You know, get a bit of theme throughout this episode. Alright, let’s as we wrap up here, Michael, let’s do some time travel. We’re gonna move forward to February, 2025. After those first guests check out, they exit the property, what’s your vision for what those guests are saying and feeling about the experience as they walk out of the Salterra Resort experience?
Michael Tibbetts :
We would like our guest to experience unreasonable hospitality. It’s not an original term to me. It’s a book that you may have, have picked up by Will Gu, who was the general manager owner of 11 Madison Park in New York City. And it’s a really inspiring book to think how can we create and craft unreasonable experiences, things that our guests wouldn’t anticipate that are unique, whether it’s a, it’s a unique turndown service, whether that’s someone that they got to know on the team, that it truly goes out of their way to tell them the story of the resort, show them something around the island. It’s a dish, it’s an experience or excursion. But I wanted to be really almost unreasonable that it’s stretching beyond what is expected. And I think of my own experiences at resorts around the US, around the world, it’s those special touch points and those stories guests entering into a story themselves. And that’s something that we can take with us. And as you said, what is the story? What is the experience that guests are gonna be excited to share with their friends and family? And, and hopefully that will gather other folks to, to come and visit us as well. So that’s really what I’m challenging the team now is like to really think through from the guest arrival all the way through departure, how can we surprise and delight our guests?
Ryan Embree:
We’ve done a fantastic job of painting, like I said a very great picture of what guests can expect, but it’s those things that we don’t expect sometimes, like you said, that leave the lasting mark on us as hotel guests. So thank you so much, Michael. We’re open for reservations, right? You can head over to the website, check it out, go follow Salterra on social media. I’m sure that audience is gonna be growing very quickly as those doors get closer and closer to opening. So again, congratulations. I know you’re not at the finish line yet. Very anticipated resort in the Salterra Resort and Spa. Thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot with us, Michael.
Michael Tibbetts :
Thank you so much for having me. It’s been a really amazing experience, love telling this story.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much for listening, and we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this celebratory episode, Travel Media Group is celebrating a major milestone! TMG has officially surpassed 1,000,000 social followers created for our hotel social partners!
Join Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree, and Chief Technology Officer at TMG, Jason Lee as these two social media experts discuss the incredible achievement and what it means to the organization. For our hotelier listeners out there, go to our website to learn more about how you can be apart of the next milestone and increase your hotel’s social followers by partnering with us.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, here for another incredible episode. We have a very familiar voice typically on to share a innovative, solution with us, or an upgrade to our solution. But we’re here today to celebrate an incredible milestone. Jason Lee, CTO at Travel Media Group. Jason, thank you for joining the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee:
Thanks for having me back on, Ryan. For the first time in a while. Thought it was something personal
Ryan Embree:
No, but we have a very personal, uh, milestone to celebrate. Yes. This is a great achievement. If you saw the title of the episode, we are celebrating 1 million social media followers for our hotel partners. It’s an incredible milestone, something huge for this solution. We know the importance of social media, we’ve talked about on this podcast numerous times, but being able to pass this threshold of 1 million followers, that’s representative of 1 million travelers that are following our hotel partners social platforms, whether it’s Facebook, X, LinkedIn, or Instagram. So exciting. I’m sure you were here at the infancy of the social media solution for hotels. Specifically for hotels, mind you talk to us a little bit about that evolution of when that solution first started to, here we are here in 2024, passing this incredible milestone.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. When we started, it was really not on a lot of hotel’s radar. So most of the pages that we were creating, you know, this was even in a lot of cases before there was even a place page on Facebook. So we were creating the first business pages for most of our clients. So you really taking from there to now where, you know, over this amount of time, pretty much every hotel has probably made a Facebook page, whether they’re posting on it or not. Yeah. They probably have gone in after, you know, a conference or something and decided, Hey, I’m gonna, I’m gonna do this. But when we started, we were like really early on creating social media for hotel pages. And a lot of the kind of strategies that we started with have drastically changed based on how, how the social networks have actually changed. So they’ve actually there’s an evolution inside of that, but there’s also been an evolution in, while each platform, has its own type of audience, but then at the same time you’ve also had platforms combined. So back then it was Facebook and Instagram were two separate companies. Yeah. You know, X was called Twitter, but over time, that’s as a strategy. You know, our strategy has changed as the travelers have changed their usage pattern. Sure and as hotels have needed it, but we went from, very kind of generic posting to now where we are on Facebook, Instagram, X, LinkedIn, TikTok, we’re producing short form videos for hotels. We’re producing great scheduled content out weeks in advance. Our platform has become extremely advanced. Our ad strategy has become extremely advanced. So all of those things together have really kind of lent themselves to kind of where we’re at today and celebrating this really cool milestone. But, but the cool part of this milestone, I think for me is that all of this content generation that we’ve done over this time has produced, you know, actual people engaging with it and using it.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that’s an important note to make. And you know, because anyone 1 million followers doesn’t happen overnight, but you can’t get there in a variety of different ways. Right there were times where people were buying followers, buying likes. That is not what this is. This is curated content specifically for hotels, and you talked about the evolution of how our ad strategy, our posting strategy, and the reason that we were able to do that is because we work with so many hotels across the country, we’re able to do what we preach all the time on this podcast, which is look at your analytics, figure out what’s working for you, what content travelers are engaging with, and then from there you really start to sharpen your strategy. And you make a very interesting point also with the evolution of these social media platforms working within just, you know, time, right?
Jason Lee:
Yes. So the way that LinkedIn used to just be a place where you could find a job. Right. And now it’s a really important platform for B2B business, uh, especially for hotels, wedding planners, corporate planners, group events. Now we’re seeing more of these companies that are willing to, take a corporate retreat somewhere. LinkedIn might be your best place to find that. Yeah the way that we interact on our social media platforms, for me, I used to stay in my feed on Instagram. Now I’m in that explore page that for you page where I’m seeing maybe accounts that I don’t necessarily follow, but the algorithm has based it upon my interest. This wasn’t something that was happening at the beginning of this, but it’s also the evolution of social media within hotels.
Ryan Embree:
When we used to talk to hotels, I think the strategy was, I’m gonna find the youngest person on, on my team, and they might know social media, so I’m gonna have them create my page for me. And then all of a sudden hotels learn maybe that wasn’t the best idea. These pages are actually representative of my business, my voice, my brand. We needed a little bit more time and effort. So then they started kind of putting that on a DOS and then the director of sales would say this, this is the a lot of time, it’s very time consuming. And in a place now where we are, where we have staffing shortage, there’s a, there’s a social media position now. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Like some of these resorts hire specifically for a social media person. So there’s so much evolution within our industry that’s happened during that time. But you’re right, I’ve talked about it before. Build a following, not a follower account. So as, as impressive as this milestone is, it’s not just about that number, it’s about having the right following.
Jason Lee:
And I think if you look at how social media has evolved over time, there’s a lot of talk about algorithm and being part of an algorithm or being inside of an algorithm. And if you have spent any time on social media, you might see all of the things that you are interested in over and over again. So I see a lot of like cooking. I see a lot of like golden retriever videos and you know, surfing videos. So it’s like, I see a lot of that kind of stuff, but if you think about it from a social media standpoint, you only enter the algorithm on the other side. So you as a user are entering it based on your preference. You as a creator are entering that as consistent content of a certain type, consistent content from a certain business type. So you don’t, you can’t make make it in front of those eyeballs, right? Unless you’re doing something consistently, unless you’re doing something that is on brand for yourself and for your area.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and that’s one of the first tips that I share with hoteliers is listen, if you’re within a couple followers of a milestone and you don’t plan on continuing this, you just want to get to a thousand followers or 500 followers or what, but it’s not gonna work. You have to have a consistent strategy. We found the statistic and a social media survey that we did, over 60% of hotels are only posting at least once or very rarely on their social media accounts. So it’s a big opportunity for the hotel industry. And that’s why we’re seeing more people reach out to us because they’re understanding the importance of social media in their own lives. We work in travel, right? Yeah. Luckily, a lot of people love to travel. So when we’re talking about interest and algorithms, that is a great way to kind of get in front of new eyeballs. New travelers is by putting this content out there. But you have to do it, like you said.
Jason Lee:
And I would say short form video right now, we’re seeing a lot of stuff, and we have clients right now, so we have hotels that are getting more engagement or getting more reach and engagment sorry, reach and impressions on a video than they have followers. So, you know, it just shows you that it goes way beyond your follower count if you’re doing it correctly.
Ryan Embree:
So let’s, let’s share with our audience some tips on, how to grow your following. So if you’re struggling right now, you’re a hotel management company, and you’re saying, I just need more followers. My content just doesn’t seem to be getting the time and the time and effort that I’m spending on, it doesn’t seem to be getting the reach and impressions and followers that I want. Let’s talk through some of these do’s and don’ts. We’ll start with the don’ts. Feel free to interrupt me now. This comes from Hootsuite’s 2024 Social Media Consumer Report, and it’s what has caused consumers to unfollow a brand in the last 12 months. And we’ve seen examples of a lot of these angling for metrics, right? Uh, repetitive content happens a lot. Boring content, inauthentic content. I’ll stop there. ’cause authenticity, especially now you’re seeing more and more people get interested in these AI generated photos. You don’t know how that’s gonna hit your audience. No. You know, if you, if you’ve got this AI generated photo, so tread carefully. It might be cool to do maybe a little cheeky post here and again, but don’t rely on that every single time to be your social media voice and brand. Um, ’cause it could come off as inauthentic and then clickbait, you know, so. Those are, those are the don’ts. Let’s talk about some of the dos tagged or being tagged. Tell us maybe how your social media team uses getting engagement from other accounts or listening to other accounts to try to grow followers.
Jason Lee:
Well, one thing that’s really awesome about being a hotel, so if you are just a influencer trying to build a following or you’re just a random business trying to like build up a following, you know, you kind of have to stick with your content. I think with travel, the content is of so many things around you. It’s restaurants and businesses, it’s attractions that are around you. It’s the events that are happening in your city that are driving occupancy. All of those things are things that actually matter. And the cool part about that content is it has a very captive audience, but usually it’s day driven. So especially on the event side. So you key into an event, use their hashtags, get into, and you can post about the event. They’re more than happy to have you do that. The people that are coming in, and this obviously is a direct occupancy driver, but this could also be something, a type of an event that’s also interesting to travelers who are coming to stay at your property. Sure. So I think this stuff, the cross on that stuff is incredible and you’re able to pick up people to start following you right away from those kinds of things, just by exposing your brand to them. But then I also feel like another huge part of this type of build is using your guests that are staying with you. You know, so that same kind of thing. But I agree. I think tagging an event or a business or an attraction is an incredible way to get views.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. If you’ve got a savvy social media manager on the other side, like you said, they are looking for times that they’re being tagged. Right. Absolutely. And, and they’re gonna want to engage with that. Interact with that. You brought up events, you know, I think as hoteliers we tend to just talk about it as an occupancy driver and don’t think of it as once that event starts, it’s done. I’ve always advocated to post during event. Right. We’ll take the most recent, probably most notable Taylor Swift, concert series. Get engagement, asking your followers, what was your, what was the set list? What was your favorite song of the night? What photos do you have to share? We’ll reshare it on our post. That’s some stuff that spurs during the event to get engagement. And then if it’s something that happens annually saying follow our page for more updates, as we count down to next year’s event. So there’s tons of ways to do that, but, I think that’s stuff we do really well. So we look at events, we go pre, pre-event, we, and then go week of the event. Yeah. And then we usually will do a post after the event as well. Thanking them for coming to the city, thanking them for staying with us, that kind of stuff.
Ryan Embree:
I think that’s a big missed opportunity there. ’cause they think, again, once that event has passed, my occupancy driver has passed. And there’s no other residual benefits that I can have. So definitely make sure that you’re doing that. But it’s also about keeping an ear out for your travelers that are tagging you. Or even sometimes they don’t need to actually physically tag the property. They just need to be in their location. Have their location on. So on Instagram, you can go to your page and see when someone posts from the balcony of your hotel, and maybe they’re, maybe they’re a micro influencer. Maybe they’ve got a great following there and they have the location of your hotel. You wanna keep your eyes and ears open for those so that you can engage, you can like, and maybe even comment there to maybe get some of their followers over to your page as well. Let’s talk about short form videos a little bit. You know, we released this late last year. We’ve been seeing some tremendous analytics on the side. You were just speaking to some of those. How is this a way to get organic growth? Because, you know, our followers are great when they share they tag, but if we wanna get outside of our following, the Instagram reel or TikTok is a great way to do that.
Jason Lee:
A hundred percent. And and I think it’s just the way, again, this information is fed. So the platforms really want to keep people engaged. They wanna keep people watching and moving video to video. So, they’re using information that they’re getting based on this person’s preferences, based on their search history, other things. So if they’re looking for travel and they’re, they’ve been searching all around
Ryan Embree:
No, and another example I absolutely love that we do is kind of a top five countdown, you know, whether it be attractions, restaurants in the areas or something like that. And the reason that’s so brilliant is because that keeps a user. If you’re watching a countdown video, you start at five, more often than not, you’re gonna stay all the way to see what number one is. And the algorithm will see that you’re interacting with that video in longer and will be more likely to send another piece of content your way that’s in that same vein. Totally. So if you’re doing, you know, multiple reels, which you should be doing. Now all of a sudden you’re showing up on this feed a lot more often. You know, and the other thing I’ll bring up about the, for you explore page on Instagram reel and TikTok is this younger generation are using these platforms for search. So I know that’s maybe for some, listeners that’s like hard to conceive, but the next time, I would challenge you the next time you’re going on a trip or something like that. Or just need general information, anything you’re throwing into Google, try to do that If you have TikTok and Instagram and see what comes up. And I’ll tell you, it’ll be a very interesting way. But that’s the way this younger generation is actually finding their information. So if you’re not on there, that’s like not having your website on Google. Absolutely. So very, very critical, especially if you want follower growth there.
Jason Lee:
And I’ve said a few times, but I feel like social media, especially for millennials, gen Z especially, it’s almost like a compass to explore this information, to guide them in where they’re gonna stay. And if you think about what is currently out there, we have static webpages with static galleries, and we fill these galleries full of images. So you think about like how the use case of a image gallery. So I go to that gallery, I go image, image to image. Now you think about the use case of Instagram and Facebook, but, but specifically Instagram probably and TikTok. But I go there, I see your images, and then I also see your videos. If I click into your videos, I can go video to video and watch all the videos that you created. If you have nothing in there, obviously I have not, no way of looking at that. But I do feel like that is the, all of that rest of that information that I need to confirm my booking, to say that this is the place I’m gonna stay. And so I would definitely think like that. And I think the longer that, you know, ’cause especially if you’re just starting out, the more content you have in there, the more impactful that kind of video to video pass through of that, of your page is gonna be 100%. Let’s talk about social media ad spend. You brought it up. It’s something that you felt was important enough that every hotel, social media partner that we have, social ad spend is included in their solution. Great way to get outside of your follower base. Why was this so important and why is this a good tool for a growing audience?
Jason Lee:
It kind of gets the back to what I was talking about that videos are attracting those people that are looking for you. This is a very similar kind of thing. So this is, and there is a difference in the ad spend that we’re doing than, than what you might think kind of the traditional sort of Google ad spend where all sudden I see the top of the search. I see your business. This is boosting content. And so it’s taking pieces of content about your property, about your area, about attractions, about things that drive occupancy. And it’s boosting it out past your audience into new audience. And so this is a really important thing because again, it goes back to that place where they, where where the platforms can see what you’ve been searching for. They can see the other things that you’re looking at. So this is getting out in front of those types of users. And so you’re in a lot of cases with your content with, and what’s cool about this is that because it’s not an ad, it feels like it’s part of their feed. So it’s a very, it’s a very cool way of getting way more people engaged with your posts.
Ryan Embree:
Well, one of the parallels we always talk about with social media is the digital billboard. And, you know, to kind of explain that about, well, imagine, you’ve got this billboard and it’s digital. The word of caution, I would say about social media ad spend is there’s a difference between that billboard being two exits before your hotel and 200 exits right before your hotel. And how effective that can be. We are only effective because we work with so many hotels. We know what buttons to push in, in the social media ad spend world, which optimizes the growth, reach and impressions of the posts that we’re boosting. Yeah, so make sure if you are gonna like, kind of wade into those waters, the research, consult some ad experts. ’cause it’s, it’s really easy to also spend and not see the type of return that you’re looking for.
Jason Lee:
Right. And I think there’s a big difference between that sort of, call to action post or call to action ad. So we’ve all seen that, like where we’re like flipping through videos or looking through posts, and you’ll see a promotion. You see that like, learn more or book. Now this is a very, this is different than that. And so there’s an important distinction though too. So it doesn’t cost as much. You’re not spending that as much per click. But what you are getting is you’re getting your content out there. So, so let’s say you just started Mm-Hmm.
Ryan Embree:
I think that’s perfectly summed up of why growing an audience and and following is so important. And and it also gives you the ability to invite people that engage with your content. Yes. Which is huge with follower growth. So one of the things that I suggest every hotel you do if you have a LinkedIn page is go and invite your connections on LinkedIn. So there’s actually a button that you can click to invite your connections. If you’ve got staff members that also have LinkedIns, they can invite their connections. Great way to build your, LinkedIn following with a snap of a finger. Facebook, a hundred percent. Facebook, Instagram, Facebook mainly on, on ads. People that engage with your videos or content boosted content, you then have the ability to go and invite them. So yes, you figure if they’re engaging, if they’re liking my content that hey, maybe have an invitation to come follow my page, you’re gonna see more of this stuff that you like
Jason Lee:
A hundred percent.
Ryan Embree:
So invitation’s very, very important there. What about social landing pages? Let’s talk about that. That’s, that’s also something that we provide for our social media partners. You think about each one of these platforms we’ve talked about is used in a variety of different ways, but there might be a lot of crossover where you could have somebody come from LinkedIn and then say, come follow us on Instagram. A social media landing page is a great, and one view link is a great way to do that.
Jason Lee:
A hundred percent and so you have some platforms, well, Instagram specifically. They don’t even allow you to put a link. So, so let’s talk about that event that we were just saying, we were just talking about earlier. So you have this event that’s coming to town, and you do link in bio. Are you gonna change your website? You gonna change your website to accommodate this once a year event? I don’t think you are. So that’s where these landing pages become really important, where you can have your other network, other pages on there. You can have your website on there. So any promotions that you’re doing are also kind of, you can push back into that and you can have a special button just for the promotion, but then it also ties back into these important events or businesses that you wanna highlight. And all of those links can be added in there. So then it’s like link in bio, link in bio. But where followers come in is, I feel like this is a incredible place to source followers is your own guest base. So people that are staying with you. So now at the front desk, it’s like, Hey, what’s going on? Or if you wanna stay up to date with all the things going on this week while you’re staying with us, yes. Just, you know, scan this QR code and now they go into a landing page that has all of your social networks on it has your website, it has all the other stuff that, that you’re doing on there. And I think these can be extremely effective because some people might be more comfortable on Facebook, some people might be more comfortable on Instagram, so you don’t know where they want to follow you, but you want to be able to capture ’em wherever they are. And I think these pages are incredibly effective if you use them.
Ryan Embree:
That transitions us perfectly into the next topic that I wanna talk about, because I think we also fall under this spell of thinking, the only time that I’m gonna be able to gain followers is at the beginning or at the very end. So if somebody is interested in what I’m putting and kind of inspiration they’re gonna follow and like my page or at the very end, they really had a great experience, I’m gonna ask them to follow just like a review, right? But there’s a lot of places in between in that traveler booking journey that are great use cases for gaining followers. So let’s walk through some of them. So inspiration we kind of already talked about, but what about like pre-booking research?
Jason Lee:
I think pre-booking is huge, you know, so, so again, this could come into the reason why somebody would want to follow you, and that would be that there’s relevant information about the time they’re gonna stay, or they can see that there’s a bunch of relevant information. I go to your page in pre-booking and there’s nothing there or a post from like 2013 or something. I’m not, there’s no reason for me to follow it. There’s no reason for me to do anything there. But now, but now you fast forward and now I have a ton of content in there and I have content that is relevant to the current week, then me staying, maybe a month from now, I might be like, Hey, this is an important resource.
Ryan Embree:
It subconsciously tells you something too. And I think this, this happens with us as consumers and travelers of, we work in hospitality where we want to serve our guests. If we’re not providing basic information on places like social media or review as we’ve talked about, that hospitality might be lost in translation there for the guests or the traveler. So it’s very important. I’m sure you know, not every single hotel that’s listening to this is a luxury resort that might have all this content. It might just be a, you know, select service right. Property right off the highway. But there’s still something to be said for having that post in there, talking about your breakfast, talking about that pool in the hours, some of the frequently asked questions. There’s just a level of care there and attention. If you, if you come to a Facebook page that hasn’t posted in a couple years, what’s to make you think that that hotel room might not be as clean as it should be? I think there’s a lot of parallels there that subconsciously as travelers we kind of connect, we start to connect those dots. What about post-booking? So you get somebody to actually commit, make that decision. Where is social media fall in the post-booking, pre stay?
Jason Lee:
Well, I think if you can 100% add some, add your social links into booking confirmation if it’s possible for you to do it, because I think that’s a great, again, it’s a great idea. Again, that’s confirmation. And I think a lot of times we don’t do it because we don’t have a social media strategy and we know there’s nothing there. So there’s no value. The value once you, when you have it now, this is that this is confirmation to book. So you think about yourself, if you’re traveling a lot of times, or if you bought anything right? You purchase it and then your research doesn’t stop. You, you continue on because maybe it, maybe it took you a week to choose this hotel. You’ve searched all over the place, you finally chose it, and now you kind of sort of continue research. But this is also the place where you’re sharing with family and friends where you’re gonna stay. If they’re traveling with you, obviously you’re gonna be sharing that information. So I probably wouldn’t be sharing any of that information if there’s nothing there. Or if, or if there’s nothing relevant to share. Uh, or if I go there and I see this empty page, it might even turn me off and I might look someplace else to book. So I think that that part is really important. And, and you know, we’ve heard numbers as much as 8% are canceling rebooking, um, post-booking. So 8% of travelers are in that space where they actually cancel their reservation and rebook.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s easy. It’s easier than ever, right? Brands are making it easier. Travelers feel more comfortable now. You know, over the past couple years where their travel plans changed at a moment’s notice because factors that we don’t know about, I feel okay now canceling my booking and saying, you know what, maybe this wasn’t the best pick. Or maybe they, the hotel across the street dropped their rate $5 and that $5 hasn’t been shown to me in social media posts of why I should be staying here versus there. So this is a great place, you know, I think of this as the hype kind of setting, right? It’s like I keep coming back to your social media. Oh my gosh, here’s, this is what this pool looks like. This is what the breakfast is gonna be. This is where we’re gonna walk in, we’re gonna check in, it’s gonna, we’re gonna get our room. This is the time you wanna build excitement and hype for the trip that they’re gonna be having.
Jason Lee:
We did this, we recently did a post or did a series of posts at a property where we showed the different kinds of breakfast that you could make from their breakfast. So we, we showed like a bagel sandwich where it was like we had the, the continental breakfast had bagels. It had, it has eggs and it had bacon. Right? So we showed making this like bagel sandwich from, from the continental breakfast, you know, or these different kinds of ways of doing stuff where you’re like, I want, this is cool. I can’t wait to stay there. Or I would maybe even share that with people I’m traveling with. Um, but also you go back to that thing about mentions. No one is going to mention your page if there’s not content there.
Ryan Embree:
If there’s nothing there. Yeah. Or, or you know, what they, they do, which this is what hoteliers think. Well, I haven’t interacted with my page in years, so it, it’s not gonna really hurt me. That doesn’t mean that travelers aren’t interacting with your page a hundred percent. They will go to your last post, whether it’s two weeks or two years ago, and they will leave their complaint there. Because they understand the power of social media. So if they had a bad stay, just because you posted two years ago does not mean at the top of that post, they’re gonna comment and say all, everything that they need to say about that. Also, something you want to, you want to definitely keep an ear and an eye out for. In stay you talked about it. I think it’s a great place to get followers. People might not be as comfortable picking up that phone, like they used to. Maybe they want to DM you on Facebook for an extra set of towels or something like that. But again, always comes back to listening. You have to be there to, to answer that call, when it comes through.
Jason Lee:
But I do think there is fear there. I think, you know, I can feel that where it’s like, don’t treat this like reputation. Don’t, don’t treat it like, well, if I engage here, this is a place for people to create negative, it makes me vulnerable. It’s the opposite. I engage here, this is my, this is me, this is my proactive messaging about my brand out to travelers and in stay is so overlooked as such an important place to engage with your travelers. But it also becomes this place where it’s the also the reason why I would follow, so the reason why I’d follow is that I get push notifications when you post. And if you’re posting valuable content about things happening at the property, especially if it’s stuff like, here’s what’s going on in our fitness center. Here’s what’s going on in our pool, here’s what’s going on at our restaurant. Those are things that are valuable to me during my stay. So I think then once you have them, then it’s like the continued engagement in post-stay becomes a natural part of this thing. So now you have this like space where you, we literally just covered pretty much every stage of the booking process, inspiration to travel, pre-booking research, booking in stay, post stay. It becomes this like really amazing place where your content can have a huge effect, um, not only on getting reservations, but also creating advocates of your business.
Ryan Embree:
Well, wonderfully said. And it literally takes one click of a button to be in a traveler’s feed for as long as they allow you to be. Right? And if you’re not doing any of the things that we talked about at the top of the episode, but if you’re doing any of those things, then you’re not having a good consistent social media strategy. So anyone listening to this, if you get that click, more often than not, you’re gonna keep that follower. You’re gonna keep that advocate for your hotel. You’re gonna keep that hopefully engagement going as long as you’re producing consistent good social media content. So I think great way to wrap up here. Any final thoughts? Uh, again, congratulations on this milestone. 1 million followers for our hotel social partners. What a journey it’s been. And we’re gonna keep growing. And, and try to get to two, five and as many as we need to.
Jason Lee:
As excited as I am for us, I am more excited for our hotel partners because this is where they all gain, this is them moving forward and really getting the most out of these types of solutions. And I think that this solution in, in general, whether, you know, if you’re listening to this and you’re like, you know, on the fence of what to do, whether to start something or not do something, I would do start something. Start it now. And there’s so many different things that where that this affects, you mentioned LinkedIn and I don’t wanna get too crazy with this, but business travel is back up. It’s starting and it is on the rise. This is something that is moving up and your strategy, whether that’s with a DOS or that’s with you as a GM, whatever that is, that strategy of going out and, and talking to local businesses, going out and talking to inbound teams or, or inbound groups or whatever those things are that are, that are drawing occupancy to you. This is one of those things that I think is a crazy hack where if you’re not doing it and you engage here, you get your DOS, you get your GM, you get people engaged locally, LinkedIn can be an extraordinary business tool.
Ryan Embree:
No, it’s awesome. And you know, again, it, it’s not about follower count, it’s about building a good social media following. Everyone starts at zero, but you have to start somewhere.
Jason Lee:
The follower count will happen. You just gotta have the content.
Ryan Embree:
Exactly. So I think that’s, that’s a great way to wrap this up. Jason, thank you. Congratulations again for being on the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee:
Thanks Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
And, uh, we’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The latest and greatest TMG Hospitality Trailblazers episode is here! 👏🔥
Join Suite Spot host Ryan Embree and the Chief Marketing Officer at Charlestowne Hotels, Michael Cady, as these two hospitality experts cover some exciting and insightful topics for viewers, including:
♻️ Sustainability in the Hotel Industry
⚡ The First 100% All-Electric Hotel in the Country: Hotel Marcel
💪 The Critical Importance of a Strong Social Media Presence
📱 Technology and the Guest Experience
🏨 What is on the Horizon for Charlestowne Hotels
Tune in now!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. I am here for another edition of our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. Very excited about our guest today, lot to talk about. I’m gonna bring ’em right in. Michael Cady, Chief Marketing Officer at Charlestowne Hotels. Michael, thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot.
Michael Cady:
Pleasure to be here. Thank You.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, excited to to have you on. Obviously being a digital marketing podcast, having the CMO at Charlestowne Hotels, got a lot of talk about. But before we get into talking about that beautiful portfolio you have over there at Charlestowne, talk to me a little bit about your experience and the journey that led you to where you’re at now.
Michael Cady:
It’s been a long, strange trip that’s for sure. I guess I’ve been doing this for 25 years now. Time is happening fast. It’s crazy but yeah, about 25 years in branding, marketing, digital media, creative services. I’ve been with Charlestowne Hotels for eight years. Currently, I oversee an in-house marketing team that executes all our campaigns and initiatives across our portfolio, customizing each plan hotel. Before Charlestowne, I did two marketing director gigs in hospitality. One with Orient Express now called Belmont, so worldwide luxury travel train, cruise company. And then the other, which back in the day was similar boutique lifestyle hotel management company as Charlestowne. Obviously that’s changed a bit, but, uh, back in the day it was, it was a lot like us and also have some agency experience. So use a lot of my agency background into integrating our team. And I work for a company called Saachi and Saatchi, which is a global ad agency working on Walmart, Procter and Gamble, Coca-Cola, some of those bigger brands.
Ryan Embree:
Let’s lean into that spectrum there. Obviously a wide range of experience segments that you’ve been a part of. I want to get kind of your philosophy, the marketing environments that Charlestowne operates from anything from lifestyle, independent collegiate markets, brands, soft brands, really all across the gamut. Kind of like your experience there. Share with us a little bit about your philosophy with that in-house marketing team that you’re talking about when you approach each project from a marketing standpoint, we’re gearing up as marketers. This is an exciting time. We’re getting into the spring, getting into the summer, getting our summer campaigns ready for the travel season. Talk to us a little bit about how your team’s prepping for that.
Michael Cady:
Well, I guess I’ll cover the, the year to date so far. And then kind of go into our different environments. January and February actually, were pretty slow overall for us. Mostly on the occupancy side. I dunno, I think like January’s becoming this month of like personal focus and reflection, getting back to basics and so just didn’t have the leisure travel demand that, that we’ve had maybe in years past. March and April rebounded nicely. Um, and so now we’re at budget or trailing just a bit. And what’s been cool, even the last years group weddings and events continue to increase from the massive drop off from Covid. So it’s just cool to see those segments finally prosper. But yeah, I’m hoping for a good summer get ahead of budget or at least get on part of budget. I probably think the next couple months we’ll tell the story of our national outlook, maybe even perception as as we head into a presidential election. So we’ll see how it goes. This summer’s crucial for us. A lot of our properties are big time in the summer, but I think getting back to your question about, just how do we do it and, you know, especially in the lifestyle and soft brand world, you’re spot on. Every property we do has a different marketing, branding and creative strategy, no matter the market, the segment, the geography, we do it differently per hotel. And I guess we’re just so used to doing the individualized thinking as like 95% of our portfolio the last 45 years has been independent and mostly in secondary & tertiary markets. So we’re just used to thinking creatively and strategically and per property and really don’t have all the bureaucratic hurdles that I think a lot of management companies have. We kind of control our own destiny. And so that’s the approach and the entrepreneurialship we take here at Charlestowne.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I mean you guys are storytellers, right? Especially for those independent hotels, you, you really have to build up the value and the, uh, we’ve talked about this on, on podcast past. There’s really no ceiling there, you know, with the story that you can tell and what you can share from a marketing perspective. Well, Charlestowne has, has enjoyed over the course of its 45 year history, a flurry of portfolio growth, especially recently. What about when it comes to a new property? Do you have kind of some steps or a game plan or blueprint when you are either developing a property or acquire one on how to attack marketing from that standpoint?
Michael Cady:
I mean, first off, our growth has always been organic. So through referrals, word of mouth being in the news, we don’t even have a dev person. And so that’s just on purpose. ’cause we can’t do what we do for hundreds of hotels. It will not work. It’s impossible. And so, you know, we either obtain a property, as you said, through new development or take it over really like the first 60 to 90 days. We actually do use SOPs and, and like structured methodical ways to onboard. But then after that, the creative and the strategic lines start working. And so if we get organized up on the front side, we then start to evaluate the guest programming, the future improvements needed for branding. Is the guest experience good enough? And so that’s where my team really gets involved after the first 60 days, is we think about branding and obviously branding’s way more than a name, a logo and a font, which I think, you know, is good to point out because every touch point can be some type of brand experience. And so, you know, basically Ryan, like eight years ago, we developed our own in-house creative agency. And so we do all the branding and programming and guest experience in-house, and we work alongside all of our operations team in developing or repositioning brands. And so the hope is with that sort of integrated approach, it’s like a kind of a 360 guest journey that you and your operator can focus on in hopes that you’re delivering a really killer experience for the guests. We just, we found we can do it faster than third party agencies. We can do it cheaper and we can do it a lot more effective because when I’m developing the branding, the operators are right next to me and we’re working together to develop it. And I think that’s really the key when you take over or you’re doing new development, is developing the brand experience alongside your operator.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And we’ve talked about it on this podcast. There’s opportunities to also customize, put a little bit of that local art or, uh, experience wise. And then that’s when it opens you up to be able to say, let’s start incorporating these things, see how it impacts the, the journey. And then it’s always important as you mentioned, to take a look back and say, okay, where are there some gaps? Where can we optimize? Where can we shift and analyze that data and guest feedback to make sure that you’re creating these experiences? Which then in turn, turn into hopefully recognition, which Charlestowne Hotels has had a lot recently on TripAdvisor, Travelers Choice Awards Best of the Best for the Latrell French Quarter Inn and the Spectator, along with several other hotels recognized in the portfolio with regional accolades. As marketing people, we love to be able to shine the trophy a little bit, showcase those and highlight those. But what do you attribute the success to? And how do you from a marketing standpoint, leverage these awards to help win business?
Michael Cady:
Great question. I mean, first and foremost, when you have three properties in the top 25 in the country for TripAdvisor, that’s just a straight up a testament to our operations team, both at the home office and of course our hotels. I mean, we receive a ton of accolades, right? But I think the TripAdvisor one hits differently for me, just ’cause it’s a hundred percent awarded by guest rankings. There’s, there’s no gray area there. And so I attest that to employee wellbeing and guest experience, if those are your sort of core areas to me that relates to TripAdvisor and getting good guest scores. So I just think, let’s not forget the word hospitality amongst spreadsheets and AI and development and investment deals and mergers and minutia. Like it actually is about hospitality, which is, you know, creating a really cool brand experience and then delivering upon that once guests arrive. And if your employees are happy, usually your guests will be happy. And so I think that’s why the employee wellbeing is good. Again, kudos to the operations team. They’re the ones that do that. You gotta be creative and agile and, generating those curated yet organic experiences, you could tap into guest preferences, guest needs, maybe lean, lean into some consumer trends, but all of it happens on property. And those are the people. That’s why we got those awards, not me. I can tell you that now. Yeah, sure. We leverage the awards in pitching. Um, there’s no doubt about that, right? I think we should. It’s an honor and we’re proud of it. But we do it pretty subtly honestly. We want owners who wanna work with us, but just as much we wanna make sure we wanna work with them. And I think that’s been a real key to our success in the 45 years is like, if it’s not a good fit, we’re not interested. And so having contracts for 15, 20, 25 years, that’s what it’s all about to us. And not just gobbling up as many hotels as we can as soon as we can.
Ryan Embree:
That’s a reputation within itself, right? And testimony to the company over there is, is the partners that you’re working with. But I wanna circle back on that TripAdvisor point that you make. And I think it does hit different with TripAdvisor. Obviously the amount of reviews from that source has certainly slowed over the years with Google and some of the OTAs being able to generate more feedback just because of character limits on TripAdvisor. But I still would argue with that TripAdvisor is still the trusted source of guest feedback. It’s still one of the first links that you see on that SERP page when you’re looking at hotels in the area or even a specific hotel. So to be able to be recognized by TripAdvisor is a huge accomplishment. And what you were saying about the experience in the hospitality, I love that you’re preaching that ’cause you’re so right. I mean, we can get caught up here and yes, there are places in that feedback where people talk about things like, you know, it was priced this much or, you know, this was a great deal. But the things that stick out in those reviews and the feedback when you read them are the experiences, the aha moments, the good surprises as we like to say in our industry and the stories that are being able to tell, and especially for soft brand independence and lifestyle hotels. Those are the things you wanna hang your hat on at the end of the day because maybe those, it’s not gonna be brand standards that, that you’re gonna see, but you didn’t come to that property for a brand standard type experience. You came there for a unique one and a unique stay. So let’s talk about another one of my favorite topics and something you touched on a little bit. Technology and innovation. Obviously it’s a balance, right? In a hospitality world, we just preach to our entire audience, you gotta keep hospitality in there. Don’t get caught up in the flashy AI technology of the day. But there are some things that can obviously help with innovation. And with that being said, hotel Marcel in your portfolio, I wanna make sure I get this right. First 100% all electric hotel in the United States. Is that correct?
Michael Cady:
It’s so impressive. Thanks for bringing it up. It’s the first, there’s a lot of words here, but it’s the first all electric, solar powered LEED platinum certified fossil fuel free hotel. That’s a lot of words.
Ryan Embree:
You got them memorized though, Michael.
Michael Cady:
Oh, that’s been in my PR sort of mind for a long time. But it is an amazing accomplishment. This thing is I hope a trendsetter for the country and the world, basically the very entrepreneurial and innovative owner. Again, we love working with people like this. He established his own microgrid. And so it’s like this grid inverter, it’s, it’s located in the hotel’s lithium battery rooms and it allows for off the grid operation and emergency power. It’s not only is that amazing in itself, it’s unbelievable what he did to an adaptive reuse hotel. This thing used to be a tire factory and he made a hotel out of it. But wow, the design, the branding and the architecture of those hotel is second to none. It’s a home run and our owner deserves all the credit. And that’s what gets my company excited is working with people like this and we’re just blessed to be working with him. But yeah, you’re right there, there’s tech that needs to happen. There’s no doubt. Especially I think the tech that helps the actual guest experience. I know less and less people wanna interact and they just look down on their phone all day long. It’s like their best friend, which there’s more to life than that. So hopefully that gets across to your viewers. But there is some good technology. I mean, we’re doing the easy ones, right? Mobile checking and checkout SMS texting I think is a great way, not only for in-house communication on service issues, but to guests when they’re coming and at the property I think is a great thing. We do some chat bots with AI, we’re looking into beacon technology. We haven’t really done that just yet, but it’s something we’re looking into. And then simple operation stuff like integrating with smart devices, that’s a no-brainer, which a lot of hotels are doing. I think the biggest thing we’re focused on today and this year is we are building a very robust CRM platform. So we’re doing that for our entire portfolio. I don’t think it’s gonna get to the level of how Las Vegas does it, but for a company such as ours with, you know, 60 plus different brands, to be able to build a really thoughtful strategic and innovative CRM is a big deal for us. So that’s a big one for us this year.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that leads to what a growing trend right now in our industry. Hear it all the time, is personalization, right? And trying to match expectations and preferences to your traveler prior to arrival. And especially with such a unique portfolio, I can definitely see where that would help and kind of streamline and hopefully optimize the guest experience there. But yeah, going back to Hotel Marcel, it’s such a cool story to see and ahead of its time in the sense of, you know, you’ve got a lot of travelers that are caring more about this organizations, companies. Now I’ve heard the phrase we’re not giving you a travel budget, but we’ll give you an emissions budget, right? And you have to start traveling emission friendly. These are the type of things that trends, overall trends that you want to kind of see so that you can be ahead of the curve is certainly sounds like you are there with that property and owner. Let’s continue down the trend path. This is on the other end of the spectrum, kind of a challenging trend. It’s been frustrating in our industry is staffing, we’ve heard a lot of innovative creative solutions to try to combat the staffing shortage right now it’s getting better, which is nice. But I am curious with such a unique portfolio, I mean, you can probably offer some pretty cool things to retain and recruit staff. Anything that you’re doing on your end to try to take advantage of that?
Michael Cady:
I think some of the things are just like blocking and tackling that in the day-to-day world of hospitality. You can lose focus pretty quick. So I mean, just things like developing a mentorship program in our company. We do continuous learning. So like, you know, last month was a huge WebEx for our company on AI and where we’re at and where we’re going on that. And then again, blocking, tackling, develop clear progressive paths for your people and let’s make sure they know that. And so we, we encourage all the cross-functional collaboration, having different people join some of the pitches I’m in, right? So they can hear how I communicate about our company. But property level, you know, stuff that we, we’ve executed cashless tips, gig pro, both of those I think are really needed in our industry and really came to light post Covid for us. And then, you know, the home office, I think last year we hired 19 new hires and introduced a completely new leadership structure for more property supporting career advancement. We even created a layer of vice presidents for our company, which was really cool. So there’s some really amazing leaders right below me that are just doing great things from technology to marketing to revenue management ops, you name it. And so I think it’s a multiple of the things, right? It’s some tech things and some processes, but it also is just good old fashioned human resources and communication.
Ryan Embree:
We’ve talked about tech in this episode in regards to the guests, but also in regards to associates, your employees and how you’re incorporating to make their life easier, better, more efficient. Those things can weigh on you if you come in and you’ve got inefficient operations or systems that weighs on a work life balance, and you want to make sure your employees are happy and they feel like their jobs are as easy as possible to do. And then you touched on mentorships. You know, one of the things I always ask that question at the top of the episode about journeys. And more often than not, and I’m sure you have several in your career, but everyone seems to stick on a mentor. You know, they’ve got that one person that they’ll do the shout out on the podcast at the top of the episode and say, I probably wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for X, Y, and Z. So those mentorships are so important to see someone to what your career in hospitality is gonna look like 5, 10, 20 or even 40 years down the line. So very, very important. And then those all create stories throughout the organization. So really cool. Talking about that, I read Michael, in a recent interview, you gave some best tips and practices for obviously marketing your specialty. You mentioned social media, that is a hot topic on the podcast, being a digital marketing podcast. Can you share your thoughts about the importance of a consistent social media strategy and then maybe the power of social ad spend, that you really honed in on.
Michael Cady:
Wow. Social media. I mean, I feel like we talk about it more with owners than anything else related to marketing. And I don’t think that’s actually a good thing. I mean social, I think organic social is an important piece for some properties that need highly curated content. Maybe they have high ADR, they need quality, they have a lot of programming to share creativity at their properties at the forefront. We hire a third party firm and give them scope of work and you know, are posting Instagram stories every day. And it is a huge part of the marketing mix. But, you know, there’s a lot of properties in this country they can’t afford that. And so we, we have some properties just like that. It’s not a one size fit all. I think we have a ton of properties that are on a budget and they can’t afford a firm. And so we develop more of a organic social grid, if you will, right? And it’s focused on the active booker. That’s really important to note. It’s not about gaining followers and having everyone join the Instagram page. It’s not that. It’s for people who are visiting your Instagram. Maybe they went to your website and they’re like, lemme go check the Instagram, make sure that’s good. We develop very beautiful grids that are seasonal. We probably do six a year. And it’s simply a real good check of someone saying, that works, right? The photos look nice, it’s well placed and it checks the box for them to be like, yeah, that’s kind of the same experience I saw on the website. Everything’s a go, but it’s not creating a story showing today’s sunset and going into those details. That option is a lot cheaper and very effective for many hotels. And so it doesn’t always have to be this over the top, you know, content all the time on organic, even though maybe all the owners think that. So many different strategies in the organic side. But all that being said, we put most of our efforts on paid social media and that is the key in our opinion, because not only you can focus on offers, email acquisition, brand awareness, but all that’s tracked, it’s analyzed monthly, it’s optimized based on ROI. There’s actually return you can retarget to these people. And so we, we put a lot of emphasis on the paid social side.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you make several great points, but you know, one I’ll, I’ll really kind of dive into is the amount effort that you put. Because I’ve seen hotels make a beautiful video, like you said, maybe of a sunset. You know, they try to do it. One of those like TikTok trends where they’re going all over the hotel, they get done, they post it, they’re exhausted, they maybe see some engagement on there, but they’re like, man, that wasn’t worth the effort. And it’s like, that doesn’t need to be every single time. What you’re talking about there is making sure you’re right when somebody comes to your page to check you out, to reaffirm their booking. ’cause they’ve booked, they wanna see just some social media presence just as if we were driving by the hotel, we would wanna see the lights on, right? If we looked into that hotel and it was completely dark, you’d be like, oh, I’m worried. Did I get the right place? Are are they open right now? The same thing can be said about, about social media. You come onto the feed, you see there’s a nice picture of the pool that you saw maybe on the website or didn’t see on the website and you say, this looks where, where I wanna be at. You might see a local event. Maybe that’s an added extra there, right? I’m so happy you kind of delved into that because I think a lot of people hear this podcast where I’m constantly preaching about power of social media, how you leverage it and they think I just don’t have the time to be able to create these unique pieces. And sometimes it’s not about that. Sometimes it’s, it’s having a consistent presence there.
Michael Cady:
A hundred percent. It’s like a digital billboard for active bookers. That’s, that’s our strategy for a lot hotels.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’ve heard, we’ve heard that a lot, I’m sure with an incredible portfolio like Charlestowne has, you guys are always selling and being a marketing person, you’re always looking for opportunities to celebrate milestones, it projects, uh, new developments. Is there anything particularly you’re excited about or how about top of mind right now that you’re wanting to launch campaign wise?
Michael Cady:
I think we’re well positioned and poised right now as a company with our resources to maintain kind of our stronghold on boutique independent soft brands. So I feel really good about that. Our primary focus is organic growth, as I mentioned. And mostly we like popular tourism markets, but mostly it’s secondary and tertiary markets. In 2024 we’ll add properties in South Carolina, New Mexico. We’re also rebranding and relaunching a ski resort in Aspen, Colorado. We have some really cool things out there. I think our focus as a company is, I’d say guest technology, creative F&B programming and as I mentioned, launching a new CRM platform for the entire portfolio. So we have some really cool things in the pipeline that are in more of the dev phase, where we’re doing the branding as we speak. And those will probably be more in 2025 or 2026. But yeah, I feel very good. It’s nice to feel this way in terms of our path and we’re not trying to do something we’re not. That makes sense.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, no, absolutely. All while celebrating, a 45th anniversary next year, right?
Michael Cady:
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Ryan Embree:
So super exciting. Well, well thank you so much Michael for being on podcast. We covered a lot of ground today. Any final thoughts before we wrap up?
Michael Cady:
No, I think, you know, just shout out to all the third party management companies because it’s really hard. You can kind of control some of your future, but at the end of the day, a lot of owners hold many decisions in their hands. So my advice, you know, is just the management companies that can adapt and show as much flexibility to owners will win. So thankfully that’s been our, you know, bread and butter and, um, hopefully, you know, all the management companies can continue to do the great work they’re doing. So it’s, it’s really cool to be on the show and lemme know if I can ever help you.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely Michael. Well, we appreciate it. We’ll definitely keep an eye out for all those exciting developments at Charlestowne Hotels and celebrating that 45th anniversary next year. So thank you so much for being on the podcast.
Michael Cady:
Thank you, Ryan. Have a good one.
Ryan Embree:
All right. And thank you for listening. We’ll talk to you next time on the Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Chairman and CEO of Coury Hospitality, Paul Coury, is recognized as a TMG Hospitality Trailblazer!
Paul joins the Suite Spot to give viewers a look at the Coury Hospitality brand and how it grew from its humble beginnings of one hotel in Tulsa, Oklahoma, to a portfolio that contains the most extensive collection of Autograph Hotels.
Paul’s story is one of perseverance and triumph. Tune in to hear the whole story and be sure to subscribe!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree with another edition of our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. We’ve got a fantastic episode. First time guest, I’m gonna bring him right into the conversation. Paul Coury, chairman, CEO of Coury Hospitality. Paul, thank you so much for being with me on the Suite Spot.
Paul Coury :
Thank you, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited to have you here. We’re gonna have a great conversation today, all about Coury Hospitality. But you know, as many times as we’ve done this TMG Hospitality Trailblazers, whether this is your first or 12th, 15th time hearing, this type of series, what this all about is about the pioneers hotel management companies, brands that are pushing our industry forward towards the future. We work in such an amazing industry, and certainly Coury Hospitality. And Paul, you’ve done some, some great things we’re gonna talk about. But before, as many times as we’ve done these episodes, I can guarantee you one thing. This question is never answered the same way because no two hospitality professionals have the same upbringing or journey into hospitality. Share with us a little insight and background into your journey that ultimately led you to Coury Hospitality.
Paul Coury :
Well, thanks again, Ryan. I look forward to trying to enlighten your audience today. It’s a great industry. I have heard this term by a lot of hoteliers, that they are accidental hospitality individuals, and I kind of fall into that category. I’ve never worked in a hotel. I never, you know, maybe a few restaurants when I was super young as a busboy or something, but mine was a journey of starting a real estate company in the mid eighties. And we, purchased a building and next door to this building was an old historical hotel in Tulsa that had sat there an occupied for many years. And we ended up purchasing that asset as strategical consolidation with the building and some land that we were buying. And then we set out on a journey to redevelop it. And I think at the time we were gonna, we were working with Hyatt to do one of their first suite hotels. It, it happened to be a bad time, like all cycles, right? We caught ourselves in the middle of the big oil bust that hit and lasted 20 years in Oklahoma. So while we never developed that hotel, it did subsequently get developed. We owned it for 10 years and introduced me to some people in the industry through some exposure, marketing exposure. And we ended up doing some consulting for a family outta Chicago that owned many hotels and golf courses around the country. And, you know, what I would say to you is that was my first exposure to the concept of a boutique hotel, because these were really small hotels that were very, I don’t know if I would say run down, but they, they weren’t, they weren’t cared for. They weren’t a true design or boutique, but they were great locations. For example, the Royal Palms was one of them. There were others like that. There were some ground leases the Phoenician Resort, the Harbor Beach, Marriott, things like that. So I was exposed to the industry and learned a lot about, you know, small hotels and family owned operations and things of that nature. And our first actual hotel occurred in the mid nineties when we purchased another building, historical building in Tulsa and converted it to a boutique hotel. And it opened in 99. It’s the Tulsa Ambassador, and we still own it 25 years later. I’m not a very good seller. And, It’s been a magnificent asset. It’s, it’s been like the golden goose in so many respects. It’s just outperformed itself four years and still remains top in, in the market, 25 years later.
Ryan Embree:
How special for that property that still be one of the leading performing ones in, in the portfolio, which is really cool to see. And yeah, your story is one that we can relate to on this podcast. We’ve had many people sit in that chair, and essentially say the same thing. I fell into the industry. So for those HR professionals out there that are, that are hiring, it doesn’t necessarily have to be someone in hospitality that is going to be your next hospitality start, especially with staffing shortages that we’ve definitely been combating in our industry for the last couple years, thinking outside the box, because a lot of these hospitality professionals don’t expect to have the type of hospitality start or have that vision for the future. And, and then you end up like stories like yours, Paul. So, let’s shift our conversation to, you have a beautiful portfolio over there at Coury Hospitality, obviously known for being the largest operator of Autograph Hotels. I’ve actually had my start in hospitality out Autograph Hotel, love the collection. Why do you feel like the Autograph Hotel collection is such a great fit for Coury Hospitality?
Paul Coury :
We joined that brand in 2014, and I think they launched it in 2008. And I was courted to bring four of our hotels in for a couple of years before we did. And the brand was the first boutique soft brand to really hit the market. You know, Marriott was head of Hilton and Hyatt by four or five years, and they really did a good job of understanding what they were trying to create. And I think they held true to that brand initially. It was mainly historical buildings that they would bring into in special locations and so forth, and ones that didn’t fit a brand profile, the, the design, the rooms, et cetera. But there were standards that they had created that you needed to comply with and minimums, and they would create some pips. So for the four that I had that were all historical billings that we did at a very, you know, four-star level, in my opinion, it was a really good fit. Subsequent, you know, it just became an incredible performer for us. We saw RevPAR growth plus 30% over the first two or three years. And those are big numbers. And in some of the assets I already thought were at the top of the market. The evolution of that and where we are today is you’ve now got a Bonvoy brand with, in the case of Marriott with 2 million members, 200 million members, I’m sorry. And, and over 150 autographs open and more in the pipeline. The evolution of the tribute, which is is another version of Autograph. But for us, it allows us to do our thing, design them at a high level, highly activate ’em, have good brand pull through, and each, each hotel has its own story. Each one has its own mini brand within the Autograph brand. So for us, with our creativity and the way we approach hotel, you know, being a hotelier and, and our design platform, it’s, it’s just been an incredible fit. And it was almost like it was made for us.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And, and you don’t have the thresholds of, it’s exactly what you said. I mean, with the strong brand behind you, you don’t have the thresholds of maybe a traditional brand to say that, you know, this is the limit of my ADR, this is the limit of my RevPAR. And you can tell that story. You can design that story to a place that’s compelling and competitive for guests when they come in to have that unique experience that they might be willing and to pay a premium for. So obviously a lot of success in the lifestyle, hospitality, space and sector, being a leader in that lifestyle, hospitality. Are you noticing any trends right now as we get into 2024? And how are you evolving kind of your operations on hotel operations side to kind of stay ahead of the competition?
Paul Coury :
Good question. I mean, there are a lot of people in that space now. It appears that everyone in some form or fashion with all brands wants to look unique. They don’t wanna look homogenous, which is a good thing, but it does make it tougher to meet the customer’s expectations. And again, this is kind of becoming a little bit overstated, but Covid also created some new challenges and expectations with the guest after coming back. And so what we did was, and we, we kind of made this decision in the midst of Covid, and we were looking at how, what, what happens when you come out of this? We started saying, well, activation is going to be critical, unique activations. Yeah, great. You’ve got a rooftop bar and you’ve got a speakeasy, or you’ve got a nice bar. So, but now what? So within those spaces, you have to create unique opportunities for people to go experience something they haven’t experienced before. Whether it’s, you know, some of our speakeasies, we turn into dinner clubs, the old school dinner clubs, we really leaned heavily on music. One of our properties has three or four opportunities to listen to music on any given night if the weather’s right and you can open up a couple of your outdoor spaces. You know, we’ve really, we’ve really empowered our, we, we call our employees experienced curators. And so the notion there is that people are collecting stories and experiences, and it’s up to, I mean, as much as I would love to greet everyone and make sure that my brand and, is pulled through, I have to rely on my experienced curators to do that. So we’ve really focused on having them understand our culture, what we’re trying to deliver to the guest, and that it’s not just anymore saying their name and saying here’s a bottle of water. So on check-in, you do something unique. You may have a specialty cocktail that’s paired with a food appetizer or something in their room, or something that, you know, in the afternoon they can come down and participate in the property. So, you know, Ryan, one of the things that occurs to me that’s changed in the hotel world too, is, you know, when I was early in my career, hotels were still a place that people would go in the community and gather whether it was a business meeting or social event, and then somewhere along the way that kind of went, went out of vogue and it was the last place you wanted to go. And you, you know, people would check in a hotel, you may have a great steakhouse, they would say, where’s good steakhouse? Right here. They wouldn’t buy into that. That they’re like, okay, great, I’m gonna go down the street. So it’s changing again. Now, hotels are the community gathering spots. And so when you design those, you’ve got to activate those in a way where you’ve got multiple opportunities to meet what you may want or what someone else may want. I mean, you can’t be everything to everyone, but you, you want more than one thing. You want several things. And if you come and then whoever’s with you, okay, well, let’s, we had a nice standard, let’s go down to the speakeasy where they specialize in cocktails, handcrafted cocktails, or we have a wine venue where it’s all, it’s a private club and you, you can buy individual glasses of high-end wines and in a very intimate setting. So it’s, it’s really so much more. And then when you design the property, it’s also the uniforms, it’s the sound, it’s the smells, it’s the what do the, do the table settings and the plate wear? Do they pull through with the brand and someone sees that something feels really good but they can’t tell you what it is. Right? They can’t say, oh, this uniform and this silverware matches what I’m seeing around me.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. That the type of stuff that rises above that level of sameness. You know, and one of the places we talk about on the podcast is to say, well, how well are you telling your story is what, what type of feedback are other guests sharing to future guests online? Right? And, and I don’t remember, to your point, I don’t remember the last review that I saw. Well, guess what? I got this really great bottle of water when I checked in. But it was something where we went into this beautiful lobby, there was music playing, it kind of set the, the energy and the vibe for my stay. That’s the type of feedback that you want online for that next traveler to see. I think it’s a fascinating trend, what you brought up. It’s you’re actually the first person that’s kind of opened my eyes to this, but you’re right. You know, getting the community back into the hotels, what happened during last couple years was our radius of travel shrank to, ’cause we didn’t want to get on planes or anything like that back in covid. So what we, we started looking at was maybe those unique properties that we hadn’t experienced that has a unique experience right in our backyard. So to see more and more people do that and to be set up in a place where I can give you a unique experience, I can give you something that you’re not gonna find a couple exits down the road, I think sets you up for success moving forward and certainly is gonna be something that owners and developers are gonna look for. And, and I wanna just kind of pick your brain a little bit, Paul, when you have those conversations about a new property, which we’re gonna talk here in a second about one of the newest ones coming up for CouryHospitality. But when you have those conversations, give us some insight into how you kind of curate for owners and developers, every aspect of that experience, from culinary to entertainment, design, art is a, is a big piece I know in your portfolio as well. Give us a little insight into that.
Paul Coury :
I think, I’ll give you an example. In Kansas City, we had a historical hotel and then we added a new wing on new architecture, and we opened up and Covid hit like it did for so many people. And so we basically moved our restaurant and bar outside, and we had a, on the new building, we had a, a one story parking that you could pull under the building with open sites. So we ended up putting some curtains up. We took furniture out there, and we started serving dinner out there. And, and we brought in some music and it became incredibly popular. So I happened to be there one night, and they brought in this musician that I’d never heard before, that was a well-known jazz musician in Kansas City name’s Lonnie McFadden. And I heard this guy and I was blown away. I mean, he was a great musician and all that, but he was a storyteller. He tap danced, he played instruments, and he talked about the history of jazz in Kansas City. He was in his late fifties at the time, I think, and he had a family legacy that went back to his father. I approached the guy and I said, look, you’ve got a great show. Why have you not ever done your own venue? He’s like, well, people have told me this, and it’s never happened. So we happened to have, in our old building in the basement, our old ballroom, we had a new ballroom in the new building. So we ended up negotiating a deal with him where we created a jazz dinner club and put his name on it, and it’s called Lonnie’s Reno Room, and which was named after an old club in Kansas City. And we did a menu that’s old school, beef Wellington, cordon blue, things like this. And it was a prefixed menu, and you would pick one of each item, and we set up, we designed a stage, we did low lighting. It’s really, you know, sexy space. Well, what a success story it’s been, can’t get in. He’s been voted the last three years, the best jazz musician, best venue. And when you go down there, you see all age groups. You see super young kids on a date, very special date, typically. Or you see people my age and older going down there for just with a group special occasion. But you know, the whole story, the branding, the authenticity, it’s so real. It doesn’t feel like I just put something there to go have a drink and it’s dark. You leave there and you feel like you saw something that changed your life. I’m not kidding you. I tell him, you could put this show anywhere in the United States, and it’s gonna be one of the best shows because of him and his, his unique skillset that could talk, you know, the stories, the history, the music, the tap. You just don’t see that. So we got really lucky, but we learned from that. We learned about being authentic and finding someone in the community that people can connect to. And so this, again, this community notion, we are leaning into that so heavily right now in all of our new properties and existing,
Ryan Embree:
Well, I mean, you think about a larger trend and just not even in hospitality, but just society right now. Like we are craving authenticity with, with AI and, you know, all of this technology coming and which obviously there are some elements that we can, we can do to improve the guest experience, you know, help our employees out. But from a guest perspective, we’re looking and we’re craving that authentic experience there. And it’s more than just hanging up a piece of art in the lobby and saying, well, this was a local artist here. Maybe 90% of your travelers are gonna walk by and not recognize the uniqueness of it. So being able to incorporate that in your culinary, your F&B elements of your lobby, but you also have to have your staff members on board. They have to know the history behind this too. They have to buy into that story as well, because if it stops at a building or if it stops at experience and your, your employees aren’t in that, it gets lost. It’s just like a game of telephone because your staff is very, very critical in telling that story to your guest and making sure that that falls on the, on their shoulders, the weight of that and saying, wow, this is really cool that I’m in this historic building that’s been here for a hundred years and I’m getting to experience this. So all very, very cool stuff. And, and right on point with what we talked about on this podcast before, Paul, let’s switch to one of the, those autograph collection properties that are in the pipeline. You said there was a big pipeline. Well, you’ve got one of them in there. You’ve already have a major footprint in Texas, where I’m from originally, you’re expanding in Texas, in fall 2024, the first Autograph Collection Hotel in Frisco, which has just been, I mean, that was booming when I lived there a decade ago. Hall Park Hotel discussed the exciting development and what travelers can expect from this new project.
Paul Coury :
That’s going to be, I mean, it’s literally a hundred yards from the Star, which is, you know, the big training facility that Jerry Jones built for the Cowboys. And it’s a whole immersion engagement that he created. And we were lucky enough to be selected by Craig Hall, who owned a lot of buildings in that area and was one of the first developers of that area. And he actually raised a couple of existing buildings and then built this new hotel and apartments and some office. But when we got involved with that, I would say Craig, Craig’s passion is art. And so this hotel will have a park that flanks it, a major park, and he’s going to do a lot of art in the park Statuary special unit, very unique. I don’t even, it’s being curated at a very high level. And I think one of the challenges was while you would, well, on the, on the surface, you would think that the notion of a art hotel would be easy. It’s very difficult because, you know, you’re not, you’re not gonna go probably do cowboy football art, and that’s gonna work. I mean, that would be your first thing you would think of is, oh, I’m by the star. I’m gonna do pictures of former cowboy football players. So once again, we got involved, he was already actually under construction and had laid out what, what he thought his vision was for the restaurant and bar. And we were like, you know, Craig, let’s rethink this. We want two bars, and your family has a history also with the wine business. They own Hall Wines in Napa. So we created a separate bar and wine area, a lounge that would, that would focus on, you know, selling very special cheeses where you could go in and select 20 or 30, I forgot what they call it, cheese sommelier, but it’s called like a smellier or smellier or something like that. So we, we did that and then we created another bar and restaurant with a large outdoor space that pulled in the park and so again, we thought, we’ll lead this with the food and beverage and tie into more the soft story to Craig Hall, which was the wines, and he and his wife Catherine. And then the art would follow. And so that’s where we’re at now. The property will open the end of the year and the art’s being designed and activated for it based on what we created there. And it will have a lot of really large suites. It’s going to have 60 suites, which is really unique. And so I think it’s going to provide a product and that part of Frisco that’s super elevated, it’s a beautiful design, and I think it’ll be one of the nicer autographs probably within the system when it’s all said and done.
Ryan Embree:
So Cool. Fascinating, really to hear kind of, again, the thought process that goes behind that. I’m sure all of the renderings, all of the ideas that kind of get put on the table, and then carefully kind of, you know, there’s a reason for everything. And, and you know, we’ve had a couple brand leaders on recently on the podcast, and from a curtain in a room to an extra sink in a suite, there’s a reason for everything. And whether it’s the, the guest feedback that they’re hearing, whether it’s associate feedback they’re hearing or owner development, and trying to incorporate their story, which is really, really cool into a new property like that. So very excited to see that open at the end of the year. And again, you know, if you have the opportunity to go there now, you’ve got some background and can kind of understand the thinking and thought process behind that. So you’ve got such a collection, we’ve talked about already, ultra unique lifestyle hotels. One of the ways to set expectations, we’ve talked a lot about it, social media marketing, right? That I’m sure those experiences that you’ve shared, so far, those rooftop bars on a sunset on a Friday night with a packed crowd and music going. That’s all over Instagram and TikTok and Facebook. So tell us your philosophy on kind of strategic social media marketing, especially with these unique hotels that where you have to tell a story so everyone can experience the elevated experience that you’re offering.
Paul Coury :
Again, another great question, and I keep referring to Covid, but that’s kind of a point where I think a lot of the world was reset, but prior to that, we had just decided as a company that we were going to have a social media person at every property, that we weren’t gonna hire a firm. I mean, we still work with firms, but, and we weren’t gonna do it from a corporate level, although we have that and then help direct them. But we wanted it at the property in the moment, you know, conveying the message. And what I had heard and really resonated with me was that 80% plus of the decisions people were making on where they’re staying was influenced by the internet. They were going somewhere. Either they’re going to Bonvoy, they’re going to Instagram, they’re going to TripAdvisor, they’re going to Google, they’re going somewhere when they’re either looking or confirming that’s where they want to go. And so what do they see? Does what they see say, I wanna be there. So we, we had made that decision and then, and then Covid hit, and obviously people were furloughing but that was the one position we did not let go. And we decided that we didn’t know how long it’s gonna last, but we wanted to keep in front of people. We, we wanted to keep our hotels still in front of people and not miss that window, and they forget about you. So it’s been the best thing we’ve done. And if our company’s involved in a hotel we have, and we started off calling this person an experienced curator, and then we went further with that whole notion said, all of our employees are experienced curator, all of our people are there trying to deliver our story and our message. And we don’t really, for example, I don’t say every one of you can post on Instagram, what’s going on here? We don’t want that kind of, you know, we wanna control it. But they’re still doing, you know, they’re, they’re talking, they’re, they’re still posting their own personal things about what they’re doing and what’s going on. So we’ve seen a lot of growth and we’ve seen a lot of growth in our activations occurring with the local community. So in our project in Grapevine, Texas, which is the Vin Hotel, I would say 70% to 80% of our guests that are engaging in our property are outside. They’re not hotel guests, they’re people being driven to the property by activation from our social media. And then guess what? The old word of mouth, you know, you tell, I had this great experience, I had to, and you tell a story, and then this story, five other people here, and you know, you remember the book, the, the tipping point that was very popular, you know, 25 years ago. That was what the whole notion was finding important people, mavens, if you will, that would say something great about your widget or your hotel and then it self manifests. So it’s, it’s as simple as that. It’s good old fashioned word of mouth that you’re now doing through social media.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Word of mouth to potentially, you know, back in the day, it just used to be maybe your close network of maybe 20 of family friends, and now it’s, you have access, putting it on an organic page of, you know, 200 million, sometimes hundreds of millions of people of seeing that and exposing your brand. And, and you hit it the nail right on the head, Paul, as far as what we preach here of a consistency. And it’s so funny to see that something stemmed from your social media position to you opening that up to the entire associate over there at Coury Hospitality, because you realize that the importance and the power that this can have on influencing future travel there. So speaking of marketing for Coury Hospitality, you guys have, along with your beautiful portfolio, a beautifully designed website, and on it, your profile on there, Paul saying, we’re not just developers, we’re storytellers. Our properties come alive through storytelling. Now, we’ve talked a little bit about some tools that you can use to do the storytelling, but how do you and your team of experienced curators, you know, story tell for your properties?
Paul Coury :
We also have a term now as activate every inch. And we’ve actually found in, in the case of the Vin again, which is in Grapevine, it’s a wine inspired hotel. But after we opened in September of 20, we have created two more special speakeasy type room. And so through, again, like I can create a beautiful room, but then what do I do to activate it and bring it to life? And that’s the story part, you know, that’s the rest of the story. And that’s what brings the people in because they understand your messaging and they get it. They look at that and they say, that’s what I’m looking for. And then they become part of the story and so on and so forth. So it’s actually, it’s simple, but it’s not, you know, trying to activate something takes a lot of work. Takes a lot of work, and we have standups like every hotel does, but we also have constant brainstorming sessions about what do we do now and how do we keep it fresh? There’s an opportunity with everything, the Kentucky Derby, mother’s Day, on and on. But you can create, you know, Cinco de Mayo, all there’s, there’s standards out there, but then you have to come up with your own. How many Taco Tuesdays have you seen out there? you know, yeah. Wind down Wednesday. It’s all trying to find a reason to create a new chapter for people to, to come and have fun.
Ryan Embree:
You know, it’s so easy on the flip side, as a traveler, looking for those experiences. ’cause we do it in our, I know I certainly do, you know, we do it in our own, you know, research online when we’re looking, we wanna feel a part of something, a part of the story and a part of experience, and be the first one to share it, by the way. Right? How, how good does that feel when you go to a really cool spot restaurant or anything like that, and you’re the one that gets to say, Hey, you have to check out this spot, and then all of your friends and family are like, wow, that was incredible. That was a really cool experience that I had there.
Paul Coury :
Ryan, there’s a whole trend going on right now. Private clubs and privatizing and even taking it to the next level of exclusivity. And, you know, there’s different opinions about, is that right or wrong? But the truth is, people are all about that. If you put up a sign that says members only, you drive people nuts. It, it’s like, what’s behind the door? Well, we can’t show you unless you’re a member. I mean, it’s happening everywhere. I just, I just toured a hotel in Arizona and they have a very high end club, and it’s $90,000 to join. And it’s within a hotel. I toured another one in Newport Beach in a high end hotel, same deal. We did it on a very small scale with a 45 seat wine club that we call Cave Society. So we’re now looking on one of our designs that within the restaurant space and the bar, we’re going to create a private club within that, that, so let’s say you have fish in a regular restaurant. Well, this version may have tableside sole manure where they come and present at tableside. I mean, that’s an example of how you might elevate that experience for someone. And if they want that and they want to be in that exclusive world, they’re going to hotels to find that. Yeah. Isn’t that ironic? I mean, yeah, it used to be a hotel was a place you would go to sleep to park your stuff and, and be treated well. That was the old saying. It’s just, yeah, it’s, it’s, the price of poker is going up. And particularly in this space, it’s just, you’re going to have to always find another way to give the guests an experience they can’t find somewhere else.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. That’s an, that’s a fascinating term. Continue to keep an eye on, but certainly goes right in line with what you talked about, about getting the community involved there and super, super smart idea. So we’ll continue to keep an eye on that. Checking down your LinkedIn feed for Coury Hospitality. Make sure you follow them. Where you recently announced your new motto, unmatched moments. Share us a little bit more about the idea behind the motto and the feedback you’re getting from your associates on your town hall tour that you’re, that you guys are doing right now.
Paul Coury :
Yeah, we believe that, again, for us to tell a story, to have an unmatched moment that occurs at every interaction with the guest, every interaction be a chance to create a memory, good or bad. If someone interacts bad with you, you created an unmatched moment also. So we’re interested in the good unmatched moments first, I wanna qualify that, but so we’re really with our, with our going to the people with our little show, and we’re town halls, we’re meeting with them, we’re making sure they understand the culture. We want them to be a part of the culture, but we’re not just saying, do this because you should. We’re treating them the same way. We’ve created two platforms of bonus programs, all of our line level people, including housekeepers, including front desk, and they have opportunities in two different ways to make meaningful bonuses. Not just like a $50, you know, gift card or something like that. So our idea is that we’re gonna commit to you and show you loyalty, and hopefully you’ll learn that that’s a two-way street. And again, I’m old enough where I’ve got some interesting historical perspective, but the notion of loyalty has changed. I mean, gen Z and and millennials have a different idea about how long you work someplace. Six months and a year is a long job. I mean, I’m going off on a little bit of a tangent, but I’m trying to get to a point if I’m gonna create people, if I want people working for me that buy into our philosophy about engaging with our guests and creating unmatched moments, they’ve got to feel like we’re treating them the same way, and that they’re respected and they’re treated with a commitment. And then in turn, they’re gonna share that with who they interact with. It’s an interesting management philosophy that’s existed for a long time, but instead of it coming from them to us, we’re trying to take it from us to them.
Ryan Embree:
Certainly an interesting way, again, at the top of the episode we talked about, I mean, we’ve got, we still are combating those staffing challenges. So finding ways to connect with your associates. ’cause you’re right, you know, there, there was a time in Covid where we had to, we had to furlough, we had to lay off a lot of these associates. So building that trust is gonna be super important to kind of change the narrative of what loyalty looks like in hospitality. So your team members aren’t jumping ship for another dollar an hour across the street or, or anything like that. You want to create an environment and have buy-in like I talked about earlier. I mean, if that line of communication can move from the building to your associates, to your guests, that is how you create those memorable experience. So interesting to hear that. And your thoughts on, on staffing and, and the culture over there at Coury Hospitality. We’re gonna jump into some rapid fire here before we wrap up. You know, and I typically save this line of questioning for what’s called our spotlight series, where we talk about one particular hotel. But I think you got such a unique portfolio over there. I’m gonna try to stump you with some of these. So, favorite view at one of your properties?
Paul Coury :
I think my favorite view is the Vin because when we designed it, we’re, we’re in a older community that really leaned on the train world. And then what happened was they also have this high speed rail now that we’re on the first stop from DFW, and it’s a bullet train, Swiss bullet train. So we built this massive window that when you walk in, that’s the money shot. You see the train yard, you see our outdoor activation, and you really feel like you step back in time.
Ryan Embree:
That’s very cool. Favorite fun fact about one of your properties, Paul.
Paul Coury :
Okay, so my first hotel, which is the Tulsa Ambassador, was built by a gentleman, general Patrick Hurley, who went on to become Secretary of War under Hoover. And his father-in-law was Admiral Byrd from World War I that led the Atlantic Fleet. So he named this and he was ambassador to Iran, ambassador to Russia, ambassador to China. This guy was a major player, so this hotel was called the Ambassador. He did another one called the Commodore in deference to his Father-in-Law. And I really felt such a interesting connection with that history. And then I was able to find his son, who was a very famous artist, Wilson Hurley, who did big landscapes and, and like, he’s in the Smithsonian, he’s in the Cowboy Hall of Fame, some of his pieces. But I was able to meet him and get to know him before he passed. And just that he, he had an estranged relationship with his father, during their life for various reasons. And when I met him, the son, he was 80 years old, right? Or 70 years old. But it was cathartic and it did some healing with him and his father in a strange way for this hotel to be restored and bringing him in. He had said, I would never come back to Tulsa. And you know, I was young in my career in the hotel, but that was, that’s a great, to me, something that I’ll always feel like was a real historical connection.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s super cool. And again, one of those stories that, you know, you see a piece of art or I would encourage, obviously we’ve got a lot of hotel owners, associates listening to this podcast. I mean, that’s, go ask about, you know, these pieces of art that you see. And and that’s gonna be one of my next questions here in a minute. But, you know, there could be some very special story behind, you know, some of this stuff. So, favorite signature dish?
Paul Coury :
Beef Wellington.
Ryan Embree:
All right.
Paul Coury :
And, and that goes back to the chalkboard restaurant that’s in Tulsa Hotel. That restaurant had been in some form or fashion since the seventies. That was always their signature dish. We’ve kept it, we’re doing another chalkboard. We’ve kept it, I’ve used it in Kansas City, and it’s an old school classic that you don’t see very often. And if you haven’t ever had a beef Wellington, I encourage everybody to try a beef Wellington.
Ryan Embree:
I like it. All right. And last one, favorite piece of art?
Paul Coury :
Okay, so we were in, we’re opening another Vin in Rogers, Arkansas, which is the Bentonville headquarters or Walmart headquarters. And we were in Aspen for the wine and food show last June. And I went into a gallery and I found this bronze. It’s about 10-12 feet wide, four feet tall, and they’re big grapes, cast grapes on a deal. And the artist is a very famous Chinese artist, Robert, I’m not sure, KUO Robert Kuo. And he’s, he’s like 85 years old, and this was the last piece he cast. So we bought that in anticipation to make it a major focal piece for the new Vin in Rogers. And so when we’ve designed our lobby and all this, we’ve taken this big piece. We, we have it, we, we’ve figured out how we’re gonna hang it, and it’s gonna be displayed over the front desk, and it’s gonna be a showstopper, and it is magnificent. So that’s my first real big investment in something that I consider true art, and I’m really excited about, you know, having people see that, talk about that.
Ryan Embree:
That’s interesting. It’s, that’s one of those stories that you hear, you know, the lobby was planned probably around a piece of art and not the, not the other way around, but I’m sure we’ll see it all posted all over social media as we, as we talked about on this episode. As we wrap up here, you know, we always like to wrap up these episodes, especially with trailblazers such yourself and, and fast moving hotel management companies like Coury Hospitality, with a little bit of a glimpse into the future. What’s your vision for Coury Hospitality over the next five years or so?
Paul Coury :
We’re gonna stay true to what we do. We’re gonna stay in this space. We’re really focused on it. We’ve got a lot in the pipeline in different stages. And needless to say, the economy’s kind of slowed up some financing for us and for other people. But I could see us with 20 to 30 more over the next five years. And we have a couple of brands we’re gonna develop. I think the VIN is one. We have a concept we’re working on in Frisco that is, is really taking it to the next level. It’s a, it’s a very fine hotel with five restaurants attached to it, and people are doing that now. You know, Sam Fox just did one in Arizona. He did the global ambassador, and he put his brands on there, his restaurant brands on there. We’re partnering with a restaurant group. They’ll do some of those and, but they’ll be attached to the hotel. Think of a food hall except instead of individuals, small kiosk, real restaurants, right? Yeah. With their own outdoor space, you can share certain spaces. I think this is a trend. I think this is, is going to be keeping it to the next level and what people’s expectations become to draw them in.
Ryan Embree:
That sounds amazing. I mean, you certainly on this podcast episode have added some things to my travel bucket list, so I really appreciate the time. Paul, thank you for joining me here on the Suite Spot. And yeah we’ll keep an eye on Coury Hospitality and all these exciting projects you got going on.
Paul Coury :
Thanks, Ryan. I appreciate you thinking of us.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much for everyone listening to the podcast, and we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Interim President & CEO of the American Hotel and Lodging Association, Kevin Carey, joins the Suite Spot in the very first episode of Check-In with Kevin Carey!
Get the latest news, updates, and information on the hotel industry in this series, and find out what efforts the AHLA is getting involved in to impact hoteliers and hospitality at scale. From policy legislation to industry events and the rebranding of the Hospitality Show, this episode is full of content!
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, with a very special episode today. We have a first-time guest, but I’m sure, widely recognized by the entire industry, Kevin Carey, interim president and CEO of the American Hotel and Lodging Association. Kevin, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Kevin Carey :
Good morning. Happy to be with you.
Ryan Embree:
We’re gonna cover a lot today, Kevin, so let’s jump into it. Speaking of being busy, we are about to enter a busy summer travel season. I’m sure all the hoteliers listening to this podcast, wherever they’re watching or listening from, are excited about that or reaching the halfway point of the year, which is crazy to say. I was there to witness live your keynote at the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference back in March in Atlanta. You shared some really great accomplishments so far, year to date that AHLA has been able to achieve. Could you share with our audience a little bit about some of the efforts and wins so far in 2024?
Kevin Carey :
Well, I’d be happy to and, I think your assessment is, is right on the mark. Uh, it has been a busy first four months of the year. Certainly, you hear that through, uh, we’re in earning seasons now. You’re hearing a lot of our member companies report out. Uh, so you’ll hear some of the things happening across their scope of their operations in our environment representing the industry. It has been a very significant and busy first four months of the year, whether that’s here in Washington, working with the Congress and the administration in so many state capitals, with the legislatures in session, and really across the scope of our activities whether that’s, uh, the support we provide to our members through our many committees or events or, or the great work our foundation is, is doing a few key accomplishments. I point to one of real significance was the defeat of the, the joint employer rule. And that was significant, not only with action that the House took but the Senate as well as a favorable court ruling, in the Eastern District Court in Texas, blocking the implementation of that rule, because that posed some real challenges for the industry, and in particular the franchise operating model, and would’ve created complexities and uncertainty there in this environment. We also, a month ago, announced the rollout of our collaboration with the Hotel Association of Canada and our launch, uh, of the Green Key Global Initiative. And then finally, uh, we rebranded our, our very successful regional set of events as the Hospitality show supporting, uh, our trade show and conference, uh, which will take place in San Antonio this year, October 28th to the 30th. Uh, and we’ve got a number of those events planned over the coming weeks, uh, alongside the seven that we’ve held thus far this year. So it’s been busy, as you said.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Super busy. And we’re gonna talk about some of those things that you mentioned. I wanna go back to Green Key Global rather. Uh, we just celebrated Earth Day. All of these conferences, whether it be the Hospitality Show, we talk about the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference, one of those trending issues that continues to pick up steam, sustainability and green travel. It’s, it’s so critical for hoteliers. Guests are being more cognizant of it, corporations and businesses are looking more into that. Talk to us about this collaboration with Green Key Global and why it was a priority for you and AHLA.
Kevin Carey :
Sure. I’d be delighted to, we’ve been observing, the momentum behind sustainability, and you cited whether that’s leisure travelers who are increasingly looking and making decisions, in their journey, in their search for properties for sustainable practices. Corporations, uh, and also group travel organizations are building those requirements, including for a third party verification into their RFPs, uh, and where they have their corporate travelers, uh, or groups contract, uh, at a property level. We’ve been in a dialogue with the Hotel Association of Canada for about a year and a half. Uh, we’ve had a long standing, uh, very close working relationship, uh, with the team there. And they’ve operated the Green Key business, uh, in North America for over 20 years. So through that collaboration, the momentum we see behind sustainability in the industry and our member companies and in the operating environment with Travelers as part of our broader Responsible Stay initiative, we felt this was the right next step in creating a strong member value and service, but also bringing something to the marketplace, uh, that could help properties, uh, across the spectrum. Whether you’re the largest brands and, and many are participating already, Marriott Choice, Accor, Hyatt, IHG management companies as well have already signed up with Green Key Global. So we’re seeing that momentum and it’s certainly something that we wanna bring to the marketplace and offer as a strong member value to our companies as well.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s so great. I’ve talked about this in the past, issues like sustainability. When you see different brands all on one page about an issue, that means something right there. There’s, there’s clearly some momentum there. And it’s just so great to be a part of industry that is, is prioritizing that because we know, again, how important it is for decision making, booking decisions, but also is just a win-win for everyone, it feels like. So really exciting partnership there. Excited to see how that continues to grow. You talked about the rebrand of the Hospitality Show. I had the pleasure of attending the inaugural hospitality show, but now, we’re rebranding some of these localized events, which in regional events, which is really exciting. First off, wanna ask you if you had the opportunity to attend one of these, or several of these, and then for those hoteliers that may have seen this in the news and know it’s in their local area or regional area, walk us through maybe what one of these events looks like just to, to put it in their shoes.
Kevin Carey :
I’d be happy to. So we launched this initiative, at the end of 2021. Uh, and then over the last two years, um, we’ve scaled up the number of events, in this year have planned 18 events that we’re going to conduct across the US in key markets. We’ve already had seven year to date. Uh, we’ve got four more, uh, over the coming 30 days between now and Memorial Day. But really stepping back, the purpose was we saw these as a terrific opportunity to engage the industry at a local level in market to collaborate with our state lodging association partners and to create an opportunity of high value where local hoteliers, general managers, owners, directors of sales, property level key employees can engage with their peer set network, connect with vendors, but also hear about the significant issues that the industry is facing on a public policy basis, not only at a federal level, but also in their home states and key markets. So, we’ve had a terrific response. The participation numbers, have grown over this period of time. Um, to your question, uh, I was just recently in Columbus, Ohio, where we had a terrific group who joined, and had several hours of conversation. The environment and the enthusiasm. The room was terrific. You could see the networking happening, and we had a number of key local not only elected officials, but state level representatives join us as well to talk about the key issues. So we’re thrilled with the series of events and the rebranding was a recognition that our national event in partnership with Questex, which launched last year in Las Vegas, and I’ll be in San Antonio this year. This was just a way to build the, the equity and the visibility and awareness around the Hospitality Show brand, and to have these work together in concert, to engage the industry locally, and on a national level.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s a brilliant plan and like you said, all leading up to that second annual hospitality show here in San Antonio and in October, which I know has the potential for some record breaking numbers there. I’ve heard a lot of excitement. There’s already some buzz and some news about the agenda kind of being outlined. So really exciting there, but so important to, to have that regional, that networking aspect to these, these localized events. But promoting awareness for maybe issues that are impacting the entire hospitality industry right now. One that has just keeps reverberating through our industry right now is staffing, right? Especially, I’m sure hotel owners, GMs, everyone looking at occupancy numbers over the next couple months as we start to ramp up for the summer season and start to say, what am I gonna do about staffing? We’ve seen, we’ve talked about on this podcast, there’s been some impressive wage growth in hospitality, which is fantastic. Some really creative solutions to staffing that I’ve been hearing over the course of talking to third party management companies and brands of them trying to instill maybe flexible schedules, flexible pay, all of that creative solution problem solving. What do you think is gonna be a turning point here with staffing when it comes to hospitality? And I know AHLA is doing a lot of work on the advocacy side to help resolve the issue. Talk to us a little bit about that.
Kevin Carey :
Lemme put a couple things in context or provide some perspectives. So first we have seen improvement, to your point, that the industry has been able to attract and retain workers. But frankly, it’s not fast enough. Uh, and, and to meet the demand that we see and to continue to drive the customer experience that, that, that’s required, we need to attract more people to this outstanding industry. Uh, and I’m glad to hear you cite some of the, the wage and benefit gains that have been implemented over the last several years. On a broader US basis, there are still over 8 million job openings and only about six and a half million workers available to fill those jobs. Yes, the lodging industry has recovered and closed the gap in terms of positions lost, we’re still about 200,000 positions short of what would be needed and what is posted externally. So our member companies, are active on this front and creating a number of creative solutions to attract, develop, and retain employees. But we have a role to play here as well on behalf of the industry. And we’re approaching that on several levels. On one level, from a public policy standpoint here in Washington, we’re working to promote legislation and to work with the Department of Homeland Security to expand the number of H2-B seasonal worker visas. That’s an important program. Uh, and, and now that that legislation passed with the appropriation bill to work with the department to make those positions available rapidly and to look to re-engineer that program, so there’s less friction around it over time. We’re also working to encourage the Congress to move forward on legislation focused on asylum seekers, uh, and looking at other means to enable more workers to come into the industry. Our foundation the AHLA foundation also has a several programs, which are focused squarely on this front, whether it’s scholarships, employment, youth programs, working with Department of Labor around apprenticeships. So we’ve got a broad number of strategies that we’re advancing both from an advocacy, but also through the terrific work of our foundation. And we just need to keep after it, frankly, uh, Ryan on, on all these fronts to continue to do our part on behalf of the industry, to tell the story of this industry tracked workers at multiple levels to come into the industry where they can have outstanding careers.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you for everything you’re saying there, Kevin. Because I really believe the work we’re doing today because of this, and, you know, always try to find a silver lining in something, right? But the, the staffing challenges that we have had over the last couple years has really made our industry think outside of the box about creative solutions. So I think that the foundation that you and your team are doing over at AHLA right now, mixed with some of the things that we’re doing, doing is really setting a great cornerstone for us moving forward so that we hear more stories about people saying, I didn’t just fall into hospitality. Right? And how many times have we heard that in our industry? I’ve interviewed so many key individuals that said, you know, I didn’t really think of hospitality as a career. I just kind of fell into it and fell in love with it. But I think the work that we’re doing right now today, and the work that you and your team are doing are setting up a foundation for people saying, I’m getting into hospitality as a career path. I see advancement there. And anything that benefits that I am all for. Because we work in a wonderful, wonderful industry. And one of the ways I think every individual is continuing to share their hospitality journey and story, because every single one of them is, is so special and unique. I’m sure you see these stories all the time with the AHLA foundation that you were mentioning at the top of the episode. Would love to hear, I know you’ve probably got hundreds, maybe thousands of stories, but anyone in particular that pops out to you that you could share with our audience? This is a bit of inspiration with those stories.
Kevin Carey :
Yeah, first, just just to look back, to last week mentioned I was in Orlando and had an opportunity to join both, Davidson Hospitality Group, but also Hotel Equities and I can tell you the energy in and around those conferences, the focus on growth culture opportunities for people was really a strong takeaway that I had in both those opportunities to join those conferences. So, you know, you can see the enthusiasm, and really what that translates into in terms of career opportunity. But to your question, there’s so many programs, that our AHLA foundation, is instrumental in and advancing on behalf of the industry. We opened the year in January in Los Angeles with our annual Night of a Thousand Stars Awards. And the individual awards and some of the compelling stories motivational and inspirational stories that we hear each year really set the tone for the year. I touched on some of the programs that the foundation is advancing around the employment youth program, bringing entry level youth into the industry. It’s trained more than a thousand people and brought them into the workforce. Our apprenticeship program, as I referenced with the Department of Labor, has brought, has had over 1400 apprentices to date participate in that program. So whether it’s the roughly a million dollars a year we distribute through the foundation for scholarships, the employment training around human trafficking that we do, all of these elements are really tell the story and also are inspirational in terms of the great work that our foundation and the association overall are doing.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I’m sure incredibly rewarding. And again, like I said, with the sustainability issue, to see all, a lot of brands come together for a common cause, something’s clicking there and there’s something, right. So I would encourage you, if you’re listening to this, definitely find out some more information about the AHLA foundation, how you can join that very important cause there. Now, there’s never a time when AHLA is not hard at work advocating for hoteliers. You mentioned there’s always a hot topic, right? Trending issue. What are some of the issues you and your team are currently working on, and how can hoteliers that might be listening to this get involved?
Kevin Carey :
You’re absolutely right on that front whether it’s here in Washington, if it’s at a state level and the great work our team does with our partner state lodging associations, or even expanding to look at cross border issues that have impact on the industry as a whole. You know, there are a lot of positive metrics, that we’re seeing, in the industry as we’ve touched on many. But the reality is we’re still in recovery mode. If you talk to owners, there’s certainly pressure on profitability in the current environment. So our focus is gonna be squarely on regardless of, of level, ensuring that there’s responsible public policies, and that we’re working to ensure elected officials and policy makers understand the implications of initiatives that they’re thinking about legislation that they’re introducing. And so it doesn’t create an onerous burden, create complexity in our operating environment. So some of the initiatives I touched on, whether it’s joint employer at a federal level, the overtime rule that was made public last week, and the implications that has on operating costs and on jobs going forward. And at a state and local level, we’ll continue to work aggressively to defeat legislation in New Jersey that would put the franchise model at risk. We’re certainly very mindful of the fact that our member companies have seen improvement over the last several years. But there’s a number of aggressive regulatory and legislative efforts that pose risks, in the current environment. And, and we need to have a strong voice on those as an industry. And that’s our job number one to represent this terrific industry.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I’m sure, hoteliers all over the country, very appreciative of all the work you and your team are doing, staying vigilant on the issues and keeping those at the forefront to make sure that our industry remains healthy, remains in positive standing, moving forward. So as we wrap up here, you know, we are a digital marketing podcast and we preach all the time on this podcast about the importance of social media and leveraging it as a way to drive awareness, whether it’s an individual hotelier driving awareness of their property, a brand driving awareness or AHLA driving awareness on some of these top issues that you talked about. Can you speak to the importance of a channel like social media and how that can amplify the voice of the American Hotel Lodging Association and get more awareness to issues that we just talked about?
Kevin Carey :
Yeah, if you really think about the role, AHLA plays, certainly we’re known for the advocacy, that we do on behalf of the industry. The way that we serve as a convening entity bringing all segments of the industry, the owners and brands and management companies, independent hotels and vendors together. But one area that is of vital importance is promoting this industry to stakeholders and to policymakers. So we’re very conscious and deliberate about our communications, and our social media channels and how we’re focusing on our member companies, what this industry represents in job creating power and the mobility. And so we continuously are looking at how our communications can enhance the reputation and understanding of the industry across all these stakeholders. So we encourage everyone to interact with us via our social media channels, certainly our website and also our events as well. So, across all of those platforms, we’re eager to have those, we’re interested in the industry and our members interact with us.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And certainly a very powerful way to share some of those amazing stories that you shared with us today, Kevin. So thank you so much. I know this was your first time on the Suite Spot. We appreciate it. We appreciate everything you and your team are doing over there. And, I wanna thank you for joining the Suite Spot, Kevin.
Kevin Carey :
Awesome. Enjoyed it. Have a good day. Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell, with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot takes travelers to Rhode Island in the latest Spotlight series episode – The Beatrice Hotel! As one of the most iconic and historic hotels in the nation, the general manager for the property, Jennifer Curtin, gives travelers an inside look at why this hotel should be their next destination.
From the rich backstory behind the name, the local attractions in the area, and what the guest experience is all about, this episode covers it all. Tune in now!
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you for joining us. We are here in the content creation studio in Maitland, Florida at our Travel Media Group headquarters, and have another fantastic edition of our Suite Spot: Spotlight series. This time with a fantastic property that we’re gonna be showcasing and in with me today to talk about this beautiful property is Jennifer Curtin, the general manager of The Beatrice. Jennifer, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Jennifer Curtin :
Good morning, Ryan. Thank you so much. Really happy to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re excited to have you. And you know, we’re gonna get to The Beatrice and your beautiful property here in a second. But as we do with all of our new guests, this is your first time to the Suite Spot. Talk to us a little bit about your background and hospitality journey that led you to The Beatrice.
Jennifer Curtin :
Yes, absolutely. Happy to and actually it’s, it’s quite a full circle story that I have. So my career actually started right here in Providence, Rhode Island. I attended Johnson Wales University, majoring in hotel management, and that’s actually located just steps from the Beatrice Hotel. And so this is where I started, I was working in multiple different operations through school. So I worked with Hilton Hotels. I worked in a luxury residential community here in Providence. And then in the summers I used to live on Cape Cod and I worked at an amazing it was a five star resort, Chatham Bars Inn down on the Cape. And so, really for me throughout school, I wanted to get exposure in multiple different operations and environments and really get a sense of what it is that I wanted to choose for a path outside of college. And so for me, it was really that luxury boutique space. That’s really where my heart lies. And so upon graduation, I started with Kimpton Hotels first in Boston, Mass, which is home for me. So that was a natural starting point. And then from there I moved with them to Aspen, Colorado and then to Seattle, Washington. And it was when I was in Washington, Seattle that I got the call and moved back to open the Beatrice again, you know, back here in Providence, Rhode Island.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure that was such an exciting call to be called back to your hometown where it all started and you went to school for hospitality, which I will tell you of all the hospitality industry experts that we interview on this series in others, it’s rare, but I’m seeing more and more of it. I mean, you’re talking to another grad of a hospitality management program down here at UCF. More and more people are going to school to get into our industry, which is amazing because most of the time you’re gonna hear people say, well, I just fell into the industry, or I was doing a job in college and fell in love with the industry. So it’s so great to see and hear stories like yourself, Jennifer, where you knew you had a passion for it, but also finding and having a journey within it and finding a segment and space that you really, that you really cared about. And the fact that you got to do it in your own backyard, I’m sure also benefits you because you know a lot about the local area.
Jennifer Curtin :
Absolutely. No, it’s wonderful. And I will say, you know, I’m very fortunate to have Johnson Wales right in our backyard, for The Beatrice because that is where the majority of our recruiting stems from. There’s nothing better than hiring, you know, a college student who is, you know, motivated and passionate about this industry and is, coming to work and really putting what they learn in the classroom into motion and real life. It, it really makes, you know, everything kind of start to click. So we’re really fortunate in that way.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. What an opportunity too for them to see and learn from you a graduate from there and can see what the possibilities are of a career in hospitality is. Which, you know, we’ve been battling this staffing shortage now for a couple years. To hear more inspiring stories like that certainly helps more and more people get into our industry, which we love so much. So let’s talk about your passion, the Beatrice, the property that we’re gonna be spotlighting today. And again, if this is your first time hearing or listening to this podcast in this series specifically, the SuiteSpot Spotlight series is all about highlighting some of the most unique historic hotels in our industry across the country. We’ve been up to New York City internationally, down to to Mexico. We’ve been down to Miami. So here in this episode, we’re visiting Providence, Rhode Island at The Beatrice. Share with us the story, the unique rich story of The Beatrice and Beatrice Tempkin for whom the property is named for.
Jennifer Curtin :
Yes, absolutely. So this property is, the building itself is historic. So we’re located right in the heart of Providence, Rhode Island, specifically the financial district. And so the location is, is amazing. The building was actually the original 1887 exchange building. And so to bring this hotel to life, the full building was renovated right down to the core. And it was really intentional that the historic elements of the building were retained and restored. That’s really important to all of the development that Paleo properties does, and really important to, really the city of Providence as a whole. We’re very mindful of that in, in all the construction. So retaining that historic charm, but also really bringing the elevated and modern hotel and building to downtown that it was really seeking and, and needing. So it was a really exciting project to be a part of The namesake Beatrice Temkin, I mean, she was such a prominent person right here in the Providence Rhode Island community, very well known. She was known to be just ahead of her times, as an example. I mean, she championed and led an eighth foundation in the seventies. That was just the type of person that she was. She was known to be elegant, sophisticated, in tune with all the little details. And so she is a remarkable person to have this hotel named after. And really, it’s, it’s front of mind for us in every decision that we make, that her elegance and her sophistication is carried through. And so you’ll see that in everything from the decor, the style of the hotel, the elevated amenities that we chose to have in all the guestrooms and throughout the public spaces. And then of course, in the level of service that we deliver. I mean, attention to detail. She wouldn’t skip a beat. Um, and so we’re very mindful of that and, and that’s what we’re very focused on with the team and making sure that that’s the level of service that we provide and execute every day.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so cool that you have kind of that intersection of history and obviously the story of Beatrice Tempkin as well, that you can tell your guests, you can tell your associates and employees to kind of serve them moving forward as they get to know the property and as they become more and more involved in the property, I’m sure it’s, it’s something that is really, really cool to, like I said, be immersed in that history. We’ve had a couple of new build properties on the Spotlight series. Obviously everyone likes the shiny new toy, but there’s something about that just rich history in a building like the Beatrice, that when you, when you first come in, you can feel it. And it’s kind of a feeling that sticks with you during the entire experience. And it’s something that I think we’ve come to appreciate more and more as for travelers, is we’re more immersed into that story. We’re more invested into the story of a building, the story of your namesake over there at the Beatrice. So, but all of this can’t be done without sharing that story. And it’s so critical to share your story online. One of the places that I think your property, Jennifer does an excellent place. You’ve got a wonderful website. Is this be about the town section of your website. Talk to us a little bit about, ’cause these are essentially guides for all types of travelers. Talk to us a little bit about the thinking behind these guides and what it does to help get your guests immersed in the experience.
Jennifer Curtin :
Yes, absolutely. These guides are something I’m really proud of. They are loaded right on our website, you know, and so they’re there and accessible for our guests when they’re at the decision making stage. You know, and something I’m very mindful of, and you kind of touched on this, but checking into a beautiful new hotel with all the amenities, you know, amazing service, clean guest rooms, it’s really just not enough today. Nowadays, travelers, they’re really looking to feel like they’re immersed in the location that they’re traveling to living like a local. And so for us here in Providence, that really takes coming together as a community. You know, we have the amazing hotel that we, you know, can confidently have our guests check into, but it’s more, it’s, it’s beyond our four walls. It’s about getting them in and around Providence so that they really can head home and feel like they experienced it all. And they know what it’s like to be a local here in Providence. And so that’s really what we utilize these guides to do, is really build partnerships and be a part of our community with all the businesses, um, all the chambers, all the travel destination organizations, and really come together as a community and know that it takes all of us to come together to really be succeeding. And so I spend a lot of time working with the local businesses, you know, in coming up with different packages and programming so that our guests can check in and they can experience, if they book our water fire package, they can experience a VIP experience floating down, you know, the river in a gondola. And, you know, they can go up to a local glass blowing studio with our friends and partners that gather glass and, you know, walk away with custom made glassware and really feel like they’ve seen and done everything here in Providence, Rhode Island, which is so important to us. And so we use these guides to really promote and put that bug in someone’s ear about what they can do to travel here, to Providence, Rhode Island, and really continue to put Providence on the radar as a destination that can be a fun getaway for people to come to.
Ryan Embree:
They’re absolutely wonderful and they’re also personalized, right? We’ve been hearing a lot about that in our industry. Personalization of the guest experience. So you’ve got a guide that talks about people traveling with their pets, right? That in itself, logistically there are some nuances to that. And for you to be able to share maybe a local dog park or groomers nearby or something like that, that’s something that the guest then doesn’t have to think about, worry about. And it’s coming from a trusted expert, a local, from your team to be able to share that it’s all part of the guest experience even before that, that traveler steps foot in your lobby. Something we talk about on this podcast all the time about how the experience is now blending more and more to online and the search. And you can start impacting how that guest feels about your property prior to them putting the key card into the room. Which I think is what you’re saying, where it’s become more now. It, it can’t just be a clean room, a hot shower. Right, right. Which was the old, the old phrase. So, and mission accomplished on your end, Jennifer. ’cause uh, the Beatrice has earned some really impressive recognitions. You guys are number one hotel on still one of the most trusted sources of guest feedback, trip advisor number six in the entire northeast for the Conde Nas Traveler Awards. Can you speak a little bit, uh, about these recognitions and the effort that you and your team are putting forth to earn them?
Jennifer Curtin :
Yes, absolutely. These, these accolades and, and these rankings are something we’re so proud of. And I will say, you know, it’s a result of the hard work and the dedication that goes in from the entire team every single day. You know, the biggest thing about winning these awards is you really have to deliver consistently, you know, so it is delivering amazing, exceptional service to every guest every single day. And so that’s, that’s where it gets challenging, is that consistency. And so being able to have that is what really has these accolades follow and really give the, the recognition to that hard work that goes in every single day from our entire team. So we’re really proud of these, you know, and for us it’s also about not getting complacent, you know, this industry, it moves very quickly. There’s always new things, there’s always new trends. And so what worked last year might not work this year, or, you know, what was relevant six months ago might already start to phase itself out. And so really being relevant, being innovative, you know, you really have to kind of be a little bit ahead of the, the curve or ahead of the time back to Beatrice. Um, so we’re really focused on that, you know, implementing new things that we’re seeing kind of trending in the market, if you will, or maybe even ahead of a trend, you know, so we’re working on a few different projects right now, one being a wellness menu, and so wellness being a huge focus, in everyone’s lives right now. Finding ways to have a curated menu of whether it be pillows or sleep enhancements, whether it’s a sound machine or a diffuser. Um, so a few different things, and back to, you used a word that I love, personalized. You know, we are always trying to personalize our guest experience. And so that’s really where you take a hotel from being just meeting the mark, you know, clean all the amenities, but once you start to personalize it, and that’s when you can really take it to the next level. And these accolades, you know, are a testament to exactly that. And, and that goes in every single day from the team.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. That’s where a hotel stay becomes an experience that sticks with you, right? Is that personalization, you know, and you talk about the fast changing trends. I mean, we’re a digital marketing podcast, no stranger to how quickly these things can move in and out. And we talk to our audience all the time about looking at data, looking at how things are working, the response you’re getting from your guests, both online and in person, and tweaking, making changes based on that feedback. So very, very important. But you mentioned consistency. One of the most consistent things I’ve seen online about your property, Jennifer, is the experience people have at the rooftop, the Bellini rooftop. I love this series because I think it gives an inside picture to someone that gets to have this experience every single day. Myself, some of the listeners might not be able to, hopefully we’re able to see the Beatrice and, and be a part of that experience one day. But paint a picture for those that haven’t been to your property about what that feeling, what that vibe is, you know, maybe at a golden hour at, at the rooftop, at that food and beverage outlet for you.
Jennifer Curtin :
Yeah, so the Bellini Rooftop, it’s a really special place. So it’s a private membership club, and as a hotel guest, you have access to that space throughout your stay. So, you know, it’s on our top floor again, we’re right in downtown Providence, Rhode Island. And so that view is iconic and amazing in itself. The space, it’s extremely intimate. It’s a small space, just like the rest of the building, very intentional. All of the decor is custom. Everything from handmade terra floors to wood paneling walls, which were handmade by a local yacht builder in Newport, Rhode Island. So just that in itself, you walk in and it’s just, it, it takes your breath away. It’s beautiful. The furniture, it’s all designed by Ignacio Tripani, and so, you know, bright colors, you know, the bar is, is pink with a gold accent on the bottom. So it’s a really beautiful, intimate space. And with it being, you know, a private membership club and hotel guests having access to it, the level of service is extremely intimate and personalized as well. Uh, so you can expect, I mean, our, our team, they know all of their members by name. They know where they like to sit in the club. We have both indoor and outdoor seating, and, you know, they know what their go-to, uh, beverages, you know, they, they know what their preferences are. And for our hotel guests, you know, something that we’re really big on, you know, you can count on the team knowing if it’s a couple celebrating an anniversary, or if it’s a girl’s weekend celebrating a birthday. You know, that is all learned during our reservation process, our fact finding process, and it’s shared with the entire team so that we can really have that embedded into our level of service. And so that’s a really special place. Um, you know, as I mentioned, indoor and outdoor seating. So this is the time of the year, you know, spring heading into summer where it really turns into a magical place. You touched on it, golden hour. I mean, it’s, we get this beautiful sunset every afternoon up there, and so there’s truly no better place to be in providence than on that rooftop.
Ryan Embree:
Certainly done a great job of painting the picture there. Uh, when it comes to that rooftop and something we’re gonna talk about next, I’m sure it’s a very Instagrammable moment and somewhere that a lot of your guests members are taking pictures of sharing online, which helps obviously expand the brand, right? And, and tell that story that you’re trying to get out there. Talk to us. You know, I wanted you to compliment you and your team. You guys have a fantastic social media following. If you’re not already, go to their Instagram go to their social media outlets, follow, talk to us a little bit about the importance of creating a social strategy to kind of set the table for that story that you’re sharing. You’ve packed, we’re 20 minutes in, you’ve packed so much information in this. How do you get that information to a traveler using outlets like social media?
Jennifer Curtin :
Social is is so important to us. We put a lot of time and energy into social. We have some amazing partners, um, you know, Maverick Creative from a PR standpoint and ABD agency, um, from a marketing agency. And so together as a team, a lot of resources go into our social, uh, we’re very, you know, tuned into the importance of influencers and the power that an influencer can have, you know, both locally and nationally. You know, one of our, our biggest goals is to continue to get the Beatrice and Providence Rhode Island on the map nationally. And so doing that through influencers and through lifestyle content that is so powerful. And I always go back to, you know, everyone is scrolling social media, and so being able to sublimity put on on their minds the possibility of spending the next weekend that they wanna do a, a vacation here in Providence at the Beatrice is so important. And the way to do that is, of course, having a beautiful website with still photos and depicting what the guest rooms in the public spaces look like, but really showing what does that Rooftop Club look like on a Friday night when we have live jazz music and, you know, it’s golden hour and the sun is setting, and we have, you know, a fresh spring cocktail menu that’s, that’s getting launched. Um, so we spend a lot of time and energy into that, and it, it really, it plays a big part in the success of a property nowadays.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I mean, from inspiration to booking, I mean, social media is such a huge part. You make a great point though, Jennifer, that I share with my audience about those pictures. Sometimes obviously we need to, to let the guests know what our rooms look like, what our amenities look like, but I think a true genuine feeling that you get is what that feeling is, or that vibe is when there’s other people’s a part of the, you know, the Bellini rooftop, right? So they can almost feel like, oh, I can imagine myself there. Uh, and it doesn’t just look like an empty rooftop bar. So there’s some things that you can do in order to kind of set guest expectations of like, when you walk in here, you’re going to see this beautiful check-in area, this lobby, you’re gonna be greeted by service. I mean, one of the things I most enjoyed when I was behind the front desk was people recognizing me from my TripAdvisor reviews, right? Oh, you’re the, the famous Ryan from the front desk. Now you already feel like they’re a part of the guest experience is what in what we’re talking about. So just great points there. You know, know the Beatrice has, other than the rooftop has a number of unique amenities and features. One of those that really caught my eye was the snack attendant package. We’ve talked a lot about personalization on this podcast so far. For those who aren’t familiar, talk to us a little bit about what this snack attendant packages and the feedback that you’re getting from guests.
Jennifer Curtin :
Absolutely. So the snack attention, you know, I will say this, this really stemmed from something that we saw kind of trending in the guest experience journey of traveling. And so everyone of course, needs to dine when they’re traveling. And so we’re finding that yes, you know, having a great sit down meal is still important to travelers, but also that kind of snack in between. And so taking that to the next level, you know, and so our snack attendant package allows guests to add that onto their stay. And so maybe it’s a guest that has a late flight in and, you know, we’ll miss the restaurant hours on their first night of the stay, you know, they can have this, uh, custom snack waiting for them in the guest room. And so we send a survey if they elect, you know, to book this snack attendant package. We have our concierge, our snack concierge reach out to this guest and run through a survey with them, you know, so everything from, are you a sweet or savory type of snacker, do you like multiple different items in your snack or do you want just one particular item? And so we go through these series of questions to figure out what type of snacker they are, and then we come back and we have custom snack packages that we put together, and we’ll have waiting in the guest room for them. And so it’s been a really fun addition to the guest experience. People are really loving it, and it’s filling that void of, you know, kind of in between sit down meals. And so it’s really making something what could be just bland and boring into something really fun and creative. So we’re having a lot of fun with that. It recently got featured in Food and Wine Magazine, and so we’re really proud of that. And then look to continue that and again, keeping it relevant seasonally, we’ll be changing that out and coming up with, you know, different options for our guests.
Ryan Embree:
What a delight that must be for a guest, because I would imagine depending on when you’re booking, you know, you might forget that you had done that survey, right? And then you walk in and you see these snacks that you curated for them and, and it matches everything that you’re looking for. I’m sure that is something that really surprises and, and hopefully your guests enjoy. But at the very core of this, I think it does something really important. I think you learn more about your guests, and anytime we can learn more about your guests, you can implement into other phases, right? So if you’re seeing a big trend with your guests, maybe that’s incorporated into your F&B , you know, saying like, we’re seeing all these guests really like these sweet, kind of sweet treats. Maybe we do some sort of cocktail or mocktail that kind of mirrors that at the, at the core of this, again, I think it’s really important that you’re learning about your guests and implementing these things. So super, super smart at you and your team put that together. So here we are, we’re in the spring, as you alluded to earlier, temperatures starting to rise up. We’re starting to see travel pick up, which is fantastic for all of our hotel listeners out there. That summer travel season will be here. Before we know it, that fast summer travel season, what does The Beatrice have in store for travelers this spring and summer?
Jennifer Curtin :
Absolutely. So spring is a really exciting time for us. Um, we kick off our alfresco dining, uh, so both on the rooftop and lobby level, the Bellini restaurant. Um, so that is a, a huge hit really all through Providence, uh, Alfresco dining, I think I touched on it, but we partner with the water fire experience that takes place here in Providence. And so we put together a VIP water fire experience where our guests can take the gondola ride down the river and, you know, has a little bit of a connection, uh, to Venice and the inspiration behind Bellini being our restaurant partner. So it’s, it’s a really exciting time. Um, you know, spring menus we get really excited and, and motivated about fun new seasonal cocktails for both the rooftop and Bellini restaurants. So we’re excited. Uh, everything, you know, definitely starts to come alive here in the spring and summer.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I preach to my audience is about collaborating with local businesses. We’ve talked about the importance of having a local flare in your experience, but you know, being able to use those local experiences, partnering with them, because that’s a shared segment that you have, you know, and especially coming back to social media, online reviews, you know, those are places where you might have some references to both, where you could share a picture from that, that VIP experience. They can repost it, and you’re getting kind of some exponential brand awareness between the both of your businesses. It’s a win-win for everyone. So love that you that you’ve partnered with some of those local businesses there in Providence. This might be my favorite part of the Spotlight series. Some rapid fire questions to get to know you, Jennifer and the Beatrice a little bit better for our audience out there. So, favorite view on property?
Jennifer Curtin :
Favorite view would have to be sitting on the rooftop in the outdoor patio section. Just it, when it’s starting to turn to dusk, it’s really beautiful out there.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I mean, you painted that picture a little bit earlier that felt like it was a little bit hard to beat. Favorite fun fact about the property?
Jennifer Curtin :
I love to share with people. So we have a big grand long lobby that you walk into, and there’s a gorgeous chandelier hanging above the front desk. And so it’s a unique lobby and, it kind of catches people dead in their tracks a little bit. But my favorite fact to share with them is that actually used to be an alleyway in between two buildings. And so that was converted into the lobby. And so on one side of the lobby, you have the original back to the historic building, you have the original exterior brick from that 1887 exchange building. And then, then on the other side, you’re looking at this beautiful, modern, brand new hotel lobby. So that’s a really fun fact that I like to share with people.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure it’s a big aha moment, you know, when you’re explaining to them at the front desk that you’re actually standing in what used to be an alleyway, and then they kind of connect the dots there in front of you.
Jennifer Curtin :
That’s exactly what happens. So it’s really fun to see that happen.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure. Favorite signature dish at the property?
Jennifer Curtin :
Favorite signature dish would have to be the carpaccio. And so the Cipriani family actually invented that dish, uh, back in Venice, and so they have perfected that and it’s definitely my favorite.
Ryan Embree:
So you’re, you’re saying favorite dish up there, maybe the favorite view that, that probably would be a great combination, I’m imagining, right?
Jennifer Curtin :
Yes. That is an amazing Friday or Saturday afternoon.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I can imagine. Last one, favorite piece of art at the property?
Jennifer Curtin :
Favorite piece of art. So we have a few great ones but we have a beautiful mosaic of Beatrice right in our lobby. So it’s a handmade mosaic that was made actually over in Italy, um, and shipped over to us. And it’s beautiful. Um, and it’s really, again, with that whole experience walking into the lobby between the grand chandelier that’s hanging in this mosaic of Beatrice, it’s really a special moment for guests when they walk through that lobby.
Ryan Embree:
Sure. And I’m sure a wonderful reminder to your team too, you know, as you practice the service that you do every day of the level of service, and expectation and experience you’re trying to give to guests at the property. And speaking of this as we wrap up, you know, being the general manager, I’d love to to kind of hear in your own words, you know, when somebody walks out, it’s that moment where they check out, you know, invoices paid, all that good stuff they’re about to set on their travels. When they walk out those doors, what do you want them to say or feel as they walk out after they check out of The Beatrice?
Jennifer Curtin :
Yeah, for me, it’s, it’s really about, um, having that deeper personalized connection. And, you know, we have so many repeat guests, whether it’s they travel to Providence, weekly for business meetings, or maybe they have a student at one of the local universities, both Brown University, Rizz University, Johnson Wells, they’re all just steps from the hotel. So we have a lot of families, a lot of business travelers that come often. And my goal, and what I want them to feel like is that we’re really making this home for them. This is home away from home. And so that goes back to fact finding about our guests, you know, having a guest profile about where they like to be located in the hotel, maybe what their entree is that they always order when they sit down in Bellini, what type of pillows they like, just so that we can be one step ahead of them the next time they walk through the doors. Our goal is if there’s something that they always order or they always request, we wanna have that notated so that we can already have it in the room waiting for them when they check back in with us. And so the moment we have that going and they get to leave, feeling confident that this is the place they’re gonna return to on their next travels is really rewarding and, and what we’re trying to achieve.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Well, it sounds like you provide such a customized, personalized experience over there at The Beatrice, so congratulations to you and your team on all the awards and recognitions and hope to be able to make my way up there. And, you know, I’ll read a couple of those be about the town guides before I do to, to try to make the most of my trip. So, well, we covered a lot in this episode. Any final thoughts today?
Jennifer Curtin :
No, thank you so much for having me, Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much for joining us, Jennifer, and we will talk to you next time on the Suite Spot. Thank you. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Global Brand Head at Embassy Suites by Hilton, Bonnie Campagnuolo, is recognized as a TMG Hospitality Trailblazer as Embassy Suites celebrates its 40th anniversary!
This episode gives viewers an inside look at what has made the brand successful over the last 40 years and what is on the horizon for Embassy Suites. Ryan and Bonnie go in depth to highlight key initiatives and characteristics of Embassy Suites that contribute to the brand’s hospitality dominance.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embee. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Emre, here with another edition of the TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. As we get geared up for a busy travel summer, we are here with another hospitality trailblazer, another Hilton brand leader. I am very excited to introduce our guest for today, Bonnie Campagnuolo brand leader of Embassy Suites by Hilton. Bonnie, thank you so much for being on the podcast.
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
It’s my pleasure. Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree:
We got several things to celebrate today. I don’t wanna give too much away, but before we start talking about your incredible Embassy Suites by Hilton Brand, I wanna talk about your background and journey that led you into hospitality. As we know, it’s always unique to kind of see these paths, which get us to where we are. Where did you start? Was it behind the front desk? Did you just kind of fall in it? Tell us a little bit about your journey to Embassy Suites by Hilton.
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
So I never worked in a hotel. I started in ad agencies in Orlando, Florida and had a number of travel and tourism clients across the years and across different agencies. I moved to the client side, marketing teams first at Walt Disney World, and then with a vacation ownership company also here in Orlando. And then moved up to DC for a job with Hilton, uh, almost 14 years ago. And I was director of Resorts marketing for the Hilton Hotels and Resorts brand, which was an amazing, amazing ride. From there, I worked on all of our full service brands in marketing and then went over to the brand side and, uh, did what we called, uh, customer experience and innovation for full service brands. And then I have been in this role since July of 2020, and it’s, it’s a great job. I love my job.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Well, it’s interesting that, you know, we get a lot of, a lot of people that I interview on these hospitality trailblazers and they come up originally from operations. So I’m wondering kind of, you know, what do you think mindset, maybe lessons learned that were a little bit different being in hospitality a little bit later in your career?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
So I think understanding how we get messages out to guests, how we establish who we are is part of what Embassy Suites needs right now. And I, I don’t kid myself about knowing how every little thing happens in a hotel, and I’d surround myself with people who do, and I’m not shy about asking our hotel leaders, if we were to think about doing something like this, how does that affect you? If we were to make a change like this in a guest room, how does that affect what the housekeeper’s life is like? Or did we just create something that’s really cool, but a pain in the neck to clean because it, you know, creates a little ledge or something that we’re not never gonna get, right? So I really, we have tons of folks who know more than me and I love all of them, and we make sure that we have those conversations. And I’d also say my experience on the customer experience and innovation team really taught me how to ask questions and dive into the what ifs. And, uh, that’s been, that’s been really helpful as we, as we think about where this, where this brand goes and what guests are looking for and what owners need.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s so critical the way that questions can be phrased to owners, guests, associates, as you mentioned before, because you’re right, something could a change that you implement or make at a property, it could ultimately be yes, that’s a good change, but are the effects of it gonna have net negative value to it? So I think it’s fascinating kind of hearing that, having that balance. We’ll talk a little bit about this episode, but we’ve got a big milestone to celebrate. If you’re watching us on our YouTube page, you could see the banner up in Bonnie’s corner there celebrating 40 years. Congratulations on that. It hits in May 2024. When something lasts for 40 years, obviously it’s successful. What do you think after 40 years, something’s clicking between some of the things we talked about, owners, guests, associates, what do you attribute this brand’s longevity to?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
We were based on giving guests more. That’s what the man who created the brand, Hervy Feldman wanted to give guests more. And so a full service all suites hotel with a great breakfast included, which involves our made to order omelets that people know and love, as well as an evening reception to get your night started, right, or end, end your busy workday. So that’s what guests really love about us, and we are very particular about making sure those key elements of our magic formula, the service evening reception, a great free breakfast, and those two room suites are stay core to what we do. And guests, you know, reward us with their business, whether they’re traveling for work for a a group event or a convention, a conference, or for leisure, whether that be team travel, exploring a particular area on a long weekend, et cetera. Um, seven nights a week, we’ve got guests who we are perfect for. And so owners love that consistent business. We’re not just a business hotel, we’re not just a leisure hotel. And so it gives them a steady, a steady stream throughout the week. And they also have a slightly more efficient labor model than, uh, your typical full service hotel. And so that helps with their profitability
Ryan Embree:
Secretly, as I share this into our nationwide podcast, but Embassy Suites is one of my favorite brands. I think it’s like a magical place like it’s known for its atriums when you come in. I remember when I would travel as a child coming into some of these lobbies with, koi fish in a river that felt like it was going right through the lobby. Now we’ve obviously, you know, redesigned and reimagine those spaces in the lobby, but Embassy Suites, just again, what I’ve, I’ve known it for is, and who doesn’t like a second room, right? A suite where you can separate yourself, whether you’re traveling with kids, just making it feel like there’s kind of a different place than just four walls and a bed. So again, big fan of the brand myself, but it is interesting to see how it’s evolved. Let’s talk about that. First off, Embassy Suites recently opened up their Embassy Suites by Hilton Gatlinburg, Tennessee Resort location to travelers. Have you had the pleasure of getting out there yet and checking out the property?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
I have not. Uh, and I am, it is hot on my list. We’ve got Asheville also just down the street and then Pigeon Forge coming early next year, but I’m, I’m not gonna wait for Pigeon Forge to open to go see these two gorgeous properties. The photos are amazing and that resort has a great lagoon style pool, poolside food and beverage. So a pool bar, you can have lunch out there. And then something really unique is that the hotel team has partnered with a local outfitter and they have a space dedicated in the lobby where they will help you set up whatever excursions that you wanna do. So whether it’s hiking or it’s fishing or whatever you’re looking to explore outside, they will help you do that, which I think is, is really unique and a nice add. And then great meeting space with indoor outdoor space. And so for, you know, for a meeting or a special getaway with your team, I think it’s make folks very happy and give everyone a little breath of fresh air.
Ryan Embree:
Well, I mean, it’s super unique bringing elements like that. And then obviously keeping up with the trends. We know group business is coming back very, very strong in 2024, you know, since it is one of the new Embassy Suites. You already talked about kind of some of the things that make it more unique, but when you go through these designs and you’re looking at new locations and properties, just walk us through a little bit. Obviously so much has changed over the past 40 years, but walk us through a little bit maybe how you’re using those trends and how the design prototypes maybe differ from the ones of a couple decades ago and the look and feel of it?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
You know, from some hotels that are near you and that you’ve, you’ve experienced at the time the big atrium filled with lots of trees and plant life and maybe some koi was luxurious and very different over time. Certain things get dated, but space is always a luxury for many of our travelers who maybe live in cities and their home life isn’t necessarily a standalone house with a big backyard. That open space is part of the luxury as well as the space in the room. Whether if you’re a business traveler and you don’t wanna do a call with a bed in the background, or you just want the close the door between your kids and you, then those things are priceless. So we kept the space in both the rooms and in the lobby area. So when you enter one of our newer prototypes, it’s still at least a double height entry area. We wanna make sure that that feels spacious. And then in the rooms, same thing. We’ve adjusted the floor plan so that there’s more natural light, the windows are bigger, the living room space has a, you know, has a window as well as the bedroom. In some of our older room types, it’s more of a linear suite with the parlor and the back and the bedroom up against the window. So we know that, again, light and space is something that people have come to really value. So we’ve, we’ve leaned into that. And then the things that go with technology like surfaces, easy charging, easy access to power in multiple spots in both rooms. Those are so important because those are something that is not apparent until it’s not there.
Ryan Embree:
Right. And, and I think, you know, as a traveler, when you’re looking for a plug, you know, you start to see and you’re like, uh, okay, where is a plug? So making sure you incorporate the right technology too, that doesn’t become stale over time, I think is really important. I remember those iPod docs that were like, such the craze, right? Like a decade ago and now you like walk in and you’re like, yeah, I don’t think I’m gonna use that anymore or can’t even use that anymore. But it’s so important to make those decisions that, you know, with a brand like Embassy Suites that’s been here for 40 years is gonna put you in a position for success for the next 40, you know, and, and one of the things you alluded to, Bonnie, was that this property really caters to every segment from leisure business group. You know, the properties have really become kind of destinations themselves in a way with everything that they have to offer. You mentioned some of the markets that you’re getting into as you look across the industry. Do you think there is more room to increase market share in any particular segment right now and how that has evolved during the tenure at Embassy Suites?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
So I think our market share is pretty good without going into numbers. So, but we, we see the balance shifting post covid back to closer to a 2019 segmentation in our hotels. Obviously that varies by day of week and location, but we’re getting back to more of the, you know, third group, a third business travel or non-group business, and then a third leisure. So that’s roughly where we are group is what’s growing now as, as things come back and leisure starts to balance out just based on, on people’s in the office work habits and things like that.
Ryan Embree:
Which is great because you never want to be, you know, too top heavy in one of those segments. So being able to offer an owner and developer a way to say, Hey, listen, you’re gonna be pretty good in all of these segments. So if something does happen right now, there’s a lot of external factors out there, you still have that kind of cushion to, to feel good at night to say, you know, maybe leisure drops a little bit, but group business is a big opportunity that I’m set up for in the future to be able to capture, especially with that meeting space, we’ll see kind of over these next couple years, you know, maybe continues to be this remote work where they’re trying to, businesses and groups are trying to travel to a specific destination to get everyone at a place to do maybe like a quarterly meeting. I’m sure that sets up amazing for something like Embassy Suites and to be able to host them and then maybe even extend their stay into that little bleacher side of things that we hear so much about. So recently Hilton was named World’s number one best Place to Work. Congratulations to you and your team on that. In our industry staffing shortages, they’ve remained an issue over the past couple years. We’ve talked about it, several, you know, I feel like more than several times on the, on this podcast, it obviously takes a lot more to run a 200 suite embassy suites than it does a 70 room Hampton Inn. So how do you leverage Hilton and the Embassy Suites name and reputation to combat these staffing challenges that again, have been kind of plaguing our industry right now?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
You know, I could, I couldn’t agree more. I’ve been with Hilton for 14 years, they’re gonna have to kick me out. So when it comes to our hotel teams, we make sure that the benefits of working for and with Hilton, whether you’re a franchisee or managed by Hilton, that all of that is strong and competitive in the market and are enabling our management companies with new technology that we see team members looking for like being able to access pay prior to payday. And so those are options that are available to our teams in our hotels for Embassy Suites. When you look at the tenure of our team members at some of our older properties, it is absolutely amazing how many folks have stuck around for how many years and the family environment that they feel and love. And part of our anniversary that you just talked about is just taking a look and honoring those team members that have been with us for 30 plus years. We have original team members at our very first hotel in Overland Park, Kansas. They have been there the entire time that hotel’s been there. And if you wanna find somebody who knows where all the stories are and what all the, you know, intricacies are of a building, find an engineer who’s been there for many years and those folks are priceless and it’s awesome. But the reason they stick around is because of how they’re treated and how they feel and their coworkers.
Ryan Embree:
I mean, absolutely. And, and like I said, I mean, it, it does take a lot more people, I’m sure that means more room for opportunity within those properties. It helps when you have such a big footprint across the nation too, to be able to say, Hey, it can go from one Embassy here to becoming, you know, to getting a promotion to another Embassy over here. And you still feel that comfort level of knowing kind of how you’re, how you’re running your business and property there. And we have heard examples of things like you were talking about pay, but flexible working hours, uh, you know, technology to help the, the hospitality staff. It’ll be interesting to see if this, the staffing shortage continues to stick around what brands, uh, and properties are doing to try to retain talent and kind of the creative solutions that they’re doing. But I’m sure it helps when you can use the reputation of number one, you know, world’s best place to work as, as kind of your, your jumping off point there.
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
So, or our travel benefits are pretty popular with our team members. So there’s a number of different things of course, that, that are out there. And we’re seeing it’s more market specific and there’s pockets that are, are feeling the labor shortage. But I think any employer needs to be thinking about why does somebody wanna spend their time here?
Ryan Embree:
It’s a good conversation to have and a good, I think you’re right Bonnie, it’s refreshing to kind of take a step back and say, okay, how can we be more attractive to candidates maybe that are not working in hospitality right now? Because a lot of the stories that we hear about, a lot of the journeys that we hear about in hospitality necessarily don’t start in hospitality. They come in and they kind of have, find a passion for it through there and you know, next thing you know, they’re being interviewed on the Suite Spot. Anyways, I, I wanna switch gears to talking about owners and developers and you know, I’m sure you obviously have a lot of conversations with them, but when, when an owner developer comes to you and says, you know, I wanna build an Embassy Suites and put the, put the Embassy Suites flag on on my property, what do you think the interest and appeal of this brand is even after existing for 40 years? What are you hearing from owners and developers when they come to you?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
Obviously they like the seven night a week business and the, and the strength of the brand. There’s certain things about us that are simpler to operate than some other other options. We also are a category of one, no one does exactly what we do at the upper upscale level. So some may have free breakfast, some may have, uh, cocktail in the evening, some may have all suites, but no one does all three with the service level that we do. And so most developers or owners who are looking to do an Embassy Suites probably have another hotel, this is not their first hotel and see the need and see the value. We do very well in markets where their might not be another full service property, but the market has grown to a place where the demand is great enough and the price point would be high enough to make the ROI on construction work out because it, it’s not cheap to build, but the return is there and we’ve got, you know, a number of owners who love the brand and, and keep building more, which is fantastic.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that’s a compelling argument to say that Embassy Suites has really found a niche, I think, um, in, in the traveler segment and what it’s been able to offer travelers. And I think, you know, after 40 years you would think, but everyone I think can close their eyes and imagine what an Embassy Suites looks and feels like in that type of experience that you’re gonna get there. So, um, and that’s not, that’s not easy to do because I think a lot of brands shoot for that and they might walk into a different type of prototype and be a little like, this isn’t what I’m used to. But the Embassy just has kind of a feel to it, you know, no matter what market you’re going to, I mentioned this before, spoke to a couple Hilton brand leaders over the last month, hunter LivSmart Studios, Spark, Home2 Suites, now Embassy obviously. And one of the interesting conversations we follow upon is talking about what we alluded to earlier was the balance between guest feedback from guest associates and owners and the tweaks or changes that are made based on that feedback. You’ve set a couple examples, but anything in particular that maybe you’re looking into now or tools or methods that you use to collect that data to say, okay, we’re thinking about making this change. How do we go about doing that? Like to walk us through that process.
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
We just introduced a new prototype, there aren’t any in the wild yet, uh, at the end of 2023. And so we just went through this process.
Ryan Embree:
This whole process?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
Yeah. So involved some, some research, you know, online and, and kind of intercepts where we ask what they’re looking for, what’s most important ranking, what’s most important in a room to you figuring out what’s, you know, nice to have, what’s worth paying for. On the flip side, we had some theories about ways, things that we could change, which would also decrease construction cost or make things more efficient based on how you lay, lay it out in the room. And I said, my dumb idea, I said, well, what if we got rid of the additional sink at the wet bar? So outside of the bathroom you have a full bathroom, but in every Embassy Suites there’s also this wet bar with a sink. The microwave, the safe is typically there and then the mini fridge. So what if we got rid of that and we did research and people like it. If you’ve got a larger group, it’s an additional place for somebody to wash their hands to get ready. There’s a mirror there and people like to fill their water bottles there because that has a gooseneck faucet. And so we said, all right, well people use them, people like them. We will, we will stick with that and we’ll find other ways to make, to find efficiencies, which, which we did. We adjusted how bathrooms line up so that all of the plumbing is stacked and that saved almost a half a million dollars in construction cost if of a, you know, a baseline prototype.
Ryan Embree:
Wow, I love hearing, I can listen to those stories all day ’cause I know exactly where you’re talking about. And you know, you think that’s, that’s could be something where it’s like, well, is anyone really using this? Is is this kind of repetitive? You know, but then you get into the data, you start asking guests and they’re like, no, no, no, this is where I use this. And I’m sure with those types of responses, you could even use that in the future to be like, we see so many people filling up water bottles there, maybe we add a filter or something like that. And so it kind of leads you on this path of innovation to kind of keep you fresh, kind of keep you in the guest experience and, and have a pulse on that guest experience so they know what they’re doing, how they’re utilizing the room. So again, absolutely fascinating. So, so glad you shared because it’s some of the ideas that don’t make it to the new prototype and I think those are some really fun stories to, to uncover. So really cool that you were able to share that with us. Now we talked about, we touched on technology a little bit earlier. Obviously Hilton recognized as a very, very innovative company, when it comes to the Embassy Suites brand, where do you kind of see there being space to implement more technology? Do you think it’s at a good place with technology? Because you know, at the end of the day this is hospitality, right? So people serving people industry, where’s that balance and do you see, uh, more technology being integrated into the guest experience at an Embassy Suites?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
So, first and foremost, the technology that happens across all of our Hilton brands, most of it powered by our Hilton Honors app is amazing. And you don’t see it at scale in other brands. So digital key, being able to choose your room, being able to confirm to know that your rooms are connected. So if you’ve got a large party, if you’ve got kids that’s game changing in your trip, then those are available to everybody. My favorite of those is digital checkout because I always like to let the team know I’m leaving and it’s six in the morning or seven in the morning, so housekeeping doesn’t need to wait until noon to get into my room. It’s, I I think it’s like paying it forward. It’s good karma. You let the hotel team know and then maybe this afternoon somebody gets into their room earlier, you know, when they, when they arrive. So that’s my favorite thing to be able to go, oh shoot, I just got into my Uber, I’m just gonna press the checkout button and we’re good. When we think about brand specific and tech that happens just at Embassy Suites, we are very careful about where we integrate tech and making sure that it doesn’t goof up the service and the personal interaction and that we are not over kiosk different places. So, uh, we’ve got some things in test to make maybe omelet ordering a little bit smoother, but we don’t wanna take away that morning magic that happens between the omelet chef and the guests. So like I said, we’re pretty careful about making sure we don’t take away those connections because people get to know those faces in the morning, they make relationships, they know your order. And so it’s, um, we’re very careful about not goofing with the mojo.
Ryan Embree:
Just look at places like TripAdvisor and, and other places where online reviews and where that person making your omelet is mentioned almost on like a weekly basis or is part of the, the breakfast experience there versus being at a kiosk. I think that’s super fascinating ’cause we always talk about technology as like, we have to get there, we have to get there. But I feel like on this episode we’ve touched a couple places where it’s almost like, no, let, let’s pull back and make sure it doesn’t have a negative impact on the guest experience because you’re gonna have just naturally with an Embassy Suites, you’re gonna have more touch points, more ways to impact the guest than you would at a regular select service where you could just come in, check in online or check in on your phone, get into your room, and then check out right out the door. No, you want to have that evening reception, you’re gonna have the breakfast in the morning. Those are all spaces where you can make a guest experience extra special and have that impact that other brands just, they don’t have, they’re not fortunate enough to have those times. A guest could just walk in and outta the lobby without ever interacting with a staff member. So you mentioned a couple projects you’re excited about, but any, any other in the pipeline that, that are unique or that we should be on the lookout in the future?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
For sure. So we talked about our Smoky Mountains triple threat. The beginning of last year we had three beach properties open right in a row. Aruba Resort, Virginia Beach Resort, and Panama City Beach Resort here in Florida. Those are all fantastic and great adds to our already solid beach offering. So St. Augustine in Florida and Deerfield Beach just got renovated, which is fantastic. Right around the corner we have another property in Orlando, sunset walk down near Kissimmee for folks who are familiar. And then Madison, Wisconsin will open in June. That’s a gorgeous 260 room property with meeting space very close to the capital, very close to the university. So that’s gonna be a great downtown add for us. And then in May we will enter Dubai for the first time, which is very exciting. Our second property in the Middle East, we have one in Doha. The Dubai property is a tower right in Business Bay and the bottom floors will be Hilton Garden Inn. The top floors will be Embassy Suites, great fourth floor pool area overlooking the city. There are rooms on the side of the building that face the Birch Khalifa with balconies. So great viewing spot New Year’s Eve to watch the fireworks from the Birch Khalifa. So really exciting property, for us to, uh, to see open. So there’ll be a trip there in my future. Gatlinburg and Dubai will be my travels this year.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, what an amazing footprint and it’s so cool to see the brand growing and I think that’s, that’s a, a sign of strength, you know, here hitting the 40 year mark of the expansion plans. They’re not just, you know, in one area, they’re really nationwide and even internationally. So, you know, as we wrap up, looking kind of into the crystal ball, Bonnie next 5 to 10 years down the line, is there more international growth? What, what are you seeing down the road for the future of this brand, maybe as we celebrate 50 years, and 10 more years?
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
So I do think there’s more international space for us to grow. We’ve got a couple in the pipeline and there are certain markets that are right for Embassy Suites or Embassy Suites is right for the market and for the audience there. So look to see that continue, look to see, um, our service continue to be a really core part of who we are. And for us not to mess with that magic formula, how we deliver it can always be improved, but the things that people value is what, what is more important. If we see those things start to change, then we may need to adapt with that. But so far, you know, we get their day started the right way and we end their day the right way and give them a great place to sleep and relax or work. And that’s core to who we are.
Ryan Embree:
And the next time our listeners are filling up their water bottle at that second sink, we can thank Bonnie there for, for keeping it in there for us. And, you know, we’ll continue to look for all the innovations, the new prototype that you said that’s on the horizon as well. Bonnie, congratulations again on this incredible 40 year milestone with Embassy Suites. Really excited to see what the future holds for the brand.
Bonnie Campagnuolo :
Fantastic. Thank you so much.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Thank you so much for listening to the Suite Spot. We will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Brand Leader of Home2 Suites by Hilton, Talene Staab, is named a TMG Hospitality Trailblazer and joins the Suite Spot to discuss Home2 Suites and the incredible developments taking place for the brand.
From designing the hotel to finding new ways to improve the guest experience, this episode covers the key aspects that make the Home2 brand special.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. So excited to bring you another episode in another part of our Hospitality Trailblazers series. If this is your first time, we’ve been running this Hospitality Trailblazers series for almost two years now, and we are interviewing some of the best and brightest in our hospitality industry, some of those people that are trailblazing a path forward, and we certainly have a guest today that fits the bill. Talene Staab, Brand Leader of Home2 Suites by Hilton, Talene, thank you so much for being on the podcast with me today.
Talene Staab:
It’s great to be here with you today. Thank you so much.
Ryan Embree:
And we’re excited to talk about the Home2 Suites brand and all the innovative and exciting developments that are happening with that brand that you were the head of. But before that, although this is not the first time I have met you, we were just talking off camera about how we met at the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference, had the pleasure to meet in person even though we’re doing this interview virtually. With this being your first time Talene, tell us a little bit about your hospitality background, the journey that led you to Hilton and ultimately the brand leader for home two suites.
Talene Staab:
Sure. My family, my parents had a little diner that was like a breakfast lunch diner in the Boston area, and I worked there in high school and it was one of those places that was like, cheers, where no one ordered their food. They kind of like walked in and everybody knew, oh, Ryan’s here. We might not have known your name, but we knew what you would eat for breakfast. And it was like that sense of building community around a small business really stuck with me, even though it was hard work and I just loved it. But I started working in hotels and then my family actually moved from Boston to San Diego and relocated, and they stayed at this Embassy Suites and they called and they were like, you will not believe this hotel. And this was like 30 years ago. So the brand was relatively new. They were like, you get a suite in every room, you get free breakfast and free cocktails. And I honestly didn’t believe it. They’re like, you gotta work here. So I did. I actually was a smart sales manager there, um, became a DOS and then eventually joined the corporate team. And then when the corporate office moved to McLean, I moved back east with my family, young family, and we kind of looked at it as like an adventure. Let’s just see what happens. And it ended up being a really good move because from there I took on a ton of different jobs that kind of took me out of the brand and sales world into more operations. I got to be on the Canopy team. I joined like a week before we launched the brand. So learned about new brand development, learned about owners. Development was the big learning curve for me, which was really exciting. And then that set me up to be, the VP of owner relations owner experience. And that was really cool because I got to see what Hilton looked like from the owner’s point of view, like the whole elephant, you know.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, yeah, we’re gonna talk about that.
Talene Staab:
Yeah. And um, I learned so much from that. We set up a ton of new systems and data and experiences for owners to really like bridge any gap that we might have had ’cause we were growing so quickly. And then that led me to True, which was my first brand leader job. I joined when we only had 60 hotels, grew to 220 in three years, which was tremendously fast. And then that all set me up for Home2. I’ve been on Home2, almost for two years.
Ryan Embree:
Quite a journey. I, I love the beginning of it because we talk about there’s some like catchphrases, I feel like in, in hospitality when, when some people talk about like hospitality being in your DNA and that might be, I think your story is one, you were, you were kind of immersed into it at an early age, and you got that feeling of what true hospitality is also someone in hospitality. When you get that feeling, it, it’s kind of addictive. Like you want to, like, you want to to serve others, you know what that experience is. Sometimes we get it on the other side, which is fantastic. Every, every traveler wants that, right? Is that great service. So that great experience, everyone strives for that. But to be able to get both sides of the coin there, is really, really cool that you can offer that and such a wealth of knowledge and experience in your journey with Hilton, which is really cool. We’re gonna talk about some of that. Let’s get into Home2 Suites. It, it’s had some incredible growth. It’s turned into one of the fastest brands in Hilton’s history to make sure I get these numbers right over with more than 650 open hotels, it’s got one of the largest pipelines right now in the us. What do you think owners, developers love about this brand that has led to its exponential growth in such a short period of time?
Talene Staab:
You know, Hilton has had a long history in extended stay. We launched Homewood over 30 years ago, and if you think back then, it’s quite an investment to build in all suite or an extended stay property. So when we built the brand in 2009, which was not a great time to launch a brand, if you think about the world back then, but it was a much more affordable build, much more economical to run. So it was really an alternative in a space that had been much more investment heavy. And it was a slow burn. ’cause at the time we launched, we opened the first hotel in 2011, and you can kind of look at the trajectory before the pandemic. We were really hitting our stride. But what was interesting is during the pandemic, people really saw, you know, across all extended state, like that business was the lifesaver. It kept the lights on. And once you kind of got through the worst part of the crisis, you know, sports teams never stopped traveling the entire time
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it certainly does. And, and as we alluded to, I mean, hoteliers, owners, developers, they’re all travelers too. So it is fascinating to see that, you know, that maybe they have exposure to the brand in a different light of being like, oh, I’m experiencing this as a traveler. I can see why there is such a draw here. And I think things like the pandemic, obviously as, as we look back, it shows how durable an asset like a home two suites can be. Where we got to the closest thing to zero occupancy is we could get, but there was still a demand for that type of, uh, stay for that type of experience. And I think that says a lot. And you know, when you think about owners, developers wanting to make sure that they’re, they have a safe haven for assets, you know, I think home two suites certainly, certainly fits the bill there, but it’s more than just the growth, the exponential growth, that hockey stick growth that we are talking about. You guys are actually doing things, some exciting developments on the design front that I think is also setting you up for future success. Talk to us a little bit about those prototype updates and, and why this is gonna set the brand up for success moving forward.
Talene Staab:
Yeah, I think the big takeaway is we know how to brand hotels. Like we know how to create differentiated experiences when you’ve got so much growth with a brand like Home2, our owners have multiple Home2’s, some of them, right? So you learn so much from them. ’cause they’ve built way more than we ever have. So they’re like, this is what we have experienced between the first one we built. And then this one, these are some things that we’ve taken into consideration. So we’ve done things like remix, the remix. We’ve added more Queen Queens because again, if you think about families, teams, people with projects, those were more in demand. We stacked them over the lobby. So then that made the lobby space bigger and and better. We found tons of efficiencies that we could do from the backend for operations. And it’s important. I think we’ve also learned the team member experience is super important. So we want it to be easy to run a hotel. So back of house breakfast, we’ve kind of reconfigured to make the flow better. But in the guest rooms, I think the thing, the key with Home2 is flexibility. Like it’s flexible for a guest to stay there. You can use the curtain that divides the living room from the bedroom space. You can have a cooktop if you want or not. We’ve got a full-sized fridge, we have more flexible storage, we have have more kitchen counter space. So we just kind of refined all the things that we knew the guests really cared about and made it easier for owners to build it. So when you hit the balance of both of those, it’s even better. We made the outdoor spaces even better for guests to, we call it grill and chill, which is, um, really popular. And you think about all these engagement points are where the team members can see guests and engage with them as much as they wish, as much as a guest wants to. So those are kinds of the things that have really, you know, improved. We found some efficiencies too on some of our signature items. Like the Beacon is, is what Home2 is known for on the exterior. We found ways to make that a lot more cost effective to build. So again, focusing on better guest experience, better cost to build, uh, revenue maximization. Retail is another one. We doubled the retail space ’cause our, our early prototypes didn’t have as much retail and we know guests are like now buying and enjoying things that they like from home in, in the hotel. So a lot of good tweaks. Nothing materially different in a big way because the brand was already performing. The prototype’s already performing really well.
Ryan Embree:
Well I’m sure that’s the luxury of having so many of these hotels open, right? Like you might have one where you’re saying to yourself, I’m seeing this need or hearing this need from the guests of wanting more outdoor space, but is that something that’s particular to this particular segment of traveler? Is it for this location? Right? Or it could be in Florida where, where the weather is a lot nicer, but you might not wanna do that up north where and, and give a lot more outdoor space. But when you have so many locations you can then say, okay, this isn’t just a a, a single trend that I’m seeing. This is a pattern and, and these are the, these are the efficiencies. I think it’s also brilliant you brought up staffing right now, which has continued to kind of plague our industry right now with staffing shortages and, and it’s a real issue for owners that have to staff these hotels trying to find ways to find efficiencies to make it easier for staff. Because obviously the easier their job can be, the better they’re gonna serve their guests, the more they’ll enjoy their experience at working at a brand. So, uh, absolutely brilliant in that regard. Obviously a lot of growth domestically, but you have your eyes set on international growth. Talene, tell us a little bit about some of the markets that you see some opportunity and how the Home2 Suites brand can kind of make a splash there.
Talene Staab:
We, launched in China a couple of years ago and that was our first kind of big four outside of the Americas. And that’s been tremendously successful. We have over 50 hotels open there and many more slated. So that was kind of our first foray out and was cool to see how we could interpret the brand for China and still make it feel like a Home2, but very relevant for the region. So now we’re looking in Europe, middle East and Africa, heavy on the Europe, middle East but we, you know, they don’t have as much green space like we do here in the states. Um, a lot more adaptive reuse, you know, in very dense metropolitan areas. However, that extended stay, uh, component is really untapped market for Hilton in the branded space. So we took a, what is our 32 square meter suite and made it 25 square meters or really tested the limits of how much can we compress it and make it work still with all of the components. It still very much looks like a Home2 Suites, but for Europe, different fit and finishes, you know, they use the kitchen differently. We obviously changed the F&B and we’re super excited. We have Dublin signed and Istanbul Turkey and so having now some success early days with that. Now we’re also looking in the Korea, Caribbean, and Latin America. So we’ve just launched our prototype there. Similarly, they kind of looked at the smaller footprint, but again, different fit and finishes for what works in that market. Interesting customer research on how they might use the spaces differently. And so we’ve modified that to be regionally appropriate. So we don’t wanna look like an American brand coming into a region. It’s very regionally relevant and so we’re excited to see how that starts to develop. But like lots of exciting things. I think people really appreciate that concept. So just making it work in the regions, there’s a lot of potential there.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, what a cool inflection point for the brand to be to having that type of growth. And we talked about all of the design and, and prototype tweaks and changes with the last question, but now you’re kind of at the starting point of that with these international projects and being able to say, okay, let’s get the feedback from the, from the guests, the owners, so that we can see, see what’s really gonna resonate in that market. So very, very cool to see. We’ll keep our eye on that. Coming back across the pond so to speak. I had the opportunity to meet you, like I mentioned, and the and Isaac Lake, the brand leaderr of LivSmart Studios, which is Hilton’s newest extended stay brand. Talk to us a little bit about how this brand compares, maybe the traveler that this caters to and the difference in guest experience. Because as you mentioned, Hilton does a great job branding compare and contrast those two brands for me.
Talene Staab:
Yeah, it’s interesting, um, to see for years Hampton had been kind of our entry level brands. It gets to a point where it’s performing so well. There’s so much space below for, you know, lower rated travel in a different chain scale. And that’s how True launched. Similarly with Home2, if you’re looking at the extended safe space, there was Homewood, Home2, which is running very strong. I mean we’re at the 140 a DR for 2023. So as you can imagine, there’s a ton of business and extended stay that wants at a rate lower than that. So it naturally creates this white space that we’re like, look, people want that experience, they have to leave Hilton. And we know our honors guests are fiercely loyal, Home2 runs over a 70% honors, um, occupancy. And so we know they’re leaving Hilton to have experience as an extended stay at a lower price point. It made so much sense to create something that’s different in that space and that’s live smart. So it’s much more studio apartment living versus the services that you would get at a hotel. Like, uh, not that it’s not a hotel, but with Home2, it’s much more focused on the, the kitchen because the research show that 94% of travelers in that extended true extended stay, we’re talking 30, 60, 90 nights, 94% cook in their in their room. So much more focused on that. And it’s much more appropriate for the mid-scale segment for what you pay for in finishes and in the services that you get. So it’s a very different experience and I think we studied just to see what their overlap would be and I think we found 15% of those true target guests for LivSmart have stayed at a Home2. So we’re really looking at a market that we weren’t getting with Hilton. So we’re excited. And again, with Home2 punching above its weight class, there’s a lot of space for the LivSmart guests and we’re excited about that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it sounds like a, a massive opportunity and an an entry point into exposing a lot of new travelers or new extended stay travelers into the brand and then years down the line upgrade and say, you know, let, let’s start staying at the Home2 next time. Right. So, you know, I think, I think it’s absolutely brilliant, uh, really exciting to see the progress and of that new extended stay brand and again, the overflow into Home2 and, ’cause we know how you spoke to how brand loyal, uh, Hilton honor travelers are. So I’ve had the, I’ve had the opportunity to speak with you, Alyssa, over at Spark by Hilton. So running through a, a really great gamut of, uh, brand leaders for Hilton. And I think it’s so fascinating ’cause you have such a critical job to do, have this balancing act. And we kind of talked about at the top of the episode about you wanna grow the brand obviously, and you want, uh, an interesting product that owners and developers are gonna show some interest in and in helping you grow, but you also wanna make sure that it doesn’t negatively impact the guest experience and you want an experience that, that travelers are gonna kind of keep coming back to. What tools, methods do you use to kind of, first of all get that feedback from owners and guests and then incorporate it into visions for the future for the brand?
Talene Staab:
I’ll go back to something we were talking about at the, the beginning. I mean, at the, at the end of the day, we are of highly franchised business. We want our owners to have trust and confidence and develop with us. We wanna create strong and successful brands, but ultimately it is about that spirit of hospitality, right? We want to have our guests feel that feeling of, you know, we talk about spreading the light and warmth of hospitality. That’s kind of the crux of what’s driving our success. And so we have to really as brand leaders be the ones that are balancing the owner value proposition, the guest value proposition, and then our future to make sure our brands stay true and successful and differentiated so that we have room to grow other brands too. And there’s, you know, something for everyone. We are very close to our owner community. I mean they have been critical in building these brands. A lot of it is, you know, with a ton of their input. Otherwise we, you know, that’s how you can kind of ensure success that way. Um, we take in a ton of guest feedback. So whether it’s consumer research, like what I was referencing about extended stay cooking in their suites, we have a new stay experience platform which does guest surveying all the time. Um, we definitely look for trends. We look at team member feedback. ’cause we were talking about staffing. I mean, we look at things, you know, we had our biggest GM conference of all time. We had six brands represented, thousands of people and we hadn’t refreshed our uniforms in a while for home two. We did a fashion show and had the leaders vote, what were their favorites? And then they got to see when it launched, they were like, we picked that. So we want them to feel part of it with us because they’re the ones that are delivering the service every day. So you can’t forget about them. So there are a lot of places to get feedback and I think if you’re gonna be successful as a brand leader, you have to keep the mission straight. What’s the job of the brand? Who is it serving? What are we trying to accomplish? And use that filter to take in all the feedback to make sure you’re doing the right thing because everyone’s got their agendas right. So we have to just kind of make sure we’ve got the right proportion of feedback from all parties to make it right. Because, you know, it’s tough too when you think about like my early days with True, it was so different. The rooms are a lot smaller, it’s much more efficient. The living room is the, is the lobby and that’s where everyone hangs out. But people wanted it to feel like Hampton because that’s what they knew and that’s what was like the gold standard to compare it to. And so we really had to tell owners, you gotta stick, stick with us, stick with the plan, we have this like plan, it’s gonna work. And it took a minute for us to find the True guests and for people to stop comparing it to Hampton, which is of course what you would expect. But it was key to the success of True is that it’s, it is different than Hampton. So it’s a whole different traveler that’s like, I found my place. So we find that with each of our brands, but it’s not easy. To stick to the plan when people are, you know, expecting it to be something, so.
Ryan Embree:
Fascinating. ’cause I never thought about that. You’re right. ’cause there might be some initial feedback right off the bat that you’re saying that people are calling for changes, this isn’t working, but it’s like you also have to have a little bit of a runway with these brands about saying we gotta, we’ve gotta get this off the ground. We have truly see if this is something that sticks. ’cause you’re right, there could be a comparison, but that’s the whole reason you created the new brand, right? is for it to not to feel like that. So oh, a absolutely fascinating point there. Uh, and then, you know, obviously throw in a Black Swan event like, you know what happened in 2020 and that shifts everything, right? Because now the guest experiences, I used to want to go out and for a couple years I was actually just staying in my hotel. I I didn’t want to go anywhere, experience anything. And now all of a sudden a couple years later I wanna get back out. So you have to see, okay, what, what is that? We always talk about that new normal, what does that feel like? And, and how can you make changes? So very difficult job you must have over there doing that, that balancing act.
Talene Staab:
It’s fun though and you wanna think of how do you evolve it? Yeah. And keep the, and that’s why if you know your brand’s core, you can still keep the spirit, the essence, the intentions of it and still continue to evolve into what the, like you said, the new normal is and then continue to be successful that way.
Ryan Embree:
I think that’s a great point even for our hotel listeners down to the individual property level that of just knowing what your business is, who you cater to, and making sure you kind of stay, kind of stay in your lane in a sense of, of just having a clear vision. Because if you try to stray too far away from who you are, guests, travelers, they’re going to see that they’re, they’re savvy. Uh, travelers have gotten a lot more savvy. Uh, they had to over the last couple years. They know they have more options than ever and there’s more flexibility. So it’s going to be the brands that kind of stay true to who they are and deliver that consistent experience that are gonna thrive. And I think Home2 Suites and has done a fantastic job and, and you could see, you know, mission accomplished on, on the other side of that. And that’s tremendous growth. So I wanna get back to your experience, Talene, ’cause I think you’ve got a, a really unique story because you talked about Canopy, True, Home2 now share a little insight of knowledge from going to a brand like True, you kind of, you, you kind of spoke to a little bit of the challenges off the beginning, but you know, launching a new brand like a Canopy went back in the day to now having kind of an established mission and brand that you’re, that you’re the head of and how that has served you in, in the position you’re in today.
Talene Staab:
It’s funny, as I was thinking about it, you know, canopy was right at launch when I joined True, it was kind of in the toddler years and then with Home2 was much more, I’ll say teenager, I won’t say grown up ’cause it was still feeling really, it still feels new and you know, we haven’t even been through like full renovation cycles yet. So it’s like, you know, relatively new. But it, it is a different perspective, right, for each and like at launch when you launch, you’re really like, you have all these theories and concepts of how it should be, but when it gets out in the wild and you hear, you know, what owner developer feedback is and what they wanna do and how they wanna achieve the same goal, but maybe they wanna go about it a different way. So that’s important to listen to. When I think about my time with True, I kind of alluded to, it’s like sticking to the plan and let it work first and then completely make changes, which we did. But you gotta give it a chance to, to stand on its own. And again, from a branding perspective, I appreciate when there are things that make people talk about it. Like with Home2, we joke about we have a curtain that literally divides the living room and the bed space. Some people love the curtain, some people hate the curtain, but the people that love the curtain love the curtain more than people that don’t like the curtain. And so that is like the most important piece of value real estate. Like if you have a little kid that’s trying to sleep and doesn’t wanna be staring at the parents, you know, to see if they can stay up a little on that curtain is valuable. So like there are these things that you kind of need to listen to and let that work. But what’s important is throughout all of it, you have to have good relationship with the owners and developers in a trust that we’re all kind of working towards the same goal of success. Because then you can have really good discussion and, and and candor in your conversations to make the best product. So I feel like those relationships throughout all of the, um, stakeholders in branding is super important. The owner, developers, the team members, and of course you got to, you know, stand by the guests and what they ultimately want. So it’s been, it’s been good to see it with brands from different stages, you know, and then as you look at older brands that are looking now for how do we get owners to reinvest and keep the products fresh, you know, I I look at, you know, sometimes, you know, we ask a lot of our, our owners, but the returns and the premiums that we drive with our brands, there’s a reason for it. And it’s not always the easy way, but like there has to be that trust that we’re aiming for retaining that, that premium. So I think it’s kind of goes back to maybe what you said as from my experience is like take in all the feedback and then measure it against, you know, what your intentions are and what your goals are and then you’ll know.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it it is, and and you’re right. I, I think a decision like that, the curtain is a great parallel by the way
Talene Staab:
I’m really excited about Bristol, Connecticut. Because it’s gonna round out our continental US. It’s our 49th state. And then hopefully we’ll hit Hawaii in 2026 and we’ll have all 50 states. That’s exciting. I’m excited about Austin East side will be in the heart of Austin there. We’ve got Virginia Beach project for Napa. I mean, who doesn’t wanna have a hotel in Napa Valley That, that’s exciting. Right? There’s a lot, a lot of exciting things there. You know, we also, from a product perspective, again, I’ll go back to listening to, to guests, um, we’re doing some fun things at breakfast. It kind of goes back like guests want consistency, but they also want flexibility, right? Yes. So they want things their way. Um, so we’re doing some fun, you know, we’ve been really successful with offering these breakfast sandwiches. They’re delicious. There’s very many kinds, but guests still want more flexibility. So we’re, we’re testing out a build your own breakfast sandwich kind of pilot. It’s just kind of a nod to like, this is how you can keep the signature item, but maybe do it a different way that makes the guest happier. And then if the cost preoccupied room goes down, which early indication show it is, everybody wins. So I, I think that’s the fun kind of things where you’re solving a problem and everyone wins. I mean, ultimately that’s where we’re going for. So, and then be able to deliver it over, you know, 650 hotels the same way.
Ryan Embree:
That’s That’s the, that’s the challenge. But yeah, yeah, personalization. Um, I mean that’s, that’s a huge thing right now. Yeah. What, and I think that, I think that resonates on both ends. You know, I’m hearing some brand leaders saying, you know, there’s a specific piece of, there might be one or two specific pieces of a new build that the owner’s gonna have exact say and it might be ’cause of a, a local artist that they, that they put in the lobby or something like that. So there’s some personalization there so it doesn’t feel like, so cookie cutter. But also on the guest side too, I think you can have a consistent guest experience with personalization there. You know, if you have a seasonal drink, uh, at your, at your F&B station or you have a seasonal breakfast item or something like that, there’s consistency If you’re, if your guests know that there’s going to be some seasonal option there that is consistency even though it’s ever changing, if that makes sense, right? Yeah. To hopeful. I didn’t confuse our audience too much, but I think when you offer that flexibility as, as you mentioned, that’s where the pieces of the guest experience just get kind of those notches a little bit higher and higher and you see that reflected in your online presence, your reviews and ultimately kind of word of mouth.
Talene Staab:
So you probably traveled a lot and I mean, I’m sure there’s days where you’re like, I don’t remember which hotel I’m in, what you’ve got keys, but you’re like, I can’t remember what room I’m in. Like you’re in a trance sometimes when you’re traveling week after week. And so when there are things that kind of break you out of that by reminding you what location you’re in or team members that kind of did things a little differently. Like those are moments of, of making it stick with you that I think matter in service. And I think people think of service as like, there’s so many ways, it’s always above and beyond and adding more stuff. It’s really about kind of, I look at it like breaking the monotony of travel week in, week out by having something that maybe lets you know, hey, you’re in this specific city today, like enjoy this. You can only get it here. Or the way the team talks to you about their location. So there’s like all kinds of ways that you can achieve that through hospitality.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s a great point. And you know, again, being a digital marketing podcast, we share that about social media and making sure on social media you are highlighting those things. ’cause you’re absolutely right, you know, doing research now it might feel you’re going to a market, you’re brand loyal. Well guess what? There, there might be four or five of this brand in a certain market. What’s gonna kind of break the mold as, as you say, or kind of break you out that out of that trance of I’m just traveling here for business. No, this is gonna be a unique experience that sticks with me. So when I travel to another market that might for some reason that might just click subconsciously and say, I want to, I wanna stay at another home, two suites, good experience. So yeah, exactly. Now Hilton known for its innovation, uh, recently just named by Fast Company’s most innovative companies, 2024, the only hotel company to be recognized with that award. One of the innovative features you’re looking to implement by the end of 2024 is the guest ability to text on property request. I think this has become more and more of a need and want from guests. Talk to us about the importance of implementing new technology and how guest communication preferences have really evolved over the last couple years.
Talene Staab:
I’ll go back even further. It’s pretty incredible. And if you haven’t figured out by my timeline yet, I’ve been with Hilton my entire life, so I’ve seen a lot of things
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. You know, I’m trying to think here. What you just said was a great point of you’re trying to take the home experience home2 the brand. Obviously with Correlation there, you’re trying to take the home experience, put it into a hotel. I don’t know if, I’m trying to think of even at work now, I don’t have a physical phone, but I think the only time I’m pick up a phone now is at a hotel. Like I physically pick up a phone is at a hotel to do some of these requests, right? So this is something that we’ve seen not just in in Traveler space, but just every day. So it’s so exciting to hear this is, this was a great example of listening to guest feedback. But just seeing how our lives technology has evolved to the point where, okay, this is one of the last places where you’re picking up a phone now you don’t have to do that now you can text our associates and we’re just gonna have everything for you because you’re doing most of the texting anyways, you know, with, with your communication. So as we wrap up here, Talene, I’d love to hear, do a little predictions here for, for the next five years with Home Two Suites. What do you envision, what’s your vision as the brand leader?
Talene Staab:
Well, I am really excited, like I said, to hit all 50 states. I’m really excited to see how our European growth picks up because I feel like there’s, there’s a lot of potential there. Same with the Caribbean and Latin America. And, you know, I’m really excited about just the momentum that we’ve built. I mean, our numbers are incredibly strong, but I feel like we’re still on the hockey stick of growth and there’s, you know, I love that new guests are discovering Home2 that haven’t yet stayed yet. Our numbers are We have really strong occupancy, but there’s still a lot of people that haven’t experienced Home2 yet. So I’m really excited for the potential of the rest of the guests that haven’t yet found us to try. And I, I really get excited about meeting new owners too, and developers that are getting into the space and Home2 is perfect for them to, to try that out and, and join us. So there’s just a lot of, there’s still a lot of upside on a brand that’s already doing incredibly well. So I’m really excited about that.
Ryan Embree:
There’s definitely more meat on the bone on, on both, like you said, the owner developer side as well as new guests exploring and experiencing this brand for the first time and hopefully becoming advocates and users again and returning guests. So really exciting there. We’ll see how you take this, uh, as we, as we called it, Mid-Teen Year brand as it goes out of its adolescence into, into young adulthood. So excited.
Talene Staab:
I have two teenagers in real life, so I’m hoping I do a better job with Home2 than I do with them. We’ll see, well ask me in a couple years.
Ryan Embree:
Okay, well, we’ll have you back on for sure. Well, I wanna thank you Talene, for, for hanging with me on theSuite Spot. I wanna thank our audience for joining me and we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot takes a trip to Atlanta to visit the Reverb Downtown Atlanta by Hard Rock and uncovers how the unique property is one-of-a-kind and gives travelers a rocking guest experience during their hotel stays. From modern amenities like a reverberation room to a rooftop bar that sets your sights on the breathtaking ATL skyline, this episode covers all the exciting developments and why this destination should be your next booking.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello Everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. If you’re watching us on YouTube, as you can tell, we are not in the content creation studio. So that must mean we are here on site, part of our Suite Spot Spotlight series. I’m here with Derek at the Reverb by Hard Rock Atlanta. Derek, thank you so much for inviting us here.
Derek Sumpter :
It’s absolutely my pleasure. Happy to have you here. Thanks for coming.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And let me tell you, there’s just an energy walking into this place. We’re gonna talk a lot about this because this, this is really fits the bill with this series. And if you’re listening or watching us for the first time, our Suite Spot Spotlight series is all about highlighting those unique and historic hotels in our industry across the country. This property certainly fits the bill, but this is your first time on the Suite Spot. Yes, it does. We like to talk to hospitality professionals and hear their stories. We know it’s such a sometimes career paths. Take us all over the place where we start. Tell us a little bit about your journey to the Reverb.
Derek Sumpter :
Alright, sounds great. Well, I’ve been in the hospitality business since I was roughly 10 years old. Growing up my family had restaurants. So from the time I was seven, eight years old, I was washing dishes in my family’s restaurants. With that being said, went to college, was not planning on being in the hotel business. I happened to get a job as a room service waiter at a hotel, and kind of fell in love with it, fell in love with the day to day, fell in love with something different. I liked the energy of it all. And no two days were ever the same. So with that being said, just really kind of worked my way up the ranks and wound up here in downtown Atlanta at the beautiful Reverb by Hard Rock. So, you know, it’s been a long, it’s been a long journey. You know, Florida, uh, New York City, Little Rock, Arkansas, and I worked, did 20 years with Marriott. So this is kind of my first stint with Hard Rock, and with this brand, but definitely happy that I found them. They found me, I should say.
Ryan Embree:
So, yeah. Well, it certainly matches the energy. Let me tell you that the property does, and, you know, a couple couple things we always hear, right. Not expecting to be in the industry. Fell in love with the industry. Those are two common threads that we hear all the time from people that we interview. That’s true. Just like your yourself. And it’s just all about people serving people. And we need more of these stories. I talk to industry leaders all the time. We need more of these stories so we can share what a career in hospitality looks like. Because there are a lot of people out there that might not be thinking about a hospitality. They fall into it and all of a sudden you’re here at the reverb.
Derek Sumpter :
I would say most of the people that I know that are in the hospitality industry, were not planning to be in the hospitality industry before they started into it, you know, so it, it’s amazing how everybody, it just kind of draws you in, kind of sucks you in a little little bit, per se.
Ryan Embree:
Makes it so unique. Yeah, absolutely. And a unique experience and story. So let’s, let’s turn our attention to this property, right? Now very unique property, very unique. So much so. It’s the only one in the world. So tell us a little bit about the story of the brand and literally travelers are experiencing this for the first time ever. So tell us a little bit about that.
Derek Sumpter :
Well, the Reverb brand, as you just said, we are the only one currently in the world. Hard Rock was looking to get out of the, not really get out, but try something different. They’re known for their resorts and for their casinos right now. So they’re looking for a lifestyle branded hotel that really brought music, the music fan, local culture, local food, local wine, local drinks, everything all coming together in one gathering spot. Whereas Hard Rock hotels are really geared towards the artist, Reverb hotels are geared towards the fan. Like we do not call our guest guests, we call them fans. You check into Will call here instead of a normal front desk. So, with that being said, really trying to bring the fan experience to the forefront instead of the artist experience. So with that being said, 100% lifestyle, some will say boutique, I don’t necessarily call it boutique. I do call it select-serve, but with a full service tone, if that makes sense.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And one thing I’m a fan of is the location for this. Now, if you’re watching us right now, if I look to my right, I could probably throw a baseball to the Mercedes-Benz. Well, maybe not me, but someone could. And, tell us a little bit about this unique location. You’ve got Rolling Stones this summer. You got college football playoff in 2025. The World Cup in 2026. You’re gonna be at the doorstep of the World Cup. Absolutely. Tell us a little bit about this location and the energy that it brings in the morning of a big event like this.
Derek Sumpter :
Oh, it is just, it is absolutely insane. We are 100% the closest hotel to the Mercedes-Benz Stadium. For those of you who don’t know, Mercedes-Benz Stadium is the home of the Atlanta Falcons. Um, it is roughly five years old at this point in time. It is the most echo friendly stadium in the world as we speak. Um, 90% of the power is, is, is off of, off of solar panels. So with that being said, we get a crowd here that is here to have a good time. Okay. We are not cookie cutter the energy on a game day, for example, on a football game day, if it’s a one o’clock game, I mean, it starts at nine o’clock in the morning. Okay. With people in the lobby, people utilizing our food and beverage services, going to the rooftop bar. We have DJs, we have live music. We like to consider ourself the place to be before any type of event that is in downtown Atlanta here. Um, you know, for example, tonight we have Nicki Minaj at the State Farm Arena, which is direct, probably 200 yards from the front door here. So with that being said, we attract the fan that is here to have a good time, that they want to come here to have fun. Right. And that, as you heard, when you walked in the lobby this morning, you could hear the music already blaring at 8:30pm in the morning, the music’s loud. And we just bring in energy. We want people to be awake, we want people to be energized, have a good time, you know, get, get going per se.
Ryan Embree:
So it, it almost feels like we’re so close. It almost feels like an extension of the stadium. And this is kind of a place where fans and concert goers and everyone kind of gets ready for this event, all kind of cohorts down to the stadium.
Derek Sumpter :
I mean, you could, you walk to the front door, it’ll take you three minutes. You know, so with that being said, we are in the primetime location and we appreciate that. So we each really try to put an atmosphere out there that is almost rivaling what they’re, what’s gonna happen in the stadium. You know, if no, per, if Taylor Swift was coming across the street, we’d, we’d have a Taylor Swift, you know, cover band playing in the lobby, you know? We really try to cater to around what’s happening across the street. Love that. So we, we really appreciate having it right there, that’s for sure.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Super smart. Now, as we know, not every single night is gonna host an event here. But even without an event, this hotel just feels like an experience. I mean, some of the amenities that we have, we’re in a room right now, where you can conduct a podcast on site if you wanted to.
Derek Sumpter :
Yes. And we are not the first ones to do a podcast out of this, out of this room. I can tell you that much right now. But, but absolutely, we really try to give the fan an experience where they’re on air. Okay. We want them to, to feel like they’re in a special type of place where they can one, be themselves, two, have a good time, and three, just really have everything come about. That is exactly what they want to do. I mean, we’ve had live radio broadcasting in here. We’ve had entertainers in here doing live podcasts and broadcast, and not just in this room. The whole entire lobby area is really geared towards broadcasting, having a good time and putting yourself out there.
Ryan Embree:
Well, there’s a sound booth as well that guests can come in and can play instruments.
Derek Sumpter :
Absolutely. You know, if, I mean, we have guitars set up in there. We have amplifiers. Uh, one of ’em is actually a reverberation room where we have woofers and all the seats and then the walls. So when you plug in your guitar and you do the downstroke on it, it’s gonna shake the, it’s gonna shake the whole building. So it’s pretty cool. Once again, it’s all about the experience. We want our fans leaving out this front door saying, that was something very unique that I’ve never experienced before. So I wanna come back, you know what I mean? We certainly see a ton of return customers coming back to this place whenever there’s something going on in downtown Atlanta.
Ryan Embree:
Another part uniqueness, speaking on that is your dining and that rooftop. That I just took our breath away when you gave me a tour of the property. Absolutely. Talk a little bit about that. The name of it I think is, is also very unique.
Derek Sumpter :
It’s an interesting name. You know, it’s RT60 is the name of our rooftop bar. I’m a little biased, but I will say that I think we have the best view of downtown Atlanta from our rooftop bar.
Ryan Embree:
It’s hard to argue.
Derek Sumpter :
We can see directly north all the way to, if you’re familiar with downtown Atlanta, our bar really looks north. It goes to, you can see all the way to Buckhead from, from our bar. Um, we have a wide open view where there’s a lot of hotels in downtown Atlanta that have rooftop bars. It’s very limited because of the buildings and everything is kind of blocked in. But we do have the wide open view up there, and I’m sure you’ll show some pictures when you’re here, when you’re going on, going online there. But, once again, it just brings another dynamic to the hotel. Once again, another piece of energy that we absolutely love. But RT60, it is you not, you would think it’s Rooftop 60. Which is absolutely not Rooftop 60. Okay. RT is reverberation tone. Okay. 60, which is the perfect tone. Okay. Which is the perfect sound. And there’s also a rooftop RT60 bar in New York City, and it’s kind of a Hard Rock thing, but we get it a lot where it’s rooftop 60, that’s kind of cool. It’s a 64, but people, I say, no, it’ Reverberation Tone 60.
Ryan Embree:
And, and I would encourage you to go online, certainly look at the pictures, but it doesn’t do it justice. I mean, you gotta come to the rooftop. You have to see that view for yourself, especially at nightly, I would imagine with the lights of the city and everything like that.
Derek Sumpter :
Yeah. It’s absolutely beautiful up there. Just when the, you know, daytime does not do it justice, just like Ryan said, nighttime is where it’s at because you get the lighting, you get the view of the stadium, the stadium changes, colors. It, it, and it’s just, it’s just a great scene up there, you know, and especially we love it because when, when fans are coming outta the stadium, they can see right. To the building and see that there’s actually action and stuff going on up there. So it’s really like a tidal wave coming out the front door of the building coming around the corner to the hotel. So, so it’s, it’s very good. It’s a good thing for us, and it’s a good thing for the brand for sure.
Ryan Embree:
It’s, it’s so immersive. This, this experience that you get here, I think that’s, that’s the word that really describes it. I mean, you can even go to your website. One of the features I absolutely love about this is you can get a Spotify playlist. You can, uh, from RT 60. But that’s just, you know, that really, just touches on the technology. And, and some of the cool features that you have here. We were in, uh, one of the, the roadie rooms. Yep. Uh, which are, is very unique as well. But talk to us a little bit about implementation of technology, why that was a priority with the Reverb brand.
Derek Sumpter :
Well, that’s, you know, once again, going after, we’re going after that, that demographic that is, that is tuned in. Right. They’re, they live off their phones, they live off their laptops. They live off their iPads. So we want everything to be integrated. So you mentioned Alexa. Alexa can control the lights. Alexa, can you, can we all know Alexa, right? Yeah. You can do whatever you want, right? Yeah. But that’s kind of what the new, the new travelers kind of expecting that these days. Right? Absolutely. And we kind of want it to be the forefront of it. You know, we are the only brand, as far as I know, that does have Alexas in all the guest rooms at this point in time. You know, I know Hard Rock is probably gonna be rolling them out to all the other Hard Rock properties here very soon. But we, we think it’s a great tool. Everything from, you know, suggestions for restaurants to playlists. You mentioned the Spotify playlist. It’s on there.
Ryan Embree:
Karaoke, was it?
Derek Sumpter :
We do have karaoke in the, in the, in the rodeo room as well. So, so once again, we want people not to just sit in their rooms and be, to be bored, per se. We want them to be hanging out, having a good time, jamming the music. When you check into the hotel, you check into your room, the music’s already playing in your room. That’s, and it just kind of sets the tone for the minute that you walk in the front door. Right. So we, we feel it’s very important. We have to have that. We’re a Hard Rock. We start our Reverb, but we are a Hard Rock, and I think the fan expects a little, a little more. If that, if that makes sense.
Ryan Embree:
It, it absolutely does. And I would even argue, you know, having something like Alexa in the room also brings that little piece of home with you. You know what I mean? So you’ve got this unique experience, but you also have this familiarity of being like, oh, I can put, you know, Alexa to play my favorite music as I get ready for the big concert. Or get ready for the game and then put my fight song on, on the Alexa. Something I typically do at the house. So, so another really unique thing, you had mentioned the Hard Rock, and taking little bits of the location. And one of the things I think is one of the coolest things is city guides. Talk to us a little bit about, for those who aren’t familiar, what the city guides are and how that can make the most of a traveler experience.
Derek Sumpter :
Absolutely. Well, a city guide is, what we’ve done is we’ve reached out to people that grew up in, not only in this community of this is, we’re located in Atlanta, but the neighborhood is called Castleberry Hill. But we’ve really reached out to local artists. I mean that, and that’s performers, um, singers, bands, uh, even graffiti artists, really asking them what they like to do when they’re in Atlanta. So you could strictly, you could go to Alexa and say, you know, I’ll give you an example of Ceelo Green, for example. You know, Ceelo Green will tell you what his favorite restaurants are, where he hangs out what his favorite record shops are, where he likes to buy clothes. You know, so it really gives you a personalized experience from the artist eyes of what they love to do when they’re in this area of town. Right. I mean, we have everything from heavy metal bands to hip hop artists to once again, painters and mural artists up there that kind of give you their take on the local city. So it kind of, once again, it immerses you into the local scene. Right. And it, and it, instead of going on your phone and googling what’s, what’s a good restaurant? Right. You can go to Ceelo Green’s favorite restaurant, you know, you can go to Post’s, favorite restaurant, you know. And so that’s, to me, that just brings another added layer of getting people comfortable of coming to, to where they are.
Ryan Embree:
That’s, yeah, that’s exactly what I was gonna say. I mean, coming for work or leisure, you know, the one thing you’re trying to do is experience what it’s like to be in that city and location. And these city guides are so cool. It’s, especially to have like a connection with maybe an artist that you really, really enjoy. And say, you know what, this is, this is so perfect. Like, there’s something special to that.
Derek Sumpter :
I agree. And like you said, it brings that local into the hotel, right? Yeah. And that’s gonna be unique to every Reverb hotel that is going forward. Wherever artists are from that specific hotel, they’re gonna have city guides there. So it is pretty cool. And it’s definitely unique to this brand. And I can promise you there’s no other hotel brands that have something like that, that effect right now.
Ryan Embree:
That’s a really cool, now being that you’re the only one in the world. It’s important for any hotel to tell their story. Y You know, prior to guests arriving. Even more so for the only hotel in the world. Like the Reverb by Hard Rock Atlanta. This is a digital marketing podcast. We talk all the time about using things like social media, uh, reputation sites to kind of set the experience, especially unique absolutely. Experience that you have here. So how do you use those two platforms to really maybe set the table before someone walks into that lobby?
Derek Sumpter :
Absolutely key to be quite honest with you. Um, from everything from our, our social media, um, just kind of setting the tone and setting the vibe of what you’re gonna get when you walk in the front doors here. You know, we we’re very specific about our social media posts are very pointed as food and beverage as, you know, kind of what’s going on across the street that, that way, you know. But as far as the reviews go, absolutely paramount. You know what I mean? We all know that’s the first thing we look at when we’re booking rooms. I know that I do, whenever I’m booking a hotel room or an Airbnb somewhere, I’m looking at the reviews of the property. And it’s key. I mean, if your garbage, it doesn’t matter what kind of product that you put out there, people are not gonna come. And we really rely on those and we really try to touch base with any fan that puts a review in negative or, or positive. We wanna get their feedback to know what we did wrong and how we’re gonna get better. Right. So absolutely paramount. We all know that people rely on those these days. I think these days more than ever. ’cause everybody lives off their phones. So we definitely live by our reviews and by our social media posts so that, ’cause nobody would know we’re here if it wasn’t for social media, to be quite honest with you. I, that’s still living in Atlanta. I still, people, I, when I tell them where I work, they say, where’s that? We still don’t know about it. You know? And so, so that being said, I, I point ’em right to the, to to our awesome little website that we have, our brand site’s. Very interactive as well. So big part of it absolutely huge for us. We, we rely on it just like any hotel or business does these days.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And you, you wanna set the right expectation because you, again, you have such a unique experience, you know, when that Taylor Swift concert comes to town or either SEC championships across the street. And you walk in and everyone’s kind of getting ready and geared up. Right? We want those good surprises as we talk about hospitality. Like, wow, I wasn’t expecting like, for it to be like this, not, wow. I wasn’t expecting it to like that.
Derek Sumpter :
And we get a few of those too, to be quite honest with you. But I would say our, our reviews and the word of mouth is genuinely positive about this property, to be quite honest with you.
Ryan Embree:
I, I can imagine. Yeah. Pretty outstanding. Well, let’s do some rapid fire here, Derek. Because as we start to wrap up the episode, uh, get to know you and the property a little bit more. I love these questions. Uh, I think I might know the answer to this one, but I’ll ask you anyways. Favorite view on the property?
Derek Sumpter :
Okay. Well, you would think, I’m probably gonna say RT60, but you’re gonna, you’re gonna be wrong there. Okay. My favorite, my favorite view is actually from our roadie room. Okay. If, if you’re in the living room section of our roadie room, the, the Mercedes-Benz Stadium is perfectly framed in the window there. So when I’m showing potential clients or potential guests in the hotel, I kind of always take ’em to that first. Yeah. ’cause ’cause once again, it kind of frames it out. But you can’t go wrong with the RT60 view. Obviously it’s beautiful, it’s all a downtown Atlanta. But if I had to pick one specific one, it would definitely be in the roadie room.
Ryan Embree:
But explain for those, for those who don’t know. Explain what the roadie room is, because they’re really, really unique room type.
Derek Sumpter :
Well, our roadie room is basically think roadie. You think tour bus, you think of people traveling on the road, right? So our roadie room is kind of designed after a tour bus. We have six stacked double, or our queen beds, I should say. And then it kind of looks like a tour bus. So if you’re walking down the hallway of a tour bus and you got, they got curtains on them, you know, so it’s a very unique room. It sleeps up to 14 people. Once again, roadie room, it’s, it’s a very unique room. And I can promise you there’s nobody, no brand that has a roadie room like that. Yeah. I know brands are trying to copy it right now. I know that for a fact. ’cause I’ve had a couple reach out to me saying, how did you guys put this together? But with that being said, it is definitely an experience that you’re not gonna get. I mean, the way I look at it is this, you’ve got a group of friends coming to see a concert at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium or coming to a football game. Yep. You got everything. You got two bathrooms in there. It’s just, it’s like a, your own private apartment slash party space. Yeah. That is all yours, karaoke machine. Um, once again, beautiful views of the city, you know, 80 inch television. It’s just a very great experience. It’s, it’s an outstanding room and I hopefully you’ll put some pictures in of it, but it, it’s really cool.
Ryan Embree:
So next question. Favorite dish on property?
Derek Sumpter :
Oh boy. I’m a huge fan of the pulled pork sliders. The chef, very nice. The chef does his own pork back there and makes his own. And, you know, our menu is very, it’s basically food truck inspired. Okay. So with that being said, everything’s kind of grab and go, you know, you know, one bite, one handful, not, you know, not big, massive plates of food. Everything is meant to kind of be transportable, kind of walking around eating it. But, but I would’ve to say my favorite dishes by far, the Caroline, the, the pulled pork sliders, our, our chef makes own barbecue sauce and smokes his own pork. So it’s pretty outstanding. Nice. To be quite honest with you.
Ryan Embree:
Oh, nice. Very nice. Yeah. Uh, favorite piece of art?
Derek Sumpter :
Oh boy. We have this beautiful mural that is in our, one of our meeting spaces over there that was made by a local artist in it’s Atlanta based all the way. It is absolutely gorgeous. And, um, I wish I could show you right now, but it’s got outkast on it for gosh sake, and I love Outkast. So there’s a lot of unique to Atlanta scenes on this mural. And once again, it brings Atlanta into the hotel.
Ryan Embree:
That’s why I love, love asking these questions. Is because, you know, some, some people might walk by a meeting space and not know the intricate details of, you know, so to being able to know, to pop in your head to see that, that, that mural. Really, really cool to know the background story behind.
Derek Sumpter :
It’s awesome. A local artist, you know. Very, very cool.
Ryan Embree:
Okay. So as we wrap up today, you know, I wanna get as the general manager. I think you alluded to this earlier, but I always ask hospitality people when they walk out of this, they check out at will call, right? Of your lobby and they walk out those doors. What do you hope as the general manager is their, what are they saying? What, what’s their experience? What, what do you hope that gets tell?
Derek Sumpter :
Well, first and foremost, I want them to say, wow. Okay. Wow. That was something that I’ve never experienced before. Okay. That was something completely different that kinda like you alluded to earlier, that I wasn’t expecting. I just want them to take that memory away that they had a wonderful wow experience that cannot be duplicated at any other property or any other hotel except for the Reverb brand. Right. And I kind of believe that we’re, we’re getting a lot of that, to be quite honest with you. You know, the smiles I see on the faces walking out here in the morning, and it feels like to me that they’re, as they’re leaving, they’re still having a good time because our, our team, our crew, you know, we don’t call our, we don’t call our staff members, staff or associates. We call them crew, you know? Yeah. We look for fun. We want our crew members to be having fun with the fans as they’re walking out the front door. So they are taking that away from them as they’re walking outta here. They’re, they’re, they’re still having fun. Even though they might be a little sad or a little bummed out that they’re checking out, we still want them smiling and laughing as they’re walking through the front door, because to me, that’s gonna be the last impression that they have of the property. And once again, we want them to come back.
Ryan Embree:
What a cool, what a cool job. It must be fun to be working. It’s here, it’s fun. And be a part of those experiences. So I wanna thank you and your team for hosting us here at the Suite Spot. Certainly check out the Reverb by Hard Rock Atlanta online, download that Spotify, look at the city guides. You can find all that information right there.
Derek Sumpter :
It’s all right there.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And look, and then check out what the event schedule.
Derek Sumpter :
Right. And we also, and just to, to kind of, to jump on that a little bit, we also have a lady named Eve that’s on our website as well, that you can type in any type of questions. It’s all AI interactive. She will give you directions, she’ll tell you what’s going on in the city. She’ll tell you everything on our website. So you could be like, I’m coming in on April 14th, what’s going on in the city of Atlanta? You could type that all in with Eve and she’ll give you all that information right there. So you’ll cool. You can almost build your agenda and your itinerary before you even get to the city. So it’s, it’s pretty cool.
Ryan Embree:
That touches on that technology aspect that we talked about. Well, Derek, thank you again. The warm welcome at this. Appreciate you at this beautiful property, we’ll to you next time on the Suite Spot.
Derek Sumpter :
Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Sweet Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Barry Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Emre, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Managing Director at the Caribe Royale Orlando, Amaury Piedra, checks in to the Suite Spot in our latest Spotlight series episodes to give viewers the 4-1-1 on the $140+ million dollar re-imagination of the resort and what guests can expect from the remarkable expansion and transformation.
This episode covers some key digital marketing topics like social media for hoteliers and gives insight into the traveler’s journey through the Caribe Royale Orlando property experience.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you for joining us wherever you’re listening or watching us on your YouTube. Hopefully you are watching this episode because we are live on site for our Suite Spot: Spotlight series at another amazing, incredible hotel. But before that, I’m gonna bring in our guest Amuary Piedra, Managing Director of the Caribe Royale Orlando. Amaury, thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot.
Amaury Piedra:
No, thanks for taking the time to be here. Happy to have you here.
Ryan Embree:
You know, I had the pleasure of walking the grounds and having a tour of this amazing resort. I feel like hopefully in that app that you provide, you got a map in there because there is so much to do. But before we get talking about this hotel, which, which we’re certainly gonna do today, tell us a little bit about your hospitality background. One of my favorite questions to ask because in this hospitality world we’re in, you can start any which way as a bellman you can be born into the industry. Tell us a little bit about your background.
Amaury Piedra:
Sure. I grew up in south Florida and I actually got my first hotel job at the age of 15. So I’m not gonna give my age away, but let’s just say it was over 40 years ago. And, uh, it was valet parking, and that’s where I started in the industry parking cars and I’ve done a multitude of positions and up to, and I wanted to get to my goal of being a general manager, managing director. And that happened around the time I was 30, but it was fantastic. It’s, it’s what I’ve done my whole life.
Ryan Embree:
You know it’s funny, I started as a bellman valet over here on the other, the side of me. I feel like if we wanna get a good gauge of maybe the hoteliers of the future, go to our front desk or go to maybe those frontline and there’s gonna be a story there. But I think it’s so important and critical that you have that background too, because when you do get in this, this managing, you know, GM, you know, we have front desk managers, now you’ve got an idea of what the job is and the day ins and day outs and, and that really is gonna serve you in your hospitality career.
Amaury Piedra:
Well, you know, I always tell our associates when we’re doing new hire orientation that you can go as far as you want to go. And I use myself as an example. So it doesn’t matter what position you’re in now, if you apply yourself, you can go to whatever you wanna get to. You can achieve whatever you want. And, I enjoy speaking with our hourly associates because they’re really the ones on the ground, you know, taking care of our guests and whatnot. So yeah, it’s a great industry that’s provided, you know, great opportunities for myself, my family, and many others.
Ryan Embree:
Those frontline employees definitely have their ears to the floor. We’ll talk about the guest experience here and how you prioritize that at the Caribe Royale, let’s get into this property, right? So the reason we’re here, this is the Suite Spot: Spotlight series. So for those that are listening or watching this, that really don’t know what this series is about – we’re traveling all over the country to highlight some of the most unique and historical properties that we’ve run into. Here at the Caribe Royale, you just went through this incredible $140 million, re-imagining. Talk to us a little bit about the history of the property. It’s not like this was built to overnight, obviously, it’s got a long historic history. And then what led to this, to this re-imagining of the property.
Amaury Piedra:
So, our owners, Sierra Land Group group based in California started building the hotel. Well, the first tower opened in 1994, and then the rest was built in phases. So it had a, it had a solid history here in Orlando, but they really central Florida, but they really wanted to elevate what Caribe was. So about four years ago, we started having discussions. I wasn’t here yet, but we started having discussions about what we needed to do to elevate the property to a four diamond, top of the market convention and leisure resort. So we embarked on that mission about three and a half years ago, and it’s actually more than 140 million at this point. But we’ve, uh, I think achieved what we wanted to achieve and we’ve gotten great reviews from the public.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, well, congratulations, to you and your team. Like I said, I had the, the pleasure of walking the grounds so much to do at, at a resort like this. And, you know, one of the questions I had on the tour was how do you get all of this packed and, and set the expectations for your guests that come on property? Because I can’t imagine when they first step on that you have things from like pickleball, for example. You have catch and release fishing at the property. Those to just name a couple. But how do you pack that whole guest experience prior to a guest arrival at the property?
Amaury Piedra:
You know, we have a lot of information on our website, and when we send out our, our pre-stay message, we pack as much information in there as possible. Then our front office has the duty of explaining it to them and providing the property map. The reality is, you know, we’ve had to stay in tune with the times. Pickleball recent phenomenon, Paddle Tennis, another recent phenomenon. So we built those courts to address what the voice of the customer was asking that we needed. You know, and then so you’ve got that, then you’ve got the catch and release fishing, which is always popular with families. You’ve got the bicycle rentals, you’ve got the trails, so you’ve got the water slide. You know, you’ve got a variety of things. So I guess what happens is there really is something for everybody. So, if you’re here on business, you know, you’ve got, you wanna go exercise state-of-the-Art Health Club, as well as the pickle ball and the paddle tennis. You’re here with your family. You got the pools, you got the slide, you got the, the catch and release fishing, you got the bicycles. You know, if you want to take a spa treatment, you’ve got a spa. So you’ve really got something for everybody. And that was kind of, we wanted to make sure that as we reimagine the resort, we could take care of all the different types of business and travelers that come to Orlando.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And, and you made a great point about listening to your guests, also keeping up with the trends, right? And kind of getting that we’ve already talked about it, putting your ear to the floor and saying, okay, this is, this is what the guests anticipate here, but there are those things that maybe they come on to property and they didn’t know that they were gonna have. And that there’s that, that surprise and delight aspect of, of the property that certainly, you know, creates experiences which in the hospitality, That’s what it’s all about. So, well, let’s talk about, as a sports lover, my favorite place. And I have heard in the news, and if you’re in Orlando, maybe outside of Orlando, you know, you’ve heard about The Stadium Club here at the Caribe Royale Orlando. I will tell you the pictures, do not do it justice. So travel here, and come see this concept. It is so cool. What type of feedback are you getting from guests that are, that are seeing this? Because it’s such a unique dining outlet.
Amaury Piedra:
You know, not to use a sporting analogy, but it’s been a home run so far. And we worked on creating this unique, this is not something that, that’s anywhere else. So we wanted to create something unique. And we worked with a design firm that I’ve worked with before Street Sense, so kudos to them. And, we worked on this together for two years, putting Stadium Club together, and we wanted to make it feel as if you were in a stadium. So the sound system is state of the art, the audio visual systems, state of the art. So we wanted, and we designed kind of like that, that circular tv video, kind of like SoFi Stadium where the Chargers play. So it’s, it’s created a great sensory experience and it’s, it’s been very well received. There’s nothing like it in Orlando. Simulators, elevated sports bar food, great drink menu, the overall sensory experience, the lights, the sound, the smoke, the this, the that. So it’s really been a lot of fun and it’s been very, very well received by all the customers. So we’re happy. You never quite know until you open. You know, we thought we had done it right, but it was very well received. We’ve gotten a lot of press out of it.
Ryan Embree:
Well, A+ marks over here. I mean, to speak to what you’re talking about, it is completely immersive. Yep. You know, which is is what you want in a, in a sporting event, if you can’t be physically there for you to be watching and enjoying that sporting event like that it’s very unique. One of a kind. So mission accomplished there to you and your team.
Amaury Piedra:
The Super Bowl’s a perfect example of that. We had over 500 people in the venue. And when the halftime show came on, first of all, during the game, but when the halftime show came on, brought down the lights a little bit, turned up the, the sound system, it was like you were at the halftime experience, the halftime concert. So it was really, really encouraging to see. And people really vote with their feed. And the volume has been good so far.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure. Yeah. On the tour I was saying, you know, there’s multiple areas, and I think this is part of the re-imagining process, right? Of like, adapting to what you want to see in those spaces. I think before it was a ballroom and then you converted it to this stadium club, where it could be rented out by meeting planners and groups that come on property. Talk to me about that. because I’m sure these planners for these events, which I’ve talked about on this podcast, rather they’re coming back by storm now. I think that we had the revenge travel of the leisure. But there’s a revenge travel of groups and events. Now. Tell us a little bit about how that process is for me. I’m sure they’re ecstatic when they come on a property like this. They say, I can have my take care of my business, but I can also take care of my employees or associates or attendees. Talk to us about that process of, you know, from start to finish what you and your team do.
Amaury Piedra:
Sure. First of all, when we went into planning what we were gonna do with the re-imagination, what we did was, okay, great. What do we believe the leisure guest is gonna want so we can fulfill that? And what do we believe the meeting planner’s gonna want and the groups are gonna want, and what are they gonna need? And how do we fulfill that? So we, we reimagined it with all that in mind. And, and that, that took a lot of planning. But, you know, the Stadium Club’s a perfect example. So we knew that we were missing this vibrant restaurant bar that people could go to at night. We had some good venues, but it wasn’t as much as what we have there now. And a really fun venue. So that’s how that came about, because we have enough meetings. We sell the original meeting room for the hotel, now we’ve got our 220,000 plus square feet at the convention center. So we took that, we reimagined it. And what’s happened now, it’s the reviews from the meeting planners have been great. Not only on Stadium Club, but we wanted to create restaurant quality food in a banquet setting. We’re able to accomplish that. We wanted to make sure we had the best service in banquets. So we’re able to pick the best team possible. That’s working out great. Our meeting planner satisfaction scores are 9.6 out of 10, which is fantastic. So, you know, we really wanted to create a seamless, just great experience for the meeting planners. At the same time, they didn’t know Caribe as a four diamond destination. So we spent 2020, 2021, and 2022 and continue today doing a lot of education and awareness. The good thing is, we are having over 55% return customers. So over 55% of the groups that booked here are coming back. And it would be higher. Some of them just go to different cities and different rotations. But that’s a fantastic number. And then they’re referring us to others. So we knew we needed to hit a home run when we first got them in. I believe we did that. In most cases, meeting planners are happy, end users are happy, and they’re referring us to their friends and others within their organizations. And, that’s playing a big, big role in it.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a really great cycle when you get that healthy kind of referral. Especially in the meeting planning and conference and event space. So this is a digital marketing podcast primarily. So we talk about a lot about social media using tools like social media, online reputation, because one of the most powerful stories, you know, we can do a great job at the property. I tell my audience this of trying to sell everything there is. But one of the most powerful stories is actually when it comes from the mouth of a guest or of a meeting planner, right? With those referrals that we just spoke to. So talk to us about this re-imagining and how you’ve used things like social media and relied on your online reputation. Because this is really just a re-introduction, right? As you mentioned of this, this resort. And to tell people this is a brand new experience you’re gonna have here.
Amaury Piedra:
Yeah. We have a great marketing department that we expanded and we wanted to make sure as an independent we could cover all bases. So we have people dedicated to social media to make sure we’re always getting the message out about what’s happening at the hotel, engaging with the customers that are on social media, putting responses down. We engage with them. We thank them. Same thing with reputation management. You know, we wanna make sure that if somebody comments on something, we act upon it so they know that we’re reading it and they know that we’re taking whatever they’re saying seriously. Either a compliment or, Hey, you could have done this better. That’s fantastic. Thank you for your feedback. Feedback is a gift. You know, we interact with them. And I think that goes a long way. And we’ve been exponentially growing in all our various social media platforms because of that. And the more that happens at the hotel, the more that we can engage with our customers. We do some live boxing events here that are televised internationally. That’s helped. We’re gonna do some music concerts starting in the new year. Not ready to announce that yet, but we’re gonna do a music series. So all that kind of stuff to keep not only the international customers, but even our locals involved with what’s happening at Caribe.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. It’s a snowball effect, like you said. And I wish more hoteliers out there would look at feedback, guest feedback as a gift sometimes because sometimes we think it’s a gift and a curse, but it really is, they’re taking time outta their day to hopefully give you a blueprint on how to perfect that guest experience. You can’t please everyone. We know that, but we can, we can darn near try.
Amaury Piedra:
I think that’s part of being an independent too. I mean, for many years I worked for one of the largest hotel companies in the world managing some of their largest hotels. We create our own brand standards and we need to live up to our own expectations. And I think by being an independent, we have more freedom to engage in different ways with customers and with some of the brands where, hey, the response should be this. Well, we can engage with them in different ways, and we try to take advantage of that as much as possible.
Ryan Embree:
Super smart. Yeah. I love that. I’m sure you leverage that independent status as well for staffing, you know? And some of the things that you’re able to do. I want to shift our conversation to that. Obviously we know staffing has just been this kind of thorn on our side in the industry. We haven’t been able to shake since the pandemic. It’s just been the staffing shortage. We just had Chip Rogers from the AHLA come on and kind of talk about this. What has been your experience with staffing here? Any creative new ways that you’re doing to retain or recruit talent at the Caribe Royale Orlando?
Amaury Piedra:
Well, you know, it’s funny, right? Because a lot of people still talk about being short and yeah. There’s never enough in some key areas. When we reopened in 2020, we actually had to bring in J-1 Visa workers and H-2B visa workers from Jamaica to help us. Because we didn’t have enough. But we really made it a point that we wanted to recruit and recruit the right people, bring them into the right atmosphere, treat them right, and they’ll stay. And over the last two years especially, we’ve been able to do that. We no longer bring in H-2B visa workers don’t need them. We have our own. And we really tried to foster a family atmosphere. And that was one of the biggest things that we wanted to accomplish. Treat the associates like family, make them part of the experience, make sure they’re valued, make sure their opinion is valued. And I think we’ve been able to accomplish that, because I don’t mind sharing that. Our turnover rate was only 18% last year. In the hospitality industry, that’s tremendous. And, you know, they’re happy, they’re engaged, you know, the hotel’s been doing well so that they’re happy from that perspective. And, you know, it’s one of my biggest initiatives. It’s one of my biggest things going forward as we continue to grow. We’re over a thousand associates right now. So as we continue to grow to make sure that we’re able to maintain that atmosphere and that culture that we’ve created, and have it flow all the way down. So we do a lot of things for the associates, and we make sure they’re valued and, and, uh, you know, we take the time to speak with ’em and listen to ’em, and their input’s valuable, and we act upon that input. So it doesn’t just fall on deaf ears. And I think that by doing that, you know, we’ve been able to have that low turnover and we’ve been able to create the right atmosphere.
Ryan Embree:
Well, yeah. It’s what we talked about at the top of the episode about creating, you know, stories like yourself, right? Of coming up in the hospitality ranks. I mean, if you have a thousand plus associates here at, at this property, how many are gonna get the, we want to keep them in hospitality as much as we can. And hopefully, you know, I can be on the other side of this table interviewing somebody else that had their start here.
Amaury Piedra:
One of our biggest responsibilities I always tell our managers is we gotta develop people. And who knows, they might end up going somewhere else, you know, two or three years from now. But the reality is we owe it to them to develop their max potential. And as much as possible. Probably 95% of the time we promote from within. And we gotta make sure we have people ready for that and, and have them ready for the opportunities if they so choose.
Ryan Embree:
That’s fantastic. Well, let’s shift our attention to where we are today. Beginning of March, we got this episode launch still in the spring, spring break. You know, the dreary winter. We don’t really have a dreary winter here in Florida, but for parts of the country. Right. But, but the spring’s starting to heat up a little bit. What do you got coming for spring break or even maybe looking into the summer months? Here at the Caribe Royale Orlando.
Amaury Piedra:
Yeah, we’ve got some great spring break offers that are available on our website. We’ve got some great summer offers that are available on our website. You know, we’ve got a lot of fun things happening around the pool deck. You know, it’s definitely gonna be an entertaining time period. Like I say, we’re gonna roll out a music series and some entertainment components soon. So there’s gonna be a lot going on at Caribe. I mean, the reality is, you know, Disney’s famous for its parks and you got Disney and Universal and all the others, but you gotta have entertainment on property too. Because people might take a break in between and what have you. So between some new food and beverage rollouts that we’re gonna do, some new initiatives we are gonna have going on in the pool deck. We just built a DJ booth over the waterfall. So the DJ will be playing up there all spring and summer over the waterfall. We’ve got some fun things going on out there. So I think it’s gonna be a great, great spring and summer and, you know, we encourage everybody to come down. I mean, it’s a great place to be.
Ryan Embree:
I want to post up on one of those cabanas, those things are nice right!
Amaury Piedra:
Yeah. The cabanas are cool. You know we started with two, there was demand, we added a third, and there’s demand for more. So it’s just a great place to hang out, either as a couple or with the family and just either catch up on a game on TV while the kids are in the pool or the water slide or just whatever. So it’s, it’s fantastic. It’s gone really well.
Ryan Embree:
My favorite time of year is certainly hoteliers just because of the busy season coming along. So, let’s do some rapid fire. So test your knowledge on your resort a little bit. Favorite view on property?
Amaury Piedra:
My favorite view on property is the one that happens on top of the waterfall. Seriously. That’s my favorite view. Where the DJ goes, okay, you’ve got the waterfall, you’re overlooking the entire pool. It’s, it’s a cool view. You’ve got the slide on one side. It’s a cool view. That’s why we wanted to activate that area.
Ryan Embree:
Fun fact about the property?
Amaury Piedra:
Fun fact about the property. I think that not many people would know that we stock our lakes with fish. So hence the catch and release. This is the first property that I’ve ever worked at or resort I’ve ever worked at, that we stock our own lake. So it’s fun and it’s, it’s cool when you see the families and the kids out there having that experience, you know, a father and either a daughter or their son or whatever, catching the fish and doing all that. And it’s, it’s very good to see.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. High probability of catching a fish.
Amaury Piedra:
High probability. We wanna make sure there’s a high probability of catching a fish.
Ryan Embree:
Yes. Yes. We want that experience for everyone there. Put it on social media.
Amaury Piedra:
By the way we have all the rods and reels and everything for them. So they, they don’t need anything.
Ryan Embree:
That’s a unique amenity. I love to hear. Favorite signature dish at the property?
Amaury Piedra:
There’s gotta be two. I’m sorry. So, we have probably Orlando’s Best Fried Chicken and Waffles at Stadium Club. It’s been award-winning from our chef, Jeff McGinness. He’s won many awards for it and even cooked it for the James Beard Foundation. Great Chicken and waffles, his grandmother’s recipe actually. And then the other one is the ribeye at Venetian. It is absolutely fantastic. So put it on a par or to challenge anybody at Morton’s or Capital, any of those Venetian chop house, the ribeye. Fantastic.
Ryan Embree:
Alright, last one here. Favorite piece of art at the property?
Amaury Piedra:
I like our, I like our living green wall that’s down at the ground floor of the reception building, you know, so those, those two living green walls are really cool and they really add something very unique. I mean, you can go places and you’ll have a piece of art or whatever, but that, that living green wall is, is exactly that. It’s something that’s alive and it’s a huge selfie spot because people love to take pictures in front of them. So, yeah, it’s cool with the Flamingo and what have you and the Aviary look and yeah, it’s become a really big selfie spot.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. Super picturesque. We’ve talked about it on this podcast. Having a unique space piece of art where people can engage with that on social media. And every single time you see it, you know, it’s your property. And, hopefully getting in there and engaging and doing that for social media.
Amaury Piedra:
By the way, you talked about a dish, I gotta say. Because it’s just popped in my mind, we make a killer mojito at Calypso, our pool-side bar & grill.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Mojito, Cabana, you sold me. Well, as we wrap up, you know, I always love asking this question, especially on our spotlight series, you know, walking into the property today as a guest, you get so excited you got this vacation planned. What do you want people to say as they leave? They check out, they turn in their keys as they’re leaving the property about their experience here at the Caribe Royale Orlando.
Amaury Piedra:
Our goal is to provide, I guess you can call it relaxed luxury. Casual luxury. We don’t want to be stuffy, but we’re four Diamond, but we want to provide that in what we call our royale service way. So our associates are really genuine, you know, we don’t script them too much because we want their personality to come through. So at the end when a guest is leaving, you know, the ultimate, oh, we had a great time. We look forward to coming back. And I think that’s the key. Hey, we had a great time. And whether it’s, whether you were here for a convention and say, wow, man, we had a great time here. Or you’re a family and you made a memory with your kids, that’s the key. And you know, that memory will serve you for years to come and we had a great time. We want to come back. That’s the biggest thing.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And well, you can see that with the return numbers that you were talking about. And, you know, when you have everything that you offer here, it’s easy for a transient leisure guest to come in and come with their family and say, you know what? I’m gonna suggest that we do this for a company retreat next year. Or vice versa. Right. I come in for a conference, didn’t know much about the property, and all of a sudden, Hey, next summer, let’s, let’s bring the wife and kids here.
Amaury Piedra:
Our staff’s empowered. Take care of the customer. You know, just, just make ’em happy. Take care of ’em. Don’t worry about things. Just make sure they’re happy. And that’s our goal. And you know, so far it’s been going well and we wanna make sure we are able to do that and execute that on a daily basis. But really it’s, you know, Hey, we had a great time. We want to come back. Nothing’s better to hear than that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Vote of confidence for sure. We covered a lot of ground on this, this episode. Any final thoughts today?
Amaury Piedra:
No, I appreciate your time. You know, appreciate it. Very proud of Caribe Royale. Proud of what we’ve accomplished, proud of the transformation of the hotel. And the good thing is that more and more people are coming every year. And you know, like you said, revenge travel started with the leisure side in 2020 and 2021 groups started exploding in 2021, 2022, continuing into 2023. And I thought we were, you know, we were in a perfect position having come out of Covid fully reimagined to take advantage of that. And you know, so far everything’s gone well. And for those that haven’t visited, look for our specials online, come visit, we encourage it and I think it’s just gonna continue to grow and we’re gonna continue to do fun things and continue to get the name out there.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, congratulations again, thank you on everything. And we’re next door neighbors. Our corporate office at Travel Media Groups right up the road, so we’ll certainly keep an eye on all the exciting things you have coming over here.
Amaury Piedra:
Oh, we’ll let you know too. We’re gonna make some announcements soon about a music series and all that, so, it’s gonna be great. But thank you for your time today. It’s truly appreciated.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Thank you for joining us on The Suite Spot. Thank you for listening or watching. Make sure to follow and subscribe to us wherever you get your podcasts and have a fantastic rest of your day. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star-rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Check out the top 5 takeaways from the 2024 Hunter Hotel Investment Conference and what they mean for hoteliers. Host Ryan Embree gives insight into key topics and conversations from the event for listeners so don’t worry if you weren’t able to attend or mis.
All the must-know details are right at your fingertips. Tune in!
Episode Transcript
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Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. We are back here in our content creation studio in our Travel Media headquarters in Maitland, Florida after a busy week at the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference in Atlanta. If you’re watching us on our YouTube page, you could see I don’t have my normal attire because that is how quickly I wasn’t even able to do laundry before I got back to the office to record this episode as this was just such an insightful, jam packed event. I wanted to make sure to get these key takeaways to you as quickly as possible. What such a great event. We’re gonna talk about that later in this episode, but wanted to spend some time just giving some key takeaways from the event, what we were hearing from our panelists, some of the interviews that we’re gonna be putting out there on our social content over the next couple weeks. So make sure if you’re not following Travel Media Group to do so, to get some exclusive insights and interviews and everyone we talk to at the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference. But let’s jump right into it because we’ve got five key takeaways to review. The first one is obviously the name of this is the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference, right? So everyone wants to kind of know what is the state of investment right now. There was a lot of cautious optimism, I would say, from this event and some of the panelists that were speaking so much so that, you know, when asked straight out, you know, whether they would invest right now, a lot of the panelists, majority of them would say yes and answer different types of markets. But it is interesting to see with all these kind of looming factors, whether it’s geopolitical inflation, interest rates, this is an election year, still this type of optimism. And I think what this comes from and stems from is right now to invest in hotels or in properties. If you wait until interest rates are going to fall, everyone’s gonna kind of jump into the ring. So people are trying to be the first one to jump into the pool, get an advantage right now, because again, if interest rates do fall in the second half of 2024, like their expected do, and our panelists are expert panelists had said, you might be late to the party or in a very crowded party and might not have the leverage right now. So I was really surprised with all the optimism, but great to see in a conference like that, the energy strategic partnerships announced, Hotel Equities with trust hospitality have made a big announcement. We actually have an interview with a key stakeholder from Hotel Equities kind of talking about that strategic partnership. So keep an eye out on that. But it was fascinating to hear the opinions on which markets to get into. And I do think that is an interesting trend that we’re seeing right now because some markets, like, Miami and Nashville, we actually spoke to an asset management company that has a couple assets in Nashville saying that they were running so hot that the growth is just not there like it used to be. And it’s interesting because everyone at you know, since the pandemic has been on this steady rate of recovery, but markets like Miami, Nashville, maybe they didn’t dip as low as some of these other populous cities, New York City, San Francisco, dc they are seeing large gains. So it’s interesting to see that kind of normalization come out between markets. It’ll be interesting to see where the investments go. We got to hear from the new AHLA and interim president/CEO, Kevin Carey, who gave us a great update on wins and the advocacy that AHLA continues to do. All the great work that the AHLA foundation is doing to try to get to combat the staffing shortages. Right now, we’re gonna talk about, that was certainly a topic that was talked about at the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference and just felt and resonated. And there’s a couple, we’ve been going through this staffing shortage for so long. There’s, there’s actually some things in our designs with new prototypes and announcements at Hunter that correlate with the staffing shortages and trying to find key efficiencies. A lot of talk about conversions and renovations versus new builds. Panelists from Blackstone was up on stage talking about really how they haven’t invested in any new builds, but rather focused on their assets because it’s just cheaper to renovate a current asset than go out and buy a new one. So really interesting there. One of the panelists had a great line, I’m not sure if I’m gonna get it correct, but saying that we essentially have too much supply and it’ll be interesting to see what happens with these old assets if there’s conversions or if it’s better to just knock them down and start a new, especially with all these new brands that are being announced, which we had the opportunity and privilege to speak to one of those at the Hunter Hotel Conference. But the state of the industry, again, a lot of optimism Right now we’re running really, really hot. And I think that kind of in the back of everyone’s mind with these looming factors, people are weary, but there’s still positive overall consumer sentiment is positive out there. There’s still room for growth in things like groups and meeting business, which a lot of experts are bullish on and think that that’s gonna really, we’re gonna start to see that catch up to the leisure traveler, which has really been carrying the weight of occupancy and demand right now. So, cautious optimism, love the energy though out there. Transactions deals are trying to be had, even with all these kind of storm clouds maybe up ahead, just because there’s those storm clouds doesn’t mean it’s necessarily gonna rain. Key takeaway number two goes to efficiency, the high cost of FF&E staffing shortages. Wages rising in our industry, the focus is now on efficiency for hotels. Owners are looking, brands are designing for owners more efficient designs and prototypes. There were a couple announcements. We had the privilege of being able to head over in Atlanta to the IHG Design Center where they showed us some of their newer brands, Atwell, Garner. And it was interesting to see how efficiencies were built into their concepts. One of the ones that I found absolutely fascinating, such a smart move is connecting their front desk to their F&B outlet. So they would have a single employee or two employees be able to man both the front desk as well as the bar with some F&B, some small F&B options as an added additional revenue source for the hotel. But it really cut down on the number of staff that might be able to, that you would have to essentially hire or put full-time at a position, you know, smaller designs in the room, less square footage to make it more efficient for housekeeping to be able to fit more rooms into a specific property if you have obviously a smaller room there, figuring out ways to become more efficient. We’ve talked about that a lot on this podcast of are your employees, are your associates spending the time that is most useful to them to help improve the guest experience? So brands have have to balance that, right? They have to balance the guest experience. I don’t wanna make the room too small where it, where it’s actually gonna impact the guest experience, but I don’t wanna make it so large that the owners aren’t going to be happy or franchise ultimately that brand. So it was a, it was an interesting balance to hear, but I think that’s really in response to how long this staffing shortage has been going on. This is not something that was a six months, this is a trend now that’s happened two years, and it’s impacting the way that brands are designing new prototypes for their lobbies, for their rooms. IHG also has a really cool engineering lab where they look at FF&E they break down furniture to see how they can get the most out of their furniture to standardize across their brand. Which is really interesting concept because again, you know, with the high cost of FF&E right now, if you can tell an owner that we’ve done our research and data and actually have a lab in order to create this, the most efficiency you can sleep well at night, knowing that investment is taken care of. So I thought that was absolutely brilliant by IHG hats off to them. We actually have a interview at the IHG Design center that we’ll be releasing, so keep an eye out for that was such a pleasure to be able to meet their team and all the new and exciting things happening over there. Key takeaway number three, I feel like I’ve, I’ve talked about this at almost every conference. It’s a hot topic technology Hunter hosted a fantastic session called Beyond the Hype, demystifying AI and its impact on our future. This was presented by a former Google employee, their first Chief Decision Scientist who was brilliantly kind of broken down into AI and, and where we are in that spectrum of helping our organizations. We hear a lot of these panelists talk about, you know, we need to implement technology, but it’s really just broad views and there’s some things right off the bat where AI and technology are gonna be able to help us. And we’ve seen efficiencies like we talked about in that already. We had, we also were able to visit the Reverb by Hard Rock downtown Atlanta and actually did a spotlight series on the property and they shared some ways that they implemented technology into the guest experience, right? But some of these panelists talked about how this is gonna help on the staffing side, but I really think this session brought to light how far away we still are from completely replacing our associates because of how subjective our industry and the situations that we come across with guests are from day to day, somebody comes in to our front lobby checks in and we see that they’ve had a bad day, their flight was delayed, they came in light, it’s raining outside, and that associate behind the front desk says, you know what? I’m just gonna make their day a little bit better. I’m gonna go ahead and give them an upgrade. We can feel that that’s genuine empathy that a human being has a machine or AI learning might not be able to see that, might not realize that would make a stay, right? And, and it’s those experiences that we see and hear about online in our guest reviews on social media, all of those places online. So with someone, when you replace that, that human touch behind the front desk in those subjective situations, you might not always come out with the right outcome. And you know, the next person in line that comes in, there might not be an upgrade available for them. So at the end of the day, the really key takeaway from that session was talking about is your outcome is only gonna be as good as the data that you put in. I thought it was a great lesson learned, but it also shed a light, I think, on how far we are from completely turning over the keys and service to AI right now. And it’s gonna continue to be the hotels that focus on service that are going to see real dividends online because being able to provide exceptional service will raise your hotel above the competition. You know, there are many aspects of service right now in other industries, restaurant FMB, right now that are falling. So it’s going to be the businesses that focus on service and provide excellent customer service that are going to beat out competitors, you know, as simple as it is. Key takeaway number four, extended stay. So we’ve heard in the news a lot of new brands and extended stay, this has been the darling, they had a whole panel on it about extended stay. We had the opportunity to talk to Isaac Lake from Hilton, the brand leader at LivSmart Studios. Isaac had talked about all of the data and research that Hilton had done before releasing this new extended stay product out there and believed that demand is out there and even though it is a crowded space, we had a panel full of extended stay brands across the industry, but yet every single one of those panelists agreed there’s still tons of demand and the demand is gonna come from non extended stay hotels. First it was traveling nurses. Now that we see the infrastructure bill, you know, start to come to fruition, we’re gonna see more construction crews. So the opportunity is there. Hilton is obviously taking a huge jump among other brands that are now releasing some new brands. It’ll be interesting to see if this segment, this extended stay segment continues to be kind of like I said, the darling of the ball here. It certainly was a big conversation. We’ll see how many deals get done out of Hunter that are extended stay versus non extended stay. But you think about the extended stay guest experience, and I think it’s really important. You know, you think about having kitchenettes or, or full kitchens inside of your hotel if you’re an extended stay hotel. It’s a really unique experience than it is to non extended stay. And that extended stay traveler might be looking for something different in that experience. So when they go online, they visit your social media, they see your online review sites, make sure you’re painting a really good picture of what an extended stay looks like at that property. Maybe pictures of guest cooking directions and locations to nearest grocery stores. Right? One of the things we love to do as hoteliers is put of all the great restaurants around our location, you know, it’s one of the most frequently asked questions from our guests extended stay. They’re gonna be there for a while. They might want to know that restaurant information, but they also know that they’re gonna have to be cooking a couple times, if not, you know, multiple times during their stay. So providing them with that information, giving an idea of the type of common space, that was a big point in the design conversation that we had. Having a area where you don’t feel like you’re just kind of sitting in your room all day is a common area that you can work, you can connect, you can relax with other guests that are also in that situation. Another a great post that to put, looking for opportunities to network with the guest next to you that’s also there for an extended period of time. So very interesting Paint that extended stay picture if you are an extended stay hotel, because it, it certainly has some different aspects to it and like I said, really interested to see if it continues to be just red hot as we move into Q2 in the second half of 2024. Fifth and final key takeaway from the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference is this just the place to be? I don’t know if it was just celebrating the 35th Annual Hunter Hotel conference. We had Sarah Moss on the podcast that talked about that. This was a conference that started with just a couple hundred people. Now it’s grown to literally thousands. The energy was unmatched. It was unlike anything I’d ever seen at an event. The sessions that they had from experts, the entertainment that they had Oz Pearlman, the renowned mentalist was so much fun to watch. They had puppies and brews, the receptions done by Wyndham and Hilton. The Marriot Marquiswas a fantastic venue to host the event. I know that, that they’ve done that for years. But honestly, if you are a hotelier operator, this isnt a great event and I would encourage you to certainly research it, can find information on their website. Hope we have the pleasure of attending again in 2025, but want to thank the Hunter team and their entire staff for welcoming the Suite Spot. Like I said, we are gonna have exclusive interviews for you from brand leaders, industry experts, and all types of insights from the Suite Spot. So hope you’ll join us, follow us subscribe. As always, my name is Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening and we will talk to you next time on The Suite Spot to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Former CEO and President of the AHLA, Chip Rogers, joins the Suite Spot to discuss the state of the industry and how hoteliers can make 2024 a successful year. This episode is filled with expert advice, industry insights, and trending topics so tune in to get the 411 on what developments are going to impact your hotel business!
Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree, welcome and we’ve got a great guest, a guest that needs little to no introduction. He’s checked in with us several times on the Suite Spot. Chip Rogers, President & CEO of the American Hotel and Lodging Association. Chip, thank you so much for being on Suite Spot.
Chip Rogers:
Yeah, always glad to be with you, Ryan. Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and last time we were together Chip, was before the new year, so Happy New Year by the way. Very, very busy time for hoteliers. They’re getting their budgets together, they’re looking at data projections, all that good stuff. I wanna give a little bit of insight to our audience on maybe the planning process from the AHLA team. You guys have, have started off just really, really quickly. Lots of events. Obviously, every issue is important, but how do you kind of prioritize that, put your calendar in place, you know, around this time of year?
Chip Rogers:
Yeah, the biggest priority for us is always advocacy. I mean that’s the core of what we do at AHLA is we’re the voice of the hotel industry to make sure that policymakers are doing things that help the hotel industry not hurt the industry. And so this is a critical time of year for us because while we do a lot in Washington D.C., that just kind of keeps churning at a, at a steady pace again and again and again. It’s the state and local level that is hyperactive at this very moment because most state legislatures go into session at the beginning of the year, and then most of them are done with session by early spring. And so this is really prime time for us when working on state and local legislation. And again, this year we’ve got a whole host of issues that we’re dealing with at the state level. I’m in Atlanta, Georgia right now, probably two blocks from the capitol. We had a really big event here yesterday, about 300 hotels for our Georgia Hotel conference that we share with the Georgia Hotel Lodging Association. We had the Attorney General, we had one of the key members of the Georgia Senate join us. And we talked a lot about the policies that are impacting people. And we do these type of events really all around the country. We have 20 of these on the road events this year. And so yesterday was the second one we had. The first one was in Honolulu last week, which was wonderful, but we’ve got 18 more to go. And then of course we have our really big show, the Hospitality Show, which will be happening October 28th through the 30th in San Antonio, Texas.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure it’s so important, Chip to kind of hear, you know, get feet on the ground and talk to hoteliers face-to-face about some of these pressing issues in our industry. You get a unique perspective there. One of the things that AHLA just released recently, which should be good and and exciting news for everyone, is 72% of American travelers are likely to increase or at least maintain their level of hotel stays in 2024. So excellent news there, right? But there’s always those looming, some inflation, economic uncertainty, obviously we got an election year. What can hoteliers do to make sure when they look back at the end of this year that it’s a successful and profitable one, especially with these factors looming?
Chip Rogers:
You know, Ryan, you really hit it on the good news, which is that people are back out traveling again. Business travel will be back close to where it was in 2019, and we’re able to maintain a lot of this leisure travel. And of course now you have bleisure travel where you mix the two. I’ll be doing that later today as we head into a holiday weekend. But the big part is, is that people are spending money on hotels. And so this year, hotel revenue will be at an all time high. Now, the other side of the ledger shows that inflation is clearly having an impact. You have major labor inflation. The hotel wages have gone up faster than wages for the rest of the US economy. And so you’ve got problems with getting goods and services. There’s, there’s a lot of challenges that hotels are facing. Insurance costs are through the roof. But I think the biggest one right now, if you’re facing any type of refinancing of your property, are interest rates. Interest rates are really keeping transactions near an all time low. But if you’re having to refinance that property, you’re gonna face a much, much higher payment, most likely than what you were paying. And that takes a big chunk outta your profitability. And so high interest rates are not good for the hotel industry.
Ryan Embree:
No, not at all. And we’d love to see a healthy kind of hotel ecosystem, transaction ecosystem there. That means business owners are definitely feeling good. But you know, again, I know over the last couple years we’ve been really searching for some good news. So it’s great to hear that Americans are still out there traveling, trying to spend their hard earned dollar on experiences, hopefully at our hotels. So I wanna touch on staffing though, which seems to again be a big, big headwind. We touched on it last time. Listen, the hotel industry is doing some incredible things. I think the statistic that AHLA put out is something like 80% of hoteliers are having increased wages, which is fantastic. They’re offering more flexible hours. Some of the tips and tricks that, that we actually were talking about last episode here. What are you hearing? I know you’ve been on the event circuit on the ground level from some of these hoteliers and the staffing situation right now.
Chip Rogers:
It’s getting much better now. It’s not back to where it needs to be. And you know, we’ve always, even before the pandemic kind of had this big challenge of getting all the jobs filled in the hotel industry. And so this is a long-term challenge. It’s only really gonna be solved by having more people willing to work, more Americans working. The workforce participation rate is at an all time low right now. Also being able to bring people legally into the country to fill some of these jobs. I mean, you look at the jobs report that comes out, there’s about little over 6 million people that are listed as unemployed, but there’s over 9 million open jobs. So if every single unemployed person went to work tomorrow, which we know is not going to happen, but if that miraculously happened, you still have almost 3 million jobs that are left unfilled. And many of those affect our industry or industries that are connected to the hotel industry. And so that is a long-term systemic problem. And, and at some point, policy makers really need to address it. We work with them on a regular basis. One of the programs that really works well is the guest worker program. And we try to convince politicians all the time, this is not immigration. These are people that are coming here as our guests. They work for a limited period of time, then they go back home and then they may want to come back again. It’s been a very successful program for decades. Problem is, is the cap on that hasn’t been raised since 1990. I mean, think about what the economy looked like in 1990 and recognize that our H-2B visa cap hasn’t been raised since that time. We have been urging policymakers to raise that we should reward the people who do it the right way. Come here legally, work in our hotels at our resorts, and then turn around and go back home. We want more of that to help solve some of these challenges.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, really great initiative there. And, you know, trying to look, trying to find these solutions. But, you know, certainly proud of our industry again, for adapting to this challenge right now. And doing some of the things like flexible hours, benefits, increasing wages to really help. And then obviously we talked about, we’re gonna talk about a little bit later is, you know, sharing some of the stories. Because this is such an incredible industry. I’m sure everybody, our audience, they don’t have to be sold on how amazing our industry is. Speaking of the industry, AHLA put out its annual state of the industry report. Fascinating. If you haven’t had the chance to check it out, go to AHLA.com, you can get that information. One of the most fascinating pieces for me being a digital marketing podcast is, you had in there a survey from EchoLab, which looked at guest sentiment trends, specifically around cleanliness and service. And the way that those patterns were showing up in guest sentiment data. We preach all the time, Chip, about how guest sentiment data really is a blueprint to improve guest experience. And that feedback really should be welcomed by our hoteliers so that we can prove that stay for the next traveler. Right? Can you talk about the importance of guest feedback and utilizing that data for everyday decision making for hoteliers?
Chip Rogers:
It should be driving what you’re doing. If your guests are telling you they like A or don’t like B, then you need to fix B and keep doing A even better. And so what we’re seeing is in a couple of areas, you mentioned technology a few times there, Ryan. The basic thing that guests have now beyond a bed, like the one that I have right over here, or a desk that is right here, or a television. In fact, I only know that they need television that much anymore. But they want consistent strong wifi. That is the thing that we saw happen during the pandemic that no longer is it acceptable to have spots in your hotel where you just don’t get good coverage. I mean, you have to have solid wifi coverage. The second thing is they want to clean room. I mean, that’s what happened during Covid is people said, look, cleanliness is king. We wanna make sure that my room is clean. And so if you have strong wifi and a clean room, everything else is kind of secondary after that. But you gotta check those two boxes. And if you don’t check those two boxes, expect that your reviews expect that, that when consumers go online and talk about your hotel, they’re not gonna do it in a very positive way. So check those two boxes and then take everything else from there and you’ll, you’ll be in a good position.
Ryan Embree:
Certainly important to that leisure traveler that you were talking about earlier, as well as as yourself there.
Chip Rogers:
I couldn’t be doing this interview right now if I didn’t have strong wifi. And so it’s important to me personally, but more important than that, it’s the number one thing that hotel guests are identifying as their need for their hotel room.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. Travel Media Group, we put out our guest sentiment report and wifi consistently receives low scores. If travelers are feeling that wifi is not strong enough. They’re certainly gonna let you hear about it like you mentioned before. Let’s switch the topic to advocacy. You said it’s the most important mission for AHLA if not one of the most important, every issue, obviously small and big is important, Chip. But what are some of the most pressing issues right now that your team’s focused on?
Chip Rogers:
Well, from an advocacy standpoint, this time of year we’re always dealing with the short-term rental issue. And so we know that there are obviously millions and millions and millions of short-term rentals. In fact, there’s been 2 million residential properties turned into short-term rentals across the U.S. Those are active right now today. What does that create at the local level? I mean, you go anywhere and they’re talking about housing challenges. I was in Hawaii last week, the single biggest issue that they’re facing there, because it’s very difficult to develop in Hawaii. And they already had housing challenges to begin with. And you begin taking these residential properties out of commission and turning them into commercial lodging units and the housing problems become even bigger. And so right now, legislatively we’re working in a number of states to make sure that short-term rentals are regulated in the same way that hotels are. So that local communities can determine where short-term rentals should be. How many short-term rentals there should be, what should that stock be so you’re not taking it out of the residential housing stock. And so that’s a huge issue that we’re facing right now. Immigration challenges, guest worker challenges at the federal level remain at the top of the list. I mean, we have this huge imbalance of having millions of jobs available across the U.S. economy and no one to fill them. And that’s not like, that’s not just a sudden spike. It’s been that way now for years. And so when we look at things like this, I mean these are what keeps hoteliers up at night. Organized labor challenges are really big. And then there’s one that, I don’t know if a lot of people understand it, but it is, it’s really scary. But a proposal put out by the National Labor Relations Board, a new rule, it’s called Joint Employer. And without getting too technical, basically what it means is that the franchisees employees would be jointly employed by the franchisor. So each hotel employee would essentially have two bosses. They’d be employed by the franchisor and the franchisee. Well, that’s an absolute nightmare for the franchise industry, not just hotels, all franchisees. And it is on the wishlist for organized labor because no longer would they have to organize hotel by hotel, they could organize an entire brand at once, which is their goal. And so if you’re operating a hotel somewhere where there’s not a lot of organized labor, you could get swept up in this if your brand gets organized all at once. And so joint employer is probably the biggest legislative slash legal challenge that we’re facing at the federal level. But there’s no shortage of issues impacting our industry. And that’s why we urge people to please get involved. The simplest way they can do that is go to AHLA and sign up for our hotels act. You can also just go to HotelsAct.org. It’s free, it’s simple. It makes you kind of part of the hotel industry team. And we’re able to send messages to you that we create that you just by clicking one button could send to your lawmakers. And so whether if it’s your state lawmaker, your federal lawmaker, we do all the work, all you have to do is click a button. But that type of messaging makes an enormous difference in pushing lawmakers towards the things we want them to do and away from the things we don’t want them to do.
Ryan Embree:
So critical in the work that you’re doing over there and really having an impact on almost every facet of hotels and hospitality and what they’re doing on their everyday lives. So important, thank you for what your team is doing over there at AHLA. We’ll wrap up the episode. We spoke last time about the power of storytelling and you gave some great quotes about some stories and how impactful telling stories can be versus just spitting out facts. You know, I’m curious, we’re still early in the year, but any impactful stories that you’ve run into just talking to hoteliers that you could share to maybe even again, just to share how special our industry truly is because there’s so many that happen every single day.
Chip Rogers:
Yeah, it is amazing. As I mentioned a moment ago, I had a chance to spend some time in Hawaii last week and, and got to see the devastation in Maui from the recent fires, like it was six months ago now, but they’re still struggling. I mean, these are people so many who just, they don’t have anywhere to live, unfortunately. Some of them are having to leave Hawaii and go to the mainland because there’s just no housing whatsoever. And then some of them have to live so far away. I heard a story of a man who had worked at a hotel there in Maui, had been there 26 years and lost his home. He was now taking a bus two hours each way to work at the hotel five days a week. That’s the type of commitment to our guests that our hotel workers have. They are literally the light, and the backbone of this industry. They make all the difference in the world. And just seeing it firsthand in Hawaii, all the efforts that local hotels did to help house the homeless people that had lost their homes because of the fire. And then to really stand up for their own employees and just try to find anything so that they can have housing. It’s, it’s really inspiring. But it also reminds us that, you know, this world we live in can be fragile at times and, and tragedy can occur. How are we gonna step up and respond to it? And I’m proud to say that the industry, particularly in Hawaii, stepped up in a big way.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you for sharing that story and shedding a light on that. Like I said, those types of stories are happening all over our industry and it’s a reason why people get into hospitality. And you know, I would encourage you, talk to your GM, talk to your regional, talk to even to front desk managers, people that have been in the industry long, they’re gonna have some sort of story of hospitality of why they got into it, whether they just fell into it or had a career path for it. But it’s always something that you can come back to and have that, that sense of togetherness with this industry. So Chip, thank you for sharing that. Thank you for being with me. Any final thoughts? We covered a lot of ground on today’s check-in with you.
Chip Rogers:
No final thoughts other than it’s always an honor to represent what I believe is the best industry in the world, and that is the hospitality industry, made up with the best people in the world. That’s what drives you each and every day. So thanks for having me. I’m honored to serve at AHLA and represent our industry, but really appreciate the time I get to spend with you.
Ryan Embree:
Perfect. Well thank you so much. Well said Chip. And thank you all for listening to the Suite Spot, we will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The 35th Hunter Hotel Investment Conference is only weeks away, taking place on March 19-21 in Atlanta, Georgia!
Join Suite Spot host and TMG Director of Marketing Ryan Embree as he sits down with the Chief of Staff at Hunter Hotel Advisors, Sarah Moss, to discuss the upcoming event and what attendees can look forward to from one of the biggest conferences in the hotel industry. This episode has something for every hotelier, from best digital marketing practices to everything related to the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference.
Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you for joining us, wherever you are listening or watching us on our YouTube channel from. I’ve got a great guest with me today that I’m gonna introduce in just a second, but this is a part of our Hospitality Trailblazers series. If this is your first one, or your fifth one or your 12th one. This series is all about highlighting and showcasing some of the individuals or companies that are pushing our industry forward into the future. So without further ado, it’s my pleasure to bring in Sarah Moss, Chief of Staff at the Hunter Hotel Advisors. Sarah, thank you so much for being with me today.
Sarah Moss:
Thank you so much, Ryan, for having us. We’re so excited to chat about the conference today.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And sometimes being a Hospitality Trailblazer means that you’re actually putting a lot of the people in the same room together to help move our industry forward and Hunter Hotel Conference does such a fabulous job of doing that. But before we jump into all the exciting things about the conference, since this is your first time on the Suite Spot, it is always a little ritual to ask, you know, kind of about your background in the hospitality journey that led you to Hunter Hotel Advisors.
Sarah Moss:
Sure. So my journey in hospitality started when I was really young. My first job was in a restaurant in my hometown. Then going into college, I worked at a hotel property, really fell in love with hotels and the operations of them and was so fortunate that Georgia State is a partner of Hunter Hotel Advisors in the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference or our co-founder of the conference. And we place an intern every year with the company to give the students a really immersive experience to teach them what goes on through a conference and here at the advisory firm as well. And I was lucky enough to be one of the students that they placed here at Hunter. And so that’s really how I got my journey here to Hunter today. But it’s really unique and I love it. But I’ve been here for almost five years now and did my internship for two years before that, so seven total.
Ryan Embree:
That’s such a cool story to hear that background that you were just an intern starting at the Hunter Hotel Conference and now you’re already Chief of Staff here just several years later. It’s super exciting and you know, your start is very much like a lot of these Hospitality Trailblazers that I interview, you know, started somewhere line level with myself. I started as a bellman at a hotel. But I think that’s one of the unique things about our industry is that we just, we start in these places, all of us are travelers at heart, right? I haven’t run into one person in hospitality that doesn’t like to travel. So we’re travelers at heart. But when we start our journey in hospitality, typically it starts, you know, just serving people and you know, you get to see that evolution, which is so cool. So speaking of the evolution of things, this is the 35th anniversary of the Hunter Hotel Conference. It’s grown to be one of the biggest and most anticipated events of the year. I know you’ve said you’ve only been with this conference for about five years, but can you talk about kind of the evolution of, of this event and maybe where it started to where it is today?
Sarah Moss:
Absolutely. So like you mentioned, we’re celebrating our 35th year, which is super exciting for the conference and just for the company in general. Our first conference was in 1989 with 92 attendees. So we have grown quite, quite a few between now and then. But our, I think our, you know, biggest milestones for the conference was when we moved into the Marriott Marquee downtown, one of our amazing partners that we have to help us produce the event. It’s a lot of space, it’s a lot of exciting things that we get to activate and to, you know, provide to attendees. And it also, you know, has a connection to the downtown Hilton and the downtown Hyatt. And so it provides every brand and opportunity to be able to utilize this space in their own capacity and their own functionality as well. In 2015 we had a thousand attendees and then today we think we’re gonna be over 2000 again this year we’re shooting for 2300 coming up in March.
Ryan Embree:
What an incredible feat. And yeah, Atlanta, you know, certainly a hub for hospitality to be able to host at the venue like the Marriott Marquee. I’m sure certainly helps accommodate, you know, over 2000 now attendees, which is fantastic to hear. So let’s fast forward to March, 2024. Right. What are some of the things you’re most excited about this year’s event?
Sarah Moss:
We have a lot of really cool things planned this year. I think I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention this upcoming year, our advisory board and the committee for our award winner chose Bob Hunter, our founder of the conference, to win the award this upcoming year, which is super exciting just to be able to see him honored on stage. He’s played such a pivotal role, a lot of people’s lives and their stories in the hospitality space. And so I’m personally just really excited to see him honored for that this upcoming year. Additional to that, we have a really cool keynote speaker for lunch on Wednesday this year. Os Perlman, he’s like a world renowned mentalist. So often when you’re at these conferences, you are in meetings or you’re, you know, constantly networking. So to be able to take what we’re calling a mental break for an hour or so to come watch him and see him perform, we’re really excited about this year.
Ryan Embree:
That’s great. And to speak to Bob Hunter, I mean, certainly fitting on the 35th anniversary to be recognizing him, and I am sure he’s seen it from that, you know, less than 100 attendee conference grow to what a milestone and feat that is, to be potentially over 2300 this year is fantastic. And yeah, that is exciting. It’s really unique to have a mentalist at a conference like that. Super, super fun. And I’m excited to see that as well. Now one of the topics that we’ve explored in this hospitality Trailblazer series, Sarah is talking about the impact that the last couple years that the pandemic has had on our industry and maybe some of the lessons learned. I think you bring a really unique perspective being that you are obviously in hospitality, but also in the event industry planning this annual event. Can you talk to us about maybe lessons learned during that difficult time and how you guys got back to almost potentially breaking records in attendance this year?
Sarah Moss:
Absolutely. Covid was a tough time for us here at Hunter. Our conference is annually in March every year. And so, as many of you may remember, March was really the time that the news broke here in the US and all of thd shutdowns happened and it happened to us the week before the conference was supposed to happen. So really tough timing for us, but I will have to give credit to our team here. They rallied and we, you know, came up with creative solutions to what we are gonna be offering. One of the things I think was the most unique that came out of COVID for us here at the conference in the brokerage firm was our TikTok series. We had this amazing conference planned and we had all these speakers lined up to speak and didn’t happen. And so we were like, Hey, all these people are ready to go, have their stories lined up, have, you know, whatever’s going on in their world, so we wanna hear about it, let’s go ahead and record some sessions with them. And so that ended up turning into this amazing series that we’re still producing today. I think it was just a interesting time during COVID people just wanted to know what was going on. You wanted the information at the moment, but also you wanted to know from a hotelier’s perspective, like you’re not alone and whatever you’re going through, the person on the other side or across the country is going through the same thing. And so for us, the TikTok series was pivotal for us to be able to stay in front of people and to, you know, be that thought leadership, but to also, you know, carry us through until the next conference. We were the first conference to come back in the hospitality space after Covid in May of 2021. And we were so proud of it. And here we are having another one here in 2023 and we also had one in 2022. So just continuing and just building resiliency off of what happens, making lemons outta lemonade or whatever the phrase is.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You know, I love those, those stories of kind of innovation and adaptation during that time. Because it’s, it’s something that, you know, I don’t think you fully appreciate in the moment, right? It was probably just what you would call is, you know, business survival instinct to say, how can we just bring value and, and make the best out of the, maybe this, this really bad situation right now, but now reflecting on it and retrospectively looking back, you know, you see these things and you’re like, man, that was really, really cool what we did there. And it is something that we’ve seen so many, whether it’s new initiatives, whether it’s new technological advances in our industry, how they’ve evolved into a time where it’s like, I don’t remember when we didn’t do this. And, but you know, on the other hand of that, Sarah, I will say, and I’ve been to, you know, several hospitality events since that time and for some reason, I don’t know if it’s like, we always talk about revenge travel on the guest side, but I don’t know if it’s that revenge travel feeling of coming to these conferences, especially with hospitality people. Because it was felt so hard in our industry because we are truly a people serving people industry. So taking that away from us, that’s a foundation of who we are as industry associates, right? And, and serving people. So I don’t know what it was, but coming back to these types of events, there’s just this energy and this vibe that people have at these events now. And I’m sure it has been felt since you returned back with Hunter Hotel Conference and sure it will be felt this year, but it’s one of those things that we heard during the pandemic of, you know, I don’t know if these conferences are gonna come back. Not only are they coming back, they’re coming back in full force and producing some of the best agendas and conference material that, that we’ve seen before. So super, super exciting now. But let’s talk a little bit more about your role, Sarah, because I don’t think for our audience we typically talk about the operation side, some social and media and reputation stuff. We’re gonna talk about that a little bit later. But I don’t think people fully understand and grasp the, the monumental effort that it is to put on an event for 2000, potentially 2300 attendees. Right? You know, you’ve gotta get speakers, you’ve gotta put an agenda together. You know, give us just a little bit of an insight and a look at what it takes to prepare that, the type of preparation that you need to do in order to make this the event that it is.
Sarah Moss:
Absolutely. Man, I don’t even know where to start because there’s a lot of details that go into these events, but I think from my point of view and in my role there are so many stakeholders for the event. There’s our personal team here. We have three dedicated staff for the conference year round that plan year round. And then we also have additional help here in the office that kind of sit between the brokerage firm and the conference. So there our internal team is a stakeholder. We have the hunter family who’s a stakeholder within the conference. We have our attendees, we have our sponsors, we have our speakers, like you mentioned, there are so many different groups of people and they all come to the conference for different reasons. And so being able to produce an event that caters to everyone and everything that they’re trying to accomplish and get outta the conference, it’s, it’s a challenge at the end of the day. And I think our team does a really great job at it. I’ll be honest, I’m a little, I’m a little biased obviously, but it takes a lot of intentionality and our team is so thoughtful about thinking through all the details ahead of time, making sure our sponsors getting the return on investment that they’re looking for, making sure they’re getting deals done. Because that’s really what they’re there to do. Making sure our speakers on stage that we’re prepping them appropriately ahead of schedule so the attendees get what they need out of it. But also from a speaker standpoint is being able to advocate for yourself on stage and being that presence and brand for yourself. There are just so many things that go into the conference. I could probably sit here and talk to you about it for another 30 minutes, but I just had to give kudos to our team because I think they do a really great job at it.
Ryan Embree:
The logistics, again, I can’t even begin to imagine all of that, but it’s what you said. I mean, and sometimes with so many stakeholders and everyone moving, you know, that’s why it’s so key and critical and I think Hunter Hotel Conference does a great job of this, is having that goal in mind or that end in mind of what everyone wants to get out of this conference. And you know, so when you have a lot of moving parts, you know, the one thing is that North Star or that compass to say, at the end of the day, this is what we wanna accomplish and this is what we see as a successful conference for the year. So I teased it before, but you know, this is a digital marketing podcast. We talk about things like social media, reputation. Listen, it’s hard to, it’s hard to believe if you haven’t heard of Hunter Hotel Conference because it literally shuts down LinkedIn for an entire week. Like my entire feed is just people recording and pictures at everything from the conference. So can you talk about the importance of this from an event perspective or even if, you know, I think it’s good insight for hotels that are on this listening that have conferences at their own hotel and the type of social media campaigns or strategies that you can do to make the event as big as possible. And then also a reputation. You know, reputation doesn’t just mean TripAdvisor and Google, you know, you’ve got a reputation for what that conference logo means or what that slogan means, which we’re gonna talk about. So can you talk a little bit about utilizing social media and leveraging that as well as as reputation online to build the conference?
Sarah Moss:
Yeah, as I just mentioned in the previous answer, it was as stakeholders are so important to us and we, we lean into that and we utilize them to be our biggest advocates and influencers on social media. For example, our advisory board, an amazing group of 42 individuals that we have, we send them out a graphic and ask them, Hey, do you mind posting this on your social media saying, I’m attending Hunter. We wanna build anticipation for the event. You wanna make sure the right people are there. And so that’s really important to us. So we also do it with our speakers. So making sure that they all have a graphic saying I’m speaking or I’m a panelist there. We also do it for students, we do it for our sponsors. Just making sure that we’re building, like you mentioned, that cohesion before the event so people know and, you know, build a little fomo. They don’t wanna miss out on the event when they see all these people going. And so it helps our registration. You definitely see an uptick in our registration stats as we start posting more and more online every year, especially on our social media.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I love that, the FOMO aspect of it. And that’s great. Again, it’s great advice for hotels that run conferences, how could you be supportive to make that conference, you know, bigger than it’s ever been? Because you know, I’m sure as Sarah will tell you, if you’re doing a great job running a conference and the conference continues to grow, that partnership and bond that you have between venue and event is gonna grow stronger and stronger. So think about creative ways that you can put that event out there. Even talk to some big advocates and influencers maybe with followings on places like LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, wherever your target audience may be. Obviously for Hunter Hotel Conference, that’s gonna be LinkedIn. And I’m sure that’s a really, really important piece of your social media strategy over there.
Sarah Moss:
I think, like it’s also important to like review your analytics and I tell people I’m like, hey, or even internally I’m like, hey, this blast that we sent out or this push that we sent out, like it didn’t, it didn’t hit right. People aren’t clicking, people aren’t looking at stuff. I’m like, let’s pivot, let’s try something different. I think it’s so important to watch your analytics, whether they’re coming from social media or they’re coming from your media partners as well. It’s vitally important because you wanna make sure you’re spending your time wisely. There’s so many things that go into the event that if you’re not appropriately allocating time and the right resources to your marketing ahead of schedule and even post-conference as well, we haven’t touched that, it definitely plays an impact on how the event goes.
Ryan Embree:
Trial and error is a big part of it. But if you’re not kind of seeing the results from that, you don’t really know what’s working. And in my, you know, years of doing this podcast and being in the digital marketing realm, you’re gonna find a couple surprises here and there that you just think are really just maybe here’s a good graphic. I think this is gonna perform okay. And all of a sudden it just goes off and it really performs. And if you can’t sit back and say, why do I think that that performed? And this, this is for our listeners and audience, this is could be as granular as a social media post promotion that you put out there for a stay for a hotel. If you see how that forms and if even if it doesn’t perform, you know, what can you make little tweaks to make it perform even better? So always looking for those. I think that’s great advice Sarah, to try to say when all of this is done, when that project is complete, a big project like this, you know, what did we do right and how can we improve? And, and I’m sure there’s been some lessons learned over the years from where you’re at.
Sarah Moss:
Absolutely. And I think one, the one last thing I’ll say on this is we’re an annual conference. We happen once a year and so for like you said for that week or those three days, we shut down social media and it’s awesome and we have a lot of people pouring into our media channels as well. But what happens the other 51 weeks out of the year for us? And so we have to be really thoughtful with what we’re putting out in content that we’re pushing and to make sure we’re staying in front of people, not, you know, beating them over the head by any means. Because you don’t wanna be an annoyance, but you wanna make sure you’re staying relevant. And so like our TikTok series is one of that. We launched testimonials series this year just to be able to produce content before the conference and even post-conference that we can stay relevant and stay out there in front of people as well.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. That trial and error is so important aspect to it. But also, you know, what you just spoke to Sarah, we talk about that with slow season for hotels, right? Is they’ll say, well during the the busy season, I don’t need occupancy. I’m not gonna post on my social media channels or even during my slower season, I don’t see much so I’m not gonna post. No. The consistency and buildup always help keep growing that audience, keep growing that following. So great advice there. Let’s talk about it, because I think when we first chatted, you hadn’t announced the winner of the Hunter Conference Award for Excellence and Inspiration. Since then you’ve revealed that, which is super exciting. Tell us a little bit more about the background of this award and what it means to be a recipient.
Sarah Moss:
Yeah, so I think here at Hunter, we fall into the trap far too often if we don’t celebrate our successes and we don’t celebrate the people here in the industry enough. And I think that’s really what the award was founded off of. It was the Hunter Conference is known for their investors and hotel owners that are in the room every year. We have a very high population of those attendees. And so we wanted to celebrate those individuals, that really make an impact on the industry and on people’s lives because it’s so important. We’ve talked about it here, but it’s, it’s a people serving people industry. At the end of the day, it’s not about how many hotels you own or how many, you know, dollars you can spend in a renovation or whatever it may be. It’s really about the people. And so that was really the foundation for the award. And like you mentioned, we’re so excited and thrilled this year to be honoring Bob, our founder of the conference and founder of the Hunter Hotel Advisors firm. So we, we could not be more grateful for the award committee that they have stewarded over the past 10 years. Really more than that now. It’s the 13th year. So, we’re just, we’re very grateful.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, again, we’re, we’re fortunate to work in an industry where we have some really cool stories to share and it, it’s more than just four walls and a bed. It’s, you know, it’s providing service, do a lot of good in our communities or a lot of hotel management companies, owners, hoteliers all over the country, do some really, really cool things. And it’s really cool to have awards and recognition like this to recognize some of some of those feats. So congratulations Bob Hunter, and excited to celebrate with you at the, the conference this year. Let’s talk about, you said you got one week a year to do this conference, then I’m sure it is on to planning 2025 in the next year, right?
Sarah Moss:
The next one.
Ryan Embree:
No, not too much time to celebrate and rest there. But you know, one of the things I always find so fascinating because you, you really could sit down with your team, Sarah and decide on really anything for your mantra or slogan. This year was – Know No Limits -. Tell me how you guys decided on that and landed on this as your slogan and what that means.
Sarah Moss:
It’s a great question and I think it takes some explaining because people are like, why do you need a theme or why do you need a slogan every year for the conference? And if you’ve attended Hunter conferences in the past, in the early 90’s, maybe like in maybe early 2000’s, they actually had a theme every year of “Seize the Day” or “The Time is Now”. And after Covid, we took a really hard look at ourselves and were like, what are the things that worked really well for us and what are the things that we should continue to do here? And one of the things that we brought back was the slogans themselves. Our one coming out of Covid was come together. And I think from Hunter’s point of view, it creates a sense of comradery between our attendees of knowing what the goal is and knowing what the call to action is. And so we had “Come Together”, we’ve had “Let’s Go”, and now it’s “Know No Limits.” You know, we’ve gone through these crazy crazy covid timing. We’ve gone through an amazing, you know, 2022, 2023 for investments and the industry and now it’s what’s next. And so we just wanna charge people with Know No Limits. It’s the sky is the limit for us and we can really do whatever we want to, but we have to come together to do that. And so when you’re coming together at the Hunter Conference, we can, we can work through any problem, we can figure out whatever there may be, but we just, we find there’s a sense of togetherness, if you wanna call it that.
Ryan Embree:
I love it. it actually speaks to exactly what we were just talking about, taking what works and tweaking it or moving it forward and bringing back that was a conscious decision, bringing back those themes and slogans. And I think you’re spot on with this slogan. You know, everything that I’m hearing from industry leaders right now is they are fired up about 2024, right? We’ve just been kind of waiting for the shoe to drop. There’s just always been this looming kind of external fears and factors out there, but it at this point we’re full steam ahead. Know No Limits. I love it. I’m fired up for the conference and definitely wanted to get your perspective on what that meant and I think it’s a great initiative to theme it. So, alright, so I’m gonna get you to predict the future a little bit here on the podcast, Sarah. So 35 years this conference is celebrating this March. What’s your vision for the future of this conference as we move forward into, into the years to come?
Sarah Moss:
The crystal ball is a scary place to look into these days, but, I think for the Hunter Conference, the future’s really bright. We have just seen the impact that we’ve had on the industry and the reception that we’ve had from people. And you can just see it in our attendance numbers. This past year we hit 2000, we’re expecting 300 more this year. I mean, it’s over a 10% growth rate since I’ve been here at Hunter. And it’s even doubled in the past two years, which is amazing. And I just think it speaks to the hard work the team has done here. I think you can expect to see some interesting and off the wall things like the mentalist this upcoming year. We try to provide unique opportunities that they wouldn’t have somewhere else. I think it’s also, you know, fun for attendees. We wanna entertain them at the end of the day, they’re there to have a good time. My two phrases I always tell the team is the event is never over until people stop talking about it. Love that. And it doesn’t matter the amount of people that come, it doesn’t matter what the amount of business that they do, it matters how we made them feel. And so I think those are things that we really try to rangetrue here at Hunter is how can we enhance the attendee experience every year for them to keep wanting to come back. And so just providing those unique opportunities is one of those things that we, we look forward to doing.
Ryan Embree:
It’s so many parallels. I mean, as, as you explained that there’s so many parallels to hoteliers and, and how they treat guests. You know, we want to make them feel something when they come on property and when they leave property. So, and I think you’re right too, when it talks about, you know, that experience that guests have at a hotel that doesn’t stop until they stop talking about it. Whether that’s online, whether that’s to friends, you know, hopefully that’s a memory. If it’s a big vacation, hopefully that’s a memory that carries with you for years to come. And I’m sure that attendees are, are making those same memories at the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference. I am certainly happy to be attending this year. This is my first time, a really exciting announcement that the Suite Spot is gonna be headed to the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference for the first time ever. We could not be more thrilled. Sarah, I know we covered a lot of ground on the conference. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today?
Sarah Moss:
We are so excited to have Suite Spot with us, number one, this upcoming year. Our partners are so important to us. While you are a diamond, you’re a silver, you’re an association, you’re a media partner, we treat you all the same. And you’re part of the Hunter family at the end of the day and we’re just so grateful. To be honest with you, it’s 35 years and we’re looking forward to 35 more. It’s gonna be the best conference yet.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, we can’t wait. Hope to see a lot of our listeners and audience out there. Best place to find information, HunterConference.com. Correct?
Sarah Moss:
Yes, www.hunterconference.com.
Ryan Embree:
Follow Hunter Hotel Investment Conference as well on social media. I’m sure they’ll be posting all the exciting updates. You just had that big announcement about the mentalist speaker, guest speaker that’s gonna be there. We cannot wait. We’re counting down the days. Sarah, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot.
Sarah Moss:
Absolutely. Thank you Ryan.
Ryan Embree:
All right. Thank you everyone for listening and we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this episode, Suite Spot host Ryan Embree sits down with TMG Director of Product – Respond & Resolve™, Jackie Avery, to discuss the top 5 guest sentiment trends of 2023. It has become an annual tradition to take a look back each year and analyze which guest sentiment tags were mentioned the most and what aspects of the hotel guest experience resonated with travelers.
Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, here for the first episode of 2024 and one of my favorite annual traditions. We’ve got the same episode, but a new face and voice that’s gonna be joining me today. Jackie Avery, Director of Product for our Respond and Resolve™, which is our review response solution for hotels. Jackie, not the first time on The Suite Spot, but this is the first time we’re going through this list together.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, I’m so excited. I can’t wait to kind of talk through everything with you. We had a really busy year, so in slower seasons last year, I’d say our team was responding to and analyzing anywhere between 18,000 and 20,000 reviews a month. And then, yeah, once we got into the busy season, we were hitting, you know, over 26,000 reviews. So it was a great year, and I can’t wait to share some of the exciting things that we saw. I think everyone’s gonna be happy to hear that. Last year after looking at the sentiment, not only were more people traveling, but they were happy. They left positive sentiments. You know, everyone just kind of takes a sigh of relief when they hear that, and it’s really fun to think about. They were making informed decisions and then they were pleased with those. So I think we all just kinda take a second to celebrate that there was lower dissatisfaction and an increase in satisfaction among travelers all over.
Ryan Embree:
That’s amazing. And it’s a lot more fun, I would imagine, to respond to someone that’s had a really great experience at your hotel. It’s at your hotel than someone that may have not had that great experience. So we respond to both either way, but I’m always amazed, Jackie, by the sheer numbers when we talk through this episode, because it’s really incredible. You know, we talk to hoteliers that ask us, you know, are reviews becoming less relevant? Our sites like TripAdvisor, you know, really fading from the public eye and really the opposite’s true. You think about how reviews have really incorporated into our life from movies to Amazon products everywhere is a review or a rating, right? And hotels have been one of the longest industries where reviews have been relevant and people are making informed decisions, as you mentioned, based on that feedback. And that’s what this episode’s about. So if this is your first time listening to this annual episode, like I said, it’s, it’s a tradition. Now, our first time with you here, Jackie, but we review the top five sentiments in 2024. So what do I mean by that? Each review is compiled. Each review includes subjects and topics that the guest leaves either positive, neutral, or negative sentiment. So we go into those reviews and we actually tag that, that type of sentiment and organize that information and data. We share a lot of that through our industry reporting that we, that you can find on LinkedIn or our website, travelmediagroup.com. But this is just really an all, all-encompassing episode that counts down the top five. I can’t wait to hear it and I’m sure you’re ready as well, Jackie.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, I can’t wait to share what we uncovered. So in 2023, travelers positively tagged amenities over a million times. So hoteliers know what they have to offer and they love to boast about it, right? That’s how they secure more guests. They love to talk about it, but I often hear it means they struggle with how to respond to reviews that mention that because you have what you have and it’s kind of difficult to change what you’re offering. Um, so of course the specific compliments or complaints will determine your exact approach when responding to reviews like these. But what doesn’t change is that this is your last opportunity to acknowledge what the guest has said, right? So their review is completed, their trip is over, and you know, they mentioned something about their visit that was memorable. Was it hanging out at the pool? Was it having a couple drinks at the bar? It could be good or it could be bad, but if it’s a good experience, this is your chance to validate what happened, right? You are now compounding on the positive aspects of their trip and you are building on the goodwill that you already have. So you want to acknowledge that stuff when you’re responding to them. So now let’s say somebody negatively mentions your facility amenities, and I kind of skipped over maybe some things. If you’re not overly aware with our system, or you know, what maybe encompasses a facility amenity. What does that mean? Right? It could be anything from the bed to the room, to the view to general room maintenance, right? So when you, a guest has a positive experience and you validate that your gratitude will stay with that guest, and now you’ve compounded even further on the goodwill that you’ve already built for the guests who didn’t mention the amenities in a positive way, this is your opportunity to empathize. You can clear up confusion, you can provide more information, you can make changes, right? So depending on the context, you can ease their disappointment even though they’re already gone, right? Acknowledge what they’ve said and either clear up a misunderstanding or you can provide more information. You might just apologize. You might let them know, thank you for this information. I’m gonna go ahead and I’m gonna connect with my team and we’re gonna more proactively provide this information at check-in going forward. It could be as simple as that.
Ryan Embree:
Jackie, I think you just rolled out a perfect example and answer to the question we get all the time, which is, why should I respond to my positive reviews? Right? They already had a great stay, but that compounding effect that you talked about, you know, you already have someone giving you this compliment. Why not take it a step further and promote your business online? The negative side of things, of course, it’s something we need to address, but as consumers, as travelers ourselves, one of the things we don’t like to say that we do, but we do just inherently, is we think about worst case scenario. If we were to get in that situation, what would be the solution there? Right? And if you can give a customer service oriented response, an action plan to your guest or traveler online, that is going to put you at ease when you’re going through those hypotheticals of what happens if there’s no more towels at the pool. And, and Jackie and her team have done a fantastic job of addressing that issue and calming and, and, you know, making sure that you don’t feel like that’s gonna happen to you. So I think you’ve done just a wonderful job of laying out why you should respond to reviews, which obviously is so important. Let’s move to sentiment number four.
Jackie Avery:
So for this tag, we shift out of a category that can feel a bit out of your control and into one that travelers hold hoteliers a hundred percent accountable for. And that’s cleanliness. Cleanliness was bumped off the list last year, but it was back in full force in 2023. Well, the tags were overall positive. You know, I mentioned that earlier. This is so prevalent in reviews that I’m gonna address how you should think about it when responding to a positive review or a negative review. So when you are responding to a negative review that mentions cleanliness, I want you to keep in mind these few things, right? You’re sitting down, you’re, you have a lot of feelings about what they’re gonna say. I want you to think about if they brought this to your attention while you, they were on site, how did you or your team handle it? And now that they’ve mentioned it, what have you done to prevent this future concern or reviews like this going forward? And now as you’re try starting to reply, you need to think about this is your last interaction. Maybe you need to apologize for not addressing their concerns more adequately the first time that they brought it up. Or maybe you need to thank them for praising your team for finding such a proactive solution when they brought up their concern. So it could be you just need to empathize with the fact that they felt they had inadequate experience. Or you can just focus on the things that you team is now doing. After you’ve shown that empathy, this opens the door for you to re-highlight different procedures you have in place. Maybe you wanna point out in-house, texting systems you have going on, you wanna note that room change requests are accepted whenever possible. After you show empathy, you can now go that route in your reply because you didn’t show indifference. You wanna validate the experience that someone had, right? If they had a positive experience, praise them. Thank them for taking the time to leave their thoughts. If it was a negative experience, you’re going to wanna use the questions that I just mentioned to make sure that you respond in a way that you can regain their business. You have the chance to ease their frustration and win them back.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. Cleanliness is, everyone has a different picture of cleanliness in their head. If I were to say close your eyes and imagine a dirty room, we might have two different standards of cleanliness. So it’s so vital and critical for you to, to do what Jackie says, which is reiterate those cleaning procedures. That is huge. Recommit yourself to cleanliness and your processes because there might’ve just been a one-off. We realized that, that that happens. Travelers understand that and could say, all right, well this traveler thought their room was, was unclean, but the room next door was clean. So making sure you’re addressing that feedback is very, very important. All great tips, Jackie, but it is interesting to see cleanliness come back in because it is such a big part of the traveler’s journey and the guest experience. It’s not something a facility or amenity. Someone could walk into a hotel and not experience any of the facilities or amenities. Everyone is going to have some sort of touch with cleanliness at your property, whether it’s in the room, the lobby, common areas, parking lot. We’ve seen it all, I’m sure as you have in in those reviews. Speaking of location, let’s turn our attention to tag number three.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. So typically when looking at this tag we see comments that are about the proximity to the place the guests wanted to go. So generally, if they’ve done their research, they know where they are in relation to their final destination or their goal for an area. Whether that’s they’re visiting a university, they’re seeing a family member, they have a stay at the hospital, you know, they wanna be by the airport. So some subcategories of this tag that you know, didn’t make it to the top five but that are associated with this can be safety, noise, and attraction. So in a positive review, you wanna thank them for sharing, you know, their kind words or their story about why they were in town. You have this personal connection to the guests. You also wanna reinforce that they made a great decision about where to stay. People love to feel validated that they made the right choice. Let them know that they did. You know, so for anyone who negatively, you know, mentioned the location, you wanna let them know that you heard them. This is your chance to share any steps that you’ve taken to mitigate concerns. If you are in the heart of a city or you’re near an airport, do you offer noise machines that they can check out? Do you provide earplugs if they want them? Do you have a pre-stay email that kind of suggests specific rooms to ask for? You know, that may be away from a specific side of the building. You can also reiterate your commitment to providing a secure environment. If someone addresses concerns about where your hotel is, right? You can’t promise you’re gonna move your hotel or make all of these changes that you can’t make. But you can still hear the guest and you can try your best to share what you and your team are doing to keep them safe and to keep them comfortable.
Ryan Embree:
This is one the most fascinating tags for me is location. And I think one that if I were a hotelier, I would try to almost build my location and set guest expectations through things like review response, social media. I mean we saw back in 2020 things like grocery stores or pharmacies like where they are in proximity to your hotel was super important. So putting that kind of, almost setting the table for what is around you location wise. If there’s a restaurant a mile away that might seem really close to some people and pretty far for other people, I think it’s important to share things like only a 20 minute walk. Or if you’re, say you’re close to the airport, are you really close to the airport? 30 minutes might not be close to the airport. So the more descriptive you can be about your location, the better. Because what you don’t wanna do have is have someone come in and that expectation not be met of, I thought I was in the heart of downtown yet I’ve gotta take a 15 minute Uber to actually get downtown. So set the table and review response feedback. And even social media and your website are great places to really build the location around your hotel. Let’s jump into number two.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, absolutely. So in 2023, everyone had something to say about staff with 2.5 million positive sentiment tags. It’s clear that onsite teams and their services were well received. Yeah. And we love to see that. We know that our hoteliers and our teams onsite are working hard. It’s wonderful to see that come out in reviews. So these travelers, they may share their praise face-to-face, but they have gone the extra step. They may mention a specific team member by name, they’re still going outta their way, even if they don’t know the name to maybe mention who helped serve them. And you want to thank them for going that extra mile. You want to praise them for sharing it and they want to receive that. So you’re now uniquely positioned to connect with that guest on a different level. And good news travels fast, right? You’ll have earned an advocate for your property for life. So as you can probably guess, travelers don’t like to be told that they were wrong or that they misjudged a situation. You won’t recover a guest if you tell them, no, actually my team wasn’t being short. You don’t know all that they have going on. Or you misjudged the situation in the end, your guests, they wanna be heard. So in situations like these, it’s important that you take a step back and you show patience and kindness and understanding. You wanna lead with empathy, you want to hear them and then you can maybe share other aspects about what might have been going on. Or you can ask to connect with them offline. But it’s a safe rule to lead with empathy and understanding because there will be times where you have to take a firm stance and you have to back your team. And travelers wanna see that, right? We’ve all seen a review where you’re like, oh, you know, you wanna know that that property’s gonna do what it takes to keep you safe on site. And there are reviews where you don’t just wanna apologize. And you know, those situations are few and far between, but they come up. So as long as in general you’re leading with empathy and understanding, you open the door to kind of be more firm and draw the line in cases where you need to.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You know, this has gotta be something super stressful for especially a hotelier, a person with hospitality in their heart that have maybe been in this career. And for them to see a negative review about their team, about the way that they hosted a guest. And it just has to be mentally draining. And it, and one of the benefits that we see, kind of outsourcing review response to Travel Media Group is when we did our partner survey last year was over 80%. People said that they actually are less stressed now responding to, to their reviews. And I get it, it would feel so good, I’m sure to be that, to be able to stand up for yourself on an online review site. It’s just not the platform or channel to do so, unfortunately, because again, what we do is we put ourselves in the shoes of what if this was me? And if you are raising that issue and all of a sudden seeing a guest response that’s a little combative towards the guest, you’re thinking, all right, am I gonna have to be arguing with the GM if they make a mistake? That being said, with the negative stuff, and I hate talking about it ’cause it’s, it’s just, it’s such a tough part of our industry because again, we are a people serving people. So that’s why I like talking about this part when there is that extra praise. You know, one of the best feelings that I got when I was working at the front desk was when someone would say, oh, you’re the famous Ryan that I saw on, on TripAdvisor, because they read a review that another guest wrote about. And just like we talked about that with the location of setting the table, setting guest expectations, this is one of those places you just have a comfort feeling. If I know, and I see Jackie, who has been just, guests, have been ranting and raving about Jackie at the bar and, and the drink that she makes and the conversation that she makes with travelers. And that now becomes just incorporated in that guest experience. And that’s the key to making something memorable. Right? So it’s just obviously a big spectrum when it comes to staff. Hoteliers still fighting right now, a staffing shortage. Can you give any maybe tips or tricks when it comes to like staffing shortages or maybe hoteliers that don’t have enough staff right now and and they’re just, they’re on like a skeleton crew?
Jackie Avery:
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I would say stay the course with keeping in mind what did you do in the moment when a guest brought their concerns to your attention? Right? Maybe you’re short staffed, you’ve done everything you can that day, you’re stressed, take a deep breath, apologize, hear them, then maybe explain what happened. Ask, these are some things that I could do. Would any of that appease you? You know, or maybe help make this right. And then if that doesn’t work and you still in the end get a negative review, you at least you know, you know that you did what you could. You still led with understanding and you can respond in your reviews. And that’s acknowledged online. You know, I’m so sorry that this impacted your stay. We did try to offer these type of love that accommodations, we still understand that we didn’t meet your expectations. This was unusual for us. Please come visit us when we’re not in peak season. You know, we have all these other great events around and we’d love to show you what it’s like when we’re not at full occupancy and we could get you the room that you really wanted. But if you just go in and you’re defensive, you close the door right then and there. Don’t have the opportunity to win ’em back.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You are listening and watching an artist at work right there. ’cause the way that you just described that online you’re right, is very disarming and understandable. Empathetic. And if I’m reading that as a guest, I’m saying, yeah, you know what, maybe this guest was being a little unreasonable. They were offered this and declined it. But very different conversation if you’re, if you say something like, you know, we offered you this and you didn’t take it. Like, it’s just very different tone. And that’s why that voice really, really matters online. And as we read more of these reviews, we’re getting better as consumers interpreting what’s actually happening. I think that’s really important to understand now is because reviews have become such an integral part of our life, the response is we know what a good response and a bad response looks like. It’s becoming very, very clear. So here we are, we’re at the top, I’ve gotta guess, but I’ll let you reveal what the number one tag is.
Jackie Avery:
Yeah. So we made it number one, it’s got over 6.5 million mentions and close to 4 million of those were positive. So let’s talk about the accommodations tag. So guests hope to be pleasantly surprised when they walk in a room, but they are not gonna shy away from letting you know if they are pleased or extremely disappointed. This tag can encompass everything from the bed to the room size, to the view to in-room amenities and to general room maintenance. So there’s a lot that goes into it. Specifics and empathy will serve you well here. Kind of a theme overall, right? Right. So you’re uniquely positioned to thank a guest for pointing out what makes your property special. If you have interesting art on site or you just upgraded TVs and it’s somebody who stayed with you every year and they point that out, you wanna thank them for doing that, they don’t have to do it, right? You want to encourage them to continue to share that good news, maybe not just online, but with their friends and family. So if they didn’t point out the tag in a positive way, you can then use this time to take corrective action. You can thank them for their patience. You can thank them for their assistance in pointing it out to you, right? Instead of, why didn’t you tell me about that sooner? That’s the same situation. Why didn’t you tell me about that sooner? And thank you for pointing this out. I didn’t have to write you a review to point it out, right? So let’s not be mad at them in that case. We can all talk ideal scenarios, but we don’t have control over what they’re gonna say and what they aren’t gonna say. So empathy goes a long way in this sense because when you hear their concerns, you open the door to providing more information to clearing up a misunderstanding, to really just inviting them back even to change their perceptions. Travelers know that things can go wrong and they, you know, understand that not everything is in your control, but they don’t wanna be told that they should have done something different. They wish anything that inconvenienced them or frustrated them or was stressful never happened. So they felt a certain way and if they decided to bring it up, you know, it doesn’t help you to be frustrated with the sense that they brought it up. You just wanna, you know, feel for them that they did encounter a frustration. They’re not focused on the big picture like you are. They are dialed into their specific trip and what happened to them. And so you can kind of acknowledge what went on. You can focus on any positive aspects of the trip. Maybe you can say, we hope, even if they didn’t say they liked the location, if you know you have a great location, you can ask ’em. We hope, you know, we hope you like our location, but we do apologize, you know, that these things happened and you have the ability to add these things to your response if you don’t come off defensive and combative.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I mean it’s again, goes back to voice and tone for sure. And there needs to be a clear understanding. And that’s, we do a lot of, not just upfront effort, but continuous effort and making sure that frequency is matched with your team for our hotel partners, because every hotel is different, every hotel stay is different. We can anticipate some negative things like if you are in a noisy area. Other things we can anticipate when a guest will throw their hanger on top of a sprinkler and cause an entire Florida flood, which has happened before where at a hotel that I’ve stayed at. So both the anticipated and non anticipated, you have to have a process, you have to have a really good understanding of what you’re hoping to accomplish. And I think what you said at the top of this episode, Jackie, really resonates with me. It’s the last impression that you’re sharing with that guest. Do you want it to even to just leave an even worse taste in their mouth? Or do you want it to show empathy, understanding and acceptance and accountability that you’re gonna accept what happened and try to make it better for the next time? Which is what we as hoteliers all want to do. We want to make sure everyone’s stay is a five star stay. Absolutely love this. Accommodations again, continues to rule the land when it comes to sentiment tags in 2023. Looking forward to 2024 and doing this again, if there have been any big movements, but any final thoughts before we wrap up? Yeah,
Jackie Avery:
Absolutely. I’d say I cannot stress how important it is enough that you need to take a step back and shift your mindset when you’re analyzing your reviews or when you’re responding to them. Guest feedback is a good thing to have. Learn from it. Adjust, take any actions that you can take and make sure that you are not, you know, being defensive when you read it. And don’t underestimate the power of responding to a happy guest. Somebody who has left you an amazing review and didn’t complain, does not deserve to be ignored or to be given just a generic reply just because they were pleased. These people are advocates and they will champion, you know, for your property. So make sure that you’re spending time thanking them and giving them the quality responses that they deserve.
Ryan Embree:
That’s an absolute great point. We talk about it all the the time on this podcast. And just a reminder, the top five sentiment tags that we went through today, these were nationwide, these were hotels all over the country, compiled from millions and millions of reviews. If you are looking, you have these same top five sentiment tags within your hotel, within your hotel management portfolio right now. If you’re interested in this information, we have the tools and data that we can share with you because it’s exactly what you said. You know, taking that feedback. These are the clues and blueprint to a really great guest experience at your hotel is this feedback. It needs to be said more. It is not something to be feared or hated. This guest feedback is good and it’s good for your hotel and good for your guest ultimately. So I would say if you’re interested in learning a little bit more about your hotel, your hotel management portfolio and these sentiment tags, reach out to us at Travel Media Group. Jackie, thank you so much for joining me on The Suite Spot today. You and your team do fantastic work. The numbers again are just astounding. Every single time I talk with you, that number grows more and more. So happy to see where we’re gonna be next year and hopefully, if not only us, but for our entire industry. It’s a busy, busy travel year. So Jackie, thank you for joining The Suite Spot.
Jackie Avery:
Absolutely. Thanks so much for having me. It was a pleasure.
Ryan Embree:
And thank you all for listening to The Suite Spot. We will talk to you next time to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The next episode of TMG Hospitality Trailblazers sees Charles Oswald, President and CEO of Aperture Hotels, taking center stage on the Suite Spot podcast. In this installment, viewers will get a clear breakdown of what makes Aperture Hotels so unique and a one-of-a-kind hotel brand, along with a plethora of information covering some of the most pressing topics in hospitality and hotel digital marketing.
Tune in now!
Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. This is our first episode in 2024, recording in 2023, but really excited nonetheless. Got a great guest with me. I’m gonna introduce in a second, but this is a part of our Hospitality Trailblazers series. And if this is the first time you’re doing this, we’ve done this over a year now we are talking about the future of our industry and those individuals, hotel management companies that are really driving our industry forward. And, no better guest than I have. Charles Oswald, president, CEO of Aperture Hotels. Charles, this is your first time to the Suite Spot. Welcome in.
Charles Oswald:
Hi, it’s good to see you. Thank you.
Ryan Embree:
We’re excited to be here, Charles, we’re gonna cover a lot past, present, and future today, but let’s start in the past. You know, this is a new guest. You’re the first of the year. We work in this industry where this is, people come from all walks of life and how, and how we get into hospitality. We’re gonna talk about one of those tracks with hospitality schools a little bit later. But tell us a little bit about your background, Charles, and the journey that led you to Aperture Hotels.
Charles Oswald:
It’s been a long, it’s been a long story for sure, but, you know, I began in hospitality when I was in high school. I was a cook in freestanding restaurants, and I did that on through, uh, through college. Then moved into, uh, you know, in convention services at Hyatt. And that began my food and beverage career at some award-winning Hyatt Hotels. You know, they transferred me from, from Tampa then to Dallas, where we grew with a lot of responsibilities. And, uh, that was in the early nineties to mid nineties. Uh, and then I went on to become an, an a, uh, assistant general manager and general manager of some award-winning full service Holiday Inns, Marriots some Hilton Properties through the late nineties and early s before ultimately becoming a vice president of operations, uh, with an up and coming sophisticated private equity firm, noble Investment Group. And I would say really learned a lot there about the PE side, the investment side, uh, proper asset management and so on. And that’s really what groomed me for, uh, for my next role when, um, when Noble Investment Group sold their management company into interstate hotels and resorts. Uh, at that time, you know, the predecessor to Abridge that we know today was the largest, uh, hotel management company. That was an opportunity through that transition to step out and become a partner and CEO in my own company, uh, with HP Hotels. So I ran, uh, HP Hotels for eight years through 2019. Grew that portfolio to just shy of 50 properties. Then I transitioned into an investor role through the pandemic period planned to invest in hotels, but we know how hotels were through the Pandemic. So I had to pivot, stepped into some other industries, including managing investments for, uh, you know, some retail office development, had a charter yacht business, and several other interesting deals associated with commercial real estate. Uh, but then last year I was like, I just wanna get back to my passion. I wanna get back to hotels. This is really what I love. And so that’s when I joined Banyan Tree Management, which was a captive management company to Banyan Investment Group, which we then relaunched as Aperture Hotels to take on third party management company assignments here in, we just relaunched, in March of this year, 2023. It’s been a fast and furious ride, but operations at my roots, from the beginning and developing from Cook to CEO.
Ryan Embree:
That is certainly fast and furious, but it’s always interesting to hear these stories. It, it’s, there’s always that theme of adaptability, versatility, changing roles from departments to different states. I’d never get tired of hearing these stories, Charles, because there’s always either, you know, one mentor or you know, one group. You know, like as you were speaking about that really has like a, a really big impact on what shapes you for where you are in your career. And, and I think that’s so important, especially for our younger hotel listeners and audience to hear in this, is to really look out for those mentors along the way of your journey. ’cause it really is a journey in our industry. We have the privilege of working in hospitality where our skills are very transferrable. Uh, you can go from one state to state or country to country, brand to brand. Obviously some differences there, but a lot of similarities as well. So I love hearing your story. I do wanna fast forward to today, though, you know, here we are at the end of 2023. We’re recording, we’ve launched in 2024, but this is always a great time to kind of take a moment to reflect on the end of the year. At least. I like doing it different year for you starting a company, right. So looking back on 2023, some of your biggest accomplishments, how has it exceeded your expectations or met your expectations going in when around this time last year?
Charles Oswald:
First I have to say, you know, we began this journey in 2023 course in 2022. So when I joined the company a late first quarter of 2022, the idea was to upgrade what was essentially a family style management company into more of an institutional grade, third party management company that could deal with sophisticated private equity firms and REITs and so on. So this meant taking a lot of time to thoughtfully upgrade the tech stack, our systems, our processes, our risk management program, our insurance programs, and invest more into training development and, and really upgrading our strong players to our, or or adding strong players into our corporate leadership. So with that being done as we stepped in 2023, we have a really strong team built. And so this was the time now to relaunch that company as Aperture Hotels under that new profile with targeting third party management. So we began the year, year as we entered the year, you know, we had a dozen properties that were owned by the original affiliate there, formerly Banyan Investment Group, now Satori Collective. And so we then relaunched his Aperture Hotels at the Hunter Hotel Investment Conference in 2023. And since that time, we’ve actually added ten third party contracts into our portfolio. So we’re averaging just over one a month. And now, now it’s a really strong start for a new, essentially new company that has never really marketed itself as third party before to add that kind of have that sort of steady growth record through its first year. So we’re really excited about how quickly that’s ramped up, that’s exceeded our expectations, and that’s, again, that’s pure third party outside of any investment affiliate or anything like that, I couldn’t be more proud of, of our team and how quickly we’ve been able to adapt.
Ryan Embree:
Fast and furious, just like the, the story you said of your hospitality journey there. Certainly indeed. Now, as we prepare for the new year, you know, I know with some of the properties that you’ve already had, this could be the first new year you’re going into some of these other properties. How do you prepare going into a new year from the corporate side, and then maybe move into the more property level side for our hotel listeners that might be kind of prepping for what’s typically our slower season in the winter?
Charles Oswald:
Well, you know, I’d say first that, that, you know, our corporate team is built to support the, the property team, right? So, uh, so our goals, our objectives, our priorities are really one and the same. So for us, having a really clear set of priorities is important. Making sure that we shape all the things that we do in our business around those clear set of priorities is important and a very strong culture. Uh, so from a priority standpoint, it’s always staying focused on revenue enhancement with the primary measure being, you know, market share changes, right? Then our customer experience, our profit management, and our team member engagement. So with those four things establishes our priority. We’re looking ahead into 2024. And what are we doing? Well, I think we’re cognizant that there’s still, you know, labor pressures, inflationary pressures, brand standards creeping back into full force as we roll into 2024. And that means that we have to be really diligent about executing the fundamentals and making sure that our key priorities are always top of mind. Uh, we’re dialing in right now into productivity based labor controls, making sure that we’re not leaving any money on the table. We’re not getting fat and happy here with our business or lazy as we roll through the holidays. But really keeping profit margins in mind for the investors for whom we manage. We’re very focused on distribution strategies in. Then at the same time, as we step into 2024, we look at the beginning of the year, we wanna make sure that we’re effectively training, developing, measuring, and managing everything that we do. So we do that primarily through our balanced scorecard, which it measures all the key elements of our key priorities. And then, you know, throw in senate programs, right? I think most solid companies, you gotta prepare and anticipate, engage, evaluate, and reward. And we’re, you know, following that stream as we step into 2024,
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s certainly a great time to do it. We’ve had a bunch of episodes kind of talking about this being the year to really take a step back, analyze what worked in the year before, make adjustments. You’re talking about productivity and, and even staffing efficiencies, because this might be somewhat of a slower time for your staff, and then all of a sudden you’re gonna get stress tested here, come spring break and, and we’ll already be in the summer. So the more work you can do kind of right now, grinding with your team, making sure that every little nook and cranny is kind of taken care of from everything from the operation side, even to the digital marketing side of things, which, you know, we love to talk about on this podcast, that’s gonna serve you during those busier times. You’ll reap the rewards come the summer and busy season.
Charles Oswald:
Absolutely.
Ryan Embree:
I love this time of year also because this is the time where everyone likes to throw out their trends, their predictions, you know, OTAs, brands, publications are always trying to guess what’s next. And, you know, some years we’ve been a little bit better than others, right. Exactly. So, you know, I wanna get your prediction on one thing because I have been hearing a lot about kind of this return of the business traveler, which we’ve started to see it a little bit more pick up, but really leaning into it into 2024. What, what’s your prediction and, and are you guys maybe targeting or marketing to business travel differently than you did previously?
Charles Oswald:
Well, yeah, right. So I think when we talk about business travel and, and how we do the, you know, we, we, we like to, we think about the art and science, right? And scientifically, I think most of us historically would look at office utilization trends and air traffic trends as key indicators that we track when we’re conversing about the business traveler and when they come back, right? So looking at 2024 and where we stand right now today, you know, air traffic has, it’s recovered above 2019 levels, right? But a lot of that was, was leisure lift as well, not just really business lift. So on, on the flip side of that counterbalance to it, office utilization is hovering below 50% of 2019 levels. So below 50%. Now, lease rates might be indexed at about 96% of 2019, but the utilization is low. So what does that do? I mean, it certainly puts some pressure on hotels. You know, we’ve seen a lower index recovery and urban markets and suburban corporate office markets. But I’ll say this about that trend. You know, we have to be, careful when we’re discussing national trends. ’cause every market has its own unique thumbprint, right? For example, Miami, Phoenix, and Austin office, lease rates and utilization are largely recovered in excess of 2019. But we look at San Francisco, San Jose, Philadelphia, way behind, right? So we can’t just apply the average to every, you know, it’s, it’s like the weather every single day is anything but average. You know, it’s a little rainier here. It’s that day sunnier there on that day. It’s hotter, cooler. But what we’re seeing when it comes to travel, individual traveler is, is there is a shift that’s occurring right now. Many fortune 100 companies are calling their employees back to the office. I think in mid 2023, we saw the likes of, uh, companies like Oracle, Dell, capital One, Google, Citigroup, AT&T. They’re calling people back in the mid part of the year, late spring and through the summer to get back to three day a week patterns. Now it’s that five days a week, it’s three days a week, can be a little hard on hotels, but we’ll talk about that in a second a little bit more. And then the last trimester of 2020, uh, we saw Goldman Sachs, we saw Apple, BlackRock, uh, meta Cigna, Comcast, and, and FedEx, you know, and other more companies, um, calling people back to the office for everywhere from two to five day patterns. And in 2024, there’s a little bit more like I saw, recently that, USAA, for example, is calling people back in the office in q1. So companies are beginning to realize, and I don’t know why it took so long to realize this, but realizing that productivity fell back during this whole remote hybrid work period. And in Covid, uh, as a matter of fact, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, I, I was looking at their, their, their numbers, productivity as a country, we fell back 1.9% during the last two years. And that is the largest decline on record. That, that, I mean, that’s shocking. I keep that in mind. We’ve progressed 2% per year for well over a century. And for us to go back in a period where we have all this added technology and communication skills in systems, and I mean, like what we’re using here, right? Video conferencing pro, you go backwards when we’re supposed to be more predictivity working from home and not sitting in community it says something about the importance of the work environment. So companies realizing that, and I think as labor conditions gradually, say normalized, but also it’s a little bit of a new normal, but we’re seeing more small corporate group meetings are occurring. Some transient and extended stay is bouncing back. But it’s, it’s slow build. It’s, it’s, it’s not a, there’s no hockey stick here. One of the things that companies are having to deal with is, is some of their workers relocated during the pandemic. And so when you relocate now, what do you do with them? Well, I think they’re going to, that’s gonna convert into what we call super commuters. And some people who have to come back and stay at a hotel maybe for two nights, for their three days in the office, two or three nights, right? To man, to work with the new company mandates. So yeah, there is some recovery, but don’t look for the hockey stick. Look for just gradual small recoveries as companies try to balance their budgets, against inflationary pressures and rising, wages, but versus the need for improved productivity and people actually being in the office.
Ryan Embree:
I completely agree with you there, Charles. And it’s interesting because both of us found ourselves at the hospitality show, the inaugural hospitality show in, in Las Vegas this year. And, and one of the things we, or, at least I, I thought when I was there was just how much it felt different when we were physically there. And I think that is gonna happen with people coming back to the office or even traveling for business. And especially for maybe a younger generation that wants to get out and have experiences. They might be the ones raising their hands saying, oh, I’ve gotta travel for business. I’ll go ahead and do that. I’ve been cooped up in here and now companies making me come back into the office. I am having a little bit more face-to-face interaction. I’m feeling a little bit more comfortable. And now they wanna do some more jet setting. Who doesn’t like a good business trip? You know, especially when you’re younger, you don’t have families or anything like that. But it’s interesting to see those trends because that’s, that’s obviously targeting a different type of traveler as well. And maybe having those shoulder nights attached to that business trip saying, Hey, I’m gonna go ahead and extend this business trip into a little bit of a leisure vacation. So, super, super interesting. I’m curious to kind of see where it heads in 2024, but as we predicted before, sometime these trends and predictions don’t always go the way that we want them to. So, but, I wanna switch to staffing. You brought it up before we had Chip Rogers on a couple episodes ago. He noticed some sentiment about, you know, staffing finally starting to feel like the tide is changing a little bit, which is, is a welcome change. ’cause it has just been such a headwind and a challenge for our industry. Any creative things that you’re putting in place, I’ve, I’ve heard some really, really creative ideas out there for Aperture Hotels to retain and recruit talent?
Charles Oswald:
First, just kind of piggyback on what you said about, about the hospitality show, which is put on by AHLA and Chip Rodgers, of course, CEO fantastic job there that he’s doing there. And so as CEO of Aperture Hotels, I sit on the AHLA management company committee as well, where they have, a lot of the, the stronger management companies in the industry are represented there. And there are some highlights from a recent study that we did in the management company, you know, I’ll share with you about turnover in the labor market conditions, as a whole, we’re able to get some numbers through hotel effectiveness, which is the largest, you know, labor software in the, you know, in the industry as well, you know, some payroll records and looking at what turnover rates are, we’re challenged by and what wage increases have been. And, and just, just some quick things to think about is, is it turned out that there is a 35% increase in general manager turnover versus 2019 still. Yeah, up 300 dips, from 2022, that’s a hardest to fill role, uh, where you need talented people. And there was actually still climbing turnover. And so we have to counter that as a company and we’ll talk about that in a second. And then there’s the high turnover of the, what’s the highest turnover role? Well, I was just sitting there talking to you about, you know, 35% increase to 35% turnover of the general manager role annually. But at the housekeeping, you know, room attendant role, would you believe that 34% of all room attendants turnover in the first 30 days? Just think about that. So, so if you’re a, you know, a small hotel with 10 or a bigger hotel with 20, you know, room 10, you can count on three of your employees not making it to the 30 day anniversary if you’re average in the industry, that is just remarkable. But I think expresses the challenge we have of dealing with turnover and, you know, the current labor conditions. And, and so how do we navigate the challenge? There’s, there’s probably three things I put out there, right? First you have flexibility about four hour shifts, hour for, for some people that, you know, whether they have, maybe they have two jobs, they have to deal with kids coming home from school or think about four 10 hour shifts. You know, think about shifts at I regular times, you know, I walked into one of my hotels, I was actually about to leave to go catch a flight, as I was leaving that hotel, it was, it was four o’clock and they were doing a pre-shift with three housekeepers that were coming in the afternoon. I was like, you know, I said, how did this come to be and tell me? And they said, well, we’re, we’re being flexible, right? We don’t always need every room. You know, it’s not always a hundred percent, uh, sell out. And so we can clean in the afternoon into the early evening, give people extra, uh, hours or, or, and she pointed out, said, this girl over here has a, this young woman has a, a full-time job during the day. She gets off at three o’clock, comes over here. She mentioned another person picks up the kids from school, drops them off for the daycare, you know, and they come over and work a, a short shift and so on. So, so being, uh, I think being flexible with some of those times. In some cases, we’ve allowed a little remote hybrid work actually with sales managers. Uh, and that’s worked out okay for us. And then we have the ability for employees to use an app to select available shifts. So there’s a, there’s a workplace app that they, they, they see, um, what shifts are open there. The manager puts open shifts, schedules, people, uh, and then whatever the open shifts, other people can pick them up. And I, and I think using technology to allow people, enable them to work the shift, they really wanna, i, I think can be helpful. So, so flexibility, adaptability, um, you know, we can use contract labor to fill in some holes, though. Evidence suggests that, uh, contract labor doesn’t, uh, always embrace the same, uh, brand culture, drive the customer experience or deliver the same productivity and consistency of our own long-term employees. Uh, so you gotta be careful not to become reliant on it, but that can give you a hedge at least to, to help during maybe some of those markets where you have higher, you know, peaks and valleys, right? And then I’d say third is culture and engagement. We gotta think about skills and career development. We have to think about employee wellbeing. So we’re i those three things, flexibility, adaptability, culture, engagement, and you know, skills, career development, all that stuff. It is really important for companies to think about as they navigate the challenge.
Ryan Embree:
Today, as I interview more and more industry leaders, Charles, I love to hear, and even Chip, you know, really embracing technology in our industry, which typically is slow to kind of get to there, right? Sometimes we’re still filling out the dry cleaning cards and putting them on the outside of our doors. So to hear that we’ve had to make this and, and it’s kind of had to be kind of an adapt or die situation where it’s, we’ve had to adapt this technology, but I think it’s gonna serve our industry so well into the future because this is what the modern workforce wants, is open to, they know how to communicate. I love the idea of an app and being able to kind of pick shifts and, you know, obviously we’re at 365 24/7, so there’s only so much flexibility that we can lend there, but finding these places of efficiencies I think is gonna go a long way. Really, really cool to hear you embracing that over that you and your team embracing that over there. And one of the things you guys do, a fantastic job of, you know, doing research for this episode. I love your website. I love everything about it. I love the vibe of the website as a digital marketing podcast, you know, really admired it. One of the coolest features, if you haven’t been over to aperture hotels.com, check it out. ’cause they’ve got a built-in LinkedIn feed on their, their site. And I think that is brilliant. I mean, as, as someone that preaches the hotels all the time about the importance of using LinkedIn as an occupancy driver for groups and corporate travel, can you speak a little bit about why that was a priority to kind of embrace LinkedIn on your website and what that means to you?
Charles Oswald:
It was Brighter Minds, marketing minds than mine. Uh, Lyft suggested that. So I think what I presented as the challenge is pointing out that I think corporate websites become really stale. You know, people work really hard at first to build it. And we did as we were, as we were trying to establish our, our initial identity as Aperture Hotels, uh, earlier this year. And Golly, it was, it’s a lot of work and a lot of time to pick and choose every word and number you’re gonna put up there. But then most people, I think they, like, initially, they go into it and they, they put up a couple of maybe a newsletter here or there, and then they just kind of forget about it. And so, and then this number of corporate websites to me, are stale, they’ve got some news and updates the first two or three months, and then enough for years. So I was thinking, what are our competitors? I think the last update I saw on there was, you know, like 2015 and like, geez, it’s, it’s okay. We don’t wanna be like that. Um, so LinkedIn is, frankly, it’s, it’s, it’s the, uh, you know, it’s the best, uh, social media tool. I think for business. It’s easy, uh, to post on the go. And, and I think I’m just probably more likely to put something up on LinkedIn. We did engage a party to, uh, to help us manage that and make it more of a tidy graphic presentation and to encourage us to, to post more frequently. And so linking that over to the website just seemed like a natural solution to solve the stale issue and make sure that, that we were really posting by having it seamless. You know, that’s part of what we teach, you know, taking that industrial engineering mindset to our business. How can I, you know, put something in one place, do it one time, and, and maybe then broadcast it to more audiences, have more people see it and it doesn’t require an extra step or maneuver, but, but automation. So I think, uh, that was an efficiency that we really liked, and it helps keep our customers up to date on what’s happening with our company.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s so smart because it, obviously, if we have any members of our audience who work at a management company level, it’s, it’s fantastic because that’s where you wanna push potential owners to is, is your website. But even going down to the property level, right? We’re trying to do is create channels and highways to our website. And social media is such a clever way to get people to your website. So that’s why I think it, it was, it was such a unique idea that I hadn’t thought about before. And you’re right, there’s always that PR and news feed on a management company website that sometimes might be a little bit hard to fill, but you’re always updating your LinkedIn that pushes kind of traffic both ways. So someone finds you via your LinkedIn, they’re gonna make it to your website and vice versa. And, and all of a sudden you become kind of a part of their, their living in your feed. Just excellent work. So as you could tell, I’m very excited about it though. I wanna keep this episode civil. We talked about this off screen, how we’re kind of rivals in a sense. It’s no, it’s no Michigan or, or Ohio State, but I attended the UCF Rosen College of Hospitality. Uh, you attended the University of South Florida and Tampa. You know, I’ve seen that you, we, we were talking, you know, off mic about how some of the tremendous work you’re doing. You know, we won’t compare records or anything, Charles, but let’s talk a little bit about just the importance of these hospitality tracks, because, you know, we just talked about staffing and getting people into our industry.
Charles Oswald:
Yeah. Listen, uh, you know, it’s been fun, uh, being a part of this journey as this school has risen 72 spots in their national rankings here over the course of the last 10 years. So really excited to see that progress. But, you know, why are we there? What is this all about? Look, we gotta help people. Hospitality is a little legitimate career. You can go from housekeeper to general manager. You can go from blue collar to white collar. You know, I went from being a, a cook in the kitchen to being a CEO. And if I can do it, anybody can do it. I mean, I’m just saying like, it, you know, it, there is a career progression that can happen and what other industry can claim that. I mean, it’s, it’s, we’re talking, it’s amazing what, what the potential can be tapped in. People. A lot of times people’s future is, is, well, I’ll just say that their, their education is highly predictive of their, of their future life circumstance, right? And there’s a lot of people in hospitality that maybe didn’t get a formal education, but through our industry, they can learn on the job. Education isn’t always necessarily a certificate, a degree, something hanging on your wall there. But it can be that on job learning, it can be career progression, it can be cross training among different departments. You know, I mean, when we talked about my past earlier, the fact that I was able to, the opportunity to refine food and beverage skills with, uh, with Hyatt Hotels. And now when I was with Weingart and Hammonds, I think I, we really, uh, focus on the operational fundamentals. And I learned, you know, a lot of my rooms and labor management as I got into, you know, with Noble Investment Group, I learned about the deal and what makes that work and what private equity expectations are. And you learn all these different areas, right? And you, and you eventually begin to apply it. So, so I’m really excited about the, you know, the work we’ve gotten to be able to do over there and help develop young people. For me, I’ve had an opportunity to be a part of the, the curricular curriculum development there as well here as we continue to refine that, it’s the fastest growing school at the university, which already has over 50,000 students. This, this is a big important distinction for you know, for a mature university to have this fastest growing school, but we need people to realize what the potential is out there. This is a great industry. It can be a good time, it can be hard work, but what a great career progression opportunity it presents.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s why I love sharing these stories, Charles. ’cause I think years ago it was, I fell into hospitality and now we’re hearing a lot more people say, I went to school for hospitality. And, and it’s sharing stories like yours, Charles, like some of the other leaders, I I started as, as a bellman at a property, kind of moved around in, in operations before here at Travel Media Group. And that still has a, as a reach into our industry, there are just so many pathways, like you said, and we get to be a part of experiences, which very few industries can claim that they do. So hearing more stories, more hospitality tracks, more rivalries in state rivalries, like we’re talking about today, those are gonna be the things that really drive more people and, and help with this staffing headwind that hopefully, like I said, is at least getting a little bit better right now. So let’s talk about shift your perspective. I guess we, we’ll call it shift gears to shift your perspective. I see it all over the website featured the header of your LinkedIn profile. I always find it fascinating to see how companies land on a mantra slogan, a motto like this. Tell us a little bit about shift your perspective, how you landed on that and what, and what that means to hotel listeners?
Charles Oswald:
So a aperture, right, the, the term refers to, uh, its camera lens. You know, think about that on your digital camera or the old school cameras, but that’s the light, uh, or the lens through which light travels and, and the focus really occurs, right? And I think that says a little bit about us. You know, you know, our goal and our mantra, we wanna shine light on the opportunity, unlock the hidden business, uh, opportunity that, that, that, that may exist. And then, you know, focus on the priorities and focus on, on results and, and turnaround and how we can do better. At the end of the day, we have to deliver the highest and return on invested capital for our owners that, that we manage for. So our name, I think conveys a little bit about how we blend some art and science in our industry. You know, from a science standpoint, we use our, you know, dynamic tech stack proprietary solutions and advanced statistical methods, uh, right to shine the light and uncover the, the, the hidden business potential and focus our attention on the right thing. And then from an art standpoint, right back to we’re talking about pictures and temperature, it’s deploying, um, you know, a team of experienced executives to go and go execute those priorities and implement and deliver the art of hospitality. And so imagine a picture, a perfect stay, that that’s what we wanna deliver to our guests.
Ryan Embree:
Love that, love the parallels there. And, and you’re right, it is an art in a science, you know, our industry and shift your perspective. That’s a fantastic mantra. We’re gonna shift our focus to the future now. And, as we enter 2024, you know, what’s your, what’s your vision for Aperture Hotels, this being technically what this would be your second full year? Any goals and objectives for either next year or the coming years?
Charles Oswald:
Yeah, I’ll say this. So when I started last year, uh, really established four objectives that we, we really wanna achieve here. And it’s around, you know, national recognition and being a best in class operator, a go-to operator and, uh, you know, and, and then leadership, right? So I think when we talk about nationally recognized, uh, we wanna rank among the top 25 largest operators in less than three years, you know, managing 40 plus hotels, third party would get us there. But we’ve seen a lot of consolidation at the, we’re not necessarily interested in having hotels. We think that we can build on this foundation we’ve laid and that there are some efficiencies and subject matter expertise that we can bring to the, to the table there as we get, you know, into the 40, 50, 60 hotels. Uh, in the near future, we wanna be a best in class operator. I mean, for that, for us, that means strong operational framework that earns aperture hotels, you know, all the key brand approvals that we need, uh, allows us to work our way up the chain scale to manage higher quality asset, more complex assets. So, uh, you know, we measure that best in class, uh, operations by where we stand with the brands, as well as our balanced scorecard approach and the returns that we can help deliver to our investors. Three, you know, I talk about being a go-to operator. I’m talking about leveraging relationships that we have in our industry from the past, uh, and forging new company relationship that would help us, you know, investor relations. It helps us to become the operator of choice for a short list of select clients that are actively placing investment capital and need third party management services. Uh, and fourth, I’d say it’s, uh, you know, it’s about leadership. So wanna elevate Aperture hotels to be viewed as a trusted advisor and a thought leader in the industry as it relates to, you know, innovation strategy and operational execution. So that’s something we’ve been working on and I think, you know, as we were talking about LinkedIn earlier, you’ll notice that, that we might put in key takeaways from a brand conference might be there. You’ll see articles, uh, whether it’s from me, our SVP of commercial strategy or SVP of human resources and speaking at different parties. You see that sprinkled out through, uh, LinkedIn and up there also on our website. And that sort of leadership is what I think the industry needs, uh, more of people who are making, you know, reacting to some of the, uh, well see what’s coming, reacting to some of the things we didn’t see coming and kind of weighing in taking a proactive approach to the business, uh, where others don’t.
Ryan Embree:
No, absolutely. And we’ve talked about this before, just providing, when we’re talking about hotel management companies providing value to your owners in those capacities, right? Whether it be blogs, insights, data, you know, we, you gave some tremendous data today in the Bureau of Labor Statistics, I think fascinating when it comes to business travel and, and what that means. But yeah, more thought leaders in, in this arena, kind of talking about the trends, what we’re seeing, but also being very cerebral with your strategy, knowing your market. And it doesn’t just apply to everything. Like we talked about Charles, so well, you, you certainly got the game plan. You’re off to a fast start. You are off to a fast start in 2023. Wish you nothing but success in 2024. Thank you so much, Charles. Thank you to all of our hotel listeners. Wishing you happy New Year. We are gonna come to you all 2024. New guest, new series. Stay tuned. Thank you so much for Charles for joining me today, and we will talk to you next time on the Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Barry Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embry, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this year-in-review episode, podcast host Ryan Embree has a meaningful conversation with Travel Media Group President, Dana Singer, to go over some of the most significant innovations and milestones that took place in 2023 for TMG and what exciting developments hoteliers can look forward to from TMG in the new year.
With hotels and hotel management companies trying to grow their digital marketing efforts and reach more travelers, you will find out how Travel Media Group plans to help them achieve their hotel digital marketing strategy resolutions.
Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, as always, one of my favorite episodes of the year. It’s an annual tradition. Dana Singer, President of Travel Media Group joins me today. Morning, good morning Dana. And, we’re wrapping up another year and I love this episode ’cause it takes the time to reflect on everything that we’ve accomplished as a company, Travel Media Group, but also the industry. You know, as we get into another year, we’ve sat here in years past before and, you know, maybe that that outlook hasn’t been as bright as it looks in 2024. And maybe finding those bright spots have been a little bit harder to do. But before we get into talking about Travel Media Group, which we’re certainly gonna talk a lot about today, this is the year in review episode. I wanna talk a little bit more about the hotel industry as a whole and how it compares to those last couple years that I just talked about.
Dana Singer:
Sure, yeah. You know, the industry continues to demonstrate resilience, travel demand remains strong. however, it’s not without its headwinds and, and challenges. And this year at Travel Media Group, we conducted several industry surveys of our database, over 40,000 hotels. And we found that staffing is still a significant challenge. It’s important to mention that the industry forecasts are positive and it’s exciting to see the number of new entrants into the market, and that really speaks to the evolving needs and expectations of travelers.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, so certainly a brighter outlook than, like I said, maybe years past that we’ve seen. But, you know, some of the challenges that we’ve seen in this industry, we talked about it on this podcast just a few episodes ago with Chip Rogers when he came on, you know, still seeing those challenges when it comes to staffing and for hotel owners and management companies to find that time. But they’re getting it much more effective and efficient at combating these staffing challenges. This hasn’t been something that’s happened in the last six months, is actually something that’s happened over the last couple years. So that’s why actually we’re at Travel Media Group seeing a lot more demand for things like crafting social media for a hotel or management portfolio, responding to reviews, giving back time to their employees, taking task off their plate so that they can be more efficient. So there’s also this kind of evolution and trend towards outsourcing some of that stuff that’s a lot more welcome. So in that same vein, I wanna talk about Travel Media Group and, you know, some of the latest innovations and developments. We’ve had Jason Lee on here, chief Technology Officer. I feel like he’s on here almost every other episode talking about some sort of new development or launch. Let’s talk about some of those developments in 2023 and the impact that it’s had on our hotel partners.
Dana Singer:
Sure. You know, if I look back, I would say, one of our most notable innovations, for TMG this year would be the launch of our enhanced social media solution. Adding Instagram reels and social video content, to our existing offering really presents transformative opportunities for our clients to engage with guests and travelers. And like our other solutions and services, our social media management offers truly differentiated levels of support and content expertise, and that enables consistency and messaging and certainly a significant time savings.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. So important to be consistent there.
Dana Singer:
Yeah. And then we also launched the inclusion of Medallia as part of our respond and resolve solution. So now we have full capabilities to respond to both public facing and internal reviews, which adds additional efficiencies and time savings for our hotel partners. And it’s something that they’ve asked for. So when we think about our Respond & Resolve™ solution, it continues to be the industry leading solution. It provides high levels of support overall, and the need for a consistent review response strategy has never been more important relative to reputation management and the sincere connection to managing guest feedback.
Ryan Embree:
You made a point in there about our hotel partners asking for this, and I feel like those two things specifically was something that we were hearing from our hotel partners all the time. Like, is Travel Media Group going to be launching social video, or I want to be on Instagram reels, or my hotel wants to actually create a TikTok account. Right? And we were hearing these from our hotel partners and for us to fulfill that need and be actually one of the first to be able to do that and at such a high quality as well, with some of the custom content that you were speaking about and how we can really match the hotel’s voice. Super, super important. And then obviously we know, we’ve talked about it on, on this podcast, how much the emphasize these Medallia, surveys, how much this is a really a great roadmap because it isn’t public facing. It’s actually a one-on-one conversation that you’re having with the guests about how you can improve your hotel and guest experience. So these are absolutely critical in things like, like you said, sincere connection to managing guest feedback. So really, really important launches there. If you haven’t had the chance we have episodes on both of those you can check ’em out on our YouTube page or Spotify, SoundCloud, anywhere you can find those. So I would really encourage you, but I wanna explore this topic of, of social media a little bit further. We’ve talked a lot in some of our series to industry leaders about the evolution of social media and how it’s evolved over the last couple years. How has that translated of how Travel Media Group utilizes its social media platforms right now?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, sure. Great points. I mean, social media clearly plays, a significant role in hospitality overall. You know, guests and travelers who are in the booking journey have high expectations around a connection to the hotel that they’re gonna be staying at. And also they really need a consistent social media presence to engage with, because for the hotel that has a number of far reaching benefits in 2023, TMG launched our official TikTok page. It’s just a natural expansion of our overall social media presence with several videos already published on the page, followers can expect to watch informative, yet entertaining content including clips from virtual events, industry trade shows, interviews with some of the biggest names in hospitality and helpful podcast clips.
Ryan Embree:
One of the things before we get into Travel Media Group social media and a milestone that we hit, but where social media plays a role in the traveler’s journey is, I think one of the habits we picked up during the pandemic as travelers and consumers is we didn’t want any unwanted surprises whenever we were, especially in a time when we were traveling. So one of the things that we used to kind of set expectations or set the table of what we were hopefully going to expect was social media. And I think that has turned into a habit for travelers now. Definitely they want to come into an experience almost knowing the guardrails of what’s going to happen. I think gone are the days of just saying, Hey, I’m just gonna book here and just see what this is all about. So social media, and we’ve heard it from industry leaders on some of the series that we do, are such a great job of setting expectations prior to. And it also keeps them interested vested in your hotel up until the point where they actually step into your lobby. Because at this point right now, there’s still that risk of losing a traveler if something doesn’t match up to an expectation prior to their staying. You know, because you know how much research they’re doing, you know how much information’s out there, you know, there’s probably a plan B or a Plan C. So social media really helps kind of pad that reservation and make sure that you insulate that reservation from any unwanted competition there. Transitioning to Travel Media Group, you know, we hit the incredible milestone in 2023 of 5,000 followers on LinkedIn. And that’s such an incredible tool. I know for our hotel partners we’re posting on there such a powerful B2B platform for groups, you know, weddings and, and all those types of events that that can be found on there. But also just a way to get out news and share news, exciting developments. If you’re a hotel management company, you know, you’re trying to expand your brand. Looking for audiences like that is absolutely key. So we were absolutely thrilled to hit that 5,000 milestone. We’re sharing exciting news in some of our new series that we’ve launched, including the Suite Spot: Spotlight series, which if you are hearing for the first time, we’ve traveled already to New York City, the historic Chatwal, Marriott, Cancun, the World’s first Marriott, all-inclusive resort, which is exciting, and down to South Beach at the SLS where we actually had our first onsite episode. So we are looking for more opportunities to do that and highlight some of our industry’s most unique hotels out there. So really excited about that. You know, I feel like Travel Media Group in 2023 had this underlying theme of collaboration and connection. Can you share some initiatives that happened this past year in our organization that facilitated that connection between our hotel partners and travel media group?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, sure. I mean, as we look back on 2023, we definitely covered a lot of ground relative to the importance of collaboration and strengthening connections with our partners. And while we continue to meet with hotels face-to-face at established industry events, we also expanded this to include participation at several new events such as the inaugural hospitality and independent hotel show in Miami.
Ryan Embree:
We had the pleasure of of attending those shows. You know, hospitality show in Las Vegas was absolutely fantastic. The independent hotel show in Miami, that face-to-face connection is something, you know, we found over the last couple years. It’s hard to replace. You know, but we have found some other outlets where people, again, we’re talking about those habits that we formed where people feel more comfortable maybe doing some interactive collaborative events.
Dana Singer:
Absolutely. And in 2023, we also launched a brand new interactive webinar platform where hotels pop in and out of break rooms, interact with peers, engage with social media and review response experts. And this was all highlighted in our spring digital workshop series where attendees could join live breakout sessions around different hotel digital marketing strategies and really get a ton out of it because there’s so much learning when it’s interactive. But our ongoing commitment to industry thought leadership is definitely reflected in all of our content marketing efforts.
Ryan Embree:
I had the pleasure of hosting some of those digital workshops digital marketing workshops in the spring. And let me tell you, it was one of the most rewarding and really cool things I did all year to see a Hilton property in California talk to, you know, a Marriott property in the Midwest and talk about collaborating on social media ideas, saying, you know, we’ve got this great idea for Instagram, how can we take it a step further? And just sharing those thoughts between, you know, industry professionals. We crave that, you know, as hospitality professionals, we crave that connection. And, and some of those events have just been absolutely fascinating and facilitating some of those conversations that right now maybe have just happened at trade shows and industry events. So being able to put those on for our hotel partners has been a really, really cool thing to see and, and, and witness and be a part of. So let’s talk about 2024. You know, this is also a fun time to kind of look into the future, the crystal ball a little bit. Any insights or preview of exciting TMG developments that our hotel partners can look forward to in 2024?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, sure. I mean, we we’re looking forward to our continued path of innovation that is dedicated to the industry and really the evolving needs of our partners. These plans do include the launch of an exciting new mobile app for our OneView® platform, along with some new reporting releases that provide even more insights into the guest experience.
Ryan Embree:
That sounds amazing. To be able to think that we might be doing a episode here in 2024 talking about the launch of a TMG OneView® mobile app would be just, I think, the perfect evolution of, of where we’re kind of headed right now. And I think another point you made is what we talked about earlier, is just kind hearing the needs of our hotels and also looking at the outside trends of what’s happening out there and, you know, adapting our solutions to fit those needs. So that’s where things like connection and collaboration that we talked about come in so handy. So if you are a hotel partner at Travel Media Group, we’d love to hear from you even some of the challenges that you might be experiencing right now, because that really sets us up for a roadmap to develop, you know, some of these innovative solutions that we’re talking about on this episode. So that’s really cool. As we get to the end here, you know, I always love asking you this question, Dana, you have a really good insight on it. What would be your message to listeners? You know, like I said, it’s been tough for the last couple years, maybe a message of hope and inspiration, but what about next year in 2024?
Dana Singer:
Yeah, well, first of all, on behalf of our entire team at TMG I wanna wish everyone all the best for successful 2024. We’re looking forward to being a part of the success journey for our partners, and we’re always here for them. So, on behalf of our entire team at TMG, I wanna wish everyone all the best for successful 2024. We’re definitely looking forward to being a part of the success journey for our partners and are always here for them. We celebrated a milestone of 40 years in business in 2023, and we’re very grateful for our growing partnerships and appreciate the continued opportunity to make a positive difference. So really looking forward to the new year.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, it’s gonna be absolutely fantastic to be a part of, really exciting time to be in the industry. We talked about this with Chip Rogers on our episode, you know, is a, a shiny outlook. Everything that we’ve seen, 2024 is gonna be a really great year from everything we’re hearing and seeing even from our hotel partners. We’re just so thankful and grateful to be a part of this industry. As Dana shared that sentiment, really looking forward to all of you listening to the podcast and hopefully sharing some news if you’re a hotel listener out there with some new exciting things that you have on, on your horizon too. So thank you all for listening. This was our last episode of 2023, which wraps up just a fantastic year, tons of special guests onsite episodes, which a lot of first for us, again, just incredibly grateful. Grateful and for, for you taking the time. Thankful for you taking the time, Dana, being on the Suite Spot once again. Looking forward to next year and, and having you back on the podcast.
Dana Singer:
Sounds great.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, so thank you so much. Thank you for listening. You can check us out on our YouTube page as well as any streaming platform. Thanks for listening to the Suite Spot. We’ll talk to you next time.To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star ratingon iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The Suite Spot: Spotlight series is back with another one-of-a-kind episode that welcomes special guest, Christopher Calabrese, General Manager & VP of the Marriott Cancun Collection!
Podcast host and TMG Marketing Director, Ryan Embree sits down with Christopher to showcase the newly renovated Marriott: Cancun, an All-Inclusive Resort, and what exciting new amenities, views, dining options, and activities hotel guests can look forward to from the astounding 450-room property.
Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining me. We are continuing our Suite Spot: Spotlight series. This is quickly becoming one of my favorite series podcast series that we’ve done on The Suite Spot. Because of all the places we’ve traveled, we’ve gone up to New York, down to Miami Beach, and now we are going to beautiful sunny Mexico with a great guest, Christopher Calabrese, general manager and vice president of the Marriott Cancun Collection. Christopher, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Christopher Calabrese:
Thank you, Ryan. Good to be with you.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and we talked off screen how very jealous of where you’re at. You’ve got a wonderful property over there, which we’re gonna talk all about. But before we do that, I always love, we live and work in such a wonderful industry, Christopher, with tons of backgrounds and stories. Tell us a little bit about your journey, your hospitality journey, and what led you to the Marriott Cancun Collection.
Christopher Calabrese:
Well, I’ve been with Marriott for 52 years now, which a lot of people don’t believe, but it’s actually the truth. I’ve had the pleasure to work with all three of the generations of the Marriott family, starting with JW Marriott Sr., Bill Marriott, of course, who was our ex-chairman of the board, and now our David Marriott, who of course is the grandson of the founder and he is now our chairman, executive chairman, as they call it these days. So it’s been an honor to work with all three generations. I started with the hot shops, which was our sort of founding company of restaurants. That’s how Marriott got started in the business. And most of my background, or let’s say half of my background to date so far has been food and beverage. I then became a regional director of operations in Mid-Atlantic. And I wanted to explore the world. I wanted to see international, I wanted to be a general manager. And so at that time I expressed an interest in Latin America and they said, well, you don’t really speak Spanish, so we don’t, we can’t really put you there at this time. So I said, okay, well what might you have? They said, well, we have a job for you in the Middle East and Saudi Arabia as general manager. I said, I don’t speak Arabic. And they said, yeah, but you know, your type of personality will fit in nicely in in that area, in that part of the world. So if you’d like it, let’s do it. We can fly you in if you want to have a look. I said, no, that’s okay. Let’s just go do a one-way ticket and I’ll work out there for a couple of years and hopefully one day get back to this part of the world. And, and sure enough, that’s what happened. And so that’s kind of my journey International. And then I moved to Puerto Vallarta as general manager of the Marriott there. And then I’ve been in Cancun the rest of my career, but I’ve moved 26 times with this company. So, um, I know what it’s like to see different parts of the world or at least parts of the US for the short time that I was there, half of my career. And it’s been a great journey.
Ryan Embree:
That is absolutely fantastic Christopher and such an inspiration to maybe some of our younger hoteliers that might be looking for a long-term career in this wonderful industry that we share in the possibilities of, you know, if you’re open to the opportunity, you know, I had Chip Rogers from the American Hotel Lodging Association last episode on, and we were talking about one of the things that makes our industry so special and unique is skills are transferrable. So you can travel to the Middle East, back to the United States and to Mexico and end up where you’re at. It’s really just an ease of transition as far as the job’s concerned, you know, obviously culture and things of that, which I’m sure you’ll be able to speak to a little bit more. There’s might be some differences there, but it’s just so cool to hear your path and journey like that. And it really just makes you appreciate our industry because it’s, it’s not every industry that you have those types of opportunities. And this series that we’re talking about today, I introduced at the beginning is the Suite Spot: Spotlight series. So for those of the first time hearing this, this is about highlighting some of our industry’s most unique, iconic hotel and one of a kind hotel. And that’s my transition into your property over there, Christopher. This is the world’s first all inclusive Marriott resort.
Christopher Calabrese:
That is correct.
Ryan Embree:
Fantastic. So perfect fit for this series. Can you share a little bit about the story and kind of what makes this property so special other than it again, being one of a kind?
Christopher Calabrese:
Well, Marriott has been for a long time trying to get into the all-inclusive market. One of the largest markets in the world of course is Cancun. So it’s always made sense for us to have an all-inclusive property here. I am just blessed to be able to do this for Marriott. I’ve got years of experience. I’ve opened probably more than 25 hotels in my career. So this not something that’s a stranger to me. I know that the concept is very different. I therefore took my team and Melissa down to Costa Rica because we have a similar concept there with the Westin and the, and the JW, which is a similar type concept that we have here to kind of get best learnings from that property. Since this is something that’s new for all of us, it’s a great opportunity, it’s unique. My team is excited. More importantly, for the last 18 months I’ve been on the road with our sales organization, specifically Sia and Melissa, to talk it up and to find out what the interest is. And I can tell you that from the group customer, they’re extremely interested to get this kind of hotel from a Marriott product and a Marriott that’s gonna be managed by Marriott people, which is something different. That too is gonna help. And those customers are very excited for us to have an all-inclusive property in this Cancun market. Finally, the demand is incredible. We booked an all-inclusive group site unseen. They didn’t even need to see the property. It was still under construction to book that. That’s gonna be, you know, March 4-7 of next year. We are so excited about this concept. I mean really, I personally am excited. My team is excited. We’ve hired talented people who have that all inclusive experience to help us get this off the ground. And I’m sure their futures are gonna be bright after this because we’re gonna get heavy into this all-inclusive market moving down the road. As for our location, you know, we’re right smack in the middle of the hotel zone. I mean, it’s not every day that you can really say these days that a hotel is located only 15 minutes from the airport. So that’s something that’s huge for us. And we’re right in the heart of the hotel zone. So all the tours, all the activities shopping are, is minutes away. And if you do want to explore other restaurants in the, in the hotel zone, they’re certainly available, some of which are in walking distance.
Ryan Embree:
Man, absolutely. So much to offer there. And I’m sure you’re gonna see more of those maybe sight unseen bookings just because you have the power of a Marriott brand behind you. And that marriage of the all inclusive concept, I’m sure there’s been a lot of people it sounds like have been kind of starving for that type of concept to come to Marriott finally. So, you know, such a pleasure speaking with you today and kind of talking about this property, but you know, this is a hospitality marketing podcast and my listeners and audience, you know, we talk a lot about how to market and advertise, you know, a resort or a property and I’m just curious, you just kind of scratched the surface on all there is to do inside and outside of this hotel. How do you kind of set expectations for someone coming to a new property where there, we’re gonna talk about in a second, where there might not be much review content online because it is opening up as part of a renovation. So how do you set expectations of we’ve got so much to offer and we want you to experience it all in this amount of time that you’re here with us?
Christopher Calabrese:
Yeah, it’s amazing. I mean, of course the Marriott powerful name with more than 8,700 hotels doesn’t hurt or a beautiful Bonvoy app that all of our customers pretty much utilize. They can find out, they go to the market, they decide which hotels to, so we’ve got a great start. The demand as I mentioned before, has been incredible already for groups and for transient customers are like, they’ve been waiting for something like this to happen. We are gonna have a personalized app, which is something very new and different. One of the frustrations that we have learned from our competitors all inclusive properties is you try to book a restaurant, it’s full or a guest, you know, will have several members of their family and each one is booking a different restaurant for the same night under their particular name. This app is incredible and we’re, we’re using it already at that West Ply Conal, which is one of our properties in Costa Rica. We’re gonna be using that app and everything you need to know about the resort is gonna be built into that app and at some point it will have the bonvoy logo attached to it as well which is good, you know, to give us that brand presence that we’re always looking for. You’ll be able to book those reservations. You can change the reservations if your favorite restaurant for that particular night is full, you’ll be able to book a different restaurant. You don’t have to go to a hostess stand or stand in line or talk to an operator on the phone to try to book a reservation. So that’s gonna be cool. We’re gonna have enhanced experiences. I didn’t even know that we named our new, Cabeus Ocean Breeze, Cabeus, but it really struck me with a beautiful name today. But that’s where we’re gonna be doing outdoor massages for our guests. Our concierge team are gonna be our local experts as you might expect. So anybody who wants to explore the destination is gonna be able to get all the information they need from our highly trained concierge about the popular natural parks, the otes, the shopping areas, golf courses and everything else you can do. That’s, that’s very close by.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and I love that you talked about this, the implementation of technology into the guest experience and using that app. ’cause you’re right, there can be some headaches sometimes. You had a perfect example of the reservation system. So with travelers becoming more comfortable, as we’ve seen over the past couple years with using things like apps, reservation systems, all of a sudden you have the opportunity there if you implement that technology to kind of enhance the guest experience, really set the expectations. I’m sure, correct me if I’m wrong, are you able to download the app prior to staying?
Christopher Calabrese:
Yes, you can download the app prior to the stay. It’ll be attached to your reservation. Makes it very easy. You hit the download button and then from there they can start exploring our resort.
Ryan Embree:
So, you know, you can even have people not even set foot on property yet already doing things, doing research, you know, you guys have a great social media presence as well. You know, I had a whole episode on marketing renovations because it’s such an interesting window and I’m sure with your years of experience, you know, renovations are fantastic. They’re also sometimes headaches, right? With a lot of moving parts there. But to be a newly renovated property, you have that really unique window of opening up and being that wow factor, you know, so I’m curious, talk to our listeners a little bit at the renovation experience over there and what we should be excited about with this renovation.
Christopher Calabrese:
Well of course renovations start years in advance. I mean, it’s not something that you one day then the next say, Hey, you know, we’re gonna be an all-inclusive resort and then make the decision to close, which we did. There’s just too much going on with this construction and every aspect of the hotel, with exception to the original shell is gonna be fully renovated. We’re adding several new restaurants. We’re gonna have 9 specialty restaurants for a 450 room all-inclusive resort. It’s phenomenal. Most have 4 perhaps 5, I’m talking specialty restaurants where you can dine at nighttime. It’s just gonna be incredible to be able to shut this thing down on March 13th, which we did of this year. And to have it be ready by January 15th, 2024 is an incredible feat. It requires a lot of planning, a lot of execution. You know, we’re adding lazy rivers, we’re adding dual slides, we’re adding an adult pool. The outdoor space is gonna be phenomenal. We’ve actually pulled the front entrance out further so that our outdoor restaurants, which are not really outdoors, but you have to walk out the front entrance to, to get to those restaurants, are gonna be fully covered with a new sense of arrival of our main entrance area. That is just gonna be truly phenomenal. It’s hard to put it into words actually. You’ll see the renders and we’d actually love to have you come down and experience at one time when you get a chance. I think you’ll be impressed and I hope our guests and our group customers also will be very happy to see those changes.
Ryan Embree:
It certainly sounds like a see it to believe it type renovation, which those are absolutely so exciting and I talked about it before, you know, with this unique window of opportunity and for maybe those hotels that aren’t doing such an expansive renovation like yourself, you know, when you open up a new property like this, whether it’s a new concept or even a new build, you kind of have this blank canvas for your reputation. And if you haven’t heard me before, we always stress reputation, you know, guest feedback, responding to that guest feedback. So important, especially in today’s digital environment. So when you have a new property like this and you wanna make sure that you get full experience, everything that you just described online to a traveler that might be doing research, what are some strategies to kind of build that reputation the right way to make sure that it’s working for you and you’re building that foundation that hopefully just gets that momentum going with a new property like this?
Christopher Calabrese:
Yeah, we’ve got an incredible PR team. We’ve got a dedicated PR team is specifically for the all-inclusive Marriott brand. We have a brand team that’s dedicated to that. So once the construction is done, we actually have something that makes sense to an all-inclusive customer. But we have corporate PR, we have Mexico PR, we have our great and exciting senior manager, Melissa Basto, who has done a phenomenal job of helping us get the word out through our various social media platforms. All along the way, every stretch of the renovation we’ve been capturing images with our drone and images and photos and such like that. Those have been released on a pretty regular basis. All these messaging, all messaging has gone out to our customers and to those that are interested in this property. And they’ve helped us to build quite a bit of excitement around this new venture for Marriott as a company. And as you can imagine, there’s a bit of pressure when a company like this that’s so big and you get to be the first hotel to make this transition. So there’s pressure, it’s good pressure ’cause it keeps everybody on their toes and we know we’re gonna have a spectacular product once we finish.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely, and you’re right that, you know, being one of a kind means got all eyes on you, but you know, the way that you’ve kind of described this experience certainly puts it into perspective. And like I said, I think a lot of travelers have been kind of starving for this concept and then for there to have a marriage there with the Marriott brand just takes it kind of to the next level there. Now the property is obviously one of a kind, but it’s also uniquely positioned due to its proximity to another Marriott resort, the JW Marriott, Cancun Resort and Spa, which obviously comprises that Marriott Cancun collection. So tell us the benefit of these two properties being together and maybe is there different marketing strategies for each? I know obviously there’s two different concepts there, but how do they work in tandem and how do they they compare?
Christopher Calabrese:
Well, they’ve always been two different brands as you know Ryan, one was the Marriott Cancun Resort, which was a EP hotel. And of course the JW is an EP hotel, but there’s always been a marriage between these two properties that are tied together through our SkyBridge that connects the best of both worlds and both hotels have 450 guest rooms. Our group customers love it ’cause it’s really the largest complex within Cancun Proper in order to be able to attract large groups, we do groups from size 10 people up to a full buyout of both hotels for 900 guest rooms. So we’re able to handle pretty much anything there and in between. The JW of course, it’s been two different brands, so we have to sort of keep the integrity of those two different brands going at the same time. But the JW being our luxury brand is a phenomenal brand and yet we also bring these two hotels together for groups and to give our transient guests a choice. Now they’re gonna have an additional choice. Do you want to be really all-inclusive, which the market is heavily weighted on, or do you want the EP experience at the JW? And then we’ve had to determine when we do sell these two hotels together as group, how is that going to be handled? Is Marriott gonna remain as an all-inclusive, a hundred percent all-inclusive? Is it JW? And there’s gonna be a certain amount of flexibility depending on the group, depending on the size of the group, depending on if it’s a full buyout for both properties or a specific group for each hotel in which they will maintain the integrity of those particular brands
Ryan Embree:
With that proximity there, you know, you’re certainly making it a tough choice for us, Christopher, but it obviously sounds like you sometimes, you can have the best of both worlds and depending on the size of your group might be able to experience both there. So I’m gonna get some rapid fire questions for you. Now, this is unique. We’ve done this a couple times, Christopher, but they’ve all been properties that are open and existing. So you’re gonna give some first of its kind feedback being that you are really have been the only one. Maybe you and your staff have been the only ones, but what’s your favorite view on the property that you’ve seen so far?
Christopher Calabrese:
The biggest best view of the hotel is when you enter, and this really speaks to both of our hotels. You enter the lobby and the first thing you’re gonna see is that beautiful view of the Caribbean Sea. So that’s my favorite view. You go into that lobby, you’re gonna see it. Everybody loves it. When you’re on the receiving side of the end of those customers entering the main lobby, their mouths are open. Look, most people think that a lot of the photos are touched up and they can’t believe how blue the Caribbean sea really is. But it’s just a phenomenal site to see. And I’d say that’s my favorite view from the hotel.
Ryan Embree:
A lot of listeners listening to this episode as we produce this, as we approach December, probably very daydreaming, very envious of, of that view right now. Now we obviously know a lot of fun quote unquote things happened during renovations, but any fun facts about the Marriott, Cancun, all-inclusive resort?
Christopher Calabrese:
Well, there was this time when Melissa Basto tripped in the lobby over a piece of wood while she was trying to take some photos. No, I’m just kidding. Fun facts, well, I have to say our amazing waterpark. That thing was just created, I mean, the footprint had to be maximized. We’ve got a lazy river that went in there. We’ve got these two giant slides that are gonna start around the third or the fourth floor of the hotel. So that gives you the level of height that these two slides are gonna have as they swirl around and go into a deep pool at the bottom. The Lazy River surrounds that. If you haven’t seen the renders, you should have a look at that. So that’s, there’s always action going on in that zone. We have the main swimming pool, which is the largest pool of the three. And of course we’re gonna have an adult pool off to the side. Each of them is surrounded by restaurants. We’ve got a ceia, we got a health food bar and we’ve got the Pizzeria. So those are areas that are dedicated to those outdoor spaces. There’s staging on top of the wellness bar that’s gonna be used for entertainment at night. So we’re not having to construct these type of staging areas for whatever entertainment we have or whatever shows we have. It’s gonna be built in. So it’s really gonna be a phenomenal look and feel lots to do once you go outside in the, in the external areas of the back of the back of the hotel.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, sounds like it. And for some of those families and kids that might be visiting the property, the top of that water slide might be their favorite view on property at the hotel. But you mentioned, correct me if I’m wrong, 9 different dining experiences at the property. Have you had a chance to have a signature dish yet at the property?
Christopher Calabrese:
Oh my God, yes. In fact, one of our restaurants is gonna be called Mo’s Shakes and [Burgers]. What’s it called? Shakes and Burgers, ’cause we’ve changed the name a few times, but that’s based on the Mighty Mo sandwich and you can actually go Google it and you’ll see the recipe for that. It actually came from our original hot shops restaurants that I actually worked in. So I think I’m the only living being left other than perhaps Bill Marriott that’s actually tasted one from the original recipe, you know, 50 years ago. In fact, we prepared them then. So that’s actually gonna be the signature dish, the Mighty Mo, which is a double hamburger with special secret sauces that I can’t talk to you about, and a sesame seed bun. And it is really an amazing hamburger, double hamburger that we actually, you know, I’ve got an exec meeting that we have every Monday and a couple of times we’ve already asked to have those brought to the meeting. They’re just delicious and you gotta come down and try it. Every restaurant’s gonna have a signature plate, but this is really the signature moment, the signature restaurant for the Marriott all-inclusive brand.
Ryan Embree:
That’s so cool too. I mean, you know, from, from where you started your career, it’s very full circle that is a, you know, signature dish over there, so. Very cool. Now last one and again, this is one of my favorite questions, just go into different hotels is favorite piece of art at the property?
Christopher Calabrese:
That’s an easy one for me because that also is, has a lot of historical value. And for me it’s always been the famous painting that’s in every one of our Marriott properties, which is the painting of Bill Marriott when he was, I think just given the CEO position, which was done in 1972 and his dad, JW Marriott Sr. Standing by him and they had some blueprints rolled up. And you’re gonna see that painting in every single Marriott product throughout the world. You walk by it every day. It’s an inspiration for me to see his dad and himself. That’s one of my, I know it’s kind of hokey, but it’s my favorite artwork that, that you’re gonna see in every Marriott product when you go into any hotel.
Ryan Embree:
I was very fortunate to be a Marriott employee for a period of time in my hospitality experience, and I could close my eyes and still see exactly that image. And I’m sure a lot of our listeners see the same thing. So, you know, as we approach 2024, you know, what’s, what’s your vision for the property? Maybe maybe we connect together, hopefully in person, but we’re, we’re talking 1 year from now, what’s, what’s your vision for the property?
Christopher Calabrese:
Well, just to have tremendous success. Our owners have financially spent a lot of money on the investment. Of course, they’re expecting to get a return on that investment. Marriott is looking this as sort of the first one of many. So we’ve gotta have a lot of success there, a hundred percent confident that we will, we have a great team. We’re gonna be a sort of balanced hotel between group and F.I.T I imagine we’re gonna do a lot of weddings. We already have several weddings that are already booked for 2024 and beyond. We have groups that are booked for 2024 and beyond. So like I say, the demand, the interest in Marriott getting into this game has been phenomenal for me. I think it’s gonna be a great success story that can be built on in other properties that are coming online and are in the pipeline, in fact, for 2024 and beyond.
Ryan Embree:
Such a pleasure to speak with you. Such a unique opportunity. And you heard it, all those engaged couples and listeners out there, it sounds like they still have some spots available, so make sure to, to contact Christopher and I’m sure he’ll get you set up at this beautiful new resort and all-inclusive property. Christopher, thank you so much for, for joining me. Any final thoughts on today’s episode? We covered a lot of ground.
Christopher Calabrese:
We covered a lot of ground. Ryan, I just want to thank you for the opportunity and thank all of your listeners and we welcome everybody to come down and have a look. I think you’re gonna be impressed. I think you’re gonna be satisfied with your experience and we’d love to have your feedback once you get here and give us a chance.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much, Christopher. Thank you for listening to The Suite Spot. It’s such a pleasure to showcase on the Spotlight series, the Marriott, Cancun All-Inclusive Resort. Thank you to our guest Christopher, and we will talk to you next time on the Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
It’s time to catch up on the state of the hotel industry with special guest Chip Rogers, President and CEO of the AHLA! Ryan and Chip have important conversations around some of the most pressing and relevant current events happening in hospitality and give hoteliers key insights into how staying in touch with these developments directly affects your businesses and travelers. Tune in now to discover how staffing, work flexibility, new trends, and hotel technology keep evolving and how you can stay one step ahead of the curve.Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio. Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining, watching us. If you're watching us from our YouTube channel or joining us from any of the streaming platforms that you're listening to, if you did find us, you know, we've got a great guest today, someone that really doesn't need any introduction. Chip Rogers, president and CEO of the American Hotel and Lodging Association. Chip, thank you so much for, being on the Suite Spot with me today.Chip Rogers:Hey, Ryan, it's so good to be with you. Thank you for having me.Ryan Embree:Really technically not your first time on the Suite Spot. Last time we were together, Chip, we were in Las Vegas on a busy trade show floor after a very successful hospitality show. About six months removed from that now, what type of feedback are you getting about that event and maybe give us some insights into what you're looking for from the next one in October in San Antonio?Chip Rogers:Well, first feedback was the opening party, seems to have taken on historic status. As folks who have been, at that property know that the nightclub TAO and we packed it out, there was a line that lasted, some estimates over two hours long to get into it. And so you, you almost created that, fear of missing out. But people absolutely loved the opening party. And from there it went to, an incredible lineup of keynote speakers. And what we tried to do is make sure that we are entertaining you, informing you yes, hitting on those things that are unique to the hotel industry, but also remembering that everyone's a person, they have outside interests too, and, and could we get speakers that are funny, inspiring, educational. And I, and I think we hit all that. In fact, the most popular speaker that we had, Admiral McCraven, it was interesting. I was at an event literally last night and it was a political event and people were talking about, oh, you know, these two candidates that this seemed to be the two candidates running for president. And someone said, if there's a third party candidate, why don't we just get Admiral McCraven? And I'm like, that would be great, because now I know the guy and if he became president, that would be kind of cool. But it's that type of level of speaker that we had that I think really set us apart from many of the other shows that you go to. And so from the trade show floor, that was just amazing. We sold it out in year one to the speakers. And again, starting with that incredible opening party, it, it was quite an event. And, you know, Las Vegas always has something special for everybody. We're gonna try to redo that again in San Antonio. San Antonio, a very unique place. One of the most visited cities in the United States for people that are going on a leisure trip. And so we wanna make sure we're capturing that, that you're coming to the event, you're going to have fun, you're going to be entertained, you're gonna learn something,
Join Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree as he welcomes TMG Hospitality Traiblazer, Oliver Winter, to the podcast. Oliver is the founder and CEO of a&o Hostels which is the largest independent hostel chain in Europe! These two discuss the hostel experience, a&o’s commitment to green initiatives and sustainability, and the resurgence of the solo traveler. Tune in now to see how Oliver and a&o are making a big difference in hospitality across the globe. Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. All right. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, thank you so much for joining us, for listening to us, to watching us wherever you are, finding us here. We are here at the Content Creation Studio for another episode of TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. I am so excited to bring in my next guest, certainly a trailblazer, and what Oliver and his group are doing right now. Certainly, fantastic. We're gonna get a lot to it. So, let me go ahead and bring him in. Oliver Winter, founder and CEO of a&o Hostels. Oliver, thank you so much for jumping on the Suite Spot with me.Oliver Winter:Yeah, thanks Ryan, for having me here. Thank you very much.Ryan Embree:Absolutely. And we're gonna have some fun today. We're gonna talk about a&o all the initiatives that you guys are doing and this incredible growth that you're seeing. I think you bring a really unique perspective, but for those that have not listened to this series before, this is our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers, where we spotlight those individuals and management companies, uh, groups like a&o that are really trailblazing the path forward. So we have the pleasure of speaking with Oliver today, but Oliver, before we get into everything that we're doing right now, or even what's in the future, I wanna start with the past because this is one of my favorite questions we've been doing this series, which is almost a year old now, is tell us a little bit about your hospitality background, because we have such unique stories in our industry that I feel like rarely get told. We all talk about the, the exciting things that are happening right now, and maybe in the future, but a lot of us in hospitality, you had some very unique backgrounds before we got to the place that we were. So tell us a little bit about your background and what led you to ultimately founding a&o.Oliver Winter:Yeah, thanks. Yeah, happy to do this. Uh, so yeah, as a, as a young man between school and university, I, I had time to travel around the world and, um, came in touch with this hostel concept in many different countries. And what I saw, I liked really much so affordable stay, uh, you have with a warm shower, safe bed, a kitchen to share, a place to hang around and, and, uh, a place even very easy to come in touch with other travelers. So back to Berlin. Then, in these days, I started to study to become a teacher so far away from hospitality background parallel. During my studies, I investigated the Berlin Hostel market, and there've been in this time just non-commercial providers, like Y-M-C-A-Y-J, et cetera. So no private independent hostel. So with, with a lot of patients. And, and little luck of course, as well. So, 23 years ago, then I founded, um, AO in Berlin, opened a a 164 beds hostel. That was the very beginning, 164 beds. And it was, uh, it was from the first moment, it was great success. And, um, so then I stopped my studies and, and focused to grow this company and, and adding more bets first in Berlin later than in other cities in Germany, and then in other European countries.
The Suite Spot visits Miami Beach in this episode to talk with Simon Sorpresi of the SLS South Beach Hotel to discuss its addition to the Suite Spot: Spotlight series and how the iconic property stands out from the competition with a unique guest experience, art style, and digital marketing strategy. Tune in to discover why the SLS South Beach is a one-of-a-kind hospitality experience that every type of traveler should mark as their next destination.Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. I am so excited for this episode. If you are watching us on Travel Media Group's, YouTube channel, you know that we are here live on location. This is the first time ever we've been live on location. We're very excited. We've got this brand new Suite Spot: Spotlight series. We just had our first episode, but the first time that we're doing it live on location, and we have such a great guest and property that we're gonna be showcasing on this Spotlight series. Without further ado, let me bring him in. Simon Sopresi of the SLS South Beach, Vice President of Ennismore - Miami, Mexico, and South America. Simon, welcome to the Suite Spot for the first time.Simon Sorpresi :Thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure and it's great to host you and your team here at SLS South Beach.Ryan Embree:My breath was taken away when we came in through these doors. You have a beautiful property here at the SLS South Beach. It really truly embodies the spirit of this series. We are going around the country trying to find and showcase the hotel's most unique and historic in the nation. Yeah, and I think that SLS certainly fits the bill, but before we start talking about the property, it's always interesting to talk to another person in hospitality because, we know everyone's story's different, right? You could start as a Bellman at a hotel like myself. Some people are literally born into the industry. Some people just fall into it just by choice. So tell us a little bit about your story, and what led you to Ennismore?Simon Sorpresi :Whoa. Okay. Uh, let me try to keep it short. So first of all, it's a pleasure to have you here. As you can hear, I'm not originally from the States. I still have a very thick accent. I tried to get rid of it, which I'm clearly not mastering it, but was very interesting. I studied national construction architecture back in Europe and fell through an excursion from that architectural school in hotels, fell kind of in love with hotels. And I was like, oh my God, that's really kind of unique. There was a gentleman called Uli Prager. He was the founder of Mervin Pick, the brand. And he did the tour and he was very charismatic. He could speak about the thread counts of the linen to how to wash pots and pans. I mean, he knew it all. And as a young person, young professional, I was really, really, I think wowed by him. And said, I wanna become him. And so that's where, how it came about. Did the hotel management school in Switzerland, worked all different disciplines of the hotel. Worked very heavy in food and beverage, specialized myself in food and beverage, had my own company in Europe and said, I wanna learn English and ultimately move to New York City after a saltic business. Moved to New York City, had my own business in New York, mostly in nightlife and art galleries. And then did that for seven years and went back to the roots of hospitality in luxury segmentation in Los Angeles. And I came here at SLS South Beach is the reason why it was such a tempting thing for me,
Travel Media Group just launched its latest product innovation to its social media digital solution, Social Video for Hotels: TikTok & Instagram Reels!Tune in to this Suite Spot podcast episode to join TMG Marketing Director & Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree, and Social Media Product Manager, Brian Ross as these two digital marketing specialists share the capabilities of this exciting addition to the social media solution and the best video-making insights that will optimize your hotel’s unique social media strategy. Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for joining, thank you for listening. If you're hearing us on any of the podcast streaming platforms that you can find the Suite Spot on, or thank you for seeing us on Travel Media Group's YouTube page where you can find all of our Suite Spot episodes, and we have a fantastic episode today. A first timer, a newbie to the podcast of the Suite Spot, Brian Ross, our Social Media Product Manager at Travel Media Group. Brian, welcome to the Suite Spot.Brian Ross:Thank you so much for having me.Ryan Embree:Yes, and we're, super excited today. We've got a great episode and we're here for another launch. I feel like we do these episodes, every other episode, Travel Media Group, continuing to innovate. We have launched an exciting social media innovation and addition to our already incredible solution, due in part to you and what your team has been doing over there on the social media side. But we are launching social video for hotels, Instagram Reels, and TikTok. I'm excited. How are you feeling?Brian Ross:It's been fantastic. It really is the next natural step to what we've been doing with custom posts for hoteliers.Ryan Embree:Yeah. And I wanna talk about that because I feel like I know, I joked about it, you know, this being, an episode we do all the time with the, all these innovations. But we were a couple months ago, a couple episodes ago, talking about video content creation, TMG giving you the ability to build social videos via OneView®. So, what's the difference between that announcement and what we're talking about today?Brian Ross:So internally, what we refer to the other launch as is our DIY product. And that is essentially a product where you can go in and use our system to create content that goes out across all of your platforms, and you can track your insights and the performance of all those posts. But what this is, is this is a product that we offer where we create the custom posts for you. When we onboard somebody, we get some property notes and even in the individual posts, they can give us some notes on what they like and, you know, they know their occupancy drivers and things like that. So if they just give us a little note, then we go in and we actually create the content.Ryan Embree:So this is now us doing that with the video which is just so powerful and it's the natural evolution. We were talking off screen, off mic about this, but you know, one of the things that I'm gonna continue to reference during this episode is the social hotel social media survey that we just conducted, went out to our entire database of over 40,000 hoteliers. And one of the questions we asked them, what was your biggest challenge? And we saw 62% of the time, not enough time. That is a hotelier's life, 365, 24/7. We wish there were more hours in the day, but even if there were, we'd be open for them, right? Because we're hoteliers, not enough time, unsure of what to post 60% and staffing someon...
Join Suite Spot host and TMG Director of Marketing, Ryan Embree as he talks with the Senior Vice President, Luxury Division, The Unbound Collection by Hyatt, Ashish Verma in our new TMG Spotlight series to give listeners a lavish perspective on hospitality and how the rich history of The Chatwal, New York sets the gold standard for luxury in the hospitality industry.Episode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio. Ryan Embree:Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, my name is Ryan Embree, host of The Suite Spot. Thank you so much for joining us. We are having a brand new series here. I am so excited about this. So if you've been following the Suite Spot before, we've been doing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series, that's all about the people and hospitality management companies that are pushing our industry forward into the future, 2024 and beyond. But I am very excited about our new series that we just launched, and I think we have just the perfect guest and hotel part of this Suite Spot: Spotlight series. So to give you a little bit of background, this Suite Spot: Spotlight series are showcasing and highlight some of our industry's most unique and iconic hotels across the nation, across the globe. And I think we have such a fitting guest for our first ever edition of the Suite Spot: Spotlight series. Ashish Verma, Senior Vice President of the Luxury Division, Unbound Collection. Ashish, welcome to the Suite Spot.Ashish Verma:Thank you so much, Ryan. What an exciting introduction and, to be the first guest for the Suite Spot, which definitely hits a Sweet spot with me.Ryan Embree:Excellent. Yeah, we might steal that catch phrase, from you there, Ashish, but tell us where you're coming from because we know that the people make this industry, but this Suite Spot Spotlight series is all about, again, the most iconic hotels that we have. Where are you joining us from?Ashish Verma:I'm based in New York. It's my hometown and I'm in the heart of Manhattan. I was born and raised in India, so a great culture of hospitality. I drove my career with hotels, one of the finest in luxury hospitality. And then I moved to Hyatt International the very best, and I worked with them in India, in France, where I did my highest studies, my MBA in Paris and I worked with Hyatt again there and I moved to Phai, the original UN Plaza here in New York. Went on to work with a great hotel company Orient Express, as a GM down in New Orleans through hurricane Katrina and beyond. Returned to New York, my hometown, and it was a GM at the Luell and I've been in charge of the Chatwel, New York Luxury Division for a little over eight years.Ryan Embree:Your story is the true embodiment of hospitality is worldwide, right? And I'm sure you've seen just some incredible places, incredible hotels. So tell us a little bit about this iconic and historic hotel, The Chatwal. This fits the bill of being just a timeless property. Can you give us, you know, we shared your, hospitality experience, share a little bit of history of, of this specific property.Ashish Verma:Yes. global hospitality, hospitality being global goes hand in hand. There are some great hotels around the world and we all have a bucket list to experience and travel around the world. And the world has become a little microcosm of our own aspirations and luxury at the very finest embodies that, expresses that, offers that. And I'm fortunate between Asia, Europe and the US here in New York, having experienced some of the best. Where we are now in the heart of Manhattan, there's a lot of history where the Chatwal New York is,
Join Suite Spot Host, Ryan Embree, as he and Chief Technology Officer,Jason Lee, break down the insights and data collected in the 2nd edition of our TMG Summer Guest Sentiment Report on the podcast. This episode contains valuable information for hoteliers looking to make better operational and strategic decisions for their hotels as the end of the year approaches while closing out the year strong.
Suite Spot Podcast · TMG's Summer Guest Sentiment Report: Key Takeaways
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree here, coming from the content creation studio in Maitland, Florida at the headquarters of Travel Media Group. Got another great episode for you today with a very special guest, but a guest that has been with us a lot of times on these episode. Jason Lee, Chief Technology Officer at Travel Media Group. Jason, thanks again for joining the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: All right, thanks for having me, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, and this has become a little bit of a tradition here with these episodes that we're doing. We're gonna talk about summer guest sentiment. Now, for those listeners or viewers, if you're watching us on YouTube here, give us a little background about guest sentiment, how we're pulling it and what the trends and insights we're gonna be talking about today.
Jason Lee: Okay, so here at Travel Media Group, we process all reviews received by hotels in the United States. So meaning we, we bring them into our system. We use natural language processing to kind of pull out specific keywords, and then we use that same kind of processing in an AI that actually decides whether this is positive or negative. So taking all of that information and sort of splicing it and dicing it. But then we call it sentence chunks, but it's looking at little chunks of sentences that basically would determine whether or not those key words are positive or negative. So that's where all of this comes from. So it, so you could have, in one single review, you could have five or six sentiment points, and you know, that review could be rated positively, but the actual language could have positive and negative pieces to it. So we do not take rating into account. It is all based on the actual language in the review.
Ryan Embree: Well, that's important because we've talked about before a four or five star rating could still have some negative elements to it. Right? Absolutely. You know, everything was great in my stay, but you know, I felt like the parking was a little expensive, or there might be some positive sentiment with the negative reviews where, you know, everything seemed to go wrong, except the staff was just super nice and friendly the entire time. So that's why it's so important to kind of break down these patterns and trends. And when he says every single review, we're talking big numbers, 1.6 million reviews, that is 100,000 more than we got when we did this in the spring, which is expected. Summer still continues to be our busiest travel season, but within that 1.6 million reviews, over 7 million pieces of guest sentiment. So subjects, topics, elements of a review that people are talking about having sentiment towards, that's all broken down in these insights and data.
Jason Lee: Yeah, we use the kind of bigger categories. So the main categories we have are the room, the service experience, and the facility experience. So we use those sort of as the bigger category, and then we have a bunch of tags and aspects inside of each one of those categories.
Our latest and greatest TMG Hospitality Trailblazers episode features the President and CEO of AD1 Global, Daniel Berman!
Join Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree, as he and Daniel discuss some very eye-opening hospitality subjects prevailing in the industry and give insights into how hoteliers can effectively navigate the landscape.
And so much more!
Suite Spot Podcast · 117 – TMG Hospitality Trailblazers: Daniel BermanEpisode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree, thank you for joining me. It’s been a minute. We are going to be continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. I am so excited for the next guest that we have today in our trailblazers series. If this is the first time you’re hearing this, we’ve been doing this series almost for a year now. We’ve had almost a dozen hospitality leaders and trailblazers in our industry, and this series is all about the people and the groups that are pushing our industry forward. So very excited with that set up to invite our next Hospitality Trailblazers, Daniel Berman, president and CEO of AD1 Global. Daniel, thank you so much, for joining the Suite Spot today.
Daniel Berman:
Thank you for having me here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and this is your first time here. So what we do with all of our first time guests is we live in an industry or work in an industry rather, where we’ve got all types of stories of how people end up where they are. So, give us a little bit of background on your hospitality journey and what led you to AD1 Global.
Daniel Berman:
Yes, perfect. So thank you again for having me here. I was born in Caracas, Venezuela, move to United States in 2001. And while deciding what to do here and, I learned how to do invest in real estate. Started in 2008, and then I got into the hospitality by mistake. We bought, we bought, and my partners and me, Ari and Alex and me, we bought, almost 500 room hotel, thinking there was a real estate investment. Didn’t understood there was a business within the real estate and we almost lost everything. It took us about two years, almost three years to get that project, on a positive numbers, decided that we love the business. It was very hard, but we learned the hard way and thank God, that’s how AD1 was born.
Ryan Embree:
Wow. You didn’t really start off small huh? When it was straight for the 500 Room hotel. That’s pretty amazing. And you know what, I was talking to Daniel before this episode started because the VP of HR over there in AD1 Global Bertha Cordovis actually gave me my first job in hospitality, which was a bellman, at a resort here in Orlando. So, it’s funny how, you know, we talk about these journeys and hospitality and you, I’ve heard the mistake one before. I’ve heard, you know, the journey of, of saying, Hey, I’m just going to school. This was a side gig. That might be a first for me of hearing, you know, purchasing a 500 room hotel and kind of falling into the industry. But we’re so happy that we found this, you know, and we’ll kind of talk about this love for our industry and transition.
Ryan Embree:
You know, before we start really talking about where we are today, where we’ve kind of gone with this series has kind of started with this rocky road that we’ve been on the past couple years, right. Obviously the pandemic in 2020. We’ve now had some time to kind of time to reflect on that recovery which is nice, but still, you know, battling some headwinds with staffing shortages here and there. Tell me a little bit about, kind of reflecting back on maybe some lessons that you learned from this, the pandemic that our industry as a whole has learned and how you’ve maybe applied that to AD1 global today.
Daniel Berman:
Yes, it’s been a very, very tough years because not only the pandemic, but the aftermath, you know, the inflation, the war, the rates going up and all as a result of the pandemic. But, what we realized is what hit us the most was not the, the pandemic of the raise of the interest. It was the lack of preparation for this type of situation. Nobody knew about the pandemic, nobody expected, but as a business owners, we need to be prepared for the worst case scenario. And I think that was the, the big, big lesson in all aspects. We need to prepare for the wars and hope for the best, but we need, we need to anticipate.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. I mean, a again, nobody kind of, as you said, nobody kind of predicted what happened, but it really made our industry evolve and that’s what we’ve been talking a lot with industry leaders is in an industry where we’ve really been kind of slow in comparison to maybe other industries and in implementing things like technology, you know, at the end of the day we had to maybe make some, some decisions that kind of accelerated that pace a little bit. It’ll be interesting to see how it plays out because our guests have really, really changed their perspective on what a hotel guest experience might look like. So I wanna fast forward a little bit more to today, Daniel. We’re winding down in this busy summer season. You know, everything that I, that I’ve heard, it’s been a great summer season. ADRs across the board are really, really high thank goodness. We’d love to see that after a couple rough summers when you get to this time of the year, kids go back to school. You know, our industry as a whole kind of starts to slow down a little bit. What are you and your teams doing to prepare for what is typically a slower fall and winter season?
Daniel Berman:
Well, we are taking the opportunity to reorganize, reestablish what we call the AD1 way. Okay. And, and figure out how to enforce and cultivate that culture that AD1 has within all the properties. You know, this is about the employees mainly. You know, we need to take care of them, we need to train them, we need to, teach them, we need to prepare them, we need to be with them. So I think, you know, these low moments are the moments to step back, reorganize, get the culture stronger than ever, and focus on the employees.
Ryan Embree:
I love that. The AD1 way. And you know, I’ve had the pleasure of attending the GM conference that you do on an annual basis, and we’re gonna talk about that a little bit later. But certainly a time of reflection as we get into somewhat slower times. You know, I’ve said on this podcast before is, you know, summer is a great look at a stress test for our hotels and portfolios, right? The occupancy is, is hopefully bustling. We’re getting some really high occupancy numbers and maybe those little issues start to arise in the summer and then the fall and winter season. If what you’re talking about that kind of take a step back, reorganize, this is a great time to get into your guest feedback, see what people have been saying and say, okay, where’s the training involved here? It might be a training issue with housekeeping if you saw cleanliness slide a little bit in your reputation scores. If you’re seeing something on the investment side of, Hey, maybe let’s go ahead and get together. ’cause we saw, you know, that our lobby maybe needs some refreshers in, in this place. So it’s a great time to kind of reflect, I think, both people wise, but also checking out that guest sentiment because we know that those problems could bubble up at the top because our hotels were really stressed test during that time. So I love to, to hear that you’re kind of taking that proactive approach. With the AD1 global portfolio, it looks like you guys are, are really well positioned in leisure markets. And, and that was, I’m sure really, really helpful during the, the pandemic because that’s really what led to charge back to recovery was leisure. Are you still seeing strong demand from the leisure side? That’s question number one. And after, talk a little bit about the business traveler side. Are you, are you starting to see some comeback there and do you think we’re ever gonna get back to that 2019 pre covid levels with business travel?
Daniel Berman:
Well, going to the first one, yes. Leisure travel keeps being strong. We are seeing some kind of effect on the, on the economy, so the hitting the gas pockets, but in the, in the business side, it, it pick up a little bit. I think it’s gonna take a little bit longer. People are used to work from home and doing through, through Zoom meetings like this one, you know, and, but it’s gonna come back. You know, there’s nothing, nothing like person to person face-to-face meetings. I think we, we need to give a little more time and we’ll come back. I think it’s gonna take probably by next year it will come back.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And we just talked about you’re doing your employee GM annual conference. That’s something that you’ve always done face-to-face. Right. And, and you know, the importance of kind of getting everyone together. You know, we had the, the pleasure of going out to the hospitality show over the summer, and you’re right, there’s really nothing like kind of that face-to-face interaction. So I’m, I’m right there with you. I’m crossing my fingers. It will be interesting to see kind of that work from home hybrid remote work and how that impacts our business travel. But maybe that’s just manifested in a different way with travelers coming to a hotel, extending their vacations here and there on those days to, to really fill in those room nights. What about international travel? Right? So last summer it was a welcome to get back that international traveler. Domestic kind of led the charge, but international travel picking up, are you seeing that that demand for international travel right now?
Daniel Berman:
Yes, we’re seeing it, especially from Latin America. You know, the being that the, the Euro and the dollar are on par is cheaper to go there than to come here. So, but it is picking up, you know, everybody wants to come here. You know, everybody love USA, everybody wants to travel here. You know, we’re sitting in Florida, it’s packed of, people from Latin America and Europeans as well. But it’s picking up. I’m very confident.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And, and again, our industry is welcoming back, with open arms because we really did kind of see, you know, what that, what life was like without that international traveler who spends a hard earned dollar getting over here and, and goes to a lot of tourist destinations and leisure markets that a lot of our hotels thrive in. So, you know, especially our headquarters being here in Orlando, Florida, we saw a lot of that and know that our hotels were very, very glad to see that pick up. And we hope that continues as well. So, you know, we’re really coming to a crux of the business travelers starting to pick up, leisure travel is still very, very strong and international travel starting to pick up. It could be a really good fall and winter season, something that we haven’t seen in, in quite a few years. So really happy to see that. Let’s turn our attention to AD1 Global and your portfolio, right? You started with that one hotel with 500 rooms. You certainly grown since then and had some explosive growth since 2011 and really have made a name for yourself within the industry. I’m curious, what’s your process when you bring a new property on to kind of get them up to that AD1 standard, that AD1 way that you were speaking to earlier? Where does that begin?
Daniel Berman:
Well, it begins from the moment we put an LOI and we make sure that the whole team gets involved, everybody. So that way they can see their counterparts in, in the hotel that we want to buy and make sure that the people align and understand our culture. Not everybody understands our culture. Not everybody likes it, but lemme tell you, the people that work for us love it. And that’s what we’re looking for. We’re looking for, for people that love what they do and love the company.
Ryan Embree:
Now, Travel Media Group, we’ve had a great longstanding partnership with AD1. And, and one of the many reasons was just your commitment to the guest experience and the journey. And in fact, and I wanna make sure I read this right, your bio on LinkedIn, Daniel reads, “Crafting unforgettable experiences with AD1 Global, where innovative hotel management meets extraordinary guest journeys”. So can you speak a little bit more about that commitment and why this is such a differentiator for you over at AD1 Global?
Daniel Berman:
A hundred percent. Somebody does an investment, of course, the bottom line is important. The numbers, you know, at the bottom is important, but sometimes people forget that this is a people’s business. You know, we have the guests, if the guests are not happy, we’re in trouble. If the employees are not happy, the guests won’t be happy. So I think it’s, it’s all about them. I keep repeating the same, that’s all about the employees. It’s all about the family or AD1 family to make the difference, you know, the details of a beautiful smile. The details of saying hello first, you know, it’s all about those old fashioned details to be friendly, to be nice, to be, you know, full of love.
Ryan Embree:
And you know, with so much talk lately about ChatGPT and the technology and implementation into the guest experience, that is all well and good. And there are some ways that certainly our industry can come in here and optimize the guest experience and make it a little bit more efficient. But what makes a guest stay memorable is the people, it’s exactly what you said, right? The memories that, your employees are creating for guests. The feeling that a guest gets when they get that surprise bouquet of flowers for their anniversary, because you overheard them at the front desk talking about that, that is the type of stuff that technology and AI really can’t replace right now and hopefully never does in our industry because it really is a people serving people industry.
Daniel Berman:
What we’re trying to do is to make everybody from all the positions in the hotel aware of technology, we want them to learn how to use GPT and use it in their favor. Try to use GPT to make your your work easier, your communication with the guests more simple. So it’s, instead of seeing it against, let’s use it in favor.
Ryan Embree:
A big topic at the hospitality show that we just attended of saying, you know, this technology shouldn’t be used as a replacement, but more of an enhancement for your employees. And there’s just, so we’re just scratching the surface when it comes to that. But there’s so much fear sometimes, especially over the last couple years with our staffing shortage and where we, where we were with the furloughs and the layoffs in 2020 of being like, I don’t want to get replaced, I don’t wanna get furloughed. But now, today, where we’re trying to invite more people into our industry, right? And, and give them the tools that people, that might be new to our industry to say, let’s make your job a little bit easier. You might be new to the front desk. How can this technology enhance your position and really get you back to the things that make our guests stay memorable, right? We just talked about a few examples there. So if you can make your employees’ jobs a little bit easier to free them up to do the things that make a guest stay special, you’re really gonna see a lot of it on the reputation side, which is something that I know, AD1 Global has a huge, huge commitment to our guest feedback online with reviews, and making sure that there’s a response for every single one of those, guests that leave a review as well. Let’s switch gears, we’re gonna keep talking about the people side of things. And like I said before, I’ve had the pleasure of, you know, attending that AD1 GM Annual Conference, and I can feel such a strong sense of culture there. So you and your team have done a fantastic job of doing that. Talk a little bit about how, you know, events like that really create a strong culture and how you’re using that in what is a challenging time for finding staff right now in our industry.
Daniel Berman:
You know, these events give us the opportunity to talk directly with everybody in a different sense, you know, as a friendly manner, taking a business out of the table. And that gives us opportunity to express and let them express their feelings, okay. And, and really hear what are their concerns and their ideas. There are so many ideas that come out of those meetings, and that brings also an opportunity for them to understand that we need them to help us find other employees that they can recommend. So it becomes a network and a brainstorm of amazing ideas. So we are trying to find people anywhere. There a lot of good people out there looking for jobs, for good jobs. I mean, today, after the pandemic is not only about the money, yes, of course money, you have to pay people well, and you have to be important, but there is something more important today. People want to feel comfortable, people want to be happy, happiness. We realize that if you’re not happy, if you are, you cannot do anything. So I think the key ingredient is happiness.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. I mean, that, that’s huge. And, you know, especially this younger generation coming up, I mean, they’re gonna be looking to be a part of something special, to be part of an organization that really has a strong sense of who they are, a voice that can be found online. And we’ve seen and heard some really creative ideas of what hospitality companies are doing today to try to show that sense of community and culture. And I think these events that, you know, you’re putting on annually for your GMs and your staff, do a really good job of that. And I’m sure it gives us really insightful to see guest trends. When you get so many hotels and hoteliers in one space and they’re all kind of talking through issues that they might be seeing, you might be able to uncover some patterns and trends that individually you might not see as clearly. So sure, it gives you the upper hand as you go into a new year to try to get that and figure out what it is that’s gonna really make next year tick and what’s trending right now in hospitality. Daniel, thank you so much for joining me. I’m so excited to see the trail, the AD1 Global blazes over the next couple years and into the future. So thank you Daniel, and thank you all for listening to the Suite Spot. We will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Podcast host Ryan Embree welcomes the newest addition to the TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series, Mauri Berry, Vice President of Marketing & Digital Strategy at Remington Hospitality!
During this episode, listeners can expect to learn a plethora of valuable and exciting insights and takeaways that encompass current trends in the hotel industry, such as technology advancement, effective digital touchpoints for guests, and hotel rebranding.
Suite Spot Podcast · 116 - TMG Hospitality Trailblazers: Mauri Berry
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is Travel Media Group Marketing Director and host of the Suite Spot, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining us today. We are continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazer series. We're heating up a very, very busy summer season, but I am very excited about our guest because she's got some exciting news about a chapter for definitely a hospitality trailblazer management company out there, Remington Hospitality. So, without further ado, I will go ahead and bring in Mauri Berry, Vice President of Marketing and Digital Strategy at Remington Hospitality. Welcome to the Suite Spot, Mauri, this is your first time.
Mauri Berry: Yeah, thanks Ryan. So happy to be here. I'm honored to have been invited and talk a little bit more about what we've got going on.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, certainly have a lot going on, but we always like to start these episodes, just because our industry is so unique in the sense of, you know, some people find hospitality just through maybe a side job or gig here and there. Some people were born into it, some people went to school for it now, we're seeing that more and more often. So with every new guest we kind of like to ask your hospitality journey and tell us a little bit about your background. What led your hospitality path to Remington.
Mauri Berry: Yeah, sure. So I've been around longer than I care to admit, primarily in our industry from even before I graduated from college. You know, I've been around for a while. My background, I started in PR as a PR major straight out of college and worked for a major attraction in Atlanta. And then sort of over the course of the years evolved and adapt my career all within the hospitality space. You know, I've worked in agency environments in PR and integrated marketing for hospitality and tourism companies. I've worked at Lakeside Resorts, I worked for Marriott where I spent most of my career is in field marketing at Marriott International for about 14 years. So, have really, like I said, been around longer than I care to admit. I did leave Marriott after almost 14 years and went to a hotel management company. I knew that in order to really grow and expand my career, I needed to maybe step outside of the Marriott bubble, expand my horizons a bit into other brands, other hotel types, other ways of doing business. So jumped into hotel management space and have never looked back. I've been, as you mentioned, with Remington Hospitality for about two years and you know, it's been nonstop adventure from day one with a number of different updates and corporate and company pivots and new exciting updates. So, you know, I don't see myself going anywhere for a while, if the excitement continues the way it has since I've been here.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, certainly a lot of exciting things to share, some of which we're gonna talk about on this episode a little bit later, but it's just so fascinating to hear. I love in this Hospitality Trailblazer series kind of hearing where people jump from,
Join Suite Spot Host, Ryan Embree, as he covers the top 5 takeaways from the inaugural event of The Hospitality Show presented by Questex and the AHLA.
Suite Spot Podcast · 115 - The Hospitality Show: 5 Key Takeaways
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embry for a special edition of the Suite Spot. We teased it on social media. Hopefully you are tuning in. But we are here for our five key takeaways from the Hospitality Show, which just happened here at the end of June, 2023 at the Beautiful Venetian. This was an inaugural event. We had been talking about this for a while. We had the opportunity to show up to the hospitality show as press and media interview some of the industry's top influencers. So if you get the opportunity, head to our YouTube page, follow us on social media. We're gonna be posting all of those great interviews, insights, and data. Everyone we talk to at the Hospitality Show over in Vegas to our YouTube page. So check that out. But today we are going to be talking about the top five takeaways from the event. This was filled with some incredible panelists and guest speakers at this event. That's why I love these industry events so much. And I was interviewing someone at the hospitality show, and I know we always talk about this pent up demand for travel, but it certainly feels like there's been some pent up demand for these industry events. It's so industry to get these blend of industry leaders cuz you get just such different perspectives that sometimes we get siloed in, uh, for a brand show or other industry events. So this hospitality show was certainly special because it had a lot of point of views, but even though there were some competitors at this show, there was a lot that we agreed on here. And one of the biggest things, and my first key takeaway is staffing continues to plague our industry right now. A H l A did that study recently that found 82% of hotels are still struggling with staffing shortage. That's just an absolutely crazy number to think of where we started and during the pandemic, we were furloughing so many and that's, that's really where the panelists kind of started. And, and it's such a u unique perspective cuz we talked about the millions that went into furlough during the pandemic and how there could be some that have left our industry for good. We've never had and experienced a wave of hospitality professionals leave our industry and choose not to come back. So what's happening now is this, uh, very unique opportunity for people that have never been in our industry before. Right? If I'm switching from one hotel to another, I'm familiar with the whole check-in checkout process. Property management systems might be different here and there, but I understand all the complexities of working in a hotel as a hospitality professional. Now, the people that are coming into our industry, they might not understand those at first. So we've gotta do a better job of kind of simplifying these processes for people new to our industry. And that's a big challenge that they talked about at the Hospitality show, is figuring out ways that we can make our processes more efficient. So someone that might have not worked in the hotel industry but before can come in and seamlessly really get into a groove into their role because that first 90 days is absolutely critical to retention for our employees. That's why things like TMGs respond and resolve and responding to reviews and taking that off the plate of our employees is so important because that could be someth...
Guest sentiment data continues to provide hoteliers with insightful and valuable information that they can harness to position their hotel properties better. By learning what travelers say and feel about their hotel stays during spring, hotels and hotel management companies can better align their digital strategies for the busy summer season.
Through analyzing over 1.7 million reviews and over 7.5 million guest sentiment tags, Suite Spot host Ryan Embree and TMG Chief Technology Officer Jason Lee break down the top 5 takeaways from the 2nd edition of our annual Spring Guest Sentiment Report.
This is an episode hoteliers can not afford to miss. Tune in now!
Suite Spot Podcast · 114 - TMG's Spring Guest Sentiment Report: Key Takeaways
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining us today, wherever you're listening from or viewing us from on our YouTube page. We are here in our content creation studio at Travel Media Group headquarters just north of Orlando. And I am here with a very familiar guest and voice, Mr. Jason Lee, our Chief Technology Officer at Travel Media Group. Jason, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: Thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree: We got a very exciting episode for you today. Memorial Day just passed. We saw the record breaking numbers, pre pandemic levels of travel. I'm sure a lot of hotel listeners are very excited to hear that. It's looking like it's gonna be an even bigger summer, which we're gonna talk about. But today what we're gonna be doing is we're gonna be looking at all of that feedback that guests left us over this spring, and hopefully what this is gonna do is give us some insights, and some takeaways that we can use in these summer months to potentially leverage our marketing and increase our chance of conversion, which is what every hotelier should be doing. Since this is a sales and marketing podcast, we love to do that for you. But Jason, take us through first, what is this data that we're seeing and why is it more accurate than, let's say, a survey of just like a thousand travelers?
Jason Lee: So what we do is we use natural language processing to pull out like key pieces of information. So it's traveler sentiment, so how they're feeling about these various items. So you could have people that are both happy and upset in the same review, based on categories. So we start this, we start this whole thing with category. So we look at a bunch of different tags inside of room category, inside of a facilities category, inside of a service category. And then further past that we look at the various aspects of those tags. So I'll just give you an example. So an example would be a room, it would be bed, right? So room would be the category. The tag would be bed. The aspects of that tag would be sheets, pillows, sleep quality. It could be all of these other pieces that, so many factors, Yeah. That make up this stuff. And so, so we extract that data from each, review that comes in regardless of so completely agnostic of the rating of the review, just looking at the actual information that comes from the text.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, and that's something that, that we preach to our hotel partners is just because you have a five star review or a one star review on the other side, doesn't mean there's both positive, neutral and negative elements to that review. Absolutely. And what this is doing, and this is pulling out all of that sentiment, it's over a lot of data,
Join Suite Spot podcast host, Ryan Embree as he welcomes the President of Questex, Alexi Khajavi, as an official TMG Hospitality Trailblazer!
These two hospitality-focused individuals discuss some incredible travel and tourism subjects in this episode, giving viewers great insight into the industry’s current state. This episode is full of content from conversations regarding trends like staffing shortages, event & group travel, and an inside look at the inaugural launch of The Hospitality Show.
Suite Spot Podcast · 113 – TMG Hospitality Trailblazers: Alexi KhajaviEpisode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in, and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. We are gonna be continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. We are having such fun with this series. Again, if this is the first time you’re hearing this. This series is all about those people and groups that are pushing our hospitality industry forward. We’ve had a lot of hotel management companies, some brands on this. We’re gonna take a little bit wider lens today. This is called TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. We’re gonna look at the travel industry as a whole, and I think that’s a perfect segue into an introduction to our guest, Alexi Khajavi, president Questex, hospitality, travel and wellness. Alexi, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Alexi Khajavi:
Thanks, Ryan. It’s good to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, this is your first time on the Suite Spot. We always love to essentially start our episodes the exact same way because as we know in hospitality, some people are born into it. Some people just find it, you know, some people, a lot of people say, “Hey, I want to be the guy at the hotel”, or “I want to be the guy that’s making all these memories within the travel industry”. Where did your journey start and what led you to Questex?
Alexi Khajavi:
Well, you know, both my parents were big travelers, you know, so we, we were always, you know, trying to plan the next trip. So, travel’s been a part of my life, you know, since being a little child. You know, ultimately, even professionally, however, I graduated from the UC of California. I came outta that and joined, you know, a tour operator that was doing some early educational trips to Cuba. Traveled around, you know, and was, and was paid to do. So, I then got into the early tech scene in, you know, the early .com, 1997 to 2001, a tech startup called unexplored.com. And really since then, I’ve, I’ve been in travel and I’ve been in on the marketing and sales side of travel and hospitality, lived overseas multiple times, running hotels, running airlines, and then ran an, an advertising agency based off of the travel and hotel space. So we were working with destinations, we were working with hotel companies, and then was introduced to Questex back in 2014. And the event space was something I didn’t have a lot of direct experience in, but the ability to connect buyers and sellers, particularly in travel and hospitality, where face-to-face is so critical, was really the pinnacle moment for me to see that as being just an incredible culmination of my prior experiences, my love of travel, my love of hospitality, and the opportunity to bring both buyers and sellers together. And that’s really been the beauty of Questex is, is that we inform, we connect, and we’re able to do that both on the digital platform side as well as in the live engagement side. So it’s a really nice, opportunity. I’ve been doing it, you know, for the last eight years now.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You know, and it’s not cliche to say that, that our industry, we’ve had several of these, you know, TMG Hospitality Trailblazers that have had these mentors that have had connections that, you know, whether it’s one brand or one company and another and so forth. So you’re right, it, it’s a tight-knit community, this hospitality industry, because at the end of the day, we all have an innate love for travel, whether you’re in our industry or not. Right. People love to travel, people love that experience of traveling. And I think that brings us all close together and we’re gonna dive into that a little bit into this episode about that balance between tech and that kind of face-to-face parallels to what you’re talking about of having those events that are face-to-face, but also that digital side of things is so, so important right now. So, but before we get into kind of that today in the present and looking into the future, which we’re certainly gonna visit, I wanna move backwards because we’ve really started these episodes talking about the lessons that the hotel industry specifically had learned. But I think you bring a really unique perspective cause you’ve got that wider lens on travel, right? From airlines to hotels to events, everything in between. So, you know, what do you think the travel industry has learned over the past few years and what trends are kind of here to stay and aren’t just, you know, those things, that new normal pandemic that we, that we’ve been talking about these last few years?
Alexi Khajavi:
Well, I mean, first of all, I mean, demand is unstoppable, right? I think if anything, you know, on the early part of the pandemic, people were talking about, you know, travel would never come back. And if it did come back, would come back, you know, markedly different. And I really don’t think, you know, I mean, first of all, travel has come back. It came back in the summer of 2020. And if anything, I think it’s come back cause people realize how important it is for them to get out there, that that is a part of their lives, particularly when you’ve been locked down or you’re not able to, to go out. That really, I think, you know, there was a palpable sense on the world in the population that, you know, human connectivity, whether that’s just down the street, whether that’s having people over for dinner or whether that’s traveling 10,000 miles and experiencing new cultures, new foods, new people, new languages, that, that is a, a unquenchable thirst on humanity that a two year pandemic is not gonna change 10,000 years of human inclination to do so. So that was number one. But the reality though is if there was a correct, you know, lining in that you know, in, in that prognostication was that, it, it would come back different. And I think one of the differences is that destinations also are realizing how important travel is, but that it can’t continue in the way that it was. I mean, we went from talking about over tourism, mass tourism to talking about no tourism. And I think now what we’re trying to figure out is what is the proper type of travel for destinations, for cities, for countries in that, you know, do, do people really want to experience Venice with, you know, 50 million other people on the same day? And so I think what we’re doing now is we’re combining personal and business in a trip and in travel in a way that one I think has a unique opportunity to take the pressure off, some of these destinations. But also I think slow travel is gonna be one of the biggest trends that we’ll see coming out of this is, is that, you know, this idea that I’m gonna go and I’m gonna hit the bucket list in seven days throughout Europe and I’m gonna do the Eiffel Tower, I’m gonna do the Collosseum, you know, la la la la la that type of travel, I think, you know, has a lot of challenges in it for both the destination as well as the traveler. So I think that’s gonna be one of the bigger changes coming out of the pandemic. And I think we’re still washing through what that truly means however.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, there’s been a lot of phrases I feel like coined on this podcast. I like that slow travel and I think that speaks directly to the, the marketing that you’re doing for your destination too, right? It, it’s easy to get to those Instagramable spots that we know everyone’s gonna be interested in, but what are those one of a kind experiences they’re looking for that off the beaten path a little bit to maybe have that memory or that moment that isn’t filled with everyone around them, because they certainly haven’t been used to that these past couple years, right? They’re more likely to be, you know, with less people than, you know, surrounded by a bunch of people. And there’s a comfort level I think that also, you know, takes a little bit a while coming back as well with crowds and, and these big events, it’s quite a little balance there between that thirst for that as well and people wanting to be a part of that. But you’re right, the resiliency of the travel and hospitality industry, you couldn’t have asked for a better case study of that during these past couple years. So, and one of those balances that we talked about was that that tech and customer service, and it’s aligned cause we’re kind of forced to adopt technology a lot quicker than maybe the industry wanted to over the past couple years just because of the pandemic. I think there’s probably some benefits to that. It showed that we can roll technology out in our industry a little bit quicker than we thought we could. But you see things like the hot trend right now is ChatGPT, how can we implement that into the, the travel industry and booking experiences and things of that nature. And I think obviously that’s exciting and fun to talk about, but at the end of the day, you look at the foundation of our industry and it’s customer service, it’s face-to-face people serving people. So where do you find that balance, Alexi, of the technology and maybe exploring this, this new stuff, but also serving people and, and providing them with a once in a lifetime experience that a computer or a mobile app isn’t gonna be able to give you?
Alexi Khajavi:
The beauty of travel is that the customer journey is both, I think really well defined, but it’s long and it’s a weaving one. And I’ve always defined it as dream, plan, buy, experience and then share, and on the front end of that journey and on the tail end of that journey is really an individual human inspiration filled. So dreaming, you know, if you’re going on holiday, you’re dreaming about a type of destination, a type of experience. And so a dream is really is not something I think AI is going to replace for us because it is truly innate in being human. That is, that is tied to whether that be a belief, a pure sort of inspiration, a memory. So, you know, those things I think will always be specifically human driven. Planning and buying, I think AI and technology do a very good job of, right, and, and they make it practical. They can find you the cheapest hotel, they can find the hotel by the airport, they can find you a tour operator. I mean, that’s where technology with all of the information that’s out there can start to based off of that dream, can start to hone in and focus in on the types of practical or pragmatic or available or you know, open at the times you’ll be there. But then when you get onto the experience part of it, you mean you’re actually in the destination, you’re actually doing it. Well again, then I think it goes back to a human to human type experience. And so I think the, the bookends of travel, if you will, will always be best delivered by human beings. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Where I think technology continues to shine and will continue to outperform, is to helping us plan accordingly. Helping us find the right types of products and solutions to fulfill whether that be a dream or whether it be a meeting that you had to be in Chicago at 2:00 PM I think the, the the share part of it, you know, cause now everybody’s gotta put it on Instagram or they’ve got on social media and there’s that, there’s that bit of it as well. There’s a lot of technology that’s involved in, there’s a lot of ai, you know, people. But at the end of the day, you know, you’re posting those things for the most part yourself. So technology I think is only a tool. It’s not, it’s not the product. in fact in most technology, we’re the product technology is really merely the tool that can connect us at scale, expose us to, you know, different types of, information or, or products and solutions. The thing about I think, technology, which is really interesting about, travel is personalization. We do want to be treated and to be catered in a way that feels curated and human beings in hospitality, that that’s what makes hospitality special. But also I do think technology can do that in a way at scale that you’re seeing a lot of brands employ, which I think is a beautiful thing. I think technology, we’re just at the forefront of it. Things like ChatGPT will always be, developed in other sectors. You know, travel is not a first mover typically in technology. I actually think that’s okay. You know, I don’t think we have to be a first mover in some of these things. I think we can let other sectors perfect them and then adapt them and modify them to you know, to the hospitality’s needs. And I think that’s okay. I don’t think there’s a problem in that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I think the spectrum continues to grow where we have those people at the forefront wanting to implement technology and, and there’s hotels that certainly cater to that, you know, with implementation of Alexa in the hotel room, but there’s always those people that maybe come back, they’re holding that paper airplane ticket as they come in for their boarding pass. They maybe are putting their, dry cleaning, filling out that form just like they used to. So that spectrum and travel is, is so big and, and I think you’re right, we are slow to adopt, but I think that’s necessary because the traveler sometimes is a little bit slower. But it will be interesting because I don’t think, I think we’ve always played in hypotheticals of, well, how quickly could we implement this technology and, and what do you think the adoption would be from a traveler? And now that hypothetical played out a couple years ago where it was like we were almost forced to do some of these things where it’s like, I have to download the app if I don’t want to have interaction with the front desk, now I’m used to it. So it’ll be interesting to see if that, because we experience that if some of these new technologies start to get implemented a little bit faster than we’ve typically seen in our industry.
Alexi Khajavi:
Well, I think it’s also, to your point, it’s a matter of choice. As long as you give the customer a choice, whether they want to go up to the front counter and talk to a human, or they wanna do it on the app or via, you know, their phone, on a website or whatever it may be, then I think, you know, you, you’ve opened the option of choice for that traveler to engage with, you know, the, the brand, whether that be digitally or through sort of old school, you know, human to human interaction. I think that is the route to go.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, absolutely open it up. We want to be as inclusive and inviting to any and all travel as possible to have the experience because everyone’s experience of a perfect stay or a perfect trip is so different that spectrum is just as big as those preferences there. So, great point there. Alexi, let’s, let’s go on to group and event travel. And this is, you know, right up your sector and I, I saw recently that Questex announced some record attendance in Q1 of 2023. That is welcome news for the travel industry. How do you see event and group travel playing out the rest of the year and into the future?
Alexi Khajavi:
It’s an interesting one, right? Because, one you’ve got, again, the pandemic just absolutely took a beating on the events in my space. And, you know, we were shut down for a year and a half, right? I mean, we were not able to do events, but we, we did our first event in the summer of, I’m sorry, in the spring of 2021. And, you know, since then it’s been, it’s been month after month of just increasing attendance, increasing engagement. And we have this year we’ve outperformed 2019 on many of our events. So the numbers are back. And what we’re seeing is a couple things which we think are really interesting. One is where we are what we call a tier one or tier two event, meaning you are the flagship event in that respective sector. Again, could be hotel investment, could be bars and restaurants, could be procurement in travel. And we have fortunately across travel, hospitality and wellness, we’ve got tier one events in each of those respective markets as well as in wellness. Those tier one events, those tier two events are doing very well, even compared to 2019. And it’s because everybody, same thing happened, you know, in the financial crisis in 2008, 2009, 2010 is that if you went to 2010 events last year, you’re going to go to five or three this year. You just simply limit, you start to trade down to the number of events you, that you go to, you travel less, but you go to those that matter. So, you know, in the markets that we, we’ve got those top tier events we’re doing very well. The second one, which I think is really interesting is that, you know, remote working is changed the landscape, right? So many people are doing it. New York where our HQ is Mondays and Fridays are quiet, particularly in Midtown. And that’s just because most offices, most folks aren’t coming in on those days. And then you have people that don’t come in at all. You have businesses that are hiring for talent, not based off of location. So our events and others in the space are becoming defacto meeting points, not just between the buyers and sellers in that particular market, but of the actual companies that attend our events themselves, they’re using our events as opportunities to engage with each other and get face-to-face with colleagues that they’ve only met virtually. And that’s, that’s a really interesting development that didn’t exist before, right? So we see that as an opportunity. We don’t know how long it will last, but I don’t get the sense that people are gonna be rushing back to the office, you know, next year no matter how much employers including ourselves, you know, love it when our people are in the office. So we end up using our own events, in fact to put colleagues together that haven’t had the chance to meet face-to-face. So our events are doing very well, particularly in the hospitality space where deals get done in a face-to-face environment. You know, we are face-to-face. We talked about, you know, technology’s impact and can that replace, you know, the human component. And the reality is no is, I mean, we’re a, we’re a people powered industry and the B2B side of it, the back end of deals being done and connecting buyers and sellers, those buyers and sellers do want to get together face-to-face. And we are very much seeing that across hospitality, travel and wellness that our newsletters are doing well, our research is doing well, our virtual events still, you know, in pockets do well, but people are deeply yearning to get together face-to-face. And our events are benefiting from that.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And, and the travel that I’ve been doing, you know, in the hospitality industry, there just seems to be a different vibe when you get into these events. There’s an energy there doesn’t seem like status quo anymore. But I love what you said about, you know, businesses using opportunities and, and events to get everyone together. And it makes me think, you know, with a marketing background, I mean this is a great opportunity for hotels, large convention resorts, put together packages for the businesses, right? And present it like that because that might be something, you’re right, Alexi, everyone’s virtual now and being able to maybe blend that together with a, a little leisure trip after work or before work, especially for those employers that wanna see their employees come back in the office, could be a nice little incentive to get everybody together face to face again.
Alexi Khajavi:
Completely agreed. I mean, you know, people call it bleasure or you know, some of my colleagues absolutely deplore that, that word, but it is true, right? At the end of the day, I think one of the benefits is that B2B doesn’t have to be boring. People are blending their home lives with their business lives, their home identity, with their business identity. And you had to, right during the pandemic, you’d be on a zoom call or a teams call or whatever it may be. And you know, your colleagues’ child would jump on their lap because they were home from school, or a cat or a dog or somebody would knock on the door. So we saw behind the scenes right behind the screen. And it’s not bad, right? I mean, we all have personal lives and there’s nothing wrong with that. It shouldn’t be invasive. You know, we, we, we, we do have the ability to keep them separate. But also I think, I think there is a more of a transparency on both employees as well as employers that, you know, we’ve got a personal life and we all, we also have a business life. And that sometimes conveniently, as long as they don’t compete with one another, you can blend them, right? So there’s nothing wrong if you’re in Orlando and you’re at a conference, or you’re on a business trip for that matter that why wouldn’t you bring your kids and let them go to Disney World and experience that? I think that that breaking down of these silos in our, in our lives, that I have a professional, me and I have a personal me, I think that’s actually a positive that we’ve broken those down and we’re a little bit more accepting, I hope of each other. And, and that, you know, if you wanna bring your spouse or you wanna bring, you know, your kids, we’ve even got some events where you can bring your spouse, you, you can bring your significant other, your partner, whomever it may be to maybe the opening reception because that is a part of who you are. And at the end of the day, if it is about connecting people, then your significant other is a part of who you are as well. I do like that. I, I mean we’re playing with that, to your point. We’re creating packages. We’re creating experiences. We never used to do that pre pandemic. It was business, business, business. And I think we’ve broken down those silos and I, and I think we’ll see more of that coming.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah it’s smart and kind of makes the marketing side of me run a little bit cause you want to be able to pigeonhole sometimes your perfect guest or the customer that you’re trying to acquire, right? And say, oh, I’m going for business travel, I’m a business travel hotel. But now all of a sudden you might want to say, maybe I should throw in some aspects of what families could do around here and stuff that’s on my social media that I didn’t think maybe a business traveler. Well yeah, the business traveler that’s bringing their family and their kids, they might be interested in what’s going on around town that’s more family oriented and they might bring their family and stay a couple more days at your hotel even though they’re there for business. So let’s kind of switch over to that cause obviously you came from a marketing background. At Travel Media Group, we’re always trying to educate hotels on strong social media presence, online reputation. Those are kind of the core foundation for guest acquisition, getting travelers to convert. Could you tell some of our listeners why having a strong digital presence, especially in today’s world, is absolutely essential?
Alexi Khajavi:
Yeah, the digital platform is, it is a personal way for a brand at scale to have almost one-to-one conversations. And we’ve never really had that ability before at scale. You know, a social media account is a, it’s a personal representation of a brand that is not just a one-way conversation, but it’s a two-way conversation. And so, you know, brands are really promises, right? I mean, that’s all a brand is, it is a promise of, you know, what you stand for, what you do, why you do it, and those types of things. And so I think the requirement of a brand is really the opportunity. People look at social often as a, you know, I’ve got a post, I’ve gotta do this. And you do, right? You can’t just sort of jump in and out of it. You have to be consistent with it and you have to be present. But really we’ve never had that ability to engage almost as human beings do. But from a brand perspective and to let that voice, you know, that sort of authenticity of voice shine through. And for travel, I know I’ve always said, and it’s sort of a saying that we, that we would always repeat in my advertising agency days is if people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it. So this, this sense of purpose around the why is really, if you can tap into the why you do it and to put your e-commerce hat on or your commercial hat on, the conversions go much higher because you’re really tapping into something that’s much, much more visceral for that customer to say, this isn’t a product, but it’s a purpose. And I identify with this purpose, and again, I don’t wanna get too far that it has to be, you know, an altruistic purpose or it could be, you know, the purpose is looking good in a swimsuit in the summer. or it could be that you’re saving the Amazon rainforest. And I think that in travel, because we’ve seen a pandemic try to wipe travel away and do its best to prevent us from traveling. The visceral reaction on the part of people were no, absolutely not. I am going to travel, I am going to engage, I am gonna connect with other human beings. And so I think the ability to have a digital presence is not just the another marketing channel, but it really isn’t a, a marketing channel that allows for these brands to one, have an authenticity of voice. Two, speak with authenticity, right? I mean, you can, you can literally just speak with customers one to one-to-one and get into a conversation, but it’s also a way for you to be transparent both in your goods and your bads because social media is unforgiving in its speed, but also in its transparency, right? Is that it can, it can go both ways. It can cut both ways on you. So I think you have to embrace it. And I think, you know, travel and hospitality, the fortunate thing for us is, is that we, we are still very much a a, an inspiration led sector, which also the imagery of that plays very nicely into digital because an image speaks a thousand words type thing. So I think we’re in a very fortunate sector to be able to be living in this time where we have this massive platform that can both communicate at scale, but at the same time communicate in a almost a one-to-one way with back and forth. So it’s really, it’s really fascinating the time that we’re living in from a marketing perspective.
Ryan Embree:
We had a lot of our travelers certainly sitting and stuck in that dreaming phase that you talked about at the beginning in this episode. Scrolling and kind of putting that bucket list together of travel when this whole thing ended. Hey, where am I going and where am my jet setting off to? But just the way we absorb that information too, it’s not like we work in another industry where we’re forcing people to get out their phones and take pictures. We constantly have people taking pictures of their journey to us, their experience with us. We are very fortunate in this industry that all of the content could be surrounding us every single day. And if we’re doing things the right way, then advocacy certainly will shine online and your conversions will translate. You know, there’s, there’s a parallel there. So you’re right. I mean, it is, it’s an amazing industry to be in. That’s why we preach it with social media and online reputation cause we know how powerful it can be. On the other side, it’s a slippery slope as well. That transparency there and those blemishes that you see, it’s not a one-off anymore. We, we might been a couple decades ago, be able to say, “Oh you know, we really messed up with that traveler. We’re gonna do better next time”. A traveler might be a little bit more of an influence today if they’ve got the right audience, they’ve got the right ears or set of eyes that have been watching them. So we have to take care at, at kind of every single turn there.
Alexi Khajavi:
Just to that point cause I think this is a really interesting moment that we’re also living in, is that we’ve had this post pandemic glow about travel where people realized, oh my gosh, I, I can travel. I haven’t traveled for a while, let’s go travel. And we’re seeing it even now with business on the books for, for this summer. You’re seeing airlines, hotels, destinations. I mean, it looks like it’s gonna be a very popular summer travel season again, which is, which is fabulous. But on the flip side of that, you’re seeing hotels that have not been invested in, in terms of renovations, repairs, products and solutions. Staffing is still a really big problem for the industry. So the wait times, training, dealing with customer complaints, the rates are some of the highest they’ve ever been, both airfare as well as hotels. And you are starting to see in, you know, JD Power ratings that the customer satisfaction is going down, meanwhile the rates are going up. So you have an inflection that has occurred and, you know, paying more for a product of lesser quality, whether that be the service level or you know, the condition of the room because you haven’t spent the money on it in the last few years. That, that is a, I think a worry out there in the marketplace. It’s something that we’re very tuned into because, you know, the customer is educated, the customer is demanding, the customer is discerning, and to your point, the customer has a phone which can scale and get that message out by taking a photo of something, a line, a product, a plate of food, a pool that’s unclean, whatever it may be. And so, to your point, it cuts both ways. And I think we are, we’re at a very critical moment in the industry right now where demand is high. There’s a, there’s a ton of demand that hasn’t even gone traveling yet. And yet we’re kind of all benefiting from this very popular moment of high rates, you know, fairly good profits, although there’s some challenges with labor and increasing cost and inflation, but we’ve gotta make sure that we don’t kill the goose that lays the golden egg, so to speak.
Ryan Embree:
No, I think that is a great cautionary message there cuz you’re right, we do not wanna sit here and take our guests for granted that might’ve been sitting here and saying, you know what? It’s okay that the breakfast’s not up to par. I haven’t been, I haven’t been out in a hotel in years. This is, you know, all of a sudden that message starts to get a little bit more, you know what, maybe they should be doing this. You, you know what, I, I don’t like sitting in line at the front desk for 20 minutes. There definitely has to be some efficiencies there. Your online reputation, so key and, and guests are giving you clues every single day. We’re about to get, like you said, the hotel listeners listening to this should be very happy. It is all looking like we’re gonna have a huge summer, but at the same time, this is gonna be an incredible stress test for your property as well. And those little issues right now that you’ve been able to manage and handle might turn into bigger problems if not properly addressed. So definitely take that into consideration and you do not want to get yourself in a place where you do enough damage to your online reputation in the summer to where in those slower months it’s gonna impact conversion. So yeah, great point there, Alexi, and we talked about staffing shortages. I, I wanna lean into that cause that has definitely been a headwind, right? I feel like we’ve gotten past some of the other things that we’ve been battling in our industry, but this staffing shortage just will not, we cannot shake it for some reason. One of the things we’re about to discuss in depth is all the events and learning opportunities that Questex has to offer. I wanna talk to the importance of these events and educational opportunities for travel industry because sending employees out obviously is a morale booster, you know, to go to one of these events. But just the impact the education and I graduated from Rosen College Hospitality at UCF, we need more of these events and educational opportunities to, to start padding the staffing in our industry.
Alexi Khajavi:
Yeah, look, it’s tough, right? Because we cater to senior level professionals in the industry, but we’re always trying to encourage the future generation of, of travel and hospitality professionals to attend the staffing issue is unlike anything we’ve we’ve seen ever before. And it isn’t going away. I mean, I think there was some hope that it would go away. We’ve had open vacancies, you know, we’ve got over a million job vacancies just in hospitality alone. And that number has remained constant, you know, for the last year. It really is. It’s a twofold issue. One is the point that you bring up, which is around hospitality schools and making sure that this industry, our industry of travel and hospitality appeals to young students and people that are looking to get into the workforce. We did, and I think we lost a little bit of the trust during the pandemic when we just absolutely did what we had to do. We cut positions in order to stay afloat. But I think that that was a real moment where, you know, we treated employees as essentially just temporary work and we put them, you know, out to on furlough or, or frankly, you know, let them go. And I think that will take some time to you know, to, to build back that trust. But the other part of this is immigration. We cannot solve the labor issue in travel and hospitality without fixing the immigration issue in the US. But it’s not just a US issue, it’s a global issue. Whether you’re in the UK with Brexit or you’re within Europe, hospitality depends on immigration because it is a beautiful and easy position to enter into to earn good money. And also there is a career progression built within travel and hospitality, right? Whether to a GM position, to a food and beverage director position. So there’s a lot of benefits to it that has have clearly appealed, you know, to immigrants, whether it be to the US or any other place. And unfortunately, you know, the immigration issue right now is an extremely bipartisan issue, in the country. And so, you know, the, you know, the hope that it gets fixed anytime soon I think is true, is just that it’s a hope and that’s an unfortunate situation. So then I think it goes back to your point, which is what can we do more to provide, I think a both a trust factor but also an appealing factor to young people that want to, you know, get a job. Maybe they’re not thinking of hospitality per se as a career, but they need to earn some money. And I’m, you know, I am starting to see a little bit more creativity and innovation in that space. Aimbridge, which is one of the largest third party operators and employers of hotel and hospitality staff, they’ve got an app right now that in a market. So if you’re in LA and they’ve got, you know, 200 properties in LA you can choose which property you wanna work at that day. So a little bit of that flex working, which frankly appeals to people in this day and age, right? You know, people wanna maybe go skate, you know, Venice Beach or go surf anywhere. And having that ability to say, I don’t wanna work the morning shift, I wanna work the evening shift. You know, I grew up in hospitality. I, I was, I was a bus boy, I was working hotels, worked a lot in restaurants. I mean, I’ve done plenty of night shifts and then, and then been there for breakfast and that is tough. you know, you’re getting five hours of sleep, right? And there’s a bit of that, you know, well, we all had to do it. Now you gotta crack on and, and take it. But, you know, I don’t think that that, that always worked. I think, and it doesn’t have to be that way. We can be more creative and look, if, if you’re offering a higher wage to go work the breakfast and somebody wants to earn that higher wage and they, they work the dinner shift, let ’em have at it, right? It’s a supply and demand economics. It’s not rocket science. So I do think that we’ve just gotta be more creative in how we set up, you know, scheduling, how we appeal to, you know, the younger generations by going to those hospitality schools by illustrating the career progression in hospitality and travel. I mean, it is really one of the most upwardly mobile, you know, sectors that I know of. You know, I don’t think we had to do those things in the past. Well, we have to do ’em now and we just have to do a better job of it.
Ryan Embree:
You’re absolutely right there, Alexi. I mean, I’ve had so many people on this, on this podcast and to hear that, that first question that I asked you, right, to hear their story of how they got into hospitality, I think right now we’re hearing more and more people saying, you know, I just kind of found myself in hospitality and worked my way up. We need to change that narrative of being like, you know what? I went to school for hospitality, I went through this program and got to where I am. And we need to be able to tell those stories and make it less about finding yourself in hospitality and more about kind of finding your career in hospitality and growing through that. So it’ll be interesting to see, I love that idea that you mentioned about the flexibility of schedules cause that’s always been the knock on hospitality, right? You know, is the scheduling and work-life balance, which as we talked about now, starting to, to blend a little bit. So in a place where we’re in hospitality, maybe we have an advantage there of trying to provide a work-life balance a little bit more to cater to some of our employees.
Alexi Khajavi:
I agree. I think that’s exactly it.
Ryan Embree:
Let’s dive into the hospitality show. So I’m, I’m really excited about this event. This is, this is the first time we’re announcing this on the podcast, but Travel Media Group and the Suite Spot, we’re gonna be there. We’re gonna be at the event we’re super excited about. It’s gonna be a fantastic event from everything that we’ve seen. I mean, you guys are all over the place right now, when it comes to, to marketing this thing. So it’s gonna be a great event. What can attendees expect from this show, Alexi?
Alexi Khajavi:
You know, the show is the hospitality show in its first year was launched, not because there’s a lack of hospitality shows in the marketplace. It’s because there’s no single hospitality show that has a singular focus on driving profitability back to owners, into operators. And whether that be, you know, top line challenges from revenue management to changing customer demand profiles to social media. But certainly on some of the issues that we’ve touched upon, Ryan, which is staffing, labor, technology issues. You know, this is a really complex industry and the margins have never been, some of the best in the world either, right? I mean, you’ve got, you know, labor, you’ve got food, you’ve, you’ve got big macro, you know, challenges in this space that are costs that are frankly out of our, out of our control. So we really did see an opportunity that rather than just treat a show or launch a show that was about the real estate side or one that was about the operational side, let’s go after owners and operators that own those assets, operate those assets and want to drive more profitability back home. And, and whether they sell that, that asset in five or six years time, that’s irrelevant, is that how do you effectively optimize and run a more profitable hotel? So the interesting things around that is, it’s just endless, right? So innovating the room, how do you turn a lobby into a profit center and not just a cost center, which is, you know, some couches and, a bunch of people sort of going in and out or milling around. We’ve got over 300 exhibitors. We’re expecting over 3000 attendees. We have probably one of the most exciting and innovative conference programs on the sector. We’ve got Admiral McRaven, we’ve got Kat Cole from Athletic Greens, we’ve got Tony Capuano, we’ve got Scott Kirby, the CEO of United Airlines. we’ve got Google joining us. The program is all, you know, online and it, it really is a blend of discovery information and networking of the best and the brightest in the industry. The feedback and the response for it has been overwhelming. I mean, for a new launch to get this amount of excitement and support from the industry, from both the senior level as well as from general managers, you know, an owner, single owner of a hotel, you know, in College Station, Texas for that matter to Blackstone, right? All the way to some of the top hotel owners. It’s obviously in Vegas, which is gonna be a good time. We’ve got an opening night party at Tao which is the nightclub at the Venetian, sponsored by, DirecTV. And so we’ve got, it’s just an incredible experience that we’re gonna be offering to our attendees. And as I said, it’ the 27th to the 29th of June and, it should be a good time and, we’re looking forward to having you guys there as well.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. It’s gonna be super exciting. And you know, for our listeners, again, if you haven’t seen it, you might be under a rock because again, this, this inaugural event that Alexi’s talked about has, has been everywhere. But for our listeners that are, are interested in going, we actually have a code that you can use, 20% off any pass THSpodcast. Again, THSpodcast, go to the Hospitality show and Alexi and I will both be there. We’re excited for this event. We’re gonna have a lot of fun there. So, Alexi, you know, this was a really great conversation. As you mentioned before, our industry, very comprehensive. There’s so many elements to it. That’s why I think the hospitality show is gonna be such a success because, you know, I’ve looked at that program schedule there, it really covers everything, even if you’re just getting into the industry, right? We got a lot of listeners right now that might just be getting into this industry. We just talked about it. Finding your career through our industry, which is, is one of the most fascinating and exciting out there to senior level people. So Alexi, I want to thank you for, for your, all your insights and joining me on the Suite Spot today.
Alexi Khajavi:
No, Ryan, thank you very much. Really appreciate it. Enjoyed it immensely, and looking forward to seeing you in Vegas at The Hospitality Show in June.
Ryan Embree:
We will see you there. Thanks Alexi, and thank you all for listening. To Join our Loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
In this episode of the Suite Spot Podcast, host and TMG Marketing Director, Ryan Embree and Chief Technology Officer, Jason Lee, tackle how guest satisfaction surveys impact a hotel’s operations and influence overall bookings. From topics such as what questions to ask in a guest satisfaction survey to how they shape your hotel’s bottom line, listeners will gain unique insights on implementing a system at their properties that extract more guest feedback.
Suite Spot Podcast · 112 – Responding to Guest Satisfaction SurveysEpisode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you all for listening or watching us today. Remember, we are in the content creation studio, AKA the digital den, here at Travel Media Group’s headquarters just north of Orlando. We’re super excited to be on YouTube now, and we’ve got a frequent guest. This is your second time on video, but you’ve been on the Suite Spot quite a number of times. Jason, Chief Technology Officer here at Travel Media Group. Jason, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee:
Yeah, thanks for having me again in the digital den.
Ryan Embree:
The digital den. Yes, we love to call it that. We’ve already talked about some exciting topics here in 2023. This one is a little polarizing, I’m sure for some of our listeners. If you, if you caught the title, so it’s talking about responding to guest satisfaction surveys. We probably have heard that a lot from our brands, from our management companies, from a lot of people, from our guests. You’ve heard me talk a lot about responding to reviews. Obviously that’s something at Travel Media Group we take a lot of pride in. We reached the incredible feat of responding to 1 million plus guest reviews last summer. Very exciting achievement. We had you on for an episode to talk about that. I’m curious, it’s a different animal with these guest satisfaction surveys. Let’s kind of talk about the differences between responding to guest reviews online and maybe guest satisfaction surveys.
Jason Lee:
Yeah, I mean, I think the biggest difference is that you’ve solicited this feedback. Online, what you’re getting is someone has chosen to give you a public review and they’re motivated by anger or motivated by happiness or whatever that motivation is. But in this case, you may have caught them in a space where they could give you objective information. So you’ve solicited that information and now they’re filling that out. And so depending on your brand, it could be a lengthy survey, but typically it’s done in stages so you can get some of that information out. But going back to your original question, I think the biggest difference in terms of tone is that you’ve solicited this feedback, now they’ve given you this feedback. Now what do you say back to them? And this isn’t public. This is you with this guest, and you might know everything about this guest. You know who they are, you know what room they stayed in. You, you might have further, insight from your front desk or from other staff members who’ve maybe encountered this guest. So you have way more information than a public review where you might not know what room they were in. You might not know the guest, you might not know the situation. So now your response could be extremely specific.
Ryan Embree:
And you have to be careful with that response. I mean, some of the, the tips and best practices that we share for online reviews might not translate very well to an internal guest satisfaction survey. You know, where you’re coming off as inauthentic. I would challenge maybe the listeners to think about maybe when you’re responding to a guest in a lobby full of people versus maybe a one-on-one conversation where you can just be a little bit more interactive and not so much worry about your surroundings there. Can you kind of give us an example maybe of a guest satisfaction survey and some of the feedback that you would receive there and how you would handle that differently than maybe a public forum online like TripAdvisor, Google or OTA’s?
Jason Lee:
Yeah, so if we’re looking at negative information, so somebody had a bad experience at your property, your ability to reach this, this guest directly, now you, you have that ability. You can email them, you could maybe even call them. But seeking service recovery in a space like this is really what you should be doing. This is really the, that that should be your primary motivation in a negative situation. So this is not public. So this is figuring out what exactly went wrong, figuring out if it was something that you could have prevented, and maybe whatever you need to do with your staff to make sure it doesn’t happen in the future. But then getting with that guest directly and creating service recovery. That could be a free night or that could be just an apology. But, but this is something super direct, but also something that I think you’re, you don’t have to be, you don’t have to walk that minefield of public, like you were saying that that analogy of being in the lobby, you don’t have to walk that minefield. You can go directly with that guest and I think that’s what they want. So the more vague you are in these situations, I think that’s the worse it is. You compound the issue. The more vague you are, if you respond this way, the same way you would respond to a TripAdvisor, they’re saying something really specific, you asked me, I’m telling you this is what happened, and now you’re like, oh, thanks for your feedback. We’ll try harder. You know? I don’t think that flies there and I think it only compounds it. And in fact, my opinion is that could also drive them to TripAdvisor. That can drive them elsewhere.
Ryan Embree:
That’s that’s a great point. Because the way that you respond there, and we talk to hoteliers all the time, could determine the rating of that score on an online public review. Because we know that, and that space and forum that has direct impacts to future bookings. So if you can handle a resolve or service recovery a problem internally, that could turn into even some, some promotion for the property of how well you handled that situation. But you’re right, you know, a lot of the times we teach on our master classes, our webinars, boot camps, we do for review response for hoteliers, and we always talk about educating the next guest, right? So if there’s a pet fee that you have, you explain that policy very well for the next person to come in, so that they have a clear understanding of what’s happening and setting expectations. That’s really not the case within these internal guest satisfaction surveys. If you say, hey, next time, just know that our pet fee is $40 a night sort of thing, right? That doesn’t solve anything. It’s more about resolving those issues within the guest satisfaction surveys. It’s not so much about marketing or promoting or even educating the next guest that walks in through the door.
Jason Lee:
Absolutely. And I mean, you think about today’s rising ADRs, that guest can easily be worth $500-$600. And them coming back and staying with you. So I think sometimes we get into this space where we’re like, oh, we, we already have their money. Maybe they won’t come back. And that’s okay. But I think that as a whole, that’s a real flawed way of looking at it. You have to really take all this stuff, but I also feel like there’s a lot of data. You have talked many times about sentiment analysis and other types of, of data, and I think with whatever brand you’re with, mostly it’s probably Medallia that you would be working with, but there’s a lot of additional insights that come from that. But I think the information that you’re getting and when we’re looking at quantities, this is another really big interesting thing about surveys, is that you’re looking at, you get as almost as much surveys or sometimes more surveys than all of your third party reviews combined. So, guest satisfaction surveys is the quantities are very high. So there’s a lot of information there that, you could take to, to really refine your process, make the best experience for the guest possible.
Ryan Embree:
And you might have, as we talked about, you might have a more genuine example of what a guest is feeling, rather than just going to TripAdvisor and venting about a bad stay or ranting and raving about a hotel because they really like the front desk agent and they promised them behind the front desk that they’d lead that five star review. So I think behind the, those closed doors, you might get the most genuine feedback and, might wanna weigh that between, you know, obviously we wanna look at all the clues that our guests are leaving for us, but these guest satisfaction surveys, there’s a reason that these brands really keep a close eye on this and, and they do a lot of their measuring for their, for their brands and standards when it comes to these. So at one point you were on the other side of the front desk. You know, you were in the operation side of a hotel and I think that gives you a unique experience. When you were running hotels or, working in them, did you have an internal survey strategy? Or if we put you back behind the front desk, you know, what would be the first kind of steps to putting in a strategy for responding to guest satisfaction surveys?
Jason Lee:
I think first and foremost, and this, and this goes to probably a lot of front desk training or any kind of customer service training, but it goes to not being emotional in the moment, not reading something and being emotional. And I think especially with surveys, we might lump all of this feedback together. So there’s like additional embarrassment when you have something terrible on TripAdvisor, cause it’s public. But when you have something from a survey, you might get something really negative and react emotionally like this guest, this guest was a jerk. And, I’m not, you know, they, they’re not gonna get any more of my time. But I think the same thing happens direct face-to-face. At a front desk, a guest comes in and they, and there is a really issue and that is an issue for them. Whether you think it is or not, it is something that they’re upset about. So getting in and sort of, deescalating that situation is really important. And the best way you can deescalate, I think any situation is to listen. So in the case of a survey, it would be to really read what they wrote and think about what it is that happened to this guest and think about how you would want to be responded to if this happened to you. And then further, what actions can I take now before I get back to this guest to make sure that this, this gets handled. So when I do that, when you do it live with a guest, it’s about taking a maintenance ticket out and writing down what happened and showing them that you’ve listened to what they’re gonna say and now you’re taking action. So I think it’s a very similar thing. We investigated this, we see what happened, we’re so sorry, and then you seek whatever that recovery is. You know, that free night or maybe it’s not, it’s just like, we’re so sorry this happened. We’ll make sure this doesn’t happen to any other guests. Thank you for bringing this to our attention.
Ryan Embree:
There certainly has to be a lot more follow through because we do have that extra information, right. If somebody says, my room was not up to the standards of what I thought it should be, as far as cleanliness goes, we have where that particular guest stayed. And if you’re diligent enough in your research, you know, you might be able to uncover some trends, some patterns there. Right. Is it a particular housekeeper that’s maybe missing some areas when it comes to, to cleaning the rooms. So we have all that information. So there definitely is more of that follow through because I know there’s a lot of hoteliers out there that wish that they could identify some of that information, right? They hear about an incident that happened on site and they’re saying, I wish I knew what, what room, but all we have is a username, or an anonymous name that we can’t really identify which particular room that they were in. So service recovery makes that a little bit more difficult, whereas an internal guest satisfaction survey, you really can pinpoint and they might have those special requests, an invoice, right? That’s something that you hear all the time. There has to be follow up there. Yeah, a lot more accountability. And I was gonna ask you this, why do you think brands put so much emphasis? I mean, you’ve already said the quantity is there about how many of them are coming in. But there’s also that follow through that is required because that guest might be asking for an invoice or asking for some sort of service recovery free night or discounted night because of a certain situation. Why do you think that emphasis is there?
Jason Lee:
Because, you know, we may be on an island, we own this hotel, X brand hotel, and we’re on this island because we’ve financed this hotel. We’ve got payroll, we’ve got all the things that are going on at this property that financially and emotionally and everything, trying to make a small business. But the brand has its name, so its name and the name. See the name of maybe your sub-brand and the name of the actual like full brand. That means a lot. And most of the time there’s loyalty programs, there’s other things around getting guests to stay at multiple locations and come back again and again because there’s a certain expectation of quality or certain expectation and they wanna ensure that that’s going on. And you want that. Like that’s, that, that’s why you pay franchise fees. That’s why you have that name, you know, on, on your monument sign is so that you can get these guests coming in knowing that they’re gonna have, you know, what they’re expecting, they’re gonna get. So surveys are a way for, for brands to get an idea of what properties are, the weak links, what properties are not delivering, what they should be delivering. And the more that you know, and this is also why hotels get large pips, why they get kicked out. You know, so, but ultimately what it should be for you as a business owner is that these, are, this is is all smart business. This is something that the brand is doing for you, giving you all of this feedback. You know, when I, when I ran hotels, there wasn’t this amount of feedback. We got feedback and every piece of feedback we got, which wasn’t even close to what it is today, we really value because it wasn’t a lot. And now we have crazy analytics, we’ve got, you know, tons of guests giving us this feedback we have over time. So we have the ability to track trends, we have the ability to see all of this information and brands have the same thing. So brands, so getting back to your question, sorry, I ramble on. The main thing is so that they can, they can ensure the reputation of their brand is not being tarnished and that the guest that’s staying with this location is having a similar experience as the other location.
Ryan Embree:
Well, like I said, I mean this is a polarizing topic. Because of what you just explained. We’re getting more feedback than ever. So it’s, it’s overwhelming sometimes. So if you don’t have a good system to sit down and say, hey listen, I need to analyze all this data. If you’re just mindlessly responding or just kind of trying to check off a mark, you’re gonna keep running into the same issues and you could be missing on a huge opportunity to market and advertise your competitive advantage in other spaces, like your social media, like we talk about all the time. Now, Travel Media Group, we do provide surveys for hotels, we do internal surveys. I wanna put you on the, on the hot seat here and ask kind of, you know, some of your favorite questions. What do you think are the most valuable questions and how would you phrase them in order to get some really good insights that you could use, at the property operationally?
Jason Lee:
I think any question that requires a lengthy answer, I think the yes/no or the 1-5’s don’t maybe fully tell the whole story. And it’s a great way to collect analytics. So it could be like cleanliness one through five, service one through five, location one through five, right? Like that kind of similar deal when we get to, you know, what could we have done better? You know, what was your favorite part of, of your stay? There could be some really interesting things or what was the least. And I think people who are happy, somebody who has been giving you great answers, like, yes, everything’s great, everything’s great, everything’s great. What could we have done better? Is a great question to ask, especially a guest like that because I bet there was something and, and that could be the difference between them, you know, staying with you another time or it could be the difference to another guest, even a bigger difference to another guest. Yeah. So any kind of information you can glean that way that’s not just yes or no one through five or 0 through 10 mps. It’s really important I think, to get really what, what happened, what was your experience and what could we have done better?
Ryan Embree:
What was something that you expected or didn’t expect on property that happened during your experience, right? That could set us up for a really nice place to say, okay, listen, a lot of people are saying that they didn’t expect there to be a hot breakfast. That’s something positive. Or You can say, okay, we need to do a better job of going out there and talk about, you know, our gluten-free options and this hot breakfast that we’ve clearly made some investments to, or, you know, I, I expected more out of my housekeeping service or, or my turnover service. These are things that can be used in different ways. Kind of talk through us about using these insights and analytics that you get from these surveys. I know you’ve given us a couple examples so far, but how can we improve the guest experience through that?
Jason Lee:
I think when, whenever you see a trend, that’s really the big thing. There are certain things that just happen, the variables inside of a hotel room, and I’ve talked about this a lot in other, episodes that we’ve done. But like literally you’re, you’re talking about hundreds of variables from light switches to the time you flush the toilet to circulating pump, not giving enough hot water. You know, the, that that’s when the AC doesn’t work. It’s so many variables and there’s so many things that can happen once in one room to one guest. It’s fixed and doesn’t happen again. But the stuff that’s really important is the stuff that multiple guests talk about this trend of issue. And we have enough data either and, and surveys give us a ton of data. You combine that with third party, you probably have a real clear picture about what is going wrong. And the more you can drill into those things and fix them, I think the quantities would show you like how many guests might be experiencing this. And it could be a block of rooms are having an issue, or it could be the rooms that you know about and you sell last. Right? Because you know about ’em in all of those things. Those are still people who spent money at your establishment who had a bad experience. Those are all those things that, that can be improved and should be. And if they were, those guests could come back and stay with you again, their experience would lead them to have a great feeling about your brand and about your location. I think it’s in general, taking that and looking at trends, especially trends that are going down and then tracking them backwards. You know, 30 days I had this many complaints about odor, so now going forward 30 days, I had half as many because I implemented this thing, you know? And that’s the way to look at it.
Ryan Embree:
I think also looking at it seasonally, right? Some of the hotels that are listening to this have a huge swings in occupancy during the summer months. We’re about to get into spring break as we record this episode. That kind of puts the tension on your operations at the property. And those issues start to bubble up a little bit more during those times. And even looking, okay, this was, this was the hot topic last summer, right? It was my AC wasn’t performing as an easy example. Up to par. Now as you get into this summer, you know, continue to track that and see are these seasonal issues, you know, something that are uncovering some problems that are underlying that maybe during slow pieces of, occupancy I’m not seeing because, you know, obviously we all want to be at high occupancy. When we are, we also don’t want to be, creating issues that are, are going to prevent future stays there as well. And one thing we didn’t even get the chance to talk about on this is how quickly we should be responding to these guest satisfaction surveys.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. I would say as soon as possible, especially on the negative side, I would try to get back to them as soon as you get them.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it’s the expectation right now too, right? Yeah. Because as I’m holding up my phone here, for those that are just listening to this, this has kind of changed the game. When we ask for a resolution to a problem or an issue or an invoice or points added to our account, our patience and attention span is certainly shrinking there. So as quickly as possible, you need to make these satisfaction surveys a priority. The brand certainly does, but that needs to be mission critical here at the property.
Jason Lee:
I would say too, there’s a direct correlation to your ability to resolve that with that guest. I guess the ease of resolving that you get back to them right away and show them that you care, you get back to them a week later, it’s probably festered by that time, or they may have forgotten about it. And then you just brought up the, you just brought up what just happened and the fact that you took seven days to get back to them.
Ryan Embree:
There’s a sweet spot in there. You mentioned it at the top of the episode, it could be the difference between someone, you know, not getting a response and going to a public forum. And guess what, that internal survey might sound a lot nicer internally than what they’re gonna want to put on external because they know the impact of a reputation of a hotel out there. So they know how impactful that can be on your booking. So you definitely don’t want to get those guests in a position where they can punish you. Like I said, I mean, this is something new. Our, realm is the online review response. You know, like I mentioned before, a million plus these guest satisfaction surveys. We certainly have a lot of experience on the survey side of things. Any final thoughts on today?
Jason Lee:
Yeah, I mean, so with Travel Media Group, we have been doing, like you said, the third party review. So the, so the public reviews and that includes guest verified reviews for Choice, IHG and Marriott. We are now starting to do Medallia responses and we have really taken time to make sure that this process is correct and just like we talked about through this entire episode, that it’s different and the differences are, are really important. The nuance there is extremely important. So making sure you have a partner that gets your voice and is able to respond in this different way. So the last thing you want to have happen is that you bring, you have a partner start helping you and it compounds your problems. So it’s about taking these things and making sure that you have the right partner that could give the time to the response. So let’s say 80% of your surveys could be responded very much like a third party. So it’s more like acknowledgement and thanking and apologizing, like these kind of more normal things that happen that you could handle. But then you have this 20%, maybe less that they want a free night, they are upset there, there could be some very specific things that you just don’t respond to. They have to be handled. So we have a program and, and we’re gonna be rolling this out over the next few months as we add each individual brand into it, where we bring in your surveys, we create responses, and we can hold surveys and allow you the time to work with us, to articulate the resolution so we make sure that all of these things are handled properly and in time. So we have some really cool stuff coming and I’m very, very excited about it and I’m mostly excited because we have really taken time to understand the space and, and make sure that now that we’re ready to do this, that we can do it appropriately.
Ryan Embree:
Well, there’s so many intricacies, like we talked about, you know, examples that were given during this episode. So that’s super exciting. And we talked about a million plus. I mean, 2 million should be probably right around the corner then if we’re gonna be adding these Medallia and internal surveys. Super, super exciting news. Probably heard it here first on the Suite Spot, which is breaking. So very excited about that. Definitely look out for more information for everyone on that. Just to echo Jason and, and the excitement that we have over here about starting to respond. We took the time to really know what we’re running into on these internal surveys and the commonalities and differences that we see in these reviews and surveys. So awesome to hear Jason. We’ll have to keep an eye on those numbers like I mentioned before. But I want to thank you again for joining the Suite Spot and we’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Join Suite Spot podcast host and TMG Marketing Director Ryan Embree as he sits down and welcomes a very special guest, the EVP & Chief Commercial Officer of Sage Hospitality Group, Patrick Pahlke, in the latest episode of the TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series!
This episode has something for everyone in the hospitality industry, so tune in now!
Suite Spot Podcast · 111 – Hospitality Trailblazers: Patrick PahlkeEpisode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hotiers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for listening. Today we have another episode of our exciting series, TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. If you’re just joining us for the first time, we are absolutely loving this series. We are bringing the brightest and best in our industry, those people and groups that are pushing our industry forward into 2023 and beyond. We’ve got a great guest with me today, before I introduce him. As always, you can always find our episodes anywhere you’re finding our podcast, but also on YouTube. So check that out and let’s go ahead and get rolling with the episode. So I will introduce our TMG Hospitality Trailblazer of the day. That is Patrick Pahlke, Chief Commercial Officer at Sage Hospitality. Patrick, welcome into the Suite Spot.
Patrick Pahlke :
Hello, I’m super delighted to be here. Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree:
We’re excited to have you, you’re the guest of honor today, so let’s go ahead and open it up with a question for all of our first timers on the Suite Spot. We know we work in an industry where people can come from anywhere and they have some, sometimes some strange journeys in order to get to where they are today. So tell us a little bit about your journey to Sage Hospitality Group. Was it more the traditional way of maybe starting at the front desk and working up or completely outta left field? Cause we’ve heard those stories on this series as well.
Patrick Pahlke :
Yeah, no, mine is a long one. I would say so. First of all, as you can hear from my pungent accent, I’m from Germany originally, and, I had, I had the opportunity of living in different countries as a child with my parents. And, at one point, when I was six years old, we stayed, we lived in a hotel for, for three months, and that hotel was my playground and the general manager of that hotel was like a god for me. It was in Jakarta and it was the Hilton International in 1981. Still remember very well. And I said to my parents, I want to be that guy one day, Mr. Schutz Sandorf was his name. And yeah, just kind of stuck to my childhood dream, you know, did an apprenticeship, entered the industry in Germany in the mid nineties. Worked in different places in Europe. At one point I studied, in Lozan in Switzerland, hotel management. Then, ventured out to Asia, stayed in Asia for 16 years, worked all over the place, mostly in the, in the five star field with Hyatt International. Worked with Mandarin Oriental as well. And then, in 2015, I ventured into the lifestyle space, you know, coming from the bigger brands, moving to a smaller company, commune hotels at that time, they don’t exist anymore. They became two roads after a while and then two roads got acquired by Hyatt. Yeah. And, and once you make that move to the independent lifestyle space, you know, and, and you realize, you know, that entrepreneurial spirit that they, that they have, you know, from having a great idea to implementation when there’s not much red tape in between. Once you get used to that, it’s pretty addictive, you know. So since then I’ve never looked back, kind of stayed in the lifestyle space, moved to the United States four years ago to join a company called Proper Hospitality, very innovative in the luxury lifestyle space, helped to build up that brand and, joined Sage one and a half years ago, in summer 2021 to basically rebuild their commercial team from scratch and, you know, build it out in a way that is in line with the company’s growth, which is really to focus in on the lifestyle space as well.
Ryan Embree:
Well, your story certainly hits a lot of marks when it comes to hospitality, first, a global story, right? You know, we always hear about that about our industry and two, you know, you lived the hospitality life, right? It’s like, you know, sometimes we hear that in, in our industry of, you know, it’s just not a life or a lifestyle or a job. You have to actually live it. So hearing somebody’s story that actually is living in a hotel for a little bit of time, like I said, you, you checked off all the marks there. That’s a very interesting story. Now, I do wanna kind of talk about this last couple years. I mean, this is another question. We’ve done almost a dozen of these and I get a very different answer each time I ask it, but everyone was kind of experiencing the same thing over the past couple years. So, you know, what lessons do you think the hospitality industry in general learned? And were any of those lessons applied to your role now at Sage Hospitality Group?
Patrick Pahlke :
Yeah, I think, I think a lot of us hoteliers can write a book about the last three years, right? And everything that has changed and what we’ve learned. But I would say if I was to sort of synthesize it down, the number one thing we’ve all learned is that maybe it was something we already knew, but we honed in on it more, is that flexibility and the willingness to innovate is essential to navigating difficult business environments. Our company has always been willing to do things differently, but any sense of rigidity or needing to clinging to how things were done in the past really had to go out of the window in 2020. Obviously not just with Sage, but with hospitality companies as well. And I think that we will always have to remain open to doing things differently and looking, for new ways to solve ever-evolving challenges that we face in our industry. An example of, you know, flexibility as well, if we look at it from a people and culture or HR perspective is, you know, us having implemented, hybrid work models, for all home office employees, we have been experimenting with this as well across our properties just to implement more flexibility. I think also, you know, not making all people move to headquarters, is also a thing that a lot of hotel management companies have learned. You know, the team that I have built over the last one and a half years is really, is a total hybrid. Half of them are based in Denver and the other half is all over the country. And I think it’s totally fine, you know, to work in this environment, you know, you just have to make sure that once in a while you bring everyone together in person to make sure that we, that we have an opportunity form proper relationships, you know, that you cannot, that you cannot establish via Zoom.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and I think you stumbled on a topic we’re gonna be covering here in a minute, talking about group and business travel in those, you know, getting everybody together in a certain location. It’s kind of how, how that business travel is evolving. And, and like I said, we’ll touch on that later, but you mentioned in your journey about how exciting it can be when that red tape is removed and that red tape wasn’t over the past couple years, it wasn’t removed because, you know, we wanted to, as an industry, it kind of had to at a necessity and it made us move on a lot of stuff a lot quicker than maybe we felt comfortable as an industry doing. But it certainly has opened our eyes to a lot of stuff. You know, one of the things we talk about all the time is guest preferences when it comes to cleaning the room. You know, we didn’t realize, I don’t think there’d ever be a situation where we kind of remove that from the guest experience of, Hey, you know, we might not come into your room every single day. You might have some brands try to trial that, but no one’s gonna make that pivot so quickly. We had to do that during the pandemic and we learned some lessons from it. So super, super interesting to kind of hear those lessons and how they’re applied. And, you know, one of the things that, that we also had to adapt to and our guests had to adapt to is technology, right? So I think the best analogy or parallel is, is, you know, when we go into the airports and we see, you know, maybe most of the majority of the people using those apps and, and electronic boarding passes, but you still have those people that are holding the paper tickets. And I think that’s a great correlation to the hotel industry because obviously more people are adapting the, the wireless check-in or the keyless check-in, rather, you know, some people still like coming to the front desk and having that conversation. So how do you balance that technology with, you know, the foundation of our industry, which is people serving people?
Patrick Pahlke :
Yeah, I mean, you, you’re hitting the nail on the head. It’s, it’s exactly all about that balance, right? I mean, we of course never wanna lose the humanity aspect, right? In the hospitality experience, but we also wanna make sure that the guest is getting convenience and a more seamless experience that they desire more and more, right? I’m not saying it’s just a generational shift that wants a more tech forward approach, you know, but it’s just people all, all kinds of travelers, all demographics, they like to have options, right? So, in the past, I would say those check-in kiosks, you know, you would never see them at true luxury hotels, but now we’re really contemplating to have optionality for check-in also at, more elevated properties, you know, because that, that desire is just there. Another example is our property Catbird, which is our boutique extended stay brand that we have recently launched here in Denver, and that we will be rolling out across the country. They have a great example of how we’re approaching this. The hotel has a lot of tech forward amenities and integrations, including a self-guided check-in process via kiosks that we have in the lobby. So guests who does not wanna interact with staff doesn’t have to. However, staff is always available as well in the lobby to connect with guests, making it a much more, informal interaction and creating a sense of home for our guests. And then I think, the same also applies for just guest communication in general, right? Some guests really prefer to have a chat option, right? Where you get a text message on your phone, during pre-arrival, also during arrival, where sort of a, a chat concierge, you know, tells the guest, you know, whatever you need done, if you need restaurant recommendations, if you need to find something in the hotel, if you wanna request turndown service, just text us. You know? And then there’s other guests who prefer to speak to guest service agents. So I, I really think it’s about having that balance and about having optionalites for guests.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you bring up a couple interesting points. One of the things that we are so quick to be able to say, well, this is a young generation thing, let’s go ahead and target that younger traveler when it comes to technology, but looking at a way of segments as well, right? The luxury segment, which usually we are trying to obviously cater as much as we can to those guests because they’re paying a little bit more than other properties, but we want that, that kind of white glove service. But at the same time, they might have that experience of, I just wanna get to my room and check in, and that’s their white glove experience.
Patrick Pahlke :
Yeah, I mean your, your business traveler and luxury hotels is a, is a great example, right? Your five star hotel road warrior, they also exist, you know, your CEOs, they don’t wanna chit chat upon checkin, they just want to get there, get their key and get up to the room, you know, so just having that optionality.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And, and you know, one of the things we talk about on this digital marketing podcast when we’re talking about social media is always listening on your social media platforms. Because you’re right, Patrick, this is a way that guests are communicating with you and they almost take that chat and behind their phone if you haven’t answered to them in, you know, a couple seconds, that’s almost as bad to them as someone not being at the front desk, or that’s what they’re equating that to. So you need to make sure you’re listening on all forms because they might feel more comfortable chatting you behind their phone than they would actually coming to the front desk. And we’re learning more and more that guests are feeling that sentiment. So we talked a little bit about it, the business travel trends, right? So what does that look like this year for you? And has Sage hospitality have made a shift in how you’re, you’re trying to target these business and group travelers, which have really kind of still been sluggish in comparison to leisure travel?
Patrick Pahlke :
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, I would say last year was really the year for business travel to ramp back up. You know, it was, it was a slow ramp, but it happened. And I’m very pleased to say that now we are already at a point, you know, where we can see business travel levels almost back to 2019. And to be honest, I get, I’m getting a little bit tired of always comparing to 2019. I would like 2022 to be our new benchmark, right? But, you know, one, cannot help but still looking at the at the pre covid past. So it, it’s, it’s back, but it is slightly different. So the first thing that we’ve observed was that your average length of stay across the board for business travelers has actually increased, which is, which, which is great for us, you know, I mean, hotels are always striving to have a longer length of stay for, for, for transient guests. And, I think we can attribute this to bleisure travel, you know, it’s just, there’s just more and more extensions that we see for business travelers who will stay on for the weekend, or business travelers who would normally have their Friday as a work from home day, and then they choose to work from the pool or work from the lobby of the hotel. You know, especially when you’re operating a lot of lifestyle or boutique properties that have a natural attraction to the leisure traveler. I can see how that, how that really attracts business travelers, you know, to just extend a bit. So, so that, that’s one observation. Another one is that targeting business travelers. I think already for last year and the year before when we saw the first signs of BT coming back a little bit, the approach of our sales teams is still a lot more localized rather than centralized, you know, because a lot of the big global accounts that might still have restrictions in place, they’re a little bit more relaxed on a local level with allowing travel and a lot of small to medium sized companies as well, you know, have shown to be more flexible already at the onset of business travel coming back. So I can still see a much bigger focus on those small to medium sized accounts ever than as compared to before. Unfortunately, the, the tech industry has been, has been hit a little bit recently, as we all read in the press, right? That naturally has some impact on travel as well. But I, I see that as more an isolated industry. We we’re seeing a lot of increased travel in all other industries, and also in talking to our partners, you know, who have a lot of interesting data, you know, like the Expedia of this world, we’ve learned from them that travel budgets have actually been increased across the board. And I think it was 70 something percent of all respondents that were asked were actually expected by their employer to travel the same amount or more than in 2019, you know? So having news like that is obviously very encouraging, you know, and especially for a company like us that has mostly urban properties, you know, that’s obviously our bread and butter, you know, so we want to make sure that we nurture this, this segment as much as we can. You know, now that that business travel has come back.
Ryan Embree:
I’m sure you got a lot of listeners got their ears perked up with that, that stat that you’re sharing there and, and you make a couple really great observations. You know, one, even you mentioned at the beginning, looking in your own backyard for, for that, that business or group travel, because guess what, even though their headquarters are here, that doesn’t mean all of their employees are here, right? As, and that is becoming more and more common with this work from home. So just because a, a company is in your backyard does not mean that they do not need that space to meet or bring in their employees. So maybe those director or sales that are listening to this, it’s a good time to start calling on those and asking what that work environment looks like for them if they’re bringing anybody in. And the second point you make is that extended stay for business travel and that bleisure travel, and you are right on. And for those that are listening to this again, and sales and marketing, well, Ryan, listen, we’re getting some leisure travel, but we cater mostly to business travel. Well guess what? We also have to put in our marketing strategy, specifically social, maybe online reputation. We have to cater to those leisure travel because those business people might be bringing, their families might be bringing their kids. So those amenities that you have at your property, you know, of course we wanna show conference center, the business center, talk about the wifi that caters to that business travel, but we also want to mix in that marketing strategy, that social strategy, some of the amenities that might cater to that leisure side of things, because who knows that business traveler could be bringing their family for that little extended leisure trip as we talked about.
Patrick Pahlke :
Absolutely. And then you also asked about group. Sorry, I haven’t, I haven’t answered the second part of your question yet. So for groups, I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s been a similar ramp. It came back a little bit before business travel already. I found that, you know, earlier at, at the end of 21, but mostly small to medium sized events at first. But now we can also see larger conferences finally coming back. I would say, some cities have brought back a lot of their bigger city-wide events because they have done a very good job of closely tying, you know, safety of the city, how do I promote that and infrastructure and all of that together. And that obviously helps hotels immensely to have citywide events back, right? And then for other cities, it hasn’t been a little bit more challenging, you know, where security and, and safety is still an issue. You know, that’s something that larger conference organizers are always sort of little bit more scared about. So it’s, it’s not the same in every market, I’m trying to say with the big city wides. But good news to share is, we actually just got some stats earlier this week from our BI team and, we have actually seen the number of group inquiries and confirmed group revenue surpass 2019 for this year, year to date. So that’s very encouraging to see.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. We, and we love to hear that. Like I said, you know, I’ve said on this podcast before we, we did this podcast through the pandemic and we had to dig for that good news, and now it seems like we’re seeing more and more of these stats kind of pop up. So absolutely love to hear that. And, and you’re right. You know, we always talk about revenge travel, that’s kind of been the hot subject, but I would almost coin the term, you know, revenge events, these local cities and economies, they want these events back, in their area, the, the local businesses, the hotels, they want these events back and people are willing to travel to them. They’ve been missing out on these annual events that, that maybe disappeared over the last couple years as they start to roll back in. Huge, huge marketing opportunity to really lean into that and provide your, your travelers with the right channels to book directly with you so you’re not paying those commissions. So, we’ll stay in the news a little bit. I’ve recently seen, and this has kind of been a trend, a little bit of backlash with one of the industry’s biggest disruptors, Airbnb, you know, there was certainly a bunch of articles written on expensive fees, safety issues. There’s been a lot of, jokes about, you know, what hosts are requiring guests to do before checkout, which has kind of become a punchline. And more and more people are kind of appreciating, they’re coming back and, and appreciating what hotels have to offer because they’re not running into any of those issues. So how do you feel like our industry can really capitalize and, and continue on this growing trend and sentiment out there from travelers?
Patrick Pahlke :
Honestly, I think we just need to keep on doing what we’ve, what we have done for a long time, provide excellent service, provide really good amenities and most, mostly the great guest experiences, you know, which a, make our guests feel comfortable being in a hotel environment, and also inspire them at the same time. These are things, you know, again, I’m speaking from a lifestyle lens, you know, where our properties have great activations and things happening, you know, that again, we wanna inspire our guests, we want them to learn something while they’re staying with us, you know, so that’s kind of something that’s, I would say still pretty unique to staying in a, in a hotel. Yeah and then with a hotel, you can also look at the website, social media, et cetera, and, and you know exactly what you can expect when you book, right? You know that there will be housekeeping services, you know, that you will have staff to help you throughout this stay and, and so forth. You know, I think more and more guests are really realizing that part of the fun of travel is having access to those amenities and services. So for example, again, back to our independent properties, we have gear for borrow programs, you know, that help guests experience the destination. Like at Pierside in Santa Monica, which we just recently opened, the board shop offers surfboards and other things that are perfect for guests in a beach destination. Then here at Catbird in Denver, we have a playroom that offers similar items, but also things like small appliances that long-term guests might want to utilize, you know, for their, for their room to feel a little bit more like home and then great food and beverage offerings as well within the same space, right? I mean, the evolvement of the hotel restaurant is not what it was 20 years ago, right? 20 years ago, nobody wanted to go to a hotel restaurant. Right? Now, hotels are partnering up with really cool f and b partners to sort of elevate the experience. And in many, many cities now that you visit, the coolest restaurants are part of lifestyle hotels, you know, so that’s just something that you don’t have when you’re staying in a house. And then for others who seek more privacy and homey feel, they might still stick to staying at Airbnbs or Saunders or other providers. I honestly strongly feel that there’s enough room in the industry for both models to coexist.
Ryan Embree:
And what you said, I mean, obviously Airbnb and Saunder and all of those other companies really have embraced that technology that we talked about earlier, but it’s that customer service that we talked about at the very end, that customer touch, you mentioned it before Patrick, you guys have kiosks, but you also have people, real people there in case for any assistance. And that’s something that just Airbnb, you know, you have a chat and everything like that, and you can communicate with your hosts, but there’s that missing piece there. And, and I love what you said about setting expectations. We talk about it all the time. I’m sure my listeners are very tired of me hearing it. The better you can do at setting your expectations, those things that make your hotel experience unique, the more comfortable your guests are going to feel when they come on property. And actually getting involved in that whole experience. You know, there’s a reason that you’ve put those bikes in place, as you said, out in Santa Monica. It’s, you want your guests to experience the entirety of the experience, right? Not just a room and four walls. So the more that you can kind of market that property online and what the experience you’re selling, I think the better advantage that you’re gonna have over those Airbnbs and just that house or room that you’re sharing with someone else there. So let’s switch gears a little bit. I wanna talk about, Sage Hospitality and, and you know, one of the things that none of the TMG Trailblazers that we had on this have been stranger to has been the, the shortage in staffing that the industry has battled these past couple years. You know, a as I was doing, you know, I was looking through Sage Hospitality, I kept seeing and hearing this phrase of enriching lives, one experience at the time. Speak a little bit more about what that means to you, Patrick, and the importance of culture at Sage Hospitality Group.
Patrick Pahlke :
You’re mentioning our, our mission there, and it’s really, it’s really something that is at the center of everything for us at Sage, because our mission is our why, right? Enriching lives one experience at a time. Every business decision that we make is really made through that lens of our why. When we talk about that, we don’t mean just our guests obviously. It’s very important to Sage and our leaders that this concept starts with enriching the lives of our associates. That really comes first, right? When your associates are happy and they feel well taken care of and considered, we know that this translates into our associates taking care of our guests and enriching their lives. So when you, when you boil it down, our product is the guest experience, right? And so much of that experience is fundamentally built upon the interactions that guests have with our associates. Again, happy associates mean happy guests, and ultimately positive business outcomes. The media is also rife with stories right now about, you know, the great resignation and quiet quitting and the through line, you know, in all these stories that we see is when employees don’t feel supported and when they don’t feel engaged, they leave or stop caring about what they do. And I think that understandably hurts the business, right? People need to feel that their job is meaningful and that it contributes to the greater mission of the company. Again, this is a finding that I find, you know, we often said that is specific to, gen Z, right? Whatever you do needs to be meaningful. You need to understand why am I doing something and not just follow, but I think it goes way beyond just Gen Z. It’s just in general, anyone who works in any job, you know, I think should know how meaningful that job is and how it contributes to the greater mission of the company. Also, I recently read an article and in Harvard Business Journal that was about employees rather than customers or shareholders are the most important stakeholders in your organization, right? They are, after all where the work actually happens. Yeah. And that just requires that every employee is seen as a, as a full human being and not just a cog in the machine, right? I mean, Richard Branson made that statement a long time ago as well, that at his company, at at Virgin, it’s not the guest who comes first. It must always be the employee for exactly the same reason.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And it’s gonna be those groups that really have a strong culture and strong mission of, of who they are and, and their why, like you’re talking about Patrick, that are gonna be able to keep those happy hospitality associates, which we know play such an important role in the guest experience. So, you know, really, really excited to hear kind of about the things that you’re doing over there at Sage Hospitality when it comes to recruitment and using and, and leveraging that, that culture there. So, as you know, this is a, a digital marketing podcast at Travel Media Group. We help hotels with their online reputation through review response and social media presence. I know your role as Chief Commercial Officer has some overlap in the social media and PR space. So how do you feel like social strategy has changed and evolved over hotels for the past couple of years? And what, what advice would you share to some of our listeners today?
Patrick Pahlke :
Yeah, absolutely. I would say, if, if we just go couple of years back, you know, social media used to be seen as a secondary or even a tertiary source of information for travelers as it would research a stay, you know, even when it was a primary resource. Most hotel companies have still seen it as a secondary or tertiary. So, you know, as, as with many other technologies, it always takes a few years for our industry to wake up. You know, CRM is another area that I’m passionate about where I think we were a couple of decades behind the curve, but back to social media, younger generations, I mean, use social media as a primary search engine as well now, right? So the stats say that nearly half of Gen Z uses Instagram and TikTok to search instead of Google, right? We have to acknowledge this, right? So being visible and, and having great content, you know, and, and again, giving a a good reflection of what the experience there is like, is so vitally important for our properties, you know, and, and having a strong social media presence and being very discoverable is, is just super essential. At Sage, we went from, in the old days, purely using it as a, as a brand building and awareness tool. It’s become an important distribution channel. Now that drives revenues, you know, way beyond just building awareness. And, yeah. One of the first teams that I implemented when I came on board was to make sure that we have a strong social media support team here on a corporate level that, you know, helps to educate our properties, how to drive better content, reposting, you know, who should be in charge of creating content, how to manage agencies better, you know, and directors of sales and marketing nowadays, right? Most of them, they come from a sales background and we encourage them to be open and to learn about all these new channels. And social media is a, is a very important one, right? So having the resources to train our property teams to better leverage that channel is super important.
Ryan Embree:
Well, and it, it’s certainly a new skill. Social media, things change at a lightning fast pace. I do consultations with them and they’ll be, we’ll talk about social media and the first thing they show is their Facebook that they just created. And I said, this is a great first start, but we gotta talk about Instagram, right? LinkedIn, how are you getting driving your group business? Why isn’t your hotel on LinkedIn? You know, TikTok now is huge. So it’s, it’s more than just Facebook out there if you’re listening to this, right? Obviously Facebook very, very important. It’s still is, but there are so many more eyes and so many different places. And the best part about social media is it’s free to be on there, but you have to be consistent when you’re posting. You have to have a strategy in place, because that’s the mistake that we run into a lot with our hoteliers, is it’s very exciting off the off the jump to create that account. But you’ve gotta stay posting, you’ve gotta have a content strategy ready to go there. So let’s talk about Sage Hospitality Group in the news recently. So, 18 Sage Hotels, were on the 2023 Best Hotel rankings list recognized by US News and World’s Report. Congratulations to you and your team. Patrick, tell us a little bit about what that accomplishment means.
Patrick Pahlke :
Thank you. I would say first and foremost, when we receive awards like this, they’re always a reflection of the, extraordinary work that is being done by our colleagues at the properties obviously. Without the work that they do to drive guest satisfaction and great ex guest experiences, these awards wouldn’t happen. And we’re of course super thrilled, you know, when, when one hotel wins an award, but to have so many properties included says to us as well that we must be doing something right, you know, and, and it says to us that people are taking notice of, of the way that we’re operating our hotels differently and, and creating meaningful experiences to our guests. And, and it’s the same, you know, for, for a lot of other awards, you know, the recent Travel and Leisure and Conde Nast Awards, you know, we’ve seen more more properties included than than ever before, you know, so it just, it shows us the trend where we’re trying to bring Sage as more of a lifestyle operator. It’s working.
Ryan Embree:
That’s great to hear Pat, and I’ll, I’ll do the padding on your back for you then, cause that’s, that’s a really great accomplishment. And maybe next time we have you on the podcast, well hopefully we’re talking about some more hotels on that list. So speaking of kind of Sage Hospitality in the future, you know, this is the TMG Hospitality Trailblazer series, right? We’re talking about industry experts and groups that are pushing us toward the future. So I’d like to leave this last question of just, you know, what, what would you say is next for Sage Hospitality as we look to the future? What would you like to see the portfolio accomplish in 2023 and beyond?
Patrick Pahlke :
Yeah, as I, as I just mentioned already, our key focus is really a very strong growth in the lifestyle segment. And that just doesn’t only mean for our independent properties, right? Our, our 60 properties are our subdivided into our independent collection, which will, soon hit 20 hotels, and then we have our branded hotels as well. But really talking about lifestyle that could be independent, it could be limited service, it could be hard branded, it could be soft branded. It’s really, for us, a focused growth versus an opportunistic growth at any cost. You know, a lot of hotel management companies, they just sign up whatever they can right to rake in the management fees, you know, and that is not the approach that Sage is taking. You know, we are a privately owned company and we will remain private so that we can sustain a focused growth. And again, we’re saying when a lot of the other management companies are trying to be everything for everyone, we’re really gonna zoom in only on, on the lifestyle space. And ultimately Sage, we want Sage to become the nation’s preferred lifestyle hospitality management company. And we’ve really built our operations and commercial teams accordingly over the last two years, you know, with experts that come exactly from this area of hospitality, from the lifestyle space.
Ryan Embree:
We’ll definitely have to keep a close eye on, on you, Patrick, your team and, and everybody over there at Sage Hospitality Group. So, you know, we covered a lot on today’s episode. Any final thoughts?
Patrick Pahlke :
No, I have to say I really enjoyed spending time with you and, hope that I could contribute something meaningful to your listeners. We need more of these conversations as well to share best practices throughout our industry, I believe. So what you’re doing is great and yeah, I hope that my, my German accent was not too distracting. I know that I sound like a bad guy in a Bond movie, so.
Ryan Embree:
I love that, Patrick. And, you know, thank you for joining me on this series. You know, this was, this was really exciting. And you know, obviously for any further information about Sage Hospitality Group and all the exciting things you’re doing for our listeners, obviously best place to find you is on, on probably your website and LinkedIn, right, Patrick?
Patrick Pahlke :
Absolutely, absolutely.
Ryan Embree:
Alright. Well, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot. We, we certainly will have to have you back. And thank you everyone for listening today. We will talk to you next time on The Suite Spot to join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
This episode features the one and only President of Atrium Hospitality, Rob Mangiarelli, as he sits down and talks with Suite Spot host, Ryan Embree on all things hospitality. These two experts share incredible knowledge and insights on various topics that give hoteliers valuable information on how to make their mark in the industry.
If you’ve been following the series thus far, you should know that these industry leaders provide listeners with knowledge and insights you can only get on the Suite Spot podcast.
Suite Spot Podcast · 110 – Hospitality Trailblazers: Rob MangiarelliEpisode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check-out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for joining me. I am coming to you again from the Content Creation Studio here at Travel Media Group Headquarters, and we are continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. We are very excited, about our next guest who I’ll introduce just in a second, but for those that might be listening to this for the first time, this series we started back at the end of 2022. It is all about the people and groups in our industry that are pushing us forward. We know over the past couple years, and we’ll even get into it with our guests, how much our industry has changed and what to look forward to towards the future in those trailblazers that are pushing us there. So with that being said, I am very excited to bring in a first time guest to the Suite Spot, Rob Mangiarelli, President at Atrium Hospitality. Rob, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Rob Mangiarelli :
Ryan, thanks for having me. It’s great to be on with you.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. We’re gonna have a little bit of fun today talking about, Atrium Hospitality. We’ll talk a little bit about the industry, get some predictions out of you. We won’t hold you to them, but as I like to do with all of our first timers on the Suite Spot, we work in an industry where people really can come from all places, degrees, backgrounds and end up to where they are. So I love starting with this, especially in this Trailblazer series. Tell us a little bit about your background and the journey that led you to Atrium Hospitality.
Rob Mangiarelli :
Yeah, this is a great question and it’s something I talk about, every week when I’m traveling and I’m talking to our teams. I fell into this industry, by accident like a lot of people who have come into it. I never thought that you could have a career in the hotel business. I was an economics major at Stanford and my goal coming out of college was either to go to law school or to become a math teacher. And I didn’t wanna work in a big city. And I went back home to Colorado Springs where I grew up and while I was trying to figure out what I was going to do, I started working night audit at a Holiday Inn and I was working night audit because I loved playing golf in the morning after I got off work. And I thought, how cool I’ll do this. And, you know, every morning the general manager would come down and he’d read the PNL cause I do the daily report overnight. He’d ask how business was, and we started talking about this as a business and I thought, wow, this is pretty cool. And six months after that I got promoted and six months after that I got promoted again. And then I started, I saw this job opportunity for Hyatt Hotels pop up, up in Denver. I drove up there and I had six interviews in back to back to back. They just said, wait here, let me talk to somebody else. And, they offered me the job and, you know, 25 years with Hyatt Hotels. And I moved around a lot, in the first few years I was in Denver, in Atlanta, in Charlotte and Greenwich. And then ended up at the corporate office in Chicago, where I spent 21 years in various roles. I built our planning and analysis function. I ran hotel accounting for North America. There was a scary six month period of time where I was in charge of IT. While we were hiring a chief technology officer, I worked in our global operations center where I really got to travel the world. And then I finished up my career leading our asset management function where I was responsible for all of the owned and joint venture properties that we had around the world. And then I hit 50 and like most people, right, instead of buying a Corvette, I thought this was a good opportunity to reevaluate my life and what I wanted to do for the last 10 years, 12 years, whatever, many years of my career there are left. And I thought, you know, I’ve spent so much time at Hyatt, but what I really wanna do is get on the operation side of things. So I, I left Hyatt to work, with a partner of ours who owned and managed hotels based in Rhode Island and great experience. But six months into that gig, an old friend of mine gave me a call and Craig Mason’s president of Atrium Holdings, and I’ve known Craig since the early 2000’s when I was at Hyatt and he was at Host Hotels and he said, look, we have this great opportunity, fantastic team and a great portfolio, 80 hotels around the country, and we’d love for you to come join us as the chief operating officer. Ultimately, you know, there’s growth potential into the president’s role. So I came in, Greg convinced me to come in last February, and by May he had moved me into the president’s position. So been a lot of moves and we’re now based in Atlanta. My wife and I moved down here in September. It’s been a wild ride, but great to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You know, and as I listen to that story and I get my hospitality bingo card out, wasn’t meant to be in the hospitality industry, right? We always hear that. What I haven’t heard though is night audit, right? I hear front desk agent, bellman all the time, but starting your career as a night auditor that’s unique. That probably puts you, in that small percentage there but’s so cool that you got to experience that because that’s obviously a position that some people, GMs and other people in leadership maybe not have to get those exposure. So I’m sure that was very eye opening to you, the industry and lead you to where you are today.
Rob Mangiarelli :
Yeah, absolutely. I think that having that perspective of working on property is super helpful when you come to a corporate office because you understand it. But for me, what really helped was, this was back in the old days when night auditors actually did night audit, you really did get to understand the business and how everything flows from the PMS all the way to the PNL, which went on to help me for years when I was doing hotel accounting or planning and analysis.
Ryan Embree:
On that subject of maybe going into some roles that you’re not necessarily used to. Our industry had to do a lot of that over the past couple years, right? Some of GMs and operations people may be taking some of those roles that they hadn’t done in, in a decade or, or years or ever before. so I wanna kind of start there with our episode before we move too much into the present and the future. Let’s talk about the past couple years. Obviously very, very tough on the hotel industry, still having some, residual effects with obviously staffing ADR seem to be getting back to, to where we want them. But let’s talk about maybe the lessons that the industry as a whole learned and then maybe Rob, how you’ve applied some of those lessons to your own portfolio.
Rob Mangiarelli :
Yeah, no, that’s a fantastic question. I think, you know, first and foremost we’re reminded of the value of having great leadership on property and how important it is to have a general manager who can get down and do work, who can communicate properly and who can keep things running. And the way our teams responded during the pandemic was incredible. The work that they did was really amazing. I think that’s the first lesson and one that, I try to remind myself of, every day. Second, having, you know, written a million proformas in my life, we really learned what zero-based budgeting really looks like. And the way we were able to operate was completely unlike anything we anticipated. I never thought you could have that few people in a hotel and still be successful. And we figured it out. Third, we learned agility. We learned that we were bad at projecting the future. How long was this downturn gonna last? How deep was it going to get? And then how quickly was it going to rebound? And at every turn, I’d say we got it wrong as an industry of what was going to happen, but as operators, we had to learn how to react to that. We had to learn how we were going to respond to what’s right in front of us. How are we gonna turn 200 rooms on a Sunday and make that work with two housekeepers? And that was a really great learning for us. But, you know, finally, and I’ll quote my, my former boss at Hyatt, who was actually quoting Winston Churchill, who’s probably a little more famous than Chuck Floyd but he always used to to say, don’t let a good crisis go to waste. And I think that’s what we learned. That’s what we took from this pandemic. As horrible as it was, it allowed us to make changes that we probably never would’ve been able to make or would’ve taken us forever to make. How do we centralize roles and pull positions above property that, you know, managers thought I need to have my finance person on property, I need my HR person on property, I need my salesperson on property. And the pandemic taught us that you don’t, and we can be more efficient as an organization if we take those above property. And we also learned the value of technology. How do we use technology not only to communicate with our team members, our associates, but also to communicate with our guests in a way that simply makes us more efficient? And I, I think those are the types of things that we were forced to learn during the pandemic, but you know, we’ll never go back to.
Ryan Embree:
Oh, 100%. And you know, the, the way that you said, how we talked to our guests, one of the things obviously at Travel Media Group that, that we work with is social media. And when that pandemic happened and these changes were happening so quickly, the outlets that hoteliers turn to was social media saying, I need a quick way to let everyone know what’s going on in my market at my hotel and what the situation is. And some hotels that really didn’t embrace that technology, social media at that time, they were kind of left there going, realizing I don’t have those outlets. And you know, in an industry that I would argue really it takes some time for change to happen. I mean, some hotels are still putting the breakfast card outside of the doors and manually putting your dry cleaning out there as well. You’re right Rob. Like we had to make those pivots very, very quickly. And you know, one of the places that you mentioned was technology, a lot of adoption of keyless entry, mobile check-in, which is great obviously, but also some present, some problems I would say for a GM that might be used to having those face-to-face conversations every day, greeting the guests and saying, hey, how was your stay? You might not be able to get that same feedback that you once did. So as we talk about technology, Rob, how do you feel like there’s a balance between implementing technology into the guest experience and that service that really is at the core of foundation of hospitality?
Rob Mangiarelli :
it’s a interesting balance, that we need to face. And you mentioned mobile key and remote check-in. And I, I think there’s a balance there of people who want to do that. They want to use that technology. And frankly, we should be embracing that because for those customers, great, they can now go straight to their room. That actually frees up time for us to take care of the customers that don’t want to use that technology. That’s probably one of the things that we need to remember, that we can’t force our technology on the customer. We need to use that as an enabler. The other thing we need to realize from technology is, you know, well we’re not necessarily cutting edge and we don’t wanna be, and we can’t afford to be, we do need to have basic technology that our customers get at home. So I think about wifi and having great wifi. I think today is more important than having hot water and a good bed. And it’s a basic expectation that your customers really want you to have. And the other thing we’re using technology to communicate with our customers. So we use a technology at Atrium for a lot of our hotels. That’s a AI bot where a guest can call down or text and you know, the computer will pick it up and it’ll take all of their keywords and their questions and it’ll respond to it even faster than a guest or a, an agent at the desk would be able to. And we’ve found that our AI bot can handle 60% of the guest requests without human intervention. I need more towels, I need a late checkout. All of those things that take work off of our plate, but make life easier for our customers. That’s where technology’s an enabler to provide that better service. Not a replacement, but something that really just allows that experience to be a little bit better for our customers.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and it’s certainly in line with the expectations, like you said, because most of our guests now are feeling more comfortable behind this phone screen than they might be coming to the front desk just to have a normal conversation with someone, which is so hard to think, you know, maybe a decade ago. But as hoteliers, we have to pivot. We have to be have open lines of communication. So that’s absolutely correct there. Now, I wanna shift gears and talk about guest expectations a little bit. And before we sat down for this interview, I listened to a few others you gave, and you had this great example of visiting Shanghai. And I’m not sure if you remember this one where you said there were two employees that were hired just to push the elevator button. But your point was that was the expectation where you were visiting. We speak a lot on this series about guest expectations cause they’ve changed, no matter what we say they’ve changed and they’re higher than ever, right? Nobody’s gonna come back down and expect less clean rooms than what we’re providing right now. The pandemic had shifted that. So how do you feel guest expectations have changed over the past couple years and how do you implement things to, to not only meet them but hopefully exceed them?
Rob Mangiarelli :
Great question. And I remember my first visit there and I was just shocked. I was blown away by the level of service and I hadn’t traveled a lot internationally, so it was a great experience for me and one that I miss. But to your question on expectations, what I think is happening is that that expectation gap is widening and it’s, it’s one of the problems that we have today. You have some customers, to your point on your phone who simply wanna be left alone, mobile check in, knock and drop room service, don’t clean my room. And then you have other customers who are craving service. They don’t get it with the airlines, they don’t get it in their restaurants anymore. They don’t know where to have that experience of somebody taking care of them. And they want that when they come to your hotel. And as hoteliers, it’s our job to understand what bucket you fall in. So the simple answer is be friendly. Even people who wanna be left alone want you to smile at them. But second, we need to find a way to say yes more. One of my coworkers loves to say, covid taught us a hundred ways to say no to the customer. Alright, no, we can’t clean your room. No, you can’t check in early. I mean, heck, we built physical barriers between us and them. You know, now we just need to come back, right? How do we say yes more and figure out, okay, here’s what you’re asking, now how are we going to deliver it? But to your point, how do we meet it and then exceed it? I think first we need to understand what those expectations are. And that’s really all comes down to communication. Asking our customers what they want, understanding what it is that we can do, and then finding a way to deliver on it.
Ryan Embree:
And one of the best places to look for that is online feedback that guests are leaving us, right? You know, review sites across the board. I say it all the time on this podcast, our guests are leaving us blueprints of how to make the perfect stay every single day. And if we listen and we implement some changes here and there can really refine that, that guest experience there. so I, I completely understand it and agree with you there, Rob. Not to go hone back on the, you know, we got everything wrong during the pandemic, but I am gonna ask you here for a prediction. Okay. And, and it’s just a, a trend, you know, I’m very curious about this cause this is the segment that’s been lagging behind. We’ve been missing business, we’ve been missing the group travel, starting to come back a little bit more, but it’s really been led by leisure at the end of the day, where do you see business travel going into 2023? A lot of economic uncertainty, a lot of dark storm clouds, maybe. Where do you see that headed? And then I guess the second part of my question is, is Atrium hospitality targeting these travelers differently? Because, you know, we’ve heard the hot terms of bleisure travel and everyone’s working from home, so they’re gonna change the ways that they travel. So are you targeting those travelers differently?
Rob Mangiarelli :
Yeah, a lot to unpack there and I’ll preface it by saying we’ve, demonstrated our inability to forecast but what I, what I would say, let’s start with group, cause you mentioned group. We’re a very group heavy company. The makeup of our hotels. So we have 81 hotels and 20,000 guest rooms. But in addition to those 20,000 guest rooms, we have 3 million square feet of meeting space that we support. So we do a lot of group business and we expect group to be back to pre pandemic levels this year. Now it’s a different kind of group. It’s a lot more smurf. So you’re getting the sports teams, you’re getting the dance groups. So I was in a hotel last week and they said, you know, we’ve figured out a hundred different ways to pick up glitter out of our carpet because of the customer. And we don’t have those corporate customers in that association business that we necessarily had pre pandemic. I think they’re coming back. Now, I think what’ll happen is the major markets will see them first. So if you’re an association, if you’re a state association group and you are in Illinois, I’ll take my old hometown, you weren’t able to afford to go to Chicago pre pandemic because the corporate and the pharma and all of that priced you out. Well right now you can afford to do that. So they’re going to those markets. When the prices start increasing there, then it’ll start pushing down to those secondary and tertiary markets. And that’s when I expect to see that group business come back to us. On the corporate travel side, I don’t know that we will ever see that fully recover. I don’t know that Tuesday and Wednesday will become those peak nights. I think Friday and Saturday have turned into the Tuesday Wednesday of pre pandemic. You know, when we talk about bleisure, you ask, you know, how do we think about it? Well, the beautiful thing about our business, we’re the largest, owners of Embassy Suites in the world. And that brand in particular, I think is so well suited to that business leisure component. I have two rooms. The kids can be sleeping in one room while I’m on my laptop, doing a podcast in the other or on a Zoom call with my team. Or I can send them down to breakfast and do work in the room. And that’s going to allow us to kind of get those shoulder nights when you’re, when you’re there with your kids, you know, soccer team, I can add on an extra day and get a little bit of work done. So it’s going to be different. We need to think about it differently. I think I was listening to one of the podcasts that, you did recently and the person you had on said, it was camouflage business travel. And I thought that was a brilliant way of, of saying that because you don’t necessarily see that booking coming in through your negotiated account. So you don’t quite understand who that customer is. And we just need to be more mindful of that, that OTA customer who’s coming in or that person who’s coming in for the weekend is also coming in to work and we need to target them that way in our marketing efforts.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I I love that term as well. And yeah, I mean, we’re gonna see different travelers come to our properties in different ways and we have to be open to reaching out to them differently. I love what you said about, you’re right, maybe that association wouldn’t be able to afford Chicago. Now they’re taking a closer look at that. But that’s something on the hotel that they also need to be open to those conversations as well. LinkedIn, great place for those, B2B and connecting with those associations, because the business is out there. It’s coming back slower than leisure, but it’s out there. But you’re right, whenever you book, you usually have that business or leisure button there. There definitely needs to be some sort of combo and hybrid because that’s where I see the majority of these bookings coming from. So over the course of this series, which I love, you know, we’ve been able to kind of integrate some hotel brands, some small management companies, some large management companies like Atrium, which is a well-known name throughout the industry. You guys, as you were mentioning, a dozen brands over 80 properties in almost 30 different states. You just got done visiting one of those states. I’m curious, with such an impressive sprawling portfolio throughout the country, consistency is key in this, right? And I I’m sure you would agree. How do you guys ensure service consistency across a portfolio that big?
Rob Mangiarelli :
That’s a real challenge. It’s something that we talk about every week and what we’ve talked about this year more than ever, is our virtuous circle of business. And it starts with our people. And how do we minimize turnover so that we can improve our service levels? Cause we know if we have good people in place, they provide good service and then that good service just translates into revenue and profit, more opportunities for that growth. So, you know, I’d say as we think about consistency, it really starts with those staffing levels. Now, last year, turnover was at an all-time high. Contract labor was at an all-time high. It’s getting better slowly, but those are gonna continue to be problems for us. And we’re gonna have to learn not to wait for those to fix themselves, but to manage around them. You know, that is all about training and for us, putting a regional structure in place. So last year we built up a regional structure that has an ops person, an HR person, finance, sales, revenue, facilities to support 15 or 20 hotels because we’re gonna see that turnover on property. And the only way we can maintain that consistent service is to have an oversight function to be able to support that. Now the brands have not helped us in this effort. As we’ve come out of the pandemic, they were great partners to us as owners in terms of brand standards and what to expect. But right now, each of the brands has different expectations out there. Am I gonna clean every day? Is it gonna be a full clean or a tidy? Is it different between a full service hotel and a select service hotel, and the customer is confused. So that puts the onus back on us to be able to tell the customer what they should expect when they’re staying with us. And if we can tell them that, then we can provide that consistent service for them. So it’s an ongoing challenge.
Ryan Embree:
And it muddies the water of those expectations that these guests are having. You know, even traveling, you think about during the pandemic it was different from state to state. Now we’re talking about different from brand to brand. So it’s very difficult. So one of the most powerful things that we’ve talked about, we do review response for hotels and, and I’ve mentioned this before on some of the webinars and virtual events that we’ve provided for hoteliers, the number one reason that we’re seeing negative and responding to these negative reviews is due to proper expectations not being set. It’s not, it, it’s not that they didn’t, didn’t have a good experience. It’s, Hey, I came into the property and I was expecting a hot breakfast, and they still have grab and go and where does that blame kind of sit on the hotel versus the guest of, you should know this, or we should be putting this out there via social media, review response on your online so that they understand this when they come on the property, what exactly they’re getting. So I absolutely agree with you Rob. These expectations are continuing to change, but it’s gonna be the hotels that really have a strong online presence and can set those expectations prior to a guest arrival that are, that are gonna see success. And one of the things you mentioned was the staffing shortage obviously impacting our entire industry. The management companies that are gonna do the best are the ones with a strong culture. I went on Atrium’s website, there’s a lot of talk about the Atrium Spirit, so I wanted to give you the opportunity to kind of talk about what that means and how you’ve been able to use that in the midst of this, you know, really unprecedented staffing shortage that we haven’t seen in decades.
Rob Mangiarelli :
It’s a great question. And what I love talking about, because I think the culture at Atrium really is one of those differentiators in our business. My head of revenue management here, he also was a 20 year, 20 plus year Hyatt employee and he said, you know, I was afraid when I left Hyatt that I’d never find that culture again and I found it here at Atrium and he couldn’t be more right. And when we talk about the Atrium spirit, those are our six core values, spell spirit, service, perseverance, inclusion, respect, innovation and teamwork. And we talk about it in every one of our calls in every one of our meetings. But more than that, we make sure as a leadership team that we are demonstrating those values and all of the actions we take. So I’ll give you a a great example of something that we do that I think is fabulous and terrifying all at the same time. So once a quarter we will have what we call our state of the union call and we’ll invite every employee in the company to dial in and we’ll spend 30 minutes telling them how we’re doing from a business standpoint and what’s going on, and then we’ll open it up for the last 30 minutes and take Q&A. And you’ve been on enough calls that when you open it up for Q&A, you usually get nothing cause nobody wants to speak out. Well, we have an anonymous texting app that anybody can text whatever question they want. We’re not screening it, we’re not curating it, we’re not monitoring it. It pops up on the screen for the world to see and we’re answering. And that level of transparency between our leadership team and our hotels, I think builds that culture that we really want. And when I travel from property to property, people are always just so grateful to talk about our company and how we listen to them and how we’re honest with them, even when we’re telling them things that they don’t, don’t necessarily want to hear. But that’s the difference as we want to build a great team that can provide that level of service, we need to live that from the top.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I’m sure that buys you a lot of buy-in from your employees and trust being that transparent and open because, you know, over the, over the past couple years it, it’s been tough. So to be able to kind of sit behind and say, oh, everything’s fine, everything’s fine. That might not have been the case. And you know, now the staffing conversation is so interesting because, you know, when we were doing this podcast mid 2020, it was all about furloughs and trying to keep the employees and now we’re trying to find them and bring them back. So we’ve done this completely 90 degree turn here, so I’m sure it’s things like that, that transparency just buys you trust and buy-in within your, your associates over there at Atrium Hospitality. Very cool to hear. Now, as you know, Rob, this is a digital marketing podcast at Travel Media Group, and we’re always trying to educate our hoteliers and listeners on a strong social media presence, online reputation, right? If you have those two things online, you’re gonna be in a better chance to, to book a guest than not. Tell us a little bit about how you feel about having a strong online presence, especially today in 2023. We’ve already talked about technology, wifi. How critical is this for a hotel right now?
Rob Mangiarelli :
Oh, it’s, it’s absolutely vital, especially when we talk about the type of customer that’s now booking into our hotel. It’s not that negotiated business where they’re showing up wherever their company happened to, to book them. It’s people doing research and understanding what’s going on on a property and, and where to book. So historically, we would track all of our service scores by looking at the brand averages and how you’re doing relative to the brand metrics. Here at Atrium, we don’t look at that. We look at our online reputation management. So we have an index, we look at our ratings on all of the big guys, Google, Facebook, TripAdvisor, Expedia, Booking, and then we create an index of that versus our peers. So we’ve done a great job as an industry of using Smith Travel to benchmark our revenue performance. Well, we do the same thing by benchmarking our service reviews because we know that when a customer is looking, that’s what they’re using to make their booking decisions. So it’s something that is part of our bonus plans. So every single person who’s bonus eligible in our company is bonused on our online reputation management and how we’re stacking up relative to our competitors because it really is a huge factor in, in the buying decision.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And there’s strong correlation between those two numbers, right? Between the online management index or KPI that you’ve provided for Atrium and those revenue results that you’re seeing at the end of the year. You know, we’re always trying to tie that back here in this podcast. We understand that as our own travel. When, when we sit back and go through Google and try to figure out going on a vacation, a lot of people are looking at spring break destinations right now. Think about the way that you’re, you’re going out there doing that research. It’s not just a one hit, here’s the website. You know, you’re looking at competitors, you’re looking at different review sites, different booking sites, and then you’re trying to get excited for the trip, right? You’re going to their Instagram, you’re seeing what sort of events are in the area, and if you could provide that better than your hotel down the road, it’s gonna put you in the best position to capture that market share. So absolutely agree with you as, as well there, Rob. So let’s talk about Atrium Hospitality in 2023. Just turn to the new year. What do you hope to achieve this year and beyond for your portfolio?
Rob Mangiarelli :
That’s probably the number one question we get in our anonymous text messages when we have our associates every quarter, right? When are we growing, where are we growing, what’s coming next? And the answer I gave then, and I’ll give now is I don’t know, you know, one of the great things about being privately owned is that we’re not forced to make decisions on somebody else’s timetable. So we want to grow. We think that there’s going to be an opportunity to grow. And I think that with this business environment the way it is right now, there’s gonna be opportunities. Things are going to pop up, whether it’s interest rates going one way, whether it’s certain markets moving in the right direction. So we are as a, as a management company, simply making sure that we are prepared for whatever that next step happens to be. And perseverance is one of our core values. And what we talk about is how can we just be a little bit better every day? And that’s what our focus is, is making sure we’re a little better than we were yesterday and making sure that we’re prepared for whatever tomorrow brings us.
Ryan Embree:
All right, well we’ll keep a close eye on Atrium Hospitality and what you guys have shaping up for the future, but certainly is exciting. Love the conversation today, Rob. We covered a lot of ground. Any final thoughts on today’s episode or anything to say to the listeners?
Rob Mangiarelli :
No, you know, Ryan, I wanna thank you for, starting this podcast. I had a chance to listen to a number of them that you’ve done. And what it reminds me is how small our industry is and how we are all going through these same things. And when you hear that there’s other people who are dealing with the same challenges you are, it makes you feel a little bit better and it gives me an opportunity, to listen and learn about what other people are doing and where we can improve. So, you know, I talked about earlier that we learned agility through Covid and I don’t think that was a one time learning. I think our industry’s going to continue to evolve at a, a rapid pace and whoever figures out how to adapt faster i going to win. So it’s an exciting time in our business and I’m just happy to be part of it.
Ryan Embree:
Awesome. Well, I appreciate all the insights and, you got a couple memorable quotes within this podcast as well. You are certainly that embodiment of a TMG trailblazer and like I said, we’re excited to see what your Atrium Hospitality team have on the horizon here in 2023 and beyond. So Rob, thank you for joining the Suite Spot. I guess the best way they can find out about Atrium Hospitality is check out the website, also follow you on LinkedIn.
Rob Mangiarelli :
Absolutely. I’m always looking for, followers and our social media team does a great job of making sure that we have good content post.
Ryan Embree:
Well, it was a pleasure speaking with you. Thank you all for listening and we will talk to you next time on the Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Barry Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Join Suite Spot Host and Marketing Director Ryan Embree as he sits down with TMG Chief Technology Officer, Jason Lee, to discuss the new integration of Instagram Reels into the OneView platform.
This episode details how hoteliers can use the OneView platform to easily create Instagram Reels and upload them directly to their social media sites with just one click for their followers to interact, engage with, and reach new travelers.
Suite Spot Podcast · 109 – TMG Announces Instagram Reels & Video Content Creation For HotelsEpisode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check-out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Okay, hello everyone and welcome to the Suite Spot. My name is Ryan Embree, the host of The Suite Spot. Thank you for joining us today. We’ve got a very special episode. I feel like I say that all the time, but there’s a couple unique things about this episode. One, we are in our brand new content creation studio, AKA the Digital Marketing Den. We spent the last couple months revamping our entire studio, podcast studio for you, the listener, to make sure we had better audio quality for you, but also visuals. So if you were to go to YouTube right now, go to Travel Media Group’s YouTube page, you would actually see and hear us. This is the first time we are doing video. We are so excited. We have a very familiar guest. Jason, this is the first time, if you can believe it, that we’ve been face-to-face doing an episode of the Suite Spot with as many as we’ve done since 2020. It’s crazy. But welcome back to the Suite Spot, audibly and visually.
Jason Lee:
Yeah, this is awesome. It’s, it’s really awesome in here. You guys did a great job.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you so much. But we also have some awesome stuff to talk about. What you have been doing, Jason. So I’m gonna give the floor to you and talk about, you know, an amazing announcement. One of our most popular, episodes was the Instagram reels episode. I think year to date is our most popular episode. There are a lot of hoteliers that are interested in it, but it’s not just Instagram reels. We’re talking about video content today. That’s right. So, let’s jump in. I always love to kind of think, you know, take a couple steps back to get to where we are today. Why did you and your team decide to make this upgrade and, and create video content for hotels?
Jason Lee:
Well, I mean, obviously it’s a must in the toolkit of any hotel marketer, you gonna have to have video and then looking at reels, looking at TikTok. Video content is extremely popular and extremely viral. So the things that are produced are seen, and it’s not just seen by your audience. They’re seen all over the place. So, last July, I think is when Meta made the decision to open up reels into their API. So making it available for developers like us to be able to offer it. And at the time we were really excited and I think it was probably an answer to what was happening on TikTok. They were like, we’re gonna open this up and let it happen, but it, it made it available. So you have reels for Instagram obviously, but then there were also reels on Facebook. And so, making that all kind of come together and that’s why our team did this. And so we had the capability of putting reels out a while ago. So, but we also wanted a way for you to do that. And I think what a lot of marketers have trouble with is what do I put out? How do I create a video? Do I need like an editing studio? You know, what do I need to do to create a video? And we’ve simplified it and we’ve made it a really cool part of our platform where you can just make a video from your media gallery.
Ryan Embree:
You’ve made it so simple. We’re actually gonna create a video for a hotel today on this episode. So as long as it takes us to do this podcast, we’re gonna have a high quality, video for a hotel made, which is so cool to see. Yes. But you’re right. I mean, any hotel you’re listening to this, I would just challenge you to look at your Instagram feed or Facebook feed or whatever social media tool you use. What are you seeing more and more of, those still images? It’s almost like we have the copy version of social media where it was just all text and then all of a sudden we elevated that to image and now we’re going even further and going into video. So a lot of the content that creators are leaning into is this video content. And you’re right, hoteliers sometimes hear that word video content, they get overwhelmed. They don’t know. They think, okay, well maybe I need to go out and hire a whole production crew, right? Cause that’s how we in the hotel industry do our hotel photography. Maybe it’s me grabbing a video and going around the lobby. Those are obviously a couple different ways, but this way that you’ve created is so much more simpler and easier to do with assets, digital assets that hoteliers own already.
Jason Lee:
That’s right. And I think, you know, you’re absolutely right in that, especially Instagram where it was largely a visual medium and it was the place to share your vacation photos. And it still is. But when you see the engagement on video there and in other places, it’s, it’s insane. It’s so much more. And I think it’s because so many more, so many people are expecting it and you stay longer. So once you watch that first video, then you go right into the next video and the next video, the next thing you know, you know, you’re sitting there watching labradoodles all day long.
Ryan Embree:
Down the rabbit hole, right? There was a Super Bowl ad just about that, about how you can get into this. Just to give a couple quick stats on Instagram reels, Instagram, 1.5 billion daily users reels groove to 220 million users between July and October. An insane amount of users in a small amount of time. 62% of Instagram users say they use it to research brands and products. Yes, that’s over Facebook, which takes second place at 55% and it’s the preferred app of 16-24 year olds. And it’s still beating TikTok, but reels are unique because of the explore page and being able to put your hotel’s Instagram reels in an organic place where people can reach you. Talk to our listeners a little bit about what that means.
Jason Lee:
So when you post content, you’re posting it out onto your feed and people that are following you can see that, you know, so that’s that normal kind of thing when it comes to reels, you post that out, it does go to your feed as well. But now you’re in this other place and you’re in a place where people can explore videos. They’re exploring videos from all over the place. And the algorithm that Instagram uses to show you videos is based on your preferences and based on things you’re doing. So you are a hotel, you wanna reach travelers. Travelers are on Instagram wanting videos about travel that then, you know, you make that connection. But what’s cool about that is that when you make that post, it’s not just, it’s not just static staying on your page. Now, this is, actually out there and able to be viewed by a lot of people. And what’s cool about this, and I think what is gonna be the, the continuing trend is that it’s all about time on site. So meta wants to keep people longer cause that’s where they see more ads. So, they’re constantly refining their algorithm to keep people on longer and longer. And it’s all about content that they wanna see. So someone researching travel, in an area that you are at, they’re definitely gonna come across your video.
Ryan Embree:
But you have to be on it. And that, and that is the key to this, right? I mean, I can, we can throw stats back and forth all day about how many users, the ability to do this and that on Instagram, but if you’re not creating these Instagram reels, you lose because you can’t, you’re not gonna have the opportunity to be chosen. So it’s all about taking that first step, whether it’s with a company like Travel Media Group that helps you create this type of content, or going out and doing it on your own. So I feel like this is how we always end our episodes, but just you have to take that first step of being in the the arena. Otherwise you’re never gonna, you’re never gonna be able to catch the attention of a traveler.
Jason Lee:
It’s so true. And I, but I think it’s all about whatever your intention is, you know, and I think this is like the beginning of the year and we probably have like fresh or maybe not so fresh marketing plans that we created maybe October, November of last year. And now we’re trying to get into those and, and depending on the segments we’re trying to reach the ADR goals that we have, all of those things are kind of in flux. And, and you have these, these tools that are at your disposal, but it’s really about how do I get in, how do I start using them? But it’s even further than that. And, that’s how do I create a plan to consistently, you know, create content and consistently keep people, you know, engaged. Because that’s the trick. The trick is I do this one time and I’ll be like, sweet, I got a video out. Looks good. Everybody’s checking it out, right? And then maybe I’ll, maybe I’ll come back to this in the end of summer. When I’m less busy. So there’s a lot of like nuance to this and, but the biggest part of it is that you’re gonna have to consistently create content.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And there’s a reason why our social media content calendar within the TMG platform is, is one of the most heavily used spaces. Is because we’re planning that consistency. We’re always looking ahead as hoteliers, what’s the next occupancy driver in our market? Where do we need occupancy? Where are those gaps that we can fill it? You know, Instagram is also being used as a search engine and tool. Social media, that younger generation that we talked about, that same younger generation that led that recovery and after the pandemic, they are using social media more than they’re using places like Google and Bing, again, if you’re not in that arena, if you don’t have content out there, it’s really doing your hotel a disservice.
Jason Lee:
A hundred percent. I mean, you think about most of the places that your hotel has data, so your brand, if you’re, if you have a brand or your website OTAs, even places like TripAdvisor, and Google, it’s a lot of static information rates and availability your images from hopefully recent, but probably from a while ago. So a lot of static information and I think what travelers are looking for is they’re looking for current information and what’s more current than should be more current than your social media pages.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, absolutely. And I’m sure we’ll talk about how, you know, video content really can fit into every single stage of the traveler’s journey. But, we kind of teased this at the top of the episode. Let’s jump into TMG one view and kind of take a crash course on how to create one of these. And yeah, again, while Jason’s setting that up and we’re getting that pulled up on the screen here, if you wanna visually see what we’re doing in real time, just go to YouTube. You can visit our page and see just how simple it is. But we’re gonna talk to those listeners that are through our audio medium, step by step, what we’re doing so that you don’t feel left out as well.
Jason Lee:
So what we have here is our publishing page. And this is, this is where all of your media lies. So this is where you have all of the images for your property, if you have video, and you can kind of set them up so you can put him into categories, images for inside your room, images for your facility, images for your area. So all those categories kind of exist so you have a way of organizing them and then you can upload as many as you want here and then we have this little create button. Once you click that, it’s gonna take you into our video creation studio. And this is where you have the ability to select a template. And so we have a bunch of different templates and as you can see on here, we have our 1×1. And this is a very standard, video template. So this is the kind of video that you can put on a feed, pretty much on any any site. And then you have the 9×16 and this lends itself more to reels, more to story posts, TikTok. So that’s that type. And you can see here the the little logos that will show you what compatible sites you have that these will go with. So once you select a template, it puts you right into adding media. So as you can see here, our first little part is where you can upload media or you can add from your media gallery. And so maybe on this one we want to talk about our property. So we insert an image of our, from our property and we quickly add some text.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and what Jason’s doing right now is actually adding text over the image. So again, it’s not just a static image that’s sitting there, but actually text that’s coming over the image as it’s playing.
Jason Lee:
That’s right. You also have the ability to select, soundtrack. We have venture travel, happy travel staycation and the weekend, just a bunch of different kinds of fun tracks. And so I’m gonna select Happy Travels and then I hit next, and then I can continue adding. So here I’m gonna add a picture of my room.
Ryan Embree:
And the other great thing that hoteliers can do with this is actually use this content outside of social media, right? Right. Oh yeah. You can use it, you can download it as MP4.MOV And use it in email marketing campaigns, right? Case studies for groups and testimonials. Create these types of videos directly within one view and save them. And you have so many other uses other than just social media. I think sometimes people get caught up and just say, well, you know, I’ve got someone running my social media right now. There’s other uses to create this type of content.
Jason Lee:
Definitely. So I just did check out our king bedroom and now here’s our two bedroom. And now once I click preview, it pushes out into our video engine and it’s gonna come back with this. And so yes, it’s still photography, just like you said, there’s images that are gonna come over the top of that, but as you’re gonna see in a second, it also, the images, there’s also movement inside of the images. So even though it’s actually static, we’re actually changing the focus of where it’s at inside of the image. And you don’t, don’t have to have a 9×16 image in order to make these either. So the system will automatically sort of resize to make sure that it fits inside of the frame without it looking stretched or pixelated. So just that fast we now have a video that we can play and we can show, and like you said, you can download it, you could put it, elsewhere. This is like something if you wanted to have it inside of, you know, your email signature or you wanted a way to show, different aspects of your property. So you can see here, you can add a video description, you can select category and tag and you add the video directly right into Media Gallery.
Ryan Embree:
Talk to us a little bit about how video fits within the Travelers’ Journey, because we’ve kind of talked about this, obviously, you know, a lot of people think social media is just used for inspiration, but you really dive into kind of that post booking, pre-stay and even advocacy post-day. Yeah, so kind of talk to us and, and where this video content might fit in within that.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. It’s like you said, I think inspiration to travel is that first thing we think of is like somebody before they’ve even, they’ve never encountered us and now they’re encountering us for the first time. And I think that there’s definitely a place for that there. But you think about the, the number of people that continue searching post booking and it’s crazy. It’s a crazy number. So they continue to search and it’s taken them a while. In a lot of cases it takes them, could be hundreds of searches or hundreds of touchpoints in a search to get to you. They finally book and then they continue looking. It’s really like almost confirming their purchase. And so as they’re continuing looking, they’re gonna re-encounter you and what what it shows there, you know, and and how they encounter you is really important. And that could also be what they do to share with maybe the people they’re traveling with or, you know, this is further confirmation that the place I’ve chosen is a good place to stay everybody. And so then in stay, I think it continues to be something that could be valuable. So it could be events that I have going on, or it could be other parts of my property that a video describes and explains. So it continues to be something that is valuable to the traveler. And then in post day it continues again. So it could be content that travelers either either give you through the things that they’re posting or you can repurpose that, or it could even be them posting videos that you repost. So these are all these content pieces that, that are full circle, but but it’s not just one thing. This is a place where people find information and confirm value. So don’t just like brush it by the wayside is something that’s like ancillary and I, I see my kids wasting time on it, but I don’t wanna trust it. This is a thing.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and a lot of the content and images that we talked about, we just had Valentine’s Day, right? How many hotelier out there did a whole marketing campaign around Valentine’s packages or stays or romantic getaways that they were trying to promote at the property. Putting those images in this video creator and creating something that you can put out there takes this to the next level. And you’re right, it’s just going to inspire, it’s going to, to help secure those bookings at that stage when they’re in it. It’s gonna help them promote the property even more afterwards. So, you know, there’s really no downside to it. But I think right now is just that trepidation of jumping right into the video content and you’ve made it extremely easy for really anyone to kind of jump in if they want to.
Jason Lee:
Yeah. And let me show you really quick, we just made that video, I just added it to the gallery. So let me show you really quick inserting that video into now inserting it into a post. So you can see that Facebook is already enabled on here. So I could actually make this a Facebook post if I wanted to just without it being on a reel. But if I go ahead and publish to Reels down here, you can see that Instagram automatically lights up, I go into to preview this and now I can actually preview and it’ll show me exactly what it’ll look like on Facebook and Instagram Reels. I can adjust my text here and then I can schedule and publish it and it goes right out.
Ryan Embree:
And that’s how you get into that coveted Explorer Page, right? And then all of a sudden Jason’s hotel right now is in a space where travelers that are interested in actually traveling. You have the opportunity to get in front of those eyes. Absolutely amazing. Like I said, Instagram Reels in talking about it, what’s our most popular episode that we’ve done. So clearly there’s an appetite for it, I think on both sides of the coin, it’s just about getting in and using a tool like TMG OneView and their social media feed to, to help you with this.
Jason Lee:
Yeah, absolutely. And I mean right now we have reels covered and video posting on, and so you can post a regular video. So that 1×1 video that we had on there, you can post that on Facebook, on Instagram, on Twitter, on LinkedIn. So you have all of those to go with the 9×16. You can go Facebook or if you wanna go on reels and very soon we’ll have TikTok as well as that is going to be part of our platform and we’re already kind of in production to make that happen. But I think even further than that, right now, this is available in our self-publishing tool on OneView but we will be offering video content as part of our social content in the months to come. So a lot of exciting things happening, but it’s really all about how do we benefit, how do we, how do we create, you know, relevant information for travelers to help you secure those travelers, help you convert those reservations, help you keep them once they make a reservation, help you discover new travelers.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, the appetite is really out there. I mean we’ve seen even here at Travel Media Group, this is the most inquiries we’ve got about social media for hotels. They’re looking for opportunity to capture more market share. They might have done that hotel marketing strategy that you talked about at the end of the year. And saw social media as a huge opportunity, a huge gap in their marketing strategy. And these are the type of hotels and hotel management groups that we’re currently talking to and rolling out things like this and even talking about in the future, going into TikTok, that’s huge. You know, and that’s how you gain that competitive advantage and capture more market share there. So,very, very cool. Any final thoughts before we wrap up on our first video/audio episode?
Jason Lee:
I guess my final thought would be that this is not something that you should ignore for a lot of us. We have so many things going on in running hotels is extremely challenging, but I think you can’t ignore this. It’s one of these things that is not going away. The future traveler is here. And they’re, they’re already doing this. So if you look generationally, this is already happening. So it’s whether or not you’re going to participate in it or not. And I think if you are listening to this right now, it probably means that you are thinking about doing something and wanting to further gain market share and, have a better market position. Right now, I don’t think there’s an easier way to do that than through social media.
Ryan Embree:
And It’s becoming the expectation with that new age traveler that you’re talking about. It’s new times, it’s exciting times for sure. So Jason, it was great having you back in studio for the first time in the new content creation studio. Thank you all for listening and we’ll talk to you next time on The Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Barry Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Tune in to this insightful episode and join host Ryan Embree as he and Linda give you the 411 on everything OCI Hospitality.
This podcast episode includes amazing information and expertise for hoteliers looking to connect with their travelers, increase bookings, and increase revenue.
Suite Spot Podcast · 108 – Hospitality Trailblazers: Linda SaronEpisode TranscriptOur podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. I mentioned it before in past episodes, but we are getting rolling right along with our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. This is the first time you’re hearing this. This is something we started right at the end of 2022, where we’re interviewing and bringing on the Suite Spot some of those individuals and groups that are pushing our industry forward as we go into 2023. Beyond such an exciting chapter for our industry, I’ve got an amazing guest, another first-timer here with me, Linda Saron, President and COO of OCI Hospitality. Linda, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Linda Saron:
Thanks, Ryan. I appreciate it.
Ryan Embree:
And I hear you are right up the road from our, Travel Media Group headquarters in Tampa. You have some exciting things in the works over there in Tampa?
Linda Saron:
Yeah, we’re so excited. Yesterday we officially closed on a new OCI Hospitality property, the Double Tree, Rocky Point Waterfront. It is a beautiful location and an awesome team, and we’re so excited to welcome them into our portfolio.
Ryan Embree:
Well, that is absolutely exciting news and we’re certainly gonna talk about all the things that you’ve got rollin’ here with OCI Hospitality in 2023, but off to a very, very, hot start. And next time we’ll have to have you in our podcast studio over here. You just right up the road in Tampa. So. Awesome. Well, before we get talking about OCI Hospitality, I wanna talk about your journey. You know, every single guest that I have here on the Suite Spot, we always like to say, you know, what led you to hospitality? Sometimes it’s starting in the industry, sometimes it’s just by fate. So, tell us a little bit about your background. What led you to OCI Hospitality?
Linda Saron:
Absolutely. You know, Ryan, I think for me it was fate. It was meant to be. I started out not to age myself, but I started working in the hospitality industry about 24 years ago. I popped into a hotel thinking, gosh, maybe I could work the front desk and help in housekeeping and do my homework while I was in college. I started working for a small owner operator, a gentleman named John Willie, who still remains close to my heart. He was an engineer by trade and decided to use his money, because he was tired of some of the bureaucracy in General Electric. So he took his money and he bought a hotel and he was truly an engineer. So I joined him and he was the owner and operator. So, I was in college and had a very interesting experience with him. He didn’t necessarily interact with guests the best. After working with him for a little bit, he really gave me the opportunity to take on some of the guest challenges we were experiencing and housekeeping challenges. And before I knew it, he was asking me to pay the real estate taxes and come up with a sales and marketing plan. So I worked with him all through college and had a great experience with John. He actually spoke to me and convinced me that I needed to stay in hospitality. I had intended to go on and pursue law school, and he had created a chart. I’ll never forget, I went into the back office of the hotel and he had created a chart that showed in the state of Iowa, which is where I grew up, what a female attorney would make the first five years, and what my debt was gonna be getting out of college and how that would work out for me. And he even had the president of the brand that we worked for at that time have a personal phone call with me to talk to me about hospitality as a career path. So I think it was fate that I walked into that hotel and got to meet John Willie and I was a great compliment to his strengths and decided to pursue my career in hospitality. So I worked with John all through college and then after college I took on a job in sales with a small Iowa ownership and management group that was independent. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of Heartland Hotels, they no longer exists, but I work with them in sales. And then after a couple of years, took on an opportunity as a general manager for them, and when they decided to get rid of the business or, or move on and retire from the business, I joined a company called the North Central Group and worked with them as a general manager, dual general manager, a regional manager, and worked my way up through for 10 plus years and then moved on to Southwest Hospitality to continue to grow my career as a director of operations. And while I was there, I got a call from a old friend who I had worked with at the North Central Group and he said, hey, we need you at Oliver Companies. We need you at OCI Hospitality. And I said, I’m good thanks. And he said, you know, do me a favor, just come for the interview. So I did and I had the opportunity to learn a little bit about Oliver Companies and OCI Hospitality and what they were about. And I joined them in late 2018. So it’s been a great journey and a great experience. I shifted into my existing role in June of 2019, so not too far ahead of the pandemic coming into the chief officer role. So it’s been an interesting journey, but I wouldn’t change it.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re gonna get back to that in a minute, but what is such a unique story? You know, and that is one thing that is really a common thread. I mean, I even remember starting my career in hospitality, those few individuals that really take the time to kind of show you the industry, especially if you’re new to it, that’s such a cool kind of mentorship that led you to where you are today. And something we’ve heard very common on this podcast, the kind of bouncing around, but I also think that it ends up being the DNA or the makeup of who you are as a hospitality professional, where you bring in traits from other organizations brands, for example, and kind of makes you who you are today. So that’s such a very cool and unique story. But you did bring up the Pandemic, obviously not a place that us hoteliers like to revisit that often, but this honestly is becoming one of my favorite questions on this TMG Hospitality Trailblazer Series is kind of the lessons we’ve learned personally and the industry has learned and how you’ve incorporated that in your case in OCI Hospitality. Everyone has such a unique perspective. Can you kind of walk us through, you know, those lessons that you’ve learned and how you’ve applied it to today?
Linda Saron:
Yeah. You know, my team and I, we’ve talked a lot about, you know, that time and that period and what it was like to go through that. And it was not easy. You know, March of 2000 I was preparing for my first child to graduate from high school and go off to college. And I was sharing with my team how I was nervous that she didn’t have grit. Some of the things that I experienced that helped me have grit growing up and, and through my career path. You know, she just hadn’t experienced that yet. And so, we talked about a lot about that the beginning of the year of 2020. And I think hospitality, you know, we’ve really developed some grit we’ve learned, to be flexible. And I think specifically at OCI Hospitality, we really learned to embrace technology through that period. We had to create new efficiencies. We had to do things different in a way to protect our general manager’s time because they were performing in a very different capacity than they were pre covid. So they were cleaning rooms and checking in guests and, you know, doing some of those more hands on tasks that our hourly associates had previously done in the pandemic. So we were in the process in, our covid year of implementing some new technology platforms. And really we stayed the course Ryan because they were intended to provide some efficiencies and we needed them more than ever during that time. So, we learned a lot about why it’s important to embrace technology and efficiencies and how important it is to be flexible. And I think many of us, we also gained some grit, right? We learned to work harder, work smarter, be tenacious, and really cross-training our positions. And getting back to some of those basics were crucial for us because you may have one team member that, you know, is trying to gain full-time hours, but in order to do that, through that period they were working three different positions to do so. It was definitely a challenging and interesting time and we learned a lot and I think in many ways it made us better.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. And that’s a common trend that I continue to hear. I mean, that experience certainly opened up the opportunity for maybe GMs who haven’t done, you know, some of the tasks that maybe they haven’t done in a decade. Right. You know, we had a whole series in 2021, highlighting those, TMG Hospitality heroes that, you know, went above and beyond during that time cuz it was such a tough time. But now reflecting back on that, like you said, it could have opened up some efficiencies there, certainly some opportunities. But I wanna really lean into technology element that you brought in because I think that’s something that obviously is constantly changing, right? We could have you back on Linda in six months and there’s gonna be something new with technology that’s happening or the new fad or phase, you know, technology adoption really picked up for guests as a necessity. You know, we went from kind of filling out those cards and, and put it as a door hanger for breakfast to, you know, QR codes and Uber Eats to the room and deliveries that impacts the guest experience. You know, even frictionless check in checkout where your guest could walk right by the front desk, walk right out of the hotel without even having one point of contact with an associate, which for some hotels is scary. So how do you integrate that balance of technology, customer service in the guest experience?
Linda Saron:
I think for us, we looked at it as an opportunity to enhance guest experience. You know, it was shocking to me that, the way that digital check-in exploded through that timeframe and how people started to embrace those tools. And I saw my parents who, you know, maybe never knew what a QR code was, go into a restaurant and scan a QR code and see an updated restaurant, menu. Wow. That really gave hospitality and, the restaurant industry a lot more flexibility to change and modify. You know, you think about what it would’ve required to do a menu change previous to covid and what it requires now with some of those technology enhancements. So in many ways we’re grateful for our guests embracing those technologies and having to learn really to use some of those tools. But I think ultimately Ryan, guests want to connect. We’re human beings. We need to find ways to create a personal connection. It’s important for all of us. And I think through COVID, some of the experiences we all had, we realized more than ever, you know, we need people and we need connections and we need those experiences. And so we’ve tried to couple technology with guest connection and look for opportunities to connect with our guests through technology. So, you know, a digital check-in guest, maybe we didn’t get to see them at the front desk, but we can check in with them through a chat method from a technology perspective and be inside their guest room in a way that we couldn’t before COVID. So really embracing those tools and being grateful that kind of, we ripped the bandaid off, if you will, in people’s ability to utilize those tools or be open-minded to those tools. And I think that was a win for our industry.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I think it’s the hotels and hotel groups like your own that really embrace technology and don’t really kind of see it as an enemy, but see it as an opportunity to become more flexible and adaptable. Cause you know, whether we like it or not, like you said, you know, I think that chat, we’ve talked about social listening before, right? Somebody might feel more comfortable sitting behind their phone and Facebook messaging the front desk than they would just coming to the front desk and talking to you, or even picking up that phone. We’ve talked about that multiple times. But you have to be listening because they’re gonna expect a response just as quickly as if they were talking to you face-to-face. So you have to be open to that. I’ve told our listeners so that social listening tools keep your ears and eyes open because guests are adopting this, this technology. And like Linda said, the way that they communicate could be very different than it was pre pandemic. So let’s talk a little bit more about some recent trends, right? Inflation, economic uncertainty. Travelers are paying more for things like their grocery bills, their gas, and in our case Linda, sometimes their hotel room, right? And this makes for very thin margins for hoteliers to create the perfect experience because guests are very quick to, if they see anything wrong, to say, well this is just way overpriced or way too expensive. So one thing we talk about on this marketing podcast all the time is setting expectations prior to a guest arrival. Whether that be the things that are great about your hotel are maybe some of the things that you can’t necessarily change, like if you have, you know, a noisy street outside. But being able to set those expectations through things like social media review, response, online reviews. So how do you kind of ensure proper expectations are being set to ensure that narrative of this place is way too expensive, is not being written?
Linda Saron:
I think we’re lucky for the world that we’re in today. Guests really have the opportunity to check out our hotels and their destinations now much before they get into the building. I think with guest reviews and TripAdvisor, most times, you know, guests may know the opportunity areas for a property before they get there and maybe they’ve decided, hey, it’s a nice clean hotel with friendly service and I’m willing to tolerate the street noise to stay at this hotel. The review platform has changed and it’s really enhanced guests ability to know what they’re getting before they make the choice to buy. And I think that’s a good thing for hospitality. I think for us, interfacing with our guests and listening to them and hearing that feedback they provide us, and, using it as an opportunity to drive improvement when it’s necessary. But also from a stay experience standpoint, more than ever, it’s important for us to be consistent in our execution and our delivery. So we don’t want our guests to have any surprises. So if they’re expecting to find a clean, friendly hotel, it’s our intention to provide that when they arrive. So ensuring consistency of operations and guest experience, I think is more important than ever because the dollar it goes not as far. So it’s really important that guests can feel the value and they understand the amenities that are available to them, and we do everything we can to ensure a consistent guest experience.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. In our industry, we like those good surprises for our guests, right? The maybe the cake or the extra card. Not those bad surprises when you come on property. But I think you make a great point, Linda. The way that guests now and travelers are researching hotels is very different. I mean, you think about in the midst of the pandemic, right? What we were doing is we were constantly going back to those online review platforms. We were going to social media platforms to say, okay, what does cleanliness look like? Because it had to do with everything, it had to do with safety. During that time, we were encouraging our hotel partners to talk about some of the cleaning protocols, share that on your social media. But I think that trend is sticking. People are still going back after they book to make sure that they made the right decision because they know that they have options. Now, the flexibility of being able to change your booking prior to the pandemic seemed very scary for a traveler. Now it’s like you can go back to social media, you get excited about your stay. Some of the guests are knowing exactly how the lobbies laid out based on pictures that they’re seeing on places like review sites and social sites. So that’s the type of expectations that we wanna set for our guests. To ensure that they’re not running into those surprises like, unwelcome surprises, like Linda was mentioning. You know, one thing our entire industry is hoping for, and the good news is based on STR data that that was just released recently. We had a fantastic holiday season, even with the airlines trying to do everything that they could to maybe disrupt that. We even had some things this morning with the FAA, but it looks like that revenge travel is still pushing into 2023. People miss travel a lot, but one sector that really hasn’t picked up as quickly as we would’ve liked is business travel. So I want to get your opinion on this. What are your predictions for business travel as we go into 2023? And then second question with this is, how should we adapt our marketing to reach those business travelers? And are you guys doing anything with a different approach in that sense?
Linda Saron:
I can tell you OCI Hospitality had a great fourth quarter of 2022 business travel, really bolstered that and, and we weren’t certain that was gonna happen. But what we’ve seen is that our business travelers are camouflaged, if you will today. You know, maybe before they were a little bit more easy to identify when you saw them in the hotel or you saw them in the lobby. But that is not the case today. You know, business travelers may be coming with their family. They may have more casual attire, they may be working from a guest room. It’s, it’s a different climate for business travel. I think some of the, the ways that business travelers used to book, have changed and we’re continuing to evolve with that in 2023. Some of those rates that maybe they have a had a travel manager set previously, maybe the travel manager isn’t there or they’ve not had an interface with travel manager for a long time. So I think our business travelers, I think it’s, it’s going to continue to grow and expand, but I don’t believe it will ever be the same as it was Pre-COVID. I think leisure travel is going to continue and that’s been great for our industry. You know, people are staying on shoulder nights now differently than they ever have. You don’t have that typical Tuesday/Wednesday business travel pattern that we have in our industry. So we’ve really seen that change and, and drive performance in our industry. You asked me a follow up question to that as well.
Ryan Embree:
Actually. You did a great job of answering it and it was really the prediction for 2023. And I think you’re right. I think you might have just named a new sector here on the podcast with that camouflage business traveler. I like that and I, I think you’re absolutely right and I would say from a marketing standpoint that traveler might be camouflage, but they’re still looking at your hotel, maybe in the eyes of a business traveler and a leisure traveler. So one of the things that we, you know, told our hotel partners, specifically our social hotel partners, you know, in early 2021 when leisure was really, really going, you know, maybe let’s go less on the conference side, less on the business center, you know, and focus more on the attractions events that were coming back at that time. Now we’re definitely gearing more towards saying that leisure is still leading the pack, but there still needs to be some inclusion there for those business travelers throw in every once in a while, what that business center looks like. You did a great point, Linda, of sharing, you know, a lot of people might be working from the room talk about how spacious the rooms are and how it is perfect for kind of a work from remote type of atmosphere at your hotel. So love that camouflage, business traveler. I’m right there with you and hopefully, you know, we continue to see those trends make its way in 2023 as well.
Linda Saron:
Yeah. With that, Ryan, we’ve seen a, a great ramp up in our meeting and events bookings and the food and beverage associated with that. Most of our hotels in our portfolio, were behind the first half of, of 2022, but travel was so strong the second half, in bookings were so strong, the second half of 2022 with pent up demand and people really wanting to do things safely in person that we made some great recovery the second half of 2022 with our conference center bookings and our meeting and event bookings. And we’ve seen that trend continue into 2023 and we anticipate that’s going to continue to remain strong in 2023.
Ryan Embree:
That’s absolutely great point there. And LinkedIn is a fantastic place on social media to reach some of those event planners. You know, we talk about it all the time. Wedding planners go to your event space. If you’re a hotel, do a LinkedIn live, do an open house on LinkedIn and use it as an event. Some really great ideas to try to get people there because as Linda was pointing out, people are just looking to get together for one reason or another. A lot of planned celebration. I’m finally caught up on my end, but certainly went to a lot of weddings that were postponed over the last couple of years, but they were just looking for somewhere to get together with family and friends. So a lot of opportunity out there for occupancy for sure. So I wanna talk about kind of the landscape right now and over the last few years. I think with all of these troubling times in the economy in general, you know, you get a lot of, and consolidation, mergers, acquisitions, we see some brands, certainly some hotel management group. Where is OCI Hospitality fit in there because it is a competitive landscape. What makes OCI Hospitality unique?
Linda Saron:
I would tell you that we have the best people in the industry, and I think you would probably hear that from everybody in my position, probably on your podcast. But we’re very grateful and fortunate to have a talented cast of leaders in OCI Hospitality. You know, our mission is to enrich the lives of others through hospitality. And our team takes that very seriously. Whether you’re speaking about enriching the life of an owner, a guest, a team member, or the community that we reside in, in our hotels reside in, we all take that mission and that task very personally. So I think we’re unique. We’re a smaller management company. The Doubletree that we just added is our 26th hotel. We have a very hands-on approach to operations. We have a very hands-on approach to interfacing with our ownership groups. And I think that makes us unique. You know, it’s not uncommon for me to pick up the phone and have a conversation, with an owner related to something that happened, specific to a property that I think is important for them to know about. Or, you know, additionally for us to reach out to an owner and say, you know, hey, we have this opportunity area here and we can’t seem to overcome it. We’ve done X, Y, and Z. Let’s brainstorm. You know, let’s brainstorm together and work through some ideas. What ideas do you have about how we could overcome this challenge? So I think our size definitely makes us unique for a small management company. We’re pretty tech savvy and we have a lot of great systems and process in place. So I think the combination of our, our people, our size and our technology really makes us unique in the industry.
Ryan Embree:
Well let’s talk a little bit about the culture, right? I mean, the whole industry has kind of been hit with this industry staffing shortage over the last couple years, but culture has really been at the foundation of this and a lot of hotel management companies such as OCI Hospitality probably use that to your benefit for recruiting. So tell us a little bit about that culture you’re trying to instill over there.
Linda Saron:
Yeah, so we believe our culture at OCI Hospitality is friendly, flexible, hardworking and fun. And even, before the pandemic happened, right in late 2019, we had just, reached out and surveyed all of our team members to help identify what did they perceive our core values to be as a company and who did they feel like we are. And that’s how we came up with friendly, flexible, hardworking and fun. We’ve rolled out a great toolkit called the Art of Hospitality in all of our hotels. We’ve been doing that since 2021. I mean, it gives us really the opportunity to talk to our team members and help them understand that each of them have a great purpose every day in our hotels. So whether you are cleaning someone’s room or preparing a meal, it’s an opportunity to enrich the life of a guest. Maybe somebody is coming in for business travel, or god forbid they’re coming in for a funeral, but we all get to play a role in helping make sure that they have a great stay experience. Everyone’s role is crucially important, you know, from housekeeping to food and beverage to front office. And so we really talk a lot within our company about how everyone’s role makes a difference for guest experience and how it truly gives us the opportunity to enrich the life of someone else.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah. You know, we talked at the top of this episode, Linda, about, you know, connecting with our guests, but I also think there’s something to exactly what you’re saying, connecting with our employees. You know, typically the happy employees create happy guests. We’ve heard that before. So definitely at the forefront of a lot of hotel management companies that are looking to kind of push forward in 2023 and beyond. Now, I’d be remiss if I didn’t say, you know, this is a digital marketing podcast here at the Suite Spot. Travel media Group’s realm is really in the reputation and social media space. So I wanna get OCIs strategy with reaching traveler’s digitally. You spoke to how you guys really at OCI lean into technology. How do you reach travelers digitally and make sure you’re in the best position to capture more market share?
Linda Saron:
So thank you guys. You guys have been a really great partner for OCI Hospitality Ryan. You’ve really helped us showcase what’s available to our customers and to help them see digitally what type of experience they can have inside the walls of our hotel or our conference center or our resort. We aspire to continue to grow those platforms. We’ve seen great success where we have implemented that digital marketing strategy and those digital connect opportunities. And, in 2023 that will be a platform that we continue to work with and grow within our portfolio of hotels. So it’s been huge for us. And we cannot thank you guys enough for the partnership. We’ve really seen where we’re able to connect with our guest and create those experiences. It really drives guest experience, which drives customer satisfaction. And you know, our best performing hotels are the ones that have the best customer satisfaction because that helps them drive market share and gain repeat guests.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’ve talked about it before about how that guest experience really starts before a guest even steps foot on our property. So being able to, you know, we’re honored to be partnered with OCI Hospitality, a company that really embraces, you know, the social media and digital nuances and technology that’s ever changing, making sure that we’re staying on top of that and setting those right expectations to hopefully further that market share. And so proud to be a part of this journey. So let’s lean right into that, right? We just celebrated the end of 2022, obviously a time for New Year’s resolutions. So I’ll kind of spin this last question to ask maybe some resolutions for OCI Hospitality or just maybe what’s new and goals for 2023 and beyond?
Linda Saron:
Yeah, I would say our two biggest goals for 2023, our growth, is big for us in 2023. We wanted to continue to grow our portfolio of hotels, both in owned and managed platforms for OCI Hospitality. But also as we think about growth Ryan, we wanna make sure we’re providing great growth opportunities for our team members. Covid really wiped out a lot of our bench strength in the hotel industry. So 2023 is a year where we’re trying to do personalized development plans for all of our team members, really to help them grow. Just like John Willie did for me. He gave me the opportunity to learn and grow and now we wanna make sure we’re paying that forward to our team members. In addition to growth, we’re working to drive consistency. So we’ve rolled out some new platforms for, deep cleaning and preventative maintenance that we’re excited for in 2023. And for the first time we’re doing some substantial audits. You know, in addition to our brand audits, we’re gonna be inside all of our hotels in 2023 working to drive consistency of operations in order to drive strong guest experience, in 2023. You know, like we said, that guest experience is truly crucial to market share.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and you’ve mentioned the importance and criticalness of consistency throughout the portfolio. So, you know, we are super excited to see what’s ahead with OCI Hospitality as you guys embark on this new chapter. We’re headed to the end of this episode. Any final thoughts today, Linda, on the conversation?
Linda Saron:
No, great conversation today, Ryan, and great discussion on hospitality. And I’m excited, you know, not just for OCI Hospitality, but for our industry. I think we have an exciting 2023 ahead.
Ryan Embree:
I agree. So thank you so much, Linda, for joining on the Suite Spot. As I mentioned, next time we’ll have to have you inside of our podcast studio. Congratulations on the new property. I’m sure first of many achievements to come in 2023. Thank you for joining the SuiteSpot.
Linda Saron:
Thanks Ryan. My pleasure.
Ryan Embree:
And thank you all for listening, we will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star reading on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Join TMG Marketing Director Ryan Embree and Vice President of Product and Technology Patrick O’Brien on this episode as they analyze and give insight into the top 5 guest sentiment trends of 2022.
You will learn about the most talked about topics and how travelers felt towards them so you can adjust your hotel operations for the new year.
Suite Spot Podcast · 107 – Top 5 Guest Sentiment Trends of 2022Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. We have made it 2023, but today we are going to talk all about 2022. Yes, this is one of our annual episodes. We’ve done it, I think now for two or three years. Want to welcome Patrick O’Brien, Vice President of Product and Development and Technology. Back to the Suite Spot. Patrick, welcome back.
Patrick O’Brien:
Thank you so much for having me.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, and we’ve got a great episode for you today. If you’ve listened to the Suite Spot before, you’ve heard this around this time of year, as you know, we are the premier solution provider for the hospitality industry and reputation and review response. And with that comes a lot of data. If you’ve listened to me and you listened to a lot of episodes, you know, I love data, give so many analytics, insights, blueprints into what we as hoteliers can do to improve our guest experience on property. And this episode is all about that data. We are gonna be looking at the top five sentiment trends in 2022. But first, Patrick, this is always a question that literally makes my jaw drop every time I ask it. I know we hit a incredible milestone. We had a whole episode dedicated to it. The 1 million guest review mark that we at Travel Media Group and your respond & resolve team has responded to. Congratulations on that feat. But how many reviews do your respondent resolve team respond to each month for hotels?
Patrick O’Brien:
Well, first off, thank you very much. That was an exciting, you know, milestone to hit. And you know, I think the crazy thing with that, you look at that number and then you look at where we were last year and where we’re moving to, just the kind of the snowball effect of those amount of reviews and all that our team is getting accomplished is, is really significant. And the number of reviews month to month obviously varies. It really based on kind of trends that you’d expect to see where the review flow will increase fairly dramatically around spring break and summer travel and around holiday travel in 2022, our team responded to just under 220,000 reviews. Or, you know, if you average that out, it’d be around 18,000 a month with our highest level occurring in July at 23,800 reviews. And I think while that number is really impressive, and when you look at it in regards to our million reviews, it’s very impressive. Our team treats every response good or bad, really like a mini PR opportunity for our customers. So not only are we ingesting and understanding the customer review, we are also identifying all the qualifiable sentiment areas in that review, we’re crafting a response, providing an opportunity for the customer to approve that response and give feedback. So really be part of that conversation. And then our team has a separate analyst review, the combination of written response and custom feedback, really again for grammar clarity and consistency before they post that response to our clients guest and their potential guest to see. So that number actually really represents 220,000 written responses, 220,000 customer approvals, 220,000 grammar edits, and 220,000 responses posted to review sites. And all of that is happening seven days a week and typically occurs within 36 to 48 hours from when the guests originally posted their response. You know, there are some variables in there, but the turnaround on that whole process is pretty quick. And it’s just, for me, it’s exciting to think that before any response is posted online that you know, you’ve had three or four people review that response to make sure that it is of the best quality that it can be.
Ryan Embree:
That’s a science, right? It’s a process. I mean, we have we have workshops, we have educational courses for hotels teaching them how to properly respond to a review. Because we’ve all been there, we’re all travelers. We’ve seen a review before and we’ve seen a response that just kind of makes you cringe and say, man, they really left that opportunity, that many PR opportunity that you were talking about it, it really has an impact on travel today. I even think even more importantly, post covid post pandemic, it’s awesome to hear these numbers. It’s absolutely astonishing and so glad you were able to share those in that incredible feat. You mentioned the sentiment tags and that’s really what we’re gonna be going and diving into today. How many of those sentiment tags or topics are your team getting in those 220,000
Patrick O’Brien:
Reviews? Yeah, so I think the neat thing with sentiment tags is that the reviews in and of themselves can really kind of become a little bit of white noise, but the sentiment tags really allow you to make those that feedback quantifiable. And so in 2022 we identified as an exact number, like 10,317,622 sentiment tags. So, but of that approximately 6.8 million were positive and 2.8 million were negative. So, you know, obviously seeing a lot more positive than negative. The thing that I found really interesting this year, you know, coming off the last couple years is that the overall distribution of sentiment was more consistent month over month than last year. Really indicating to me that travelers are easing back into the quote unquote normalcy of travel. And that hoteliers are, have learned a lot over the past couple years and are doing a better job of managing expectations also as expected. Really the lowest positive sentiment percentages really kind of followed around spring break and summer travel when the system in and of itself is more heavily taxed with increased travel and really decreased tolerances towards travel. One thing though that I found this year that was very surprising, you know, as I mentioned, we always see a lot of reviews and, and a lot of sentiment around holiday travel, but this year the most positive month of 2022 was December, which is again, typically when we see increased frustration. This could have been the result of, you know, issues created by the weather and the issues that the airlines have been having and maybe showing really that the hotels had the ability to really rally behind their guests in help improve those travel disruptions with their hospitality and services. So typically the pattern that we see, but this year we definitely saw a significant increase in positive sentiment in the month of December.
Ryan Embree:
That’s super interesting to hear and you, you know, you could learn so much from this data, you know, in 2020 and 2021 we’re seeing really incredible inconsistencies with the reviews that were coming in and just based on the occupancy levels that we were seeing. And I think you’re right, the reviews in 2020, 2021 really became very polarizing. Either someone having a really great experience or someone having a very negative experience. Cause those guest expectations, which I know we’re gonna touch on today, aren’t properly set. I’m happy to hear that we’re kind of maybe getting to that, that balance there of normalcy people not coming in and not meeting those expectations or falling way below them. So if this is your first time hearing this episode l let’s show you how it works. Patrick and his team went through a lot of data, over 10 million tags, absolutely incredible. We picked out the top five for 2022, we’re gonna share ’em with you today. We’re gonna show what the first thing when these tags are mentioned, what his team of professional review response writers here at Travel Media Group, how we approach that response. Okay. Because again, there’s different strategies, there’s different approaches depending on the hotel brand, size of the property as well. And then what we’re gonna do is we’re gonna give you the hotel here some insights on some operational changes when this sentiment could be trending, one or both ways, either positive or negative. So we’re gonna give you some ideas, and some inspiration there when these tags are mentioned in your reviews. So we’ve got a big list, let’s go ahead and jump into it. The number five guest sentiment trend and tag in 2022, facilities and amenities. Patrick, I’ll let you take it away.
Patrick O’Brien:
Sure. Yeah. So this one was, was interesting. This one did not appear on the, the list last year and probably most likely because a lot of facilities amenities were still closed or in various states of openness, but actually also bumped cleanliness off of the top five this year. Which again, I believe speaks to people returning to the normalcy of travel and hotels, really using the past few years and feedback to make the operational improvements that they were getting feedback on. Typically for this topic, the items that we are looking for in identifying in this category are on-premise gyms, restaurants and cafes, parking facilities, spas, lobbies, kids areas or arcades. And these are all opportunities for the hotel to identify what makes them unique in the market. And these are what can significantly impact the on-premise and out of room experience for the guest. So these are also items that contribute to the convenience of traveling and can allow you to increase your RevPar. Typically the sentiment on these areas for the most part is positive. Of the negative feedback that comes in, it’s usually because there is a lack of those amenities or you know, again, we’re not seeing it as much towards the end of the year, but that those amenities are still closed or in limited capacity. But when that happens, our team really tries to refocus the attention on the other positive aspects of the guest stay. So, you know, if they, if they said well everything was great, you know, the complimentary breakfast was awesome, the room was great, but I really wish they had a pool, you know, we’ll apologize for not having a pool on site, but really try to re-highlight all the things that made their stay great. If there’s the opportunity to, if the hotel has other amenities, we may use it as kind of an opportunity to refocus the attention on sort of those other amenities that the property offers. Hopefully you had an opportunity to check out X, Y, and Z and you know, really kind of play into all of the things that make the guest hopeful experience on site a favorable one.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, this was an interesting topic and trend, right? Because you know, something like cleanliness, you know, maybe you can make some changes to operationally, but it’s not as easy to build a pool as it is to train a housekeeper, right? So, you know, from an operations standpoint, you know, what can a hotel you’re listening to this take, if they’re getting either positive or negative feedback about their facilities or amenities?
Patrick O’Brien:
Well ultimately it’s going to come down to what will be a common theme I think in our, our conversation today. But the factor is setting proper expectations. I think for hotels, be proud of who you are and what you offer and make sure that the guests know that upfront you don’t need to be and obviously you can’t be everything to every traveler. So really understand where you excel and focus in on that and make sure that your marketing efforts and website align with that strategy. Make sure that your front desk and other team members are pointing out those features to guests while on property. And then just make sure that you do use analytics from online reviews and feedback to try and identify when those amenities need to be updated or replaced and establish a plan to kind of stay on top of that. You know, I think, think also updating your photos can be really helpful. These amenities are never going to look as good as they did on day one and most likely when you got pictures of them for your website. But you don’t want the guests walking into an onsite gym with equipment that has been very well used and love for the past eight years thinking that it’s going to look like it did in the pictures. And again, that’s when the expectations aren’t met and the guest is disappointed it is going to leave that negative feedback. So while you can’t necessarily just add a gym or add a pool to your location, it is making sure that a guest knows what you have to offer and they are going to be able to make then the right decision for them before they book.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s a absolute great tip with the pictures there cause you’re right, that’s where setting to high expectations can actually get you in a little bit of trouble, but this is a great trend and topic to see in our industry, and I think you spoke to it very well about saying it’s ironic how this pushed cleanliness out of the top five because now guests who we’ve talked about really are just, you know, the past couple years have just stayed in the room, you know, because they, they don’t want to get out and explore the hotel or what your hotel has to offer. Now they’re getting back to the basics, right? Enjoying some of the amenities and for these hoteliers listening, that means when you start promoting that more on places like our social media, think about what is really lagging behind leisure travel, business travel, right? Get back to those amenities that appeal to that business traveler, maybe that onsite gym because they’re coming in for a conference, maybe that business center where they can just cut, find a couple hours of the lobby or restaurant to do some work in. So super, super interesting with our number five trend. Let’s move to number four, food.
Patrick O’Brien:
So typically feedback in this category, I mean the, the highest bulk of it is around breakfast and complimentary breakfast. However, we are also seeing it pertain to onsite restaurants and food service options that are available at the property. And so there are obviously a bunch of different approaches to handle these issues because they can be different and it’s an important part of our process for our team, you know, when they are onboarding and even from feedback and constant check-ins with our customers, that we fully understand what all of these options are, what their hours of operation are, and really any other intricacies or features that make the properties food offerings what they are. And then we work to maintain and update all these accurate notes and descriptions so that we can inform the guests appropriately and talk to those concerns or even those praises appropriately if it is a complimentary breakfast concern. And again, that’s probably really the biggest one. We work to try to identify if it’s a valid concern or what I’d like to consider really a preference concern and address that directly, you know, if it is that they were out of a bunch of different food options when they were there, you know, we may be able to talk about what the hotel is doing to remedy that and make sure that they, you know, that doesn’t happen in the future, but if it’s something like I didn’t like the bagels, you know, we may approach that with, you know, we really apologize that you didn’t like our assortment of bagel choices, but we hope that you did have an opportunity to enjoy our waffle maker and our breakfast burritos and our juice bar and all of these other options that were available to the guests. And I think subconsciously for other guests that let them know that there’s not necessarily a problem with the bagels, it wasn’t to that particular guest taste. If the concern is really that you don’t have a breakfast option, then what we can do is really try to maybe look at some nearby inconvenient breakfast options and talk to those and that can do several different things, you know, including just really kind of help paint the picture of your local community and how close you are to all this convenience that the, that the traveler’s looking for when they’re traveling. Now if there’s an onsite restaurant that may or may not be owned by the hotel or may be managed differently in those cases, sometimes it’s just, you know, taking the opportunity to apologize for that experience, letting the guests know that you’ll share the feedback with the restaurant and for potential future guests really sort of differentiating that one is not the other and that, you know, your experience at the hotel is not going to be indicative of this guest’s experience at the restaurant. We do kind of approach those a little bit differently, really trying to work with the hotel to fully understand what their options are so that we can talk to those appropriately.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, you know, breakfast always seems to make its way onto this list, but I’m so glad that we did this all encompassing food options because there are so many hotels that we work with that also have onsite restaurants and you know, the past couple years we’ve done this episode, we’ve talked about breakfast being this, you know, either on the go buffet still trying to transition to figure out what it is. And again, this kind of speaks to going back to that normalcy, but I will say this topic also brings up why respond and resolve at travel media group is first in class, there is a wide assortment of what hotels are serving for breakfast options, lunch options, dinner options. And your team does a fantastic job of knowing the menu and keeping notes for each one of these hotel partners. So when we onboard our hotel partners or hotel management companies, we take the time to know what that menu is so we can speak directly to the individual items on the menu as Patrick was talking about, which is so important. And he gave a great example there of how someone has some sort of negative preference in one aspect of your breakfast, talking about all the range of options that you have and turning that negative into a positive. So love to see that. What other, what other ways can a hotel listener do from an operations standpoint if breakfast or food is mentioned in majority of their reviews?
Patrick O’Brien:
Obviously with breakfast there is a, a cost to the hotel to provide these options, but there is also a real benefit to breakfast options that can help you increase booking conversions, potentially help you increase your rates. I think that it is really important to try to aggregate the feedback and make sure that you’re hitting the mark with this amenity and the cost that you were putting into this. You may start to understand that I am, you know, way overdoing it for breakfast and you know, it, it’s too much. Or if I maybe spent a little bit more, I could drastically increase the options there and really set myself apart from the market and what they’re offering and make my stay more attractive to potential guests. If you are not going to have or you don’t have the capacity to provide breakfast, there are, you know, options. You know, maybe for having free coffee and fruit in the lobby or really even we’ve, we talked about this before, but trying to partner with a nearby local restaurant. The thing that for me that is exciting about this opportunity is it really is a win-win where you know, you are helping another local business or small business, while enhancing your guest experience by really introducing them to sort of the local flare of, of your community and you know, then maybe you don’t have the necessary expense that goes along with providing those breakfast options and, you know, so I think that those, those are some good options there when you’re dealing with that. Yeah,
Ryan Embree:
We’ve seen some incredibly creative things that hoteliers have done for guests for food options, including food truck events on sites, right? Mm-hmm, you know, on our social media product and solution that we provide hoteliers, some of the most liked and engaged posts come from food truck events that hotels host in their parking lot. For me, this is a prediction that I think is gonna continue to grow for 2023. If you think about where we were prior to the pandemic, one of the biggest things that we were hearing was about sustainability and going green. We still hear about it today, but it was a really hot topic before, including things like locally sourced food in your breakfast. That can be a great way to market and stand out. Like Patrick is talking about things like gluten-free options and expressing those on places like review sites in your responses for social media sites that gives you the upper hand and competitive advantages that right now these margins are so slim in some of these markets that are trying to gain and capture more occupancy. So I think this is a very important trend and I only see it growing maybe next year, even talking about food and breakfast being higher up on this list next year.
Patrick O’Brien:
Oh, definitely. I mean, again, I, I think that you’re starting to see, you know, people moving away from the grab and go, you know, options and really trying to highlight that. And I think food is always going to be important in travel because when you’re traveling you don’t have the convenience of your kitchen and the food that you’re going to make and sometimes you don’t have the time and you know, there’s obviously extra cost and convenience for going out to restaurants and sitting down. So being able to have a good start to your day just really, I think enhances the experience and there’s just so many ways to kind of approach that from an operational standpoint.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s a great point. Guests are really gonna start to take notice now that curve of having the grab and go might be gone. They’re gonna be expecting a little bit more out of breakfast and their food options from you. So keep that in mind to our hotel listeners out there. Let’s continue down the list. We’re already at number three. This is a very important topic and certainly I know I’ve hit a couple lists in the past, location.
Patrick O’Brien:
This one’s always a bit more challenging because when you get negative feedback about your location, you know, at the end of the day we can’t really pick up the hotel and just move it somewhere else. Again, one of our approaches very similar to food during onboard and or when we start identifying location concerns, you know, is to understand the surrounding location and why people are choosing to stay at the hotel. Some of that feedback may come from the owners and the management. Some of it’s gonna come back from sentiment, but some people say it a location because it is inclusive and it offers features in many onsite amenities and kind of that resort style property and there’s a convenience in all of that. But some people say because of local attractions or proximity to certain needs like hospitals, businesses, stores, et cetera. Some say just because it was easy to get to off the highway and this is an overnight in my route somewhere else. So when we understand that we can really reinforce those location benefits in the response, even when the feedback is positive, it’s always a good idea to reinforce that in the responses. It helps us set future guest expectations. And again, all of this is about really kind of setting those expectations, but also helps you let the perspective guests know that the ideal travel type for your property is X so they can feel more confident in their choice to book with you. It comes down to you can’t be everything to everyone. Resorts sound nice, everybody would love to stay in a resort, but it is not necessarily the hotel you stay in you need in every situation. And so understanding why people are staying with you, what needs you are servicing and then really, you know, kind of reinforcing that, you know, you may be in a business park but you are located around a lot of premium businesses, so you are going to be maybe attracting more of a business traveler than a leisure traveler or if it’s the stores or the hospital, you know, we get a lot of, hotels that are around hospitals and people have family members that are, that are there that provides a convenience to them as well. So really just understanding that and making sure that you handle that in the review response.
Ryan Embree:
Here’s my tip when it comes to location, and I really learned this during the height of the pandemic, is you really do not know what around your hotel could be important to your guest when traveling. Right? You know, one of the things that happened during Covid was nobody was going out to eat. So those lists that probably a lot of these hotels listening have at their front desk when somebody comes up and say, Hey, I need some local restaurants, right? Or I need some places around here. We all have that list of maybe two or three restaurants that might be within walking distance or upscale and then maybe you have some attractions, some bars and nightlife and things of that nature. But I would suggest doing things like grocery stores, right? Where you could just grab and get something that you might not know what a guest might need. But those become insanely popular during the height of the pandemic. Cause nobody was eating out, they were all trying to get their food from the grocery store, bring it back to the hotel, you know, we were finding that a lot of these guests were asking questions like that. So I get it. I might not be looking to eat out. I might just be looking for a grocery store or a need, you know, to go to a department store or something like that. So make sure you’re adding those places to your list because you might know your location and what’s around you, but your guests who are traveling in from somewhere, you know, unknown, they’re not gonna know anything like that. So I think that’s always a bit of value to go ahead and add to the guest experience. So Patrick, what, what can we do from an operations standpoint? I know you mentioned obviously can’t move the hotel, but what, what do you tell hoteliers that see a lot of the, topics about their location?
Patrick O’Brien:
Well, I think, you know, you brought up a really, kind of an interesting point there as well is a lot of it comes from feedback and understanding feedback, but from an operational standpoint, there’s a lot of power in just talking to your guests and asking questions. And so working with your team to feel comfortable to like ask, oh hey, what brought you to our area, you know, for this day? Like, what can I help you find? What, what are you looking to do while you’re here and getting that information. Now that is a little bit more challenging to quantify and put together in kind of a playbook, but you do that, you work with your team to kind of understand that. And then, you know, also being able to, you know, really look at data and and sentiment data like this to see what people are talking about you specifically attractions and things that they mentioned and kind of be able to quantify that. Then you really want to make sure that you update and have consistency across all of your marketing efforts, whether those are OTAs, whether it’s Google, it’s your website, those areas. And you wanna make sure that you know, you are listing all of these things that travelers are looking for because in addition to kind of setting the expectations when travelers are doing online searches and Google, they’re going to use more long tailed e terms. So it may be what hotels are located near this hospital. You want to make sure that you’ve got as, as much content out there that surrounds you around those items. And again, you know, hopefully what can become more apparent is that really the secret sauce to all of this is, is fairly simple that bad reviews typically happen when expectations aren’t met. So I think, you know, if you are upfront and honest about what your property offers, and realize that there is a market for that, this becomes really, location becomes an issue that you can easily manage. There is a time and place for everything and you may not have what you consider to be the prime and ideal location, but somebody does. And it’s just finding out who that is and making sure that you are putting your marketing efforts towards them.
Ryan Embree:
You’re not gonna learn these things without talking to your guests or hearing and listening to them on places like review sites, but absolutely love that tip. Super important hotel listeners out there, respond like your guests are searching. So think about that, you know, if you’re near a attractions, if you’re near an event center, if you’re near a hospital, again, respond like your guests are searching. Always wanna surround ourselves with those keywords and terms to hopefully put us in a better position to capture more occupancy that are searching for that. Great tips there. We are moving along. We are down to number two. Number two with guests talking about online. I would argue it’s probably the number one topic that hotels were talking about. Yes. And that’s, staff
Patrick O’Brien:
Definitely. And you know, and I think that, obviously as things picked up and picked up really quickly, staffing, you know, held a lot of implications, in the hotel industry and there were challenges to say, you know, fully staffed and challenges to meet all the expectations with the available staff. And that has become obviously an operational challenge that every hotel is experiencing and dealing with. Now, I will say that the content this year is maybe not as polarizing as it was, was last year. You know, I mean last year I think you had a lot of opportunities where the staff was having to maybe enforce some guidelines and recommendations and there was a little bit more of that combative nature between the guests and the staff and we’re seeing that dissipate more, more this year. So it was definitely a little bit more positive, but there were a lot of concerns around being understaffed and maybe not getting the full experience. However, you also sort of saw a little bit more of a tendency of guests understanding that and understanding that the people that were working were working really hard to try and make sure that the experience was as good as possible. And the approach to this response really there, there is no right way or just single way to kind of attack it because it’s going to vary by the review. There are issues that could just be reflective of a lapse in service, they’re the issues of understaffing. Then there can be really those more critical or legal issues with those critical or legal issues. Again, for my team, we’re really going after working immediately with the hotel owners and management to kind of investigate those concerns and create a plan to move forward in both, you know, a public response and potentially a direct response to the guest. All of those situations are going to vary around the situation for other issues that are not as serious. Think a lot of times it comes down to really apologizing and reinforcing your property’s commitment to delivering superior service. Sometimes it is, you know, there could be a lot of issues that impact the interactions between a staff member and, and a guest. You know, letting people know that this isn’t typical of the service that we strive for to deliver, you know, to our guests. And you know, we’ll really work to, you know, with our team members to improve that. Even if it is not the case. We always shy away from blaming the guest. It may just be their perception or they could have just come in with a really bad attitude and been really difficult to work with, but you are never going to win that argument. So, you know, we never approach a response as well. Our staff is great. You are just, you know, a terrible person or a terrible guest or anything of that nature.
Ryan Embree:
And that’s one of the benefits of of having a solution like respond and resolve because it, it takes a mental and emotional toll on these hoteliers that work and eight hours, sometimes a double shift overnight to provide superior customer service and to see that written about you, human nature to get defensive there. And sometimes that comes out in our responses. So having a third party come in, know the voice of the hotel and, and being able to kind of come from a different angle, but also protecting the property and, and your reputation online. It’s so important. And another reason why, why our respond and resolve it stands out in comparison to some of the competitors. You mentioned this at the top of the episode about those mini PR issues. You know, another reason that respondent resolves is, is such a high level is because we do work in tandem with the hotel when those situations arise and they do arise in our industry, you know, hospitality more than one. We have people staying overnight at our hotels, we’re hosting them, we take responsibility for them so things happen. And when they do, you are not alone. We work in tandem with you to put together a response that is not going to create this kind of slippery slope or snowball effect that could have permanent damage on your reputation. But even some of those smaller issues that you mentioned. Another great benefit of our team is we’ve responded to a million plus of these guest reviews. Sometimes we know what to look for and some of the times those reviews when we’re talking about staffing, actually run into some privacy issues, talking about individual employees and mentioning them by name. And some of those actually can be flagged and reported as going against guidelines from that response site and sometimes are even taken off the review site. So having a team back behind you looking for those things 24/7, 7 days a week can really help and put your mind at ease to know that again, have that permanent damage that we talked about your reputation. So as we talk about staffing, this was a problem for hoteliers all year, all in 2022. Some hoteliers listening to this, still battling this, what can you do from a operations standpoint when staffing’s brought up regularly in your reviews?
Patrick O’Brien:
You know, there’s probably a much longer conversation in, in the under staffing issues and, and how to attract employees, how to kind of help retain team members and stuff at your hotel. But ideally when you’re getting I think, complaints around staffing, it’s really the exception and not the norm. If it is the norm, then there’s also a bigger conversation to have there. And try to understand that if the feedback is constructive, then it’s not always constructive. But if it is constructive, then I, you know, I think it’s always a good idea to share that with the individual or the team. We can’t get better if we don’t necessarily know that we’re doing something wrong. Sometimes you may not perceive something that you’re doing as being off-putting, but being made aware of that you could change that and then, you know, kind of increase that as well. You know what, I think sometimes we see too from owners or managers that they’re like, I know this employee and the they’re not like this or, you know, our, you know, our front desk isn’t like this. And again, you take this very defensive stance and that’s not a way that you can approach it, but even though like I think you may not necessarily agree with the feedback, it doesn’t necessarily negate the feedback and can still provide an opportunity for growth for your team members. So, you know, you did mention, you know, we will work to help hoteliers kind of try and remove certain reviews, but in each site is a little bit different and they have guidelines around that. Companies and even hotels try to rely on, I’m going to get a good reputation by just trying to get rid of every review online that’s negative. A) that that’s not a good strategy because, you know, people start to question if everything’s overly positive, but also the likelihood of that happening is not realistic. You know, there are certain times where you can definitely get reviews removed, but you know, the idea is really to still try to process that feedback, understand how valid it is, and then try and again, quantify that and make adjustments where necessary. Always have a response no matter what. Even if in the back of your mind you’re like, I don’t a hundred percent believe this because I know that this situation you still, you can’t lead with that.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, that is not certainly what we are suggesting is to go on to your hotel’s reviews and report everything or flag everything that you you don’t like, that will certainly not work as, as Patrick said. But there are those cases, and we’ve mentioned this before when it comes to staff, you’re looking for any advantage right now to try to get somebody to sign with your property versus the property next door. And one of the places they’re certainly gonna look is those reviews. And if you’re responding in a professional customer service oriented way and your hotelier, next door is blaming the guests and emotional, with their responses, employees are going to recognize that they’re going to look at what a day in a life might look like at their property. And if it’s a bunch of guests yelling at them all day every day, they might choose the hotel next door. So I know we’ve been talking about responding to reviews and, and doing it for guests and prospective travelers, but also keep that in mind if you’re hiring right now, especially if you have a great reputation and you do an excellent job of responding, point them to your trip advisor, right? Use it as a place of pride. Tell ’em if you want to feel for what a day in the life looks like, go to our trip advisor and you can see just a quick tip there for right now, we know these hotelers are struggling with staffing. All right, we’ve made it number one, top five sentiment trends in 2022. It is accommodations. Patrick, talk to us a little bit about that.
Patrick O’Brien:
This Is probably no surprise. I mean, why people are saying at a hotel is, you know, is is the place to sleep. But we’ve mentioned before when we onboard an account, we start with gaining a detailed understanding of the various accommodations at the hotel. You know, are there different tiers of room, are there different in-room amenities? Are there any plans or future plans for renovation? This really allows us to address concerns head-on and speak to them directly. Again, really hopefully to resolve the previous guest concern, but also to help better manage future guest expectations. These notes and feedback are consistently updated, you know, weekly, monthly, quarterly, whenever you know, updates need to be made, you know, based on the changing conditions at the hotel. And then again, I think it’s about identifying the underlying concern and addressing it. So one of the tricks that our team tries to implement in a response is detailing that you will work to identify the room and investigate these concerns in depth. And that’s important because you may get a review from PatrickTraveler101 and it was like my room, the air conditioner didn’t work and the carpet was torn up a little bit. So that’s not indicative of every room at your property, that’s one room. And so, you know, even by saying like, hey, we’re going to work to identify cause you know, by PatrickTraveler101, I don’t necessarily know which guest that was, but by doing that you are, A) letting that guest know, hey, we’re working to, you know, take your feedback in and make changes, but you’re also kind of subconsciously letting other guests know that this is one room, guess what, we’ve got 120 of them. So your experience is not going to be that, you know, we really wanna do that. The other trick that we use is that, you know, not all accommodation concerns are really black and white. And, and again, we’ve talked about this a little bit before, but a lot of times it can simply be due to an individual’s preference. You know, people talk about the beds weren’t comfortable and beds may not be comfortable for them, but they are comfortable for 95% of our guests just reinforcing that message, letting them know that we apologize that, you know, our beds weren’t to your preference, but we hope that you found the rest of the room to be comfortable and those types of things. It’s not a bad thing at all to apologize and you know, just to sort of reinforce that not everything in your room is going to be to everybody’s exact preference, but that you really do your best to focus on comfort and you know, and superior service for that guest while they’re there.
Ryan Embree:
That mattress example is, is so important to think because again, as a traveler, what we’re doing is we’re putting our minds in the shoes of that traveler, right? So as we start to think, that really highlights the importance of quantity of reviews. So if I see something like Patrick mentioned about the mattress, I might be scrolling through and I might scroll through a couple positive reviews to see, okay, is this an individual that is a preference or is this a problem at the property? And if I see, you know, two to three reviews talking about the mattress firmness, I could see that as an issue. But if you have more and more of these reviews and content, now all of a sudden that starts to look like the exception and not the rule at your property. If there’s one little piece of your guest experience that a traveler sees, we don’t want it to turn into a pattern in your review feed there. So when we talk about accommodations, what can we do from an operations standpoint, Patrick?
Patrick O’Brien:
Hopefully these issues are more the exception and sort of those preferences than the norm and you really are just apologizing for not meeting the preferences and working to pay attention to that area moving forward. However, you know, as you mentioned, if you’re starting to notice trends or you feel like you’re noticing trends, there are different effort levels, tiers that you can do from an operations standpoint to kind of address those. And I think the easiest is trying to identify from the review who the actual guest was and then cross referencing that to their reservation and identify the room and investigate the concern and handling those, those concerns. Kind of the second tier and a little bit more complex would be, you know, really again to spend time looking at those sentiment analytics and those review feedback analytics and trying to identify the trends around those specific concern areas and creating a plan to fix those. And that may be in spending money to do improvements in operational improvements. It could be, you know, just via those capital improvements or maybe by just taking the proper steps to update the expectations prior to arrival. Beyond that you could kind of use those two items and those two pieces of data to isolate the issues either to specific areas of the hotel and or to specific team members or staff members and then, you know, kind of coordinate and work to address those issues. But ultimately it comes down to really identifying and understanding what the root cause of those concerns really was. You know, was it an issue with the, with the room itself, was it an issue with the expectations or the preferences? And then kind of addressing those. And again, the majority of the reviews are going to center around this area so it becomes really hard to try to manage. And that’s where I think this sentiment reporting and these analytics are so important cause you can start to understand, you know, how often by a percentage wise does this topic or this specific, you know, if we’re talking about the TVs or the beds or the carpet, how often is that actually appearing in my overall reviews or is it just happening recently? So I can get ahead of this before, you know, it becomes a bigger problem. You know, really using sort of those analytics to drive your decision making is going to be important here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, the, the age of educated guessing in our industry has certainly passed us. I mean we have way too much data now to not make data-driven decisions for our capital investments, like you mentioned, but also our time investments. The most valuable resource for a hotelier is spending our time wisely. Is it training? Is it making operational changes to one part of the guest experience or another? You know, we have so much data out there that blueprint and those clues should be right in front of you left by the people that are most important people that are staying with us and the guests and they certainly are not shy to express it based on all the feedback that they left our hotel partners getting over 220,000 reviews that our team responded to in 2022. It’s been an absolutely great episode. Any final thoughts today Patrick, before we close out?
Patrick O’Brien:
Yeah, I mean, again, thank you for having me on. I, you know, and I think you kind of touched on this a little bit earlier, where there is this sort of maybe personal attack that you feel when you’re getting online reviews and feedback and so there’s a natural tendency to shy away from that. No one wants to hear negative feedback, but again, you can’t improve unless you know where and how to improve. So I think it’s very important for hotels to capture data on all the feedback so that as a business owner or a manager you can actually establish a game plan and an effective game plan. There’s a lot of sentiment tools out there that use AI and that technology is improving every day. But I would also suggest a service where you have the ability to manually adjust the AI recommendations or have a team like ours that is doing that for you and constantly teaching the AI. I think the worst thing that that happens, you know we mentioned there was over 10 million sentiment tags that we captured in 2022, and when you have that much data and you start to see some of it, it’s very inconsistent. And we hear this from our hotel partners all the time. It just starts to become white noise and when it becomes white noise you lose really this amazing opportunity to gain a competitive advantage. Being able to kind sift through that and and make the most of those analytics is important. And the other aspect would just reinforce the importance of review response and more importantly, I think non templated review response. A lot of people with time and being understaffed just want to check a box. At the end of the day, everyone who stays with you, they want to be heard and they wanna feel like you’re listening. But even more important is I think that your review response is probably one of the very best tools that you have to market your property. So don’t let that sort of free opportunity pass you by.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, hotels are learning that every day as they’re contacting us more and more about review response and respond and resolve and all the great work you and your team are doing, Patrick. So I wanna thank you for being on the Suite Spot for bringing these insights to see the top five trends. I’m curious to see what’s gonna carry over for 2023 when we do this again next year. So Patrick, thank you again for joining the Suite Spot.
Patrick O’Brien:
Thank youso much.
Ryan Embree:
Thank you all for listening and we’ll talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
The final Suite Spot episode of 2022 is here!
Sit down with host Ryan Embree and Travel Media Group President Dana Singer as they reflect on the progress TMG has made over the past year and relish the amazing achievements it brought with it.
From exciting innovations like Social 2.0 and TMG Translations, to the 1 million reviews responded to milestone, these two aficionados cover all the highlights of 2022.
Listen now to bring in the new year with Ryan, Dana, and all of TMG.
Suite Spot Podcast · 106 – 2022 Year in Review with Dana SingerEpisode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. I am super excited for this episode, our last episode of 2022, but this is an annual episode. This is kind of a Suite Spot tradition now. We’ve done this for about three years. We’re taking a break. If you’ve been following with our TMG Hospitality Trailblazer series, we’re taking a slight break, but we’re gonna be back in 2023 with some great guests lined up. If you’re just hearing about this for the first time, this is all about those hoteliers and hotel groups that are pushing our industry forward as we go into this new chapter. But I would almost consider today’s episode somewhat of a trailblazer’s topic. We’ve got Dana Singer with us. She is the President of Travel Media Group. Dana, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Dana Singer:
Yeah, thank you Ryan. Good morning. Pleasure to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, and we’re super excited to have you. And with Dana’s voice, that can only mean one thing. We are here for our TMGs year in review, and as I mentioned at the top of this episode, this is one of my favorite episodes of the year. We do this once a year because it’s, we are in an industry and we work in digital marketing, which is constantly evolving in 2020, 2021, 2022. Obviously our main topic of conversation, Dana, was all about the pandemic COVID 19 and moving through that, there was a lot of uncertainty. It feels like as we move into 2023, we finally have maybe a path, right? And, and things are getting back, I’m afraid to say it, but things are getting back to that new normal, and we’re moving into this new chapter for our industry and TMG as a business. So reflecting back on 2022, I’d like to start with just talking about maybe some of the most significant technology development and maybe share the impact that they’ve had on our hotel partners.
Dana Singer:
It was definitely an exciting year, for the industry and for TMG overall. And we made important strides with our tech innovation. All of our new developments are focused on how we can provide our partners with tools and solutions that enable important competitive advantages. As I look back, the launch of Social 2.0, which is a part of our OneView platform, has been very well received. This update enables our partners to build their social media profiles more effectively through connected accounts, post scheduling, approval processes, and re-engineered media galleries, just to name a few. It’s just so important to enhance our social solution because our hotel partners are connecting with their guests through these digital channels more than ever. And so with new digital platforms emerging and entering the space more frequently than ever, we’re committed to staying ahead of that curve. Another exciting and significant innovation that came to fruition this year was TMG translations, and this is a part of our review response, respond and resolve solution. As we think about international travel being forecasted to continue to grow, we wanted to ensure that all reviews are consistently responded to with the depth of quality that we’re already known for. And so with this addition, our partners can now connect with their international travelers like never before. By interpreting and responding to so many reviews, written in numerous languages, hoteliers can better understand this demographic and have more meaningful conversations with international guests in their native language.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that’s so important. We talked about that on most recently on our TMG Trailblazers series about the importance of international travel. We really felt that sting when it disappeared in 2020. So as we see them come back, we wanna make sure that we’re responding in their native language to make sure we’re giving ourselves, the hoteliers the best opportunity to connect and hopefully capture their business and social 2.0. We did a great episode on that on the Suite Spot earlier this year. If you haven’t heard it, it’s fantastic. And in a space like social media, which is constantly evolving, we’ve gotta be at the forefront of this innovation and technology. So it was very cool to see that. And I, I don’t want to have any spoiler alerts, but TikTok very, very important. We might be seeing a sneak peek of that for Travel Media Group in 2023. So keep your ears and eyes open. We know that that surpassed Google. Younger travelers are going there for search a lot more. Very important for hoteliers to be on that and be first in line rather than late to the party. So, but you did bring up respond and resolve that solution. Responding to reviews has really taken off for Travel Media Group and we reached such an important milestone in the summer. Hitting 1 million guest reviews responded to an incredible achievement. How do you believe that review responses really evolved since TMG first started responding 2018? That seems like a long time ago. And what does this achievement mean to you, Dana?
Dana Singer:
You know, this was definitely a significant accomplishment for the business and it speaks to TMGs commitment to providing this industry leading solution. It demonstrates our expertise, capabilities, and consistency. And these are things that our partners can count on, which enables them to focus on achieving operational excellence with their portfolio of hotels. Our in-house, US-based team of professional writers put the guest and hotelier at the center of their responses. And the quality of our work is it’s truly industry leading. The importance of consistently responding to guest guest reviews has reached a new height. We’ve been alongside our partners every step of the way. Guest experience will continue to evolve and our solutions will keep pace with the dynamics in the market. We’re really proud, to have achieved this milestone. But we’re also eager to hit that 2 million mark and beyond.
Ryan Embree:
Hey, I’m with the pace that reviews are coming in from guests and feedback is being left. I’m sure that 2 million mark is just around the corner, but you’re absolutely right. Travel Media Group really has positioned itself as the gold standard of review response in the hotel industry, responding to reviews from Independents to Waldorf Astoria, Hilton, Marriott’s, IHG across all brands and across all major online review sites. So that’s super, super exciting. We’re exciting to see where those numbers are and I’m sure we’ll be sharing some more of those. Respond and resolve achievements in 2023, no doubt. Let’s get back to 2022 cause that really marked the first time in a few years that not only Travel media group, but the industry came together for a lot of these in-person events that we have so desperately missed, right? Not only on the occupancy side business and business travel to pick up on that sector, which is really lagging behind leisure, but to also come face-to-face with our hoteliers that we haven’t seen. Right? We obviously have some great channels like the Suite Spot. We do our virtual event series that we connect with hoteliers, but there’s really nothing that substitute meeting our hotel partners face-to-face. Can you speak a little bit more in depth about the importance of having these meaningful connections, whether it be face-to-face or even in the virtual space, which has really seen adoption since the pandemic?
Dana Singer:
You’re right, Ryan. I mean, we wanna be sure to reach our customers in a variety of ways, and it’s always valuable time spent when we can do that in person. As a part of the mix this year brought some insightful learnings, one of which is how we reach and interact with prospects and existing partners. Some hotels like to meet in traditional ways, others wanna meet in new ways, and we’re prepared for it all. It was super energizing for Travel Media Group to return to the physical event scene this year and just have that opportunity to meet with management companies, brands, and hoteliers across the country. These opportunities allow us to build connections face-to-face and we love meeting brands from all over that share their stories with us at conventions and, and trade shows and, and other in-person events. But as you mentioned, you know, we also understand that, that we need to be accessible, in the digital realm as well. And so this year, we developed a very strong approach to, to growing our virtual events through webinars and masterclass workshops, boot camps, LinkedIn live sessions, the list goes on. And our most recent TMG Hospitality Trailblazers podcast series that you mentioned has created a whole new avenue for our partners to share their stories. It’s an important balance to be out in front in a variety of ways as we continue to be the industry leader in managing guest feedback for brands, hotels and hotel management groups.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, I’ve been lucky enough to be on the receiving end of both of those types of events, both the in-person events and, and you know, shaking hands and, and finally getting back to that event circuit. And then also conducting some of the virtual events and masterclass, boot camps, which has been so exciting for Travel Media Group because as an industry, again, we’re constantly evolving into these new norms and being a hotel marketing company, we really need to be at the forefront and the edge of this stuff cause it changes so quickly and trends are here and then they’re not here. So it’s, it’s been an absolute great ride in 2022 and we’re actually gonna be moving to a new virtual event platform in 2023, which is gonna be able to give us the opportunity to interact with our registrants and attendees a lot more and have that digital conversation and, and spur that networking that we’ve been just so hungry for the past couple years. So we’re really, really excited about that. Stay tuned cause I’m sure we’ll share some more details. But let’s talk to some of the listeners maybe that are hearing about Travel Media Group for the first time. You know, we had a lot of listeners come in, especially with this most recent series that we’re doing, and just learned a little bit more about Travel Media Group. Maybe this is the first time they’re hearing this kind of year end review with you, Dana. So how does Travel Media Group play a role in helping hoteliers refine, optimize, and grow their brand through digital channels to achieve strategic goals?
Dana Singer:
I mean, of course we know a hotel’s reputation is the foundation and face of the brand, so it’s critical to have a, a strong and, and firmly cemented reputation. So if a hotel is, is rebranding, social media reviews and review responses are all going to be instrumental in keeping guests informed of the change, but also letting their communities know, because some of the visual representations of, of, of a company may change, but the core values and level of service will remain intact. And so when we think about online social content that needs to be revamped to reflect these changes while continuing to be engaging and interactive. And Travel Media Group helps hotels in these specific areas on a number of fronts, but really starts by developing a plan, guiding hotels through the strategy or supporting them by managing their social media online reviews and responses, which enables the hotel leaders to focus on their other key performance activities. So these same principles apply to hotels that are not undergoing a rebrand or restructuring. A solid social media presence. And being active on guest review platforms is more important than ever. And so these components really determine reputation and the impact that they have, it’s undeniable,
Ryan Embree:
It really is. And you know, we’ve seen our hotel partners go through some of these transitions that you mentioned, but also we’ve seen the needs of travelers change. And, and I think the best example is just what happened over the last couple years. We saw a lot of hotels suddenly have to make these changes based on outside factors, and they realized, I don’t know if I have a really great medium to reach out to my consumers, to my travelers, to my guests social media, reputation, review response. These are all great channels that travelers are looking at closer than ever. Now, 2022 has definitely been a year of recovery, but we also know that inflation is a really hot topic right now. Guests are paying more than they ever have to stay at our hotels, meaning their expectations are higher than ever. So the margin for error is extremely slim. So doing things like setting guest expectations before the, the guest arrives on property through review response, continue to market to those travelers throughout the booking process, not just after they book with you, but that post book pre-stay phase, which is so important because the power is now back into the guest where they can make changes very quickly to their plans if you’re not providing them value. So I think you’re absolutely right there. We’re gonna see more of that in 2023 and these things that we’re talking about, social media review, response and reputation are only gonna grow in importance and it’s gonna be the hotels that know how to leverage this that are really gonna see that occupancy growth and sustain success. One of my favorite pieces of this podcast episode is we get kind of a sneak peek into what Travel media group might be working on. Like I said, we, we’ve done a couple episodes in 2020, more than a couple episodes in 2022, talking about all the new and exciting developments that we do on our product and technology side. Any sneak peaks to our listeners about what we can look forward to for our hotel partners in 2023?
Dana Singer:
We have a lot to look forward to in the new year, and our partners can definitely expect a continued focus on excellence and innovation as we refine our hospitality specific solutions to meet the needs of the evolving dynamics around managing guest feedback and engagement. I mentioned OneView 2.0 a few minutes ago, and this is an important foundation, to our entire offering. You mentioned TikTok a few minutes ago, Ryan and, and TikTok and Instagram reels are right around the corner, likely in late Q1, which will add an effective guest engagement channel for properties, enhanced levels of client support will be experienced by our current and new enterprise partnerships. And we’ve also included additional virtual events that we’ve planned that I mentioned, to support our partners through industry leading education and tips to grow revenue and improve reputation.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, certainly a lot to look forward to this new year. We are super excited. Dana, as we wrap up, you know, over the past couple years I mentioned this again at the top of the episode, you know, these last couple years have really been met with the new year of uncertainty, but a lot of hope. So as we wrap up today’s episode, I guess I will ask you, you know, what would be your message to the listeners that have our sights set on the 2023 horizon?
Dana Singer:
I feel, very optimistic about the new year. The hospitality industry forecasts are positive and the fortitude and resilience that was demonstrated throughout the pandemic and the associated recovery over these past couple of years are very inspiring. So as challenging as it was when the pandemic did hit, I believe the industry is better positioned for the future on a number of fronts, including technological advancements and a commitment to a positive guest experience. And at Travel Media Group, our strategic position in the industry is more clear than ever. As a trusted and proven reputation solution provider, our services are truly brand changing. Our mission is to help our partners improve and transform their online reputation to drive revenue growth and, and strategic success. So, for all of our clients that are listening, I wanted to take this opportunity to thank you for the amazing partnerships and on on behalf of everyone at TMG. We look forward to a fantastic year ahead.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, thank you to all of our TMG partners and, and really all of our Suite Spot listeners that have really made this show what it is today. Over a hundred episodes. I will say that, you know, your message is definitely being felt throughout this Trailblazer series that we’re currently in the, in the middle of every single industry leader or or hotel group that I’ve spoken to thus far has a real sense of optimism and forging ahead in this recovery. This is a time not to pull back, but to move forward. So if you’re out there as a hotel listener and you’re thinking about maybe dabbling in these digital marketing solutions, you know, you’re not really active on social media personally, but you can understand the importance of it, I would encourage you to reach out, even if it’s just for an educational conversation about how this can benefit your business because it’s really the hotels that take advantage of these mediums and channels that are going to be continuing to thrive and recover at this pace. So definitely a different tone that we’ve had in past years. A lot of excitement on the horizon with these innovations and developments. The industry is looking stronger than ever. Obviously there’s some headwinds there with economic uncertainty and inflation, but again, it’s gonna be those hotels that really forge forward and drive forward with these things to capture the most market share that they can. And Travel Media Group certainly is here to assist for any of those hotels, hotel groups and brands that are looking to do that. So Dana, I want to thank you for joining the Suite Spot with me today.
Dana Singer:
Thank you for having me, Ryan. It was great as usual.
Ryan Embree:
Yes, we’ll have to get you on more than just once, once a year, but if not, we’ll see you in 2023 in the year in review and I’m sure we’ll have a lot of exciting things to announce and talk about then. So thank you to all of our listeners out there and we will talk to you next time and next year on the Suite Spot. To join our loyalty program. Be sure to subscribe and give us a five star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
Join host Ryan Embree as he sits down with Hospitality Trailblazer Richard Alberigo, President & CEO of Alberigo Hotel Management.
These two hospitality experts outline 2023 travel trends and traveler behavior, the true meaning of hospitality, exciting developments at Alberigo Hotel Management, and so much more.
Suite Spot Podcast · 105 – TMG Hospitality Trailblazers: Richard AlberigoEpisode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree:
Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what’s trending in hotel marketing. I’m your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, continuing our fantastic TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. Got a great guest with us, another first timer to the podcast. So very excited to welcome him on. Richard Alberigo of Alberigo Hotel Management, Richard, President and CEO. Welcome to the Suite Spot.
Richard Alberigo:
Hey, Ryan, thanks a lot. I’m glad to be here.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, we’re really excited to have you, Richard. Again, my first question, I always start out, especially with the first timers, just hearing about experience, right? This is one of those industries where if you had a hundred bucks, you could never guess. Nobody’s taken the same path twice when it comes to this industry. So tell me a little bit about your hospitality experience and what ultimately that journey that led you ultimately to founding Alberigo Hotel Management.
Richard Alberigo:
Well, sure, Ryan. So, it was not planned at all back in the, I guess, 80’s, somewhere in the mid 80’s. I took a job as a bellman in a hotel, at a full service Hilton Hotel. And the industry was really not even in my mind, right? You know, I did it for money. Somebody told me, you make good money as a bellman. I did that for like two years, and they learned a lot about life as a bellman, and everybody loved Richard, you know, because, and they gave me money. They threw cash at me every night. So I came up with a big wad of cash and I’m like, this is great. Yeah, nothing better. And somebody told me, well, you know, if you wanna make this a career, Richard, you may have to work at the front desk. So I looked up at the front desk and I said, you know, well, you know, it looks like a glamor job up there. You know, I’m kind of slaving with luggage and taking people to the airport, you know. Up there, I’m kind of, I’m all that. So I took the front desk job, and then after about three months, I’m like, maybe this isn’t for me, because now everybody hated Richard and nobody threw cash at me. So, you know, I, I basically took a cut and pay. So I, I hung in there, hung in there. I always like to talk to people. So I guess that was, you know, I love to talk. So I guess, that was a good thing for the front desk. So then I just worked my way up through the ranks, took a job as a, general manager about three years after that. And then, took a job with, IHG, which is the Holiday Inn Corporate Office, and did that for seven years as a, regional support person. And following that, started my own company nine years ago. I was gonna be a broadcaster, actually, that was what my job was gonna be, sports broadcasting, which I did a little bit on the, that on the side. But hey, you know, weird things happen. And now I’m a hotelier after 35 years.
Ryan Embree:
This is, you know, some broadcasting here, you know, on the Suite Spot podcast. But yes, bellman to former bellman. I think that’s so interesting. I, I started the same way in the hospitality industry, and you do learn a lot. Front desk, you could be doing some things, you could be helping housekeeping, delivering things. But you’re really talking to the guests most of the time. So you get a lot of insights there on, you know, what’s bringing them into town, why they’re visiting and stuff like that. I absolutely love to hear so many of the leaders that we’ve had on this series, you know, have had some very humble beginnings when it comes to our industry, and love to hear that career path kind of evolve in advance. So, well, let’s jump a little bit further into the future, right? You know, we’re now a couple years removed, Richard, from the start of the pandemic, which was absolutely devastating to our industry. You know, I’ve interviewed a couple leaders in this series, reflecting back on some of the, the lessons learned from not only their group, but the industry as a whole. Let’s start with Alberigo Hotel Management. What lessons did you take for the group moving forward? And then maybe let’s widen and broaden that up to look at the industry as a whole, lessons that they’ve learned over these past challenging couple years.
Richard Alberigo:
The lessons, Ryan that we learned is never assume, because, you know, we’re hoteliers, you know, by nature, you know, we have a lot of confidence in our ability to predict, right? Because that’s what we do. We forecast, we budget. We learned right away that we really didn’t know anything about the industry post 2020. What was before 2020 was a different animal, right? Just for example is, you know, we laid off people in 2020 most companies, and we thought they would come flying back to us. It didn’t happen, right? I mean, we couldn’t find people. We would’ve never predicted that in a thousand years that, that would happen. You know, we thought that we had it figured out with housekeeping in other, that like, if you clean the room, if you do the full housekeeping service, then the guests are gonna love it, right? No, they wanted limited housekeeping after that, right? You know, we thought leisure travel in a corporate market would come on the weekends, or would not even come in the corporate market would only go to the resort areas. And we, we didn’t have that figured out either, because leisure came back in 2021, just, you know, gangbusters completely threw our forecast out. Then of course, after 2021 this year, we thought it would come back again, and it really didn’t come back in the same, breath as it did in 2021. So I think, right now, to be perfectly frank, us smart leaders we’re just throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks, because we just don’t know what 2023 is gonna be like. I think it’s gonna be a great year, but I mean, how do you really know? Because, you know, there could be another, emergency pandemic, something around the corner. So we have to be ready and willing to change. I think that’s the key is, you have to change on the fly, and you have to assume the worst, to be honest with you. You have to assume whatever you’re predicting now, you know, what, if it doesn’t materialize, what’s our next step?
Ryan Embree:
Every example that you gave talks about adaptation and changing quickly, and you’re absolutely right. In hospitality, you know, we have been known to roll things out sometimes a little bit slower than other industries. We like to test things and see if this works, if it doesn’t work, but you’re right, post 2020, that kind of went out the window. If we’re gonna adapt and get this occupancy here, or we’re seeing leisure travel really take the lead on generating occupancy for us, we gotta put all of our marketing eggs right now towards leisure travel until we’re seeing that group business come back. And when group business and business travelers come back, are they coming back during the days? Is this the same business traveler that left us after Covid? So I think you’re right, those are some great examples there of how adaptable our industry needs to be. And I think that’s a great segue into our next question, because I love this relationship that our industry has with technology. I feel like sometimes we’re very quick to embrace technology. Other times it takes us a while, and our guests are the same way because they’re on such a big spectrum. I’m sure when you were at that front desk, Richard, some of those people maybe didn’t wanna have that conversation with you over the front desk. They just wanted to go straight up to the rooms, which they now have the ability to do with mobile check-in, right? Others maybe wanted to have a conversation and felt like if you weren’t spurring that conversation along, you know, that could really be detrimental to customer service score. So how do you find that balance? And let’s just talk about Alberigo Hotel Management in specific, that balance between technology and service.
Richard Alberigo:
So, we have a lot of training classes for Gen Zs. Gen Zs are huge for us right now, because that’s the future of our industry. And, and I’ll be honest with you, gen Zs and hotel business, it really doesn’t, it doesn’t match to be honest, with Gen Zs. I mean, when they were born, they had a toy and a cellphone in their crib. So we have to adapt to the actual employee on how they relate to the guests, because the Gen Zs, they communicate through texting, and it’s all technology for them, and we have to kind of do training classes with them. We have to do, role play, which they really hate, but it’s good for them to show them that, you know, you’ve gotta talk to people, you’ve gotta inquire, but also you have to pick up on the body language. If they don’t want to talk, then you, you send ’em on their way. So it’s a fine line, and there’s really no perfect you push the button and you know, you, you become a great front desk agent, but you know, you have to teach them the different scenarios, and then they have to just adapt to the situation, you know, that comes. But you’re right, I would say the majority of the guests right now, it’s all about quick check-in. But if you don’t develop some kind of rapport with the guest during that time, then they’re just gonna go down the street. Because right now everybody has everybody’s card, right? Everybody has a frequent state card from Hilton, Marriott, IHG, whatever. So you have to do something to make it unique, no matter if the guest wants to talk or not. We always try to find out that company name. It’s a great conversation piece. Obviously it’s good for sales, but it’s a great conversation piece to find out, you know, something about them, and then ask them questions about their company, which makes everyone feel good, because everyone really, if they wanna talk, they’d like to talk about themselves. So build that bond even in a short 10, 15 second clip to show you care. Because if you don’t, then the next stay, if they have an adequate stay, that’s not good enough anymore, they’ll just go down the street.
Ryan Embree:
Right? Absolutely. And we’re gonna talk about, because of the near high, you know, rates that we’re charging, every moment that you have to be exceptional, you need to prove in the face of a customer, otherwise again, you, you could lose out on loyalty or the next opportunity for them to come in. And I think you make a great point with the way that our guests are going to start communicating with our staff. And one of the things that we consult with hoteliers about is always being on the lookout we call it social listening. I’ll always be on the lookout for people that are trying to reach you via social media. It’s crazy to think that a guest might feel more comfortable in sending you a Facebook message than they would be to just pick up that phone that every single hotel room has to give you a call or even to approach the front desk. So you really need to be listening at every stage of the guest journey. And there’s tons of insights. Richard makes a great point here that tons of insights that you’re missing out on. If you have a guest that comes in, you have the opportunity to maybe have that 10 to 15 second conversation. They walk right by you, check in mobilely and check out mobilely, and you don’t hear any sort of feedback maybe since the first time that they leave a review. And at that point, you’re kind of leaving it up to chance whether they had a good say or not. So many insights, but there’s definitely that balance there. We don’t want to be in our guest faces, kind of grilling ’em on questions and stuff like that.
Richard Alberigo:
Being able to adapt when they do want to talk. I mean, that’s the key. I mean, I think that there’s a misconception out there that, that guests don’t want to talk. They just don’t feel comfortable because they don’t know who you are when they, when they first walk in, it’s up to us to make them feel comfortable. If they don’t return a survey, they don’t tell us about their stay. If they go somewhere else at Alberigo Hotel Management, we take that personally. That means we didn’t do something right. We’re not gonna blame the guests and we’re not gonna blame the new culture. We’re gonna say, we didn’t do something right? So we’ve gotta get them to talk, because like you said, if you turn a 15 second conversation into a one minute conversation, you’ve built a big bond, and now the chances of them coming back are, are like a hundred percent better.
Ryan Embree:
That’s the core of all this. That’s the core of our industry, hospitality and hosting being a good host. I do wanna shift gears to a hot topic right now. Inflation, you know, I, I’ve been bringing this up on the series because we don’t know where it’s gonna go. As, as you pointed out, you gotta throw everything out the window at this point right now, the industry enjoying some really nice ADRs all time highs in fact. On the other side, the guest is seeing some all time high rates that makes the margin for error very, very small. What we’re talking about on this podcast, and, and I think a good thing for our listeners to hear is where are some opportunities to provide additional value, even if it’s not monetary, right? And investment wise, add some additional value to the guest experience or your hotel experience so that we’re not writing that narrative of, well, this hotel just cost way too much for what they’re charging.
Richard Alberigo:
At Alberigo Hotel management. We don’t think that the bells and whistles are really going to going to sell ’em. It’s all about the people. It, you know, it’s value of just going back to the basics, because right now you’re seeing, hotels all over the board. You’re seeing good hotels, poor hotels, bad hotels, terrible hotels. We have to have great service with our customers. Let that be the memorable, instead of giving ’em the extra three waters or the, the Coca-Cola or the beer, you know, when they check in because they, you know, they love it, but then it’s, they’re not gonna remember that because that’s not why they’re there. They’re not there to get a free Coke, right? They’re there for a long stay, and that’s forgotten within 15 minutes of the the stay. We’ve gotta make it memorable. When our desk clerks see the guests come in that door, door, I mean, it’s welcome to Courtyard, it’s welcome to Holiday Inn Express, and it’s every single time it’s consistent. It’s not 6 outta 10, 7 outta 10. It’s every single time that we say that when they come to the desk to check out, it’s, it’s not just how was your stay, it’s what could we have done to make it better? We need a survey. If there’s anything we could do to make it better, please let us know on the survey. And it’s not just give us a good survey, give us any survey. Because in the long run, they’re going to give you a good survey if they, if they like their stay and, and they’re not, they’re not. So it’s real. You can’t manipulate it. At the breakfast, it’s our, our leaders will be in the breakfast area talking to those guests before they leave, because that’s a great time to get them to talk about their stay and what we can do better. Because we’re learning, we may lose a guest here and there, but, you know, I always, I always say, if we can learn from it, then you know, we’re gonna be better for the next guest. So it’s just talking to guests, it’s making sure that they know that we care. Yes, we do the little goodies in the rooms at times and that kind of thing, but overall, I don’t think it’s the bells and whistles. I think it’s the people that keeps people, as you see in the restaurant industry now, the service is so terrible. You know, the C is the new A I always, I say now because you expect it, you expect poor service. It was a shock when you ordered your Big Mac and you got a quarter pounder, you know, in 2020, but now you expect 80% as the new A, right? So if we can do that consistently and talk to guests and do the right things, when a guest wants to switch from one room to another, call that room, find out what we can do to make it better and find out if that next room we switched them to and making ’em feel good. You know, doing things like that to me is, that’s gonna be more important than, than just the bells and whistles. And I think ADR, they’ll pay for service. It’s been proven. I mean, ADR right now, like you said, is, is a record high. And with the expenses with inflation, it’s not just the guest inflation, it’s the hotel inflation right now, the ADR is the only way we’re going to pay our employees with the higher salaries and the higher water bill and the higher light bill and the higher food costs. You know, we have to have the ADR. So if we are gonna have the high ADR, we have to have the a hundred percent service. You know, I always say, you can do, four season service at a Holiday Inn Express. You just don’t, you just don’t hire the person that goes around spraying air fresher all day. Service, you can still provide it.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And that’s totally reflected on your online reputation, right? It’s a peek into what the guest experience is. And you’re right, my listeners are probably tired of hearing about it, but guests are giving you a blueprint every single day on how to perfect your guest experience at the property and they will pay more. That’s not just Richard and I saying it, thats TripAdvisor and that Cornell study of guests will pay more when they see that there’s better reviews for a hotel. You know, you think about the way that we purchase things on Amazon, right? You could be willing to spend that extra $5-$10 to know that you’re getting a quality product. Same thing goes along with our hotel industry and travelers. They wanna make sure they’re getting the biggest bang for their buck. The best way we can do that is providing that service.
Richard Alberigo:
We’re selling clean rooms and we’re selling, hospitality. I mean, that’s what we’re selling. You know, we’re not, like I said, we’re not selling all the bells and whistles. And if you do that consistently right now, you will stand out. You don’t have to give the ranch away in order to buy their loyalty.
Ryan Embree:
It’s a very nuanced way of thinking. Surveys in general, right? Cause I talked to some hoteliers, and obviously we don’t wanna see those bad ones. Nobody wants to see the bad ones, but you should think of it as a learning opportunity. Jump into those, figure out what’s wrong, fix it, make adaptions, and then you’ll see that reflected back on your scores. So hopefully when that survey’s returned back to you again, it’s gonna have better marks than the previous. I hate to talk about trends because you already set us up saying, you know, we gotta throw it all out. But I do wanna just say maybe your guess on business trends for 2023, we have been really missing that segment. Some people say it’s on its way, it’s returning. Other people say it’s actually harder to try to figure out who our core business travelers are. The whole work from home bleisure travel. What is your expectations of business travel for 2023?
Richard Alberigo:
Well, I’ll give it a shot, Ryan, but like, you know, I’m tired of being Nostradamus am that didn’t, that didn’t come through because I, I’ve struggled with my budgets the last three years, but here’s, here’s what I think. So like you said, I think corporate is showing some good signs here in the last, just the last 60, 70 days. It really is for this fall. Will it ever be back to pre covid levels? I don’t know. And I kind of doubt it. That’s why I think that it’s very important that we provide all these other experiences because I think that there’s very few to go around. I mean, you do have the online meetings now and you know, that was already going to be a problem on cutting down travel. I mean, we talked about that 10 years ago, right? That that was gonna be the new issue. And that hasn’t changed. That only made it worse when, you know, zoom became more popular and these company bottom lines, they say, Hey, you know, I don’t need to travel, you know, four times a year. Let me go down to three and let me go down to two. That cuts down. So it’s gonna be dog eat dog to try to get the corporate customer. But I do think corporate in 2023 will come back. But I think leisure also will drop a little bit even more than it did in, in 2021, because that was not real. That was pent up demand. I think the resort areas will continue to have leisure because people wanna do things. But, you know, you know, I reside in Houston, I love my city, but it’s not a place you wanna go for leisure, right? I think that the corporate business is, is going to keep us afloat. So we have to get out there right now and meet those corporate customers. Again, it’s almost like starting over because, you know, we thought we had our base of corporate clients that loved us and they’re not gonna go anywhere else. Well, like you said, it’s been hodgepodge the last three years and everybody’s gone everywhere and they may not have even traveled for three years. So we have an initiative with our sales leaders at our hotel is to get out there and start meeting the customers and they’ll do the online as much as, you know, if they wanna do online, fine, but try to get that face to face meeting. I mean, we did a, a sales blitz trying to, to drum up some corporate business about two or three weeks ago. And we were shocked when we went into the company that they were so excited to see us because they haven’t seen anybody in three years. And you’ve got these admin people in these offices just sit there and look at four walls all day. You know, it used to be one right after another hotel would come and it would get old after a while, and then they’d put up the no soliciting signs and all that. They wanna see people. So we’re going back out there. Even if we have to meet ’em at Starbucks, we’re gonna go out there and talk to them and build that face to face rapport with them. Because online and on the phone is great, but I think a lot of the hotels have fallen in love with that, and they think that’s the only way to sell. And we don’t believe that. We think we gotta build a rapport with our sales team and they have to build a rapport with the corporate clients. And, and if we do that, we think we’re gonna win the battle. But I’m kind of apprehensive if it’ll ever be the corporate demand like it was just because of the technology.
Ryan Embree:
You’re not the first one to share those sentiments of really kind of starting over. And I know that’s a scary place for a lot of hoteliers on this podcast to probably hear, but what better time would it be to do it then right now? And really see, okay, this is a completely different landscape that I’m in. Let’s go back to basics. Figure this out. Another great place that, you know, Travel Media Group works with hoteliers on optimizing is LinkedIn. This is a tool that wasn’t there or at least used in the way that it is today, a decade ago. So all of those DOS’ check on LinkedIn, a lot of these companies are very active. You can form relationships, network there. So it’s a great, great tool that we suggest hoteliers to do. But maybe starting over and seeing, okay, where are we gonna land for this next year? And who do we wanna target? Think that’s great advice.
Richard Alberigo:
And we do all the social media too, but you know, like I said, sometimes what we did 20 years ago is not always bad. And you gotta get back out there. You gotta talk to people and they have to know you. There’s so many times that we’ll walk, I’ll attend a sales call with one of my sales directors, and maybe it’s someone that they’ve dealt with on the phone or online for, you know, three years. And right when you walk in, suddenly they wanna book rooms. It’s just like clockwork. They wanna book rooms because it, that bond that you build and, you know, meeting someone face to face, you know, it’s never gonna be passe. It’s still going to be something that’s going to make you special. So I think that’s the key. But yes, you gotta do all the social media stuff because that’s the new age. I think old school sometimes is good school.
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. I think both of us shared, prior to recording this episode that we were both at the Choice Hotels Convention out in Las Vegas in May, and it was just a different feeling being there. It’s been the first time in a couple years that Choice Hotels had hosted that. It’s just that different feeling, getting in front of people, shaking hands. So, and that’s what our industry is forged on. Our industry is all about people. So that face to face connection, very important. I wanna talk a little about your group, Alberigo Hotel Management, which was recently recognized by Lodging Magazine as one of the top 50 hotel management companies to know in 2022. Congratulations on that, Richard, what do you want the hotel world to know about your hotel management group? And can you express what this type of recognition means to you and your team?
Richard Alberigo:
Yeah, so we’re very proud of Ryan, of that recognition. We, we’ve worked very hard. I mean, we started in 2014, so our hotel company’s still in its infancy. I mean, we’re only at nine years old and many of them are 20, 30, 40 years old. So when I started, when I was with IHG, and of course at that time I had like 50 hotels in my portfolio. So I saw a lot of different hotels. I had poorly run hotels and then the great run hotels. And, even at that time I was thinking, you know, there’s so much opportunity to build a management company that will help hotels get to the next level. So I think the key when I had that 50 hotel portfolio was to build consistency. We preach consistency. I think that is the key, but not so consistency where we get boring. We’re, we’re really big on throwing stuff at the wall and just see what sticks. I think you gotta try new things, especially in this day and age. So I think that’s important. So we say we’re unique, but consistent. We talked about limited housekeeping service. From what I understand, back in 2018, we were, if not the first, one of the first hotel companies to try the limited housekeeping service. First of all, every time we walked the properties, we would see all the Do Not Disturb signs. And we said, you know, do the guests really want this service that we’re providing, number one and number two, if they don’t want it and we don’t provide it, how much will that bring to our bottom line? So we did a test property, a 30 day test property to see what it did with our cleanliness scores. Our cleanliness scores actually went up and that told us this limited service towels and trash and, you know, replenish amenities. That’s really what the guests wants. Now, of course, it’s an industry standard for Covid because the brands are all rolling it out. And we’ve also rolled out things that, you know, didn’t work. We tried housekeeping bonuses and we tried extra vacation during the tough employment era two years ago. And, you know, and what we saw is, you know, that did not make people wanna work for you. So I think it’s very important for our company is to roll out new initiatives, be unique. But the most important thing that I saw during my tenure with IHG is that people weren’t being treated correctly. They were taken advantage of. I totally am going to follow my sword and say, you know what, maybe I didn’t do it consciously, but I probably took my housekeepers for granted as well subconsciously. I mean, we were paying a minimum wage, we would throw food at ’em once a month and thought that that was the way to retain employees. And you know what, back then it worked. But now we found out, you know, when the, labor crisis happened, that that’s not what it was supposed to be. So now it’s important. I mean, we have luncheons, not just luncheons, you know, we played games, we do themes, we do Mardi Gras beads during, you know, during Mardi Gras season we do, right now we’re doing football jerseys during football season on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday we have parties. We’re going back to treating our employees and giving them a unique experience because if we feel like if we give our employees a unique experience, then they’re in turn going to give it to the guests. So it’s not guests number one, it’s employees number one, for sure on that. So it’s very important that we treat our employees correctly and give them a reason to wanna work for us. And our company, we actually still come to the property once a month for sales, once a month for operation. Most management companies, maybe once a quarter, they’ll see the property. We feel that if we can’t see the physical property and talk to the physical, the, individual employees and actually know their name, we’re, we’re just gonna be, they’re just gonna be ANU to us and they’re not gonna respect us. So in turn, we’re gonna throw out all these initiatives and they’re not gonna buy in. So it’s very important that any of our properties that we know the housekeeper that’s been there a year, and we know the front desk agent that greets us and we’re not meeting ’em for the first time when they’ve been there three years, because then we’re just the pie in the sky. We’re the Wizard of Oz, you know? So it’s very important to see the property at the property level and, you know, find out what’s going on. Don’t just analyze from a computer because that’s no way to, to build a customer base and to build a employee rapport. So what we do is we go and we analyze it and we actually consult with the properties. We don’t treat ’em like, I’m the boss and you’re the subordinate. We consult with them and as a team, we come up with action steps in order to make the hotel better.
Ryan Embree:
Its that trickle down effect that we were just talking about between your employees and the guests, right? You know, sparking that conversation, making an impact. So glad to see that that goes, you know, all the way up to the operation side, on your hotel management group. What a great example with the limited housekeeping. One of the things we do on our end is respond to reviews and, and give a hoteliers a lot of sentiment information on what changes when they’re implementing changes, how is this affecting the guest experience? Is this a positive change or is it a negative change? And sometimes it’s just doing those little tweaks that you see those changes and you measure those impacts as you saw it improved your, your housekeeping scores, right? Probably something which was extremely happy to see. So, you know, obviously implementing the changes is important. Also, seeing the data on the other side and making sure that you’re, it’s resonating with the guests and that’s perfecting the guest experience right there. So, and I’ve also seen some of those events that you’re talking about on the LinkedIn feed, some of those events that you’re talking about with your employees. So that’s really, really represented very well there.
Richard Alberigo:
You, you really gotta make it memorable. And one last thing on that is, we figured out that the first day of an employee’s tenure with you was not getting the attention it deserved. I mean, I’ll be honest with you again, I’ll follow my sword. You know, back in the day our, the first day of a front desk agent, you work with Maria today because Maria will take care of you. And we’d walk away, we had no idea what she was gonna train on. So now we put together day by day checklist for our employees to make sure that those certain things are covered on certain, you know, and it’s time lapse based on the basics to the more advanced stuff. We make sure the first day for the employee is only a four hour day. We make sure that a general leader in the hotel actually has time to have lunch with the employee. And the first day is all bells and whistles. We show ’em around, we introduce, we talk about handbooks and standards and you know, how you clock in. But if it’s a front desk agent, they don’t even look at that computer. They don’t even look at how to check someone in a housekeeper doesn’t even look at a sheet. They don’t look at how to make a bed. They don’t do any of that stuff. It’s all wine and dine. Because we feel like when they go home, the first question they’re gonna get from their family is, how was your first day? And if it’s like, well, okay, you know, let’s see how it goes. That’s not enough. You know, we need to be, these guys are great. They had lunch with me, they showed me around. They, they were cheering for me. This is awesome, right? And that first day is the key, I think, to keeping employees around longer because that first impression, you know, never goes outta style.
Ryan Embree:
And I love that, especially in a time right now where, you know, our industry we’re going through staffing shortages, we’re going through struggling to find workers. So I love that first day mentality, making them feel part of the team. And when you talk about, you know, what this generation, I know we touched on it a little bit, what Gen Z is looking for this, is it being a part of something bigger than themselves. So I’m sure that goes a long way with retention. So that’s really cool to kind of give some insights there on your groups values and cultures around your employees. I wanna shift gears as, as you know, this is a, a hotel marketing podcast. Our company Travel Media Group. We specialize in helping hotels tell their unique stories, whether it’s social media channels, reputation management or review response, Alberigo Hotel Management, very diverse portfolio. You’ve mentioned a couple brands, you know, I’m wondering how do you ensure that each individual hotel is telling its own story, but also staying true to those values? And you know, that consistency that you spoke of prior to.
Richard Alberigo:
Again, I think it, it’s actually talking to the hotel. Our, our regional director of operations, they do one-on-one calls with their general manager once a week. And again, we visit once a month, right? So we’re, we’re talking to the hotels, we’re finding out what they need. Our general leaders will send out a little snapshot every day of the problems they’ve experienced at their hotel. So we kind of know what’s going on in the hotel so we don’t have to waste time picking up the phone and calling the general leader and saying, Hey, you know what happened today, right? That’s a waste of time for both parties and then they, they’re not gonna be ready for it and they’re not gonna tell you cause they don’t remember, right? So they send a little snapshot of three or four things that happen during the day, then we can address the actual problems and don’t waste time with that chit chat call, right? So I think it’s all about building the rapport with them, talking to them, finding out what the problems are, and I think that makes them feel comfortable being a part of our company. And then I, again, that goes down to the, the line level associates, right? So it doesn’t matter what the brand is. I’ve always said, you know, the brands are different systems. That’s the only difference. A hotel is a hotel is a hotel. In the long run, you maybe have some quality assurance standards are a little different, say a Hilton Hotel and a Choice Hotel, but you run the hotel the same. It’s again, it’s consistent. It’s building a rapport with the employees and it’s actually doing what you say you’re gonna do. I mean, when we tell a hotel, we’re gonna do something, we do it and we tell ’em, if we don’t, we want them to call us out. So we’re not too big for our hotels. That’s not like, I’m not gonna call the CEO because my, my phone line is always open. You know, if they, they, I want them to tell me, Richard, you promised XYZ and you didn’t deliver. And I want that. I mean we’re, we’re doing our employee opinion surveys for the first time this year. I’ll be honest with you. There’s a couple of ’em that aren’t too flattering and it’s easy for us to be defensive, but that’s the way we learn. It’s all about communicating. It’s not just communicating with from the hotel level to the guests. It’s us communicating to our leaders and not just doing that token visit every three months because, you know, somebody said, I have to do it because we want to and we know it’s important.
Ryan Embree:
Yeah, that theme of connection is really stemming through this episode for sure with you and your team over there. So again, congratulations on being recognized in such a, a short period of time with, with your group. Feel free to give any secrets away, but what’s next for Alberigo Hotel Management in 2023 and beyond?
Richard Alberigo:
Well, of course we’re always still looking for new hotels. I mean, we feel like that we’re the best value in the industry. I mean, there’s a lot of hotel companies that have 300, 400, 500 hotels. Right now, we have 23 hotels, staff wise can give you that hands on touch looking ahead to 25, 26, 27, you know, we’re probably gonna have 50, 60 hotels, you know, I mean, that’s our goal. But even at that point, if we can’t establish that same visit structure, we visit the properties and has one on one calls every week, then we’re just not gonna accept any more hotels. We’ll just hire more people because we’ve got to continue this structure because we feel that it works. You know, we welcome anyone to sign up with us because we’ve been doing this again for nine years. The hotels that have signed up with us have always felt like we gave them better value than they were before. And you know, that’s the key. And you can sign up with us for different reasons. You can sign, maybe an owner has been running the hotel and they’re just getting tired and they don’t wanna do it anymore. Maybe the brands are starting to put pressure on ’em because they’re not doing XYZ and they need assistance. You know, whatever. Maybe they needed more of a sales effort and they just don’t know where to start. There’s all different reasons why you would sign up for Alberigo Hotel Management. And we’re very versatile and we can tailor contract with them based on their needs. Again, we take pride in what we do and we deal with a lot of word of mouth. So if we don’t do right for a hotel, we know that they’re gonna tell this person, they’re gonna tell that person before, you know, the word gets out, don’t sign up with them. So every hotel’s important with us, whether it be a 60 room hotel in Columbus, Texas, which is a real small town, or the fourth largest city in Houston. They’re all important because word of mouth doesn’t matter how large your city is.
Ryan Embree:
And it goes opposite way, right? With you do right by people and they’re certainly gonna share that story. So sounds like from this episode, I can definitely hear the passion for your group and the industry, Richard. So again, congratulations on everything Alberigo is doing towards the future and we wish you the best, certainly aTMG Hospitality Trailblazer embodiment. Any final thoughts before we close out today?
Richard Alberigo:
Yeah, well I’ll, I’ll try to be a better, hopefully after 2023 I can get back on a roll and start predicting, like, like Nosterdamus. But I, I’ve had, I’ve, I’ll be honest with you, the last three years, it’s like my budget has been thrown in the trash can a couple of times. I’m just like, Richard, is this you, you used to be so good at this, but you know, you know, I, I think that hopefully after 2023 we’ll get kind of back to, you know, semi-normal, whatever that is. Right?
Ryan Embree:
Absolutely. And you know, it’s exactly what you said and I think that’s great advice to our listeners. Do not be afraid to start something new. Try something new. Try an initiative. Obviously go about it the smart way. You know, you don’t want to just kind of just go in without a process or a structure, but if you do things thoughtfully and purposefully and you gauge your success based on real time data, whether that be insights from your guests or even some of the other metrics that you’re looking at in our hospitality, it can give you a really good shot at adapting to this new normal that Richard’s talking about. So Richard, I want to thank you so much for being on the Suite Spot. I wanna thank all of our listeners for today’s episode and we will talk to you next time. To join our loyalty program, be sure to subscribe and give us a 5 star rating on iTunes. Suite Spot is produced by Travel Media Group. Our editor is Brandon Bell with Cover Art by Bary Gordon. I’m your host Ryan Embree, and we hope you enjoyed your stay.
DISCLAIMER Thank you for listening to the Suite Spot. During episode 104, you will hear slight audio distortion due to a disrupted signal connection at the time of recording. We apologize in advance and hope you enjoy the episode.
Host and Marketing Director Ryan Embree and Tom Magnuson of Magnuson Hotels take time to reflect on and analyze the past of the hospitality industry while providing hopeful foresight for the future. They discuss many relevant topics for hoteliers, which means there is no shortage of content and information from this episode.
Suite Spot Podcast · 104 - Hospitality Trailblazers: Thomas Magnuson Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Okay. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, and we are today continuing our TMG Hospitality Trailblazers series. Very excited about the special guests that we have on today. For those that might be just listening for the first time. This is our second series 2021. We really highlighted hospitality heroes, those individual workers that were going above and beyond during the pandemic and sharing their stories on this podcast. In 2022, we're looking towards the future and we're talking with some of the best and brightest in our industry, the people that are paving the way forward and really trailblazing our industry as a whole. And with me today, I think I have a great guest that can speak to that because, he's got a global foot mark on his brand, Mr. Tom Magnuson, the co-founder and CEO of Magnuson Hotels Worldwide. Tom, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Thomas Magnuson: Thank you, Ryan. It's great to be here and to, visit with all of our friends out there who are in the hotel industry.
Ryan Embree: Yeah. And one of the questions that I love to ask, because we have such different answers, is everyone's journey through the hospitality industry. Now, it's not every day that I get to interview someone who founded a brand like Magnuson Hotels. So walk me through that journey, you know, where you started in the hotel industry and ultimately how you founded Magnuson Hotels Worldwide.
Thomas Magnuson: Well, I'm gonna compress about 55 years into about, into about 30 seconds, Ryan. I have a very interesting background. I started working for my father and my grandfather in a small motel, in a little mining town, Wallace, Idaho, up on the Montana border when I was eight years old, I think I just said. So I got a really unique insight, hands on into running and living and breathing, small business ownership of an independent hotel. I spent many years, you know, in the family company, like many people do, you know, working every single job there is. You, do what has to be done, did every job in the house, you know, waited tables, cleaned rooms, front desk, grinded keys in the basement when you had actually actual keys in the old days. But quickly through that path, as the years went on, when I was in actually, in my forties, I came back to help my father retire and he had a handful of hotels still and asked me to kind of package these up for the next phase. And part of that was becoming a Best Western franchisee, a great global company, but it really articulated the struggle of a small, unique hotel to be heard in today's world. And what we found being a franchisee, a unique minded hotel, and a unique market being a franchisee is the struggle of maintaining your identity versus the weight of sameness. That's been perpetuated for, you know, 50 years since, you know, the big brand started coming out with Hilton in the 1950s. And it's also the difficulty of being heard and bein...
Travel Media Group’s Hospitality Trailblazers podcast series is going full speed ahead!
Marketing Director and Host of the Suite Spot Ryan Embree sits down with a very special guest, Chief Operating Officer of Davidson Hospitality Group, Pete Sams!
In this episode, Pete really gives a breath of fresh air to the hospitality industry and provides a behind-the-curtains look at everything going on at Davidson Hospitality Group and what these initiatives mean for their business partners and guests.
Suite Spot Podcast · 103 - Hospitality Trailblazers: Pete Sams Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot podcast. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Got a great episode continuing our Hospitality Trailblazers series. This is the second episode of this series. For those listeners that might not know what this is, we are highlighting and showcasing some of the industry's best and brightest and people and the groups that we're gonna talk about today that are pushing our industry forward. Right? We did a similar series last year where we talked about some of those hospitality heroes, those going above and beyond during the pandemic. Now, as we have a little bit better news and outlook on the future for our industry, we're bringing some of those key members. And with me today, I've got a great guest. He's Chief Operating Officer at Davidson Hospitality Group, Pete Sams. Pete, this is your first time to the Suite Spot. Welcome in.
Pete Sams: Yes. Yes. It's comfortable. Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree: Awesome. Well, let's jump right into it. And it's the first question. Sometimes my favorite, especially with our new guests, you know, we're such in a unique industry where people's stories, you know, really can come from anywhere, right? With hospitality backgrounds. So give us a little bit about your journey and how you ended up here at Davidson Hospitality Group.
Pete Sams: Well, first and foremost, again, great to spend time with you, Ryan, and thanks for including me with such esteemed company. I don't know if Trailblazer is code for vintage or nice way of saying old, but, apparently, as you could see by the white in my beard, I've been around a little while. It's been an amazing journey to be sincere with you, Ryan. I wake up sometimes and just wonder how, how it all came together. But to give you a little bit of color on, on my background, my history, I've surpassed quarter century in the space, probably a little closer to almost 30 years at this point, which is, again, hard to fathom. Like many of my colleagues in our industry, I did not initially anticipate working in, in the hospitality space full-time. And, and as a career, my first role in hotels was I'd gone into the military out of school, served in the, in the US Army overseas, did a tour, drove an M1A1 tank, which I always say prepared me well for a life and hospitality, but getting aside, it's, you know, a spirit to serve. And I do believe in servant leadership and putting others above yourselves, being part of amazing teams. And I think it translates in, in a lot of ways. So, when I exited the military, I had gotten the GI Bill College Fund monies to put myself through school, and I was working as a server waiting tables. I was waiting tables as I was finishing my degree in finance at Corpus Christi, Texas. The first leg of my, my career kind of goes in thirds, first 10 years of my career were in the finance discipline. I got my degree in finance. And while I was finishing school, I actually became a part of the Leader in Development program ...
The first installment of Hospitality Trailblazers on the Suite Spot podcast with Marketing Director/Host Ryan Embree, featuring President of Coakley & Williams and SVP of Business Development at Hotel Equities, Mark Williams!
These two discuss everything from the origin story of Coakley & Williams, navigating the new landscape of the hospitality industry, and what is on the horizon for travel and tourism. Listen now.
Suite Spot Podcast · 102 - TMG Hospitality Trailblazers: Mark Williams Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. And today I teased it in our 100th episode. We are starting a brand new hospitality series called TMG Hospitality Trailblazers. And what this series is all about are those individuals and hotel groups that are really pushing forward our industry, getting some one-on-one insights and perspective on what they're experiencing now and what they see in the future. And I think we have just the embodiment of a hospitality trailblazer today with me, Mark Williams, president of Coakley and Williams, and Senior Vice President of Business Development at Hotel Equities. Mark, this is your first time on the Suite Spot. Welcome in.
Mark Williams: Yeah, great to be here. Thanks so much, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, absolutely. Now what we always like to do with new guests on this podcast, Mark, is ask 'em how they got started in the industry. I know for your personal background, you know, a lot of people just kind of find themselves in the industry, but you actually have hospitality through a couple generations. But tell us that journey that led you to Coakley and Williams and now Hotel Equities as well.
Mark Williams: Yeah, sure. Absolutely. Well, I'll go backwards a little bit and then we'll go forwards from there. So our company, started in 1961. We are a third generation business, which is kind of amazing. I think there's only about like 5%, I forget what the percentages are of businesses that actually make it to the third generation. So for me, that's very humbling and it's an honor to be a part of this, this company, and to work for, a group that's been, you know, started by my grandfather and his partner. They actually were in the construction business. They met, on a rainy day through a mutual acquaintance. They shook hands. They never signed a formal partnership agreement to start the business. It was all really initially based off that handshake, which is really awesome. And that kind of, that spirit of integrity, I feel like has carried itself through our business over the years. They built their first hotel in 1971. It was, it was right off the beltway. They got into the hotel management business because they were doing what they were doing very well. There's a lot of backstory and anytime you're opening things and you're in this business that we're in, there's always funny stories and challenges and there's a lot of funny, interesting stories that happened as they got that off the ground. And so as time went along, you know, we, we got into the hotel management business, and then kind of in the mid nineties, my father bought the management company and there was a construction company as well. There's still Coakley Williams Construction Company that was bought by one of the Coakley sons. And so, so things moved on and they progressed and growing up, I, I never thought that I would be in this business. I thought, yeah, I have, my dad had us working in the hotels, which was great. And I was, you know, doing odd jobs,
Join Suite Spot host Ryan Embree and Chief Technology Officer Jason Lee, as they announce the official launch of TMG OneView multi-language translation!
With this new function, hoteliers who partner with Travel Media Group will have instant access to its brand-new capabilities such as translating online guest reviews into various languages, responding to reviews in native languages, and delivering your hotel voice and tone for international travelers.
Suite Spot Podcast · 101 - Introducing TMG Translations: Multi-Language Review Response
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. Hello, Bueno Dias, Bonjour, I think that is very, very telling for what we are about to talk about in this exciting episode with me today. Very familiar voice and face Jason Lee, our TMG Chief Technology Officer Jason, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: All right. Thanks for having me back, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Typically, when we hear Jason, this means that we've got an exciting new feature to announce and talk about, and that's exactly what we're doing today. We are introducing for the first time ever TMG translations multi-language function within our review response platform respond and resolve. Jason, this is so exciting. This is probably one of the most exciting features we've ever launched with this, this solution. But usually when you come on here, there's some sort of story, right? A lot of the feedback and updates that we do in development that you and your team do Jason, is based on feedback that we receive from hoteliers in real time. So I have to ask, is there some sort of story or reason why this upgrade was necessary and why your team decided to launch this now?
Jason Lee: Yeah, so what's interesting about language and language translation is that there's a lot of dependencies and those dependencies are on the property itself, right? The language that they speak, the person who wrote the review and the language that they speak, the person who is reading the review and the responses on the live site. So there's all of those elements that are out there. And on a lot of the live sites like TripAdvisor and Google, you can actually select language and only see reviews in your language. So you could just read if you were from France and you just wanted to see French reviews about a property, you could actually see that. So being able to credibly translate reviews, create responses and make it all end to end was really important. And so we had elements of that already done, but to make it truly end to end where I pick up the review in the foreign language, I know the properties preference of language to be translated into. I know their preference for the actual review response. So I know that they want it to be either native or I know that they want to have it responded to maybe in English, if that's what their preference was. So let's say it's a scenario like this. The property is an English speaking property. We get a Spanish speaking review. Their response preference is review native meaning respond in the language that the review is written in. Now we respond to that review. Part of our review response process is that the hotel also picks up that response and can approve it and edit it. So we also needed a way for the hotel to be able to edit in the language of the review. So that is what I'm talking about. End to end. We pick up the review, we respond to it in the language preference that the property has. And then we allow the property also to edit that response in that same preference.
Join Suite Spot podcast host Ryan Embree, and listen in to the celebratory 100th episode where we take you, the listener, down memory lane and reflect on all the fascinating content we have covered on the podcast over the last four years, as well as discuss upcoming new content that listeners can look forward to this fall.
Suite Spot Podcast · 100 - Travel Media Group's Suite Spot 100th Episode Celebration
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to the Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. And welcome to the 100th episode of the Suite Spot. Thank you all for joining me. This is your host for the hundredth time, Ryan Embree I'm just so happy that we finally made it to this episode. This is a very humbling experience. You know, we started this podcast, this digital marketing podcast back in 2018. It's just so much support from Travel Media Group and, my teammates over the years. I remember the first episode when we were trying to decide on the name. We had, a couple different names. We landed on the Suite Spot and here we are at episode 100 four years later, just some quick facts before we get started. And we certainly are gonna share some content today, but this podcast is, streamed over SoundCloud, iTunes, Google Podcasts, Spotify. Now over this past, back in 2021 and Stitcher as well, we've got over 50,000 plays and 600 followers from those sites. So again, just so humbled and thankful for all of our listeners out there, wherever you are listening from. So today with episode 100, such a celebratory milestone, I figured what we do today is maybe actually count down some of my favorite and really the most played and popular tracks that we've had over these past a hundred episodes. We covered a lot of topics when it comes to hotel digital marketing. And it's funny to listen back to some of the first couple episodes. The subject matter in which we talk about on the Suite Spot is technology is social media is reputation management for, for hotels, and this technology evolved so quickly. So interesting to go back to those first couple episodes, to see what we were talking about and, and how that really bridges to today and see how much things change. So let's start the countdown, the number one. So we're not gonna work backwards. We're gonna start at number one and work our way down. Number one, actually episode 84, how to market your hotel's breakfast options. And we did not anticipate for this episode to be so popular, but it makes sense, right? One of the things I know I've talked about on this podcast, one of the things that really changed the most during these, these last couple years with the pandemic is how a hotel serves breakfast to his guests. It's a staple. It's something that we're all used to as travelers coming to the property, seeing that breakfast buffet, seeing that waffle maker, sometimes that hot breakfast, that continental breakfast and how that's really changed, right? And obviously it started with the pandemic of a health and safety issue of trying to minimize close contact between your guests and your staff. But then it's kind of also in 2021, 2022 has become a staffing issue, right? A lot of hotels still are struggling with this, and they're not able to staff their breakfast area. They're not able to keep up with the guests that are coming in and out cleaning after them making sure that the food is being refreshed. So, you know, this episode, we took a deep dive into saying not only how to market your breakfast options, but how to set the right expectations of what your breakfast offerings are currently, because there's just such a big spectrum there of where hotels are at.
Join host Ryan Embree and TMG’s Sales Director, Diane Elderkin, as they look at the summer trends we uncovered on our summer virtual roadshow for the hotel industry. From hotel markets in Orlando, Atlanta, and even Dallas, there are some very astounding discoveries we found that will benefit every market across North America.
Suite Spot Podcast · 99 - TMG Virtual Roadshow Summer Travel Trends Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree episode 99. We are one episode away from Suite Spot, 100. Thank you so much for listening. We've got a great show for you. Diane Elderkin is with me today. She's the sales director at travel media group. This episode is titled a TMG virtual road show summer travel trend. So just to give a little bit of background, what we've been doing this summer is our very own virtual road show. So we've, we're headed to five different major markets across the us, and we're gonna look at some things to really help hoteliers grow occupancy and maximize revenue during the busiest travel season of the year. So, first we start out with looking at Google search trends. We look at reputation trends and then dive into the specific, sentiment that guests are leaving on those review sites. And then we talk through how we can use some of that information for social media and marketing and advertising our property to those that are searching to stay in our area. So we are about halfway through. As of right now, we visited major markets like Orlando, which is where our headquarters are located just north of Maitland, Florida, Atlanta, Georgia, and Dallas. So we've done three and we're headed out to San Diego virtually as well as Washington DC. So again, we're at this halfway point and up to this point, we really have uncovered some really, really cool trends in patterns that we're seeing, not just in one market, but across all three. We've got Diane on. We're gonna talk through some of these trends and patterns. I think you're a great guest to bring on Diane because you and your team, you're having conversations with these hotels across the country. So you can really give some really cool insights in commentary on what this means for the hotels and the conversations that you're having on a day to day basis. So let's jump right into it. The first piece and pattern that we were seeing in these virtual road shows should be really, really excellent news for hotels. And I labeled this pattern, revenge travel pent up demand, whatever you wanna call it. It is certainly here. Orlando had 165,000 searches for hotels in Orlando per month. That's 49% year over year Atlanta, 110,000, 50% up year over year and Dallas, 90,000 a month. And that's up 82% year over year. So huge, huge numbers when it comes to travelers searching to get into these markets.
Diane Elderkin: Yeah, it's so crazy to see these, major markets like Orlando, Atlanta, Dallas, start to see these type of numbers because really over the last couple of years, these are the markets that traditionally weren't seeing this, these type of numbers. And, in our experience, what we've been seeing is a lot of the secondary markets get a lot of attention. So a lot of those remote destinations people wanna get a different experience. And so, again, not necessarily these major markets, however, with the summer, you know, we know kids are outta school. People are looking to travel and not only that business travel is starting to come back and companies are starting to send their people out to meet, to network,
Join host Ryan Embree and our very own Respond & Resolve™ Product Manager, Jackie Avery as they celebrate reaching the 1 million guest reviews responded to milestone! This episode details the journey to 1 million, explains how hoteliers can get involved in the next milestone, gives a little sneak peek at a brand new upcoming Respond & Resolve™ upgrade, and so much more! This episode is jammed-packed with exciting information for hoteliers worldwide.
Suite Spot Podcast · 98 - Travel Media Group Celebrates 1 Million Guest Reviews Responded To
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you all for listening. We've got a very celebratory episode, very excited to share with you. Episode 98, we are counting down to episode 100. So again, thank you all for listening, wherever you're listening from. And today of the 98 episodes that we've done so far, we've got a first time guest. So it is my pleasure to introduce Jackie Avery. She's our product manager for our TMG respond and resolve, which is our review response solution for our hotels. Jackie, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Jackie Avery: Thank you. Happy to be here.
Ryan Embree: And I am happy that you are here because we are celebrating some amazing humongous news for you and your team have hit the 1 million mark when it comes to guest reviews responded to online. This is fantastic. Congratulations.
Jackie Avery: Thank you. Yeah, we're so excited over here. It was a huge milestone. Definitely feeling good about it.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely. 1 million guest reviews. It's really hard to fathom to think about that. I know we've been keeping people updated on this podcast as we talk about review response and how important it is on the numbers, but now we've hit that incredible milestone. 1 million. Now this is your first time on here. So why don't you go ahead and kind of talk about your role as product manager for this really important solution for hotels?
Jackie Avery: Of course. So I oversee all of our writers and manager day to day operations. When a new client comes on, I help work with our other departments to ensure a seamless start and a really important part of my job is keeping up to date with industry trends and updates to platforms to ensure that everyone on my team is informed and is up to date as we can be.
Ryan Embree: And you have to, right. I mean, you, you and your team respond to so many online sites across the industry from OTAs, trip advisor, Google, even some social media as well. You've hit a million, that's a lot, I'm sure you know, you've come across your positive and your negative ones that you respond to. What would you say is your favorite part about responding to reviews?
Jackie Avery: I love getting to tell the other side of the story, especially when our clients really involved in this situation, they convey what happened to us. And then I get to take that information and present it in a way that their future guests can understand and relate to. And many hoteliers struggle responding to something, especially when they feel frustrated. And I just really enjoy helping 'em with that part.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely. This is a huge emotional toll and cost that it takes to respond to these reviews, especially if it's a negative one after maybe an eight hour, twelve hour shift that you've done. And someone's essentially calling you out publicly online. So it's not just hard for, for hotels, but anyone to really keep a calm mind when you're responding to these reviews.
Join host Ryan Embree and Aimbridge Hospitality's VP of Digital Marketing, Michael Curran, as they talk all things digital marketing for hotels. They discuss how to keep consistency within a portfolio while still giving each hotel a distinct voice on social media, how to balance "traditional vs. new" social media platforms, how to leverage guest feedback and generate more positive reviews, and more!
Suite Spot Podcast · 97 - Thinking Digitally with Aimbridge Hospitality's Michael Curran
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, a special edition of the Suite Spot. We've got a great guest with us today that I'm gonna be introducing here, but first wanna thank everyone for taking the time to join us on the Suite Spot and listening wherever you are across the country. With me today, I have the vice president of digital marketing for Aimbridge Hospitality, Michael Curran. He has over 27 years of experience in the hospitality digital marketing industry, including names like Walt Disney Parks and Resorts online, Hilton hotels, and for Aimbridge, he works with independent hotel brands, IHG, Hilton, and Marriot, which we're gonna talk about here. He's got extensive background in operations, website and content development, and online media strategy and execution. And I just found out he's one heck of a pinball player as well. So Michael, hello and welcome to the Suite Spot.
Michael Curran: Good morning, Ryan. Happy to be here.
Ryan Embree: Awesome. Well, as we do with all of our new guests on the Suite Spot, tell us a little bit about your background in the industry and maybe the journey that led you to Aimbridge hospitality.
Michael Curran: So I think I'm one of the few people that went to school for this and has made a lifelong career out of it. There are folks that meander in and out of the industry, but I started back in the nineties going to school for this and 27 years later, I'm still here. So yeah, I actually picked up the major on a whim. I started out in broadcasting, found out the people in broadcasting are not the type of people I enjoyed being around . So I dropped that major and I happened to have lunch with the head of the department for hospitality and parks at our university. And he sold me on it. I started with Hilton hotels, property operations. I came up through front desk reservations, revenue management sales. I have tremendous respect for F&B people, but that's the one area I've never worked in because that an incredibly difficult division. But that part didn't do. But I jumped into the online world in 1998 and I'll never forget at the meeting I was in, the regional VP for Hilton was sitting at the end of the table in our daily standup meeting, and picture it in my mind right now, he raised a piece of paper. "Hilton sent me something about this worldwide web. Does anybody want to deal with this?"
Ryan Embree:
Michael Curran: Nobody raised their hand. I'm like, yeah, sure. Why not? So that was it. I never turned back. From that point on I've been on the online part of the industry.
Ryan Embree: Well, that was a good bet to say that that little worldwide web was, was gonna take off and have somewhat of an impact. And yeah, as far as your broadcasting, I mean, here, you do a little broadcasting here, so you're able to kind of do that, but yep. That's something else we have in common. Both of us went to school for hospitality. You rarely hear that though in our industry, you know, it's usually, I just found myself here and kind of jumped into it.
Host Ryan Embree discusses insights and takeaways from Travel Media Group's recent Spring Workshops where he talked one-on-one with hoteliers about their hotel's digital presence. Discover trends in hospitality and learn how you can position your property for success through review response, social media, and reputation management.
Suite Spot Podcast · 96 - Spring Workshop Takeaways
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree, Director of Marketing at Travel Media Group. And we've got a great episode for you today. We do these episodes four times a year because we actually conduct four occupancy workshops for hoteliers. And this season's workshop is titled "Business is Blooming: How to Grow Occupancy this Spring." So this is our spring occupancy workshop. It's one of my favorites because we are coming out of the winter, which is typically a slower time for the industry. And we're finally starting to see that growth and occupancy. Now the springs the past couple years have obviously been a little bit different with the pandemic and coming out of that. But with these workshops, we are talking about positioning your hotel digitally for success when travelers are searching and they're doing quite a bit of searching, which we'll talk about here in second.
Ryan Embree: So again, these are occupancy workshops where we meet one-on-one with hoteliers in about a 15 to 20 minute session talking about the hotel's digital presence. How are they positioning themselves coming into the season of spring break, holidays, May, Memorial day, a lot of great things in the spring and really setting ourselves up also for the summer where occupancy really heats up. So with these episodes, what we like to do is, typically when I conduct these workshops, we get some really good takeaways and insights from the hoteliers that we talk about some common themes and threads. So in the past, obviously we've talked about the staffing shortage right now, which has been hurting a lot of people. This is our third time doing a spring occupancy workshop. Again in 2020 and 2021, there were very different conversations, which leads me to our first trend that we noticed this workshop versus others, which was the positivity of the hoteliers that we were talking to. The optimism that was out there, that travel is returning.
Ryan Embree: And as I talk about these travelers doing searches, you know, I've got a really amazing stat that we came across, where it says U.S. organic Google search visit growth by industry in Q4 of 2021 versus Q4 in 2020. And the percentage change for travel was at 41%. So that is a lot of eyes looking and planning and being inspired to travel once again. But as I caution the hoteliers that I spoke to on this workshop, they're gonna be looking at your hotel's digital presence a lot differently than they did pre-COVID-19 and pre-pandemic. But trend number one, occupancy is growing. It's here. Whether we like it or not, transient leisure has always been there the past couple years and has been leading the pack in recovery, but we're also seeing business, weddings come back. So we'll talk a little bit about that later, but the second trend that I noticed on these conversations that I was having is, you know, we have been as an industry running around, it feels like, trying to figure out what to do to adjust to this pandemic, this new normal that COVID has kind of ushered into our industry.
Ryan Embree: And then on top of that, you have this staffing shortage, right?
After years of postponing, couples are eager to tie the knot and the demand for weddings is skyrocketing. Host Ryan Embree discusses how hotels can position themselves to capture market share and secure bookings from both engaged couples and wedding guests. Listen now!
Suite Spot Podcast · 95 - How to Attract Weddings to Your Hotel
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree, and we've got a great episode for you today. For a subject matter that hoteliers have really been missing out on the past two years, and I'm sure guests and travelers have as well. And that's weddings. The pandemic obviously had a huge impact on group business and that included weddings. We saw a lot of couples postpone their weddings to later in the year or later down the line. And it's having a huge impact on occupancy. But now as we see ourselves getting further and further through this pandemic and see that kind of light at the end of the tunnel, we see more and more people now reaching out. And those couples that postponed, they're ready to get married and we're seeing those guests now feel more and more comfortable coming and staying at our hotel.
Ryan Embree: So that's what this episode is all about: how to attract more weddings to your hotel and how to leverage your digital marketing and doing it. So before we get started in this episode, a couple quick stats on what we're seeing with weddings. So this is according to the Knot, "wedding venues near me," search terms are up 200% since the thick of the pandemic and there are forecasted to be 2.6 million weddings in 2022. I am sure the hoteliers listening to this are very, very happy to hear that news and those statistics. And that means a lot of occupancy opportunity. But again, these guests, these brides, these grooms, when they decide to potentially make a wedding block or even pick your hotel as their wedding venue, they're going to be doing more research than ever. They're gonna be doing their due diligence, especially when the stakes are this high, when it's your wedding day, you know, you think about it.
Ryan Embree: So, so what we're gonna do is we're gonna kind of break this episode up into two unique sections. The first would be to how to actually use digital marketing to attract the happy couple, right? The brides and grooms that are looking to potentially either again, pick your hotel as the wedding venue itself if you have location and venue space for them, or even if they're looking for a wedding block, but there's also the other side to it, of our wedding guests and what guests that might not have traveled over the past two years are gonna be looking for in order to make them feel comfortable. Because as we'll talk about later, if, if they do not feel comfortable, there is no wedding block discount that's going to make them stay at your hotel versus picking a competitor. No discount offered there that, again, is gonna give you the upper hand.
Ryan Embree: So we're gonna talk about those two ways and we're gonna kind of break it down into what our digital marketing expertise here at Travel Media Group is: social media, reputation management, and responding to reviews. So we'll start with reputation management when it comes to attracting brides and grooms, and the best way that we can do that is through word of mouth. Through case studies, testimonials from past couples that maybe have used our hotel as a wedding venue and are very, very happy with the experience that they received. The more recent, obviously, the better,
Join host Ryan Embree and first-time Suite Spot guest Sammie Snapp, a social expert here at Travel Media Group, as they dive into the world of Instagram reels. Learn how hotels can leverage reels to expand their reach and boost engagement, as well as what kind of content hotels should be posting in order to stand out. Discover actionable ways to elevate your hotel’s social media strategy today!
Suite Spot Podcast · 94 - Instagram Reels For Hotels Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check-out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you all for listening and joining me today, wherever you are listening to us from. Now, usually on the Suite Spot, we are talking about all the exciting updates and advancements that we have at Travel Media Group, but as social media experts, we are also in the know when it comes to new updates and features that happen across digital marketing platforms. And that's exactly what this episode is all about. We are talking about Instagram reels today. So with me today to talk about this really exciting new feature from Instagram, I wanna welcome for the first time, Sammie Snapp. Now, Sammie is a social expert on our social media team. She's a social media content analyst that works directly with our hotels, creating content and really helping our hotels effectively run their social media campaign. So Sammie, without further ado, let me welcome you to the Suite Spot.
Sammie Snapp: Hi, I'm so excited to be here with you guys today and I'm excited to dive into it.
Ryan Embree: Yeah. And so again, we're talking about Instagram reels. Before we get off and running, because there's a lot to this update, let's first just answer the basic question, right? What are Instagram reels?
Sammie Snapp: So Instagram reels are a new feature that has just been added to the platform pretty recently within the last year or so. And it's basically a tool to utilize up to 60 second video content. Very, very similar to the TikTok app that has blown up in the past, I guess, two years since 2019-2020.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, I think the stat on that, the incredible stat that we heard at the end of 2021, was almost that, I believe this is correct, where there were more people searching on TikTok or using TikTok than they were on Google. It surpassed Google as the most used site, which is just absolutely incredible to think. So it's no wonder that Instagram kind of reached in and created this because of the popularity that TikTok has over the years.
Sammie Snapp: Absolutely.
Ryan Embree: Yeah. So what we're here, obviously Suite Spot is a hotel, digital marketing podcast, all about hotels, for hotels. So let's talk about how Instagram reels fit inside of our industry.
Sammie Snapp: So reels have a ton of benefits. The biggest benefit for the hotel industry is gonna come from the explore page and the explore page, if you wanna equate it to TikTok, it's very similar to the For You page. It's gonna show just any random user on Instagram, things that they might like, things suggested to them. And for, for the hotel industry, they're gonna show up on these explore pages for people that might not necessarily be following them. So the biggest thing for the hotel industry is that this is gonna bring in a lot more engagement and a lot more views. They might not otherwise have gotten to their hotel page from outside of just their following.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, that's absolutely critical. I, I don't think we can stress that enough, right? Because right now we work with hotels to kind of build their fo...
Host Ryan Embree and Jason Lee, VP of Product and Development unveil TMG’s Social 2.0 platform for hoteliers. This re-designed, intuitive platform has new features that make creating and posting content, as well as analyzing engagement and reach, easier than ever before. Discover how you can leverage Social 2.0 to improve your hotel’s social media strategy. Listen now!
Suite Spot Podcast · 93 - Social 2.0 Launch Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree. We have a very frequent guest and this typically means one thing when he is on. And that means another Travel Media Group upgrade and innovation, but I will let Jason, our vice president of product development and technology, announce this super exciting new launch that Travel Media Group, I know, has been working so hard on. So, Jason, what have you got up your sleeve for us?
Jason Lee: Well, thank you, Ryan. It's always awesome to be on these podcasts and to talk about our solutions and social media is really what we're talking about today. And we have relaunched our social media solution and suite and done it in a way that takes a lot of the items that have been discussed with hoteliers, like hopefully the people that are listening to this, and management companies, things that are missing from the suite, things that could make the solution more effective and we've added them into our brand new launch of social 2.0. So if you have our current social solution and you come back into OneView and access it, you're gonna see some very different pages, some very different looks and, and a lot more functionality and transparency inside of our social process. So that's, what's here.
Ryan Embree: Awesome. Awesome. And, and before we jump into all these really cool updates and innovation that we put into this, just to reiterate something that I think is super important is a lot of the things that you do on that development side is based upon feedback that we're hearing from both hotel partners and large hotel groups out there. We know that that has become an insanely hard space to kind of manage, and groups are always looking for this type of consistency across their portfolio. Yet they have to juggle different sort of brands within a portfolio, maybe to different scales. So they've got so many variables, they're looking for places of consistency. So when, when you and your team went about doing this, that's exactly what you set out to do is create some consistency there. Can you speak a little bit more to that feedback that you're hearing and maybe how you're able to streamline it for those hotel groups specifically?
Jason Lee: Yeah, I think what really, what it comes down to, I mean, we get feedback all along, you know, when, whenever we launch something or whenever we add a new group into our company and we're able to kind of get their ideas, they see it for the first time and they're like, oh, it'd be cool if it did this. Or I'd like it if it did that. And so a lot of things, I definitely, in those situations, I've got a notebook filled with stuff and it still actually has quite a few things that didn't even make it into this release, but in this case, it was really about how can I take more control or how can I get my property, so if I'm at a management company and I want my individual hotels to take part in social media, what is it that they can do in a way where it's like, they're not spending their days posting all day long, but yet they can still be involved in the process.
Jason Lee:
Host Ryan Embree discusses ways hoteliers can help attract employees in the midst of the staffing shortage by focusing on their digital presence. From reputation management to social media to review responses, hoteliers need to make sure their hotel is giving the right impression not just to guests, but to future staff as well. Listen now to learn what you can do to help combat the staffing crisis at your hotel.
Suite Spot Podcast · 92 - How Your Hotel's Digital Presence Impacts Recruiting and Staffing Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for joining me and listening in. We've got a great episode for you today. And today we're gonna be talking about recruiting and hiring. Now I'm sure this is a conversation that you've had with a lot of your teams right now. I know we are hearing it all over the country. Where can I find employees? We are just looking for more and more hospitality professionals to fill our front desk staff, to fill our management teams. Management groups out there looking for people. We had just gotten over this just devastating pandemic to our industry, and now we have this staffing crisis. Hotels cannot find people right now to work. So what this episode is talking about is how your hotel's presence impacts recruiting and hiring. Now I know that is a weird correlation.
Ryan Embree: Your hotel's digital presence, things like social media, reviews, even review response, but this has an impact. And that's what we're gonna talk about today. But first we'll start off with a quick couple stats. Now, hospitality employment is still down 1.2 million jobs from where it was in February 2020. 1.2 million, which is so sad because this is a people-serving-people industry. So when we can't find the people to give these great hotel experiences, we obviously see that impacted every single day and, and could impact vacations and, and the, just the overall guest experience. So call it the great resignation, call it whatever. The hotel industry is a loss of 7.2% of its workforce. Now that's compared to 2% for the rest of U.S. jobs. So hospitality has been extremely impacted from this staffing shortage, and it's just so difficult to get people again, to work for our hotels.
Ryan Embree: So it's an employee job market. As you can imagine, employees are getting to pick where they want to work. They're going to do their due diligence before signing on, and that's where your hotel digital presence comes into play. So today what we're gonna do is we're gonna discuss the way again, your digital presence impacts recruiting and the first place we'll start is reputation management. Now just like Glassdoor, employees are going to check your hotel's reviews to see where they're gonna be working. They're gonna ask the question, "What will my day in the life look like at this property?" Now, a really good exercise that I would suggest to you, the hotelier, is to go to your hotel's reviews online. So think about Glassdoor, right? When someone's looking to potentially sign on and become an employee, they go check reviews for that company on the website Glassdoor.
Ryan Embree: So of course, employees are gonna do this for your hotel because there's public reviews online about your hotel experience there. So the exercise would be, is read all of those reviews and imagine that instead of them being reviews, imagine being behind the front desk and hearing that feedback directly from your guests. How many times is that guest complimenting you?
In 2021’s edition of the Suite Spot, we welcome Travel Media Group’s President, Dana Singer, to the podcast. Host Ryan Embree reflects with Dana on the challenges and successes of this past year.
Dana reviews some of the adjustments that Travel Media Group has continued to make in response to the changing landscape of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the digital marketing landscape for hotels. Ryan and Dana discuss innovations launched by the Travel Media Group product development team and the role TMG played in hotel recovery. Dana also shares what she is most excited about and hopeful for in 2022 as the hotel industry continues to bounce back.
Suite Spot Podcast · 91 - 2021 In Review with Dana Singer Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to the Suite Spot. This is Ryan Embree, your host, and happy new year. We've got a great first episode of 2022 for you. We've done this on an annual basis, and it's one of my favorite episodes that we do every single year. As we enter a new year, we're closing out 2021, but we're excited for the prospects of what 2022 has to offer. We've seen a lot of great momentum going in after a busy, busy holiday, according to some of the STR data out there. And with me today, I wanna bring in the president of Travel Media Group, Dana Singer. Dana, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Dana Singer: Thanks Ryan. It's fantastic to be back with you.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, and we're bringing you on again because we did this last year, and we got such a great response from it. And I think it's just so important as we move into this new year to not only, obviously, look towards the future in 2022 and, and what's on the horizon for the, the hotel industry and Travel Media Group, but also reflect back on 2021 and look at everything that we've been able to overcome and accomplish. So that's exactly what this episode is about. So I'm gonna kind of start us off in, in a very similar situation where we were last year, Dana, just to reset. You know, we started this, this episode last year, talking about adjustments that Travel Media Group made in response to the pandemic. Can you talk about how those adjustments kind of evolved in 2021?
Dana Singer: You know, while 2020 was all about pivoting to respond to the pandemic, 2021 shifted to how we could best support our clients and partners in the recovery. We all know the pandemic hit the hospitality industry hard. Stay at home orders and the fear of the virus kept so many from, from traveling and it negatively impacted so many businesses that rely on travel, especially hotels. So in 2021, with the rollout of vaccines, optimism began to prevail. We began thinking in terms of both the recovery and innovation mindset and how we could help hoteliers transition and effectively capture the renewed travel demand that was building throughout the year. And one of the ways that we adjusted during this time was by hosting seasonal digital workshops. And our goal was to connect with hoteliers through these one-on-one sessions and provide insights on, on how they could capture market share faster than their competition by leveraging digital marketing tools to really put their best foot forward with their online reputation and social media.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, I think that's well said. I mean, any hotelier that's listening to this podcast right now can probably agree with me in saying that from Travel Media Group to the hotel, this is not the same business or hotel that came into 2020. We've had to adapt and shift and really be versatile. And the industry has, has had to do that as well.
In this episode of Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree covers key insights and takeaways from Travel Media Group's winter workshop. After talking with many hoteliers over the course of the workshop, Ryan has found some common themes and gives advice to other hoteliers out there on how they can prepare for 2022.
Suite Spot Podcast · 90 - Winter Workshop Takeaways
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello, everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you all for joining me today for episode 90 of the Sweet Spot. This is a special edition of the Suite Spot. This is actually the second edition of what we call one-on-one digital marketing workshop takeaways. So for those that are not familiar, at Travel Media Group, we put on seasonal marketing workshops for hoteliers. We theme them every single season: spring, summer, fall, and of course, winter, which we just completed. So this workshop was called "Create an Occupancy Flurry", and we've got some sort of takeaways and insights from the hotels and groups that I was speaking to during these workshops. So that's what this episode is all about. I'll give you some key insights and really just patterns and trends that we've uncovered during these digital one-on-one workshops.
Ryan Embree: So the first trend that we're gonna take a look at is, and I just love to see it, the optimism coming into 2022, especially around key groups like business and extended stays. Hoteliers are anticipating the return of these two segments, which have almost completely disappeared over the last couple years. We have been leaning so heavily on those leisure travelers as a crutch to kind of fill our rooms. In 2022, a lot of hoteliers that I talked to had the feeling that this business travel was going to return. These, these stays that might have just been maybe one or two nights might be into extended stays. And part of that is because of what we've talked about with bleisure happening. So business and leisure kind of blending together. Some people taking an extended vacation, maybe on a Thursday night, because they're really able to work from anywhere.
Ryan Embree: We've talked about that in this podcast, how that hybrid workspace is, is really gonna benefit hoteliers because it could extend someone's vacation a couple extra nights. So with that optimism for business, a lot of the things that we talked about to hoteliers in these workshops were optimizing on places like LinkedIn. Think about how many weddings got canceled, rescheduled. Annual events that have been going on for decades had been canceled. This is your opportunity to promote your hotel, to try to capture some of that pent-up demand. LinkedIn is the channel for that. That's where all of your event planners are going to be. That's where your wedding planners are gonna be joining your local business associations. It, it could lead to a lot of revenue and a lot of bookings, one particular wedding block is not just one room, that's going to relay into a whole mess of bookings.
Ryan Embree: So LinkedIn and being active on that site is gonna absolutely be crucial in 2022. That's where the decision-makers are, especially for these groups. So if you're looking to see what type of trade shows and events are coming your way, LinkedIn is a great spot for that. And it's gonna be the hoteliers are jumping on that trend that are really gonna take advantage as business travel starts to return. The second trend that we uncovered in this workshop really still had to do with staffing. Now, the last digital workshop that we had in the f...
In this episode, host Ryan Embree takes a look at the types of compelling posts that you can create around the winter season in order to engage travelers who are traveling for the holidays. These valuable tips can help grow your hotel's social media account and secure more bookings. If you're interested in learning how Travel Media Group can help your hotel's social media, click here: https://www.travelmediagroup.com/services/social-media/
Suite Spot Podcast · 89 - 12 Days of Social Tips for Hotels Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for joining and listening wherever you are out there. We've got a really fun episode for you. I love this time of year. It is dubbed the most wonderful time of the year. For some hotels, this is actually where occupancy picks up a little bit. Obviously, winter is not our favorite season. That's when that occupancy slows down, but around the holidays, you might be seeing a spike in occupancy and people traveling now, especially in comparison to last year, more and more people getting out there. So what we thought we'd do today, I'm sure a lot of people, if not everyone, has heard of the 12 days of Christmas, well, this episode, we're going to be talking about the 12 ways to engage travelers on social media. So that was kind of the idea behind this.
Ryan Embree: We're going to give our listeners some social tips and ideas for this holiday season, and maybe some ways to kind of spice up your social media feed for your hotel, and hopefully get some new travelers to follow you during this time. It's such a great time for hotels, especially to market and advertise themselves on social media. I tell hotels this all the time: it only takes that one second for someone to follow your page in order to really connect with them in perpetuity. So if you can just put one post together, that's engaging, that they like, maybe even one of these ideas that we talked through today, when they click that follow button, every single time you post, whether it's in the winter, the summer, the weekday, the weekend, they are going to be seeing that content. So it's just so important to be creative, but also consistent because that's when you'll lose followers as well. If you have too little consistency and they don't find your page interesting anymore.
Ryan Embree: So let's jump into it. We've got 12 to cover today. So the first one is really about posting about local community holiday events. Now, last year, we might've not been able to post about these events. They've been postponed. We had a spike in COVID cases around this time, but a lot of the time, what we're seeing is these community holiday events are coming back. So tree lighting ceremonies, ice skating rinks, local Christmas light hotspots. So even if you are in a place where the restrictions might be a little tighter, you know there's always those houses in the local area that really go big for this holiday season. So trying to figure where those are and sharing it on your social media. One of the things I would suggest, we've talked about it a couple of times on this podcast, is maybe going back a couple of years and looking at some of the events that you posted in the past. 2020 might not be the best base for you because, again, a lot of these events were canceled.
Ryan Embree: So going back and figuring out which ones are returning and making a big deal of it. This could be the way that a traveler or follower finds out information about this,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree and Product Director Patrick O'Brien discuss the top 5 sentiment tags of 2021. With the end of the year drawing near, now is a great time for hoteliers to look back at the data so they can make informed decisions about their hotels going into the new year. Listen and discover as Ryan and Patrick break down the numbers and provide valuable insights. If you are interested in learning how Travel Media Group's advanced sentiment reporting can help your hotel, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 88 - Top 5 Sentiment Tags 2021 Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is one of my favorite episodes that we do every single year. I believe this is now the third year that we've done this with one of my favorite guests, as well. You've heard him on the Suite Spot before, but we're going to welcome him back today, Patrick O'Brien, our Product Director at Travel Media Group. Patrick, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Patrick O'Brien: Thanks so much, Ryan. I'm glad to be here.
Ryan Embree: So let's talk a little bit about what we're going to be doing today. As you've heard on this podcast, Travel Media Group, we are one of the leaders in reputation management, as well as responding to reviews all over the hospitality industry. And with that comes a lot of data. We are just so focused on helping hotels with their reviews that we read quite a number of them throughout the course of an entire year. We actually go the extra mile and looking at specific sentiment tags. So what we do on this episode is we give you, the listener, a really great idea about over the course of 2021, what are guests talking about? What are the top five tags that guests are mentioning in their reviews? And we go even further and dive into how they're feeling. So to give you an idea of the sheer number of reviews that we're talking about, Patrick, I always love to ask because I just think it's so fascinating and pretty incredible to look over the course of a year. How many reviews is your team responding to just a month?
Patrick O'Brien: So, yeah, so this year has been really interesting for our team as we have seen review flow pick back up as the year's progressed to be really more in line with 2019. We had our highest month in July and we responded to right around 22,000 reviews that month. And it's, it's stayed pretty steady throughout the year. You know, the first couple of months were a little bit slower, but starting around March, everything really started to pick back up. But to put that in perspective in July of 2019, our hotels in the Respond and Resolve program, averaged 59 reviews for the month and in July of 2021, they averaged 57 reviews. So we are definitely starting to see a return to the pre-pandemic review flow.
Ryan Embree: You know, it was so interesting as, obviously, the pandemic started to come across the country, to see all these different metrics engages to see how the industry was doing. Obviously, the important ones that hoteliers were looking for was occupancy and ADR and how that was impacting their just overall bottom line. But you also start to see that in review flow. So it's a very, very comforting fact to know that not only are our guests coming back in this recovery, but they're starting to leave more feedback. And we've talked about on this podcast before the importance of feedback and how that can lead to a blueprint and perfecting that guest experience. So part of perfecting that guest experience is to actually not just see the ...
In the second and final part of this special edition of the Suite Spot, we continue to help hotels fill their 2022 calendars and strategize social campaigns. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Client Success Team Lead, Aislynn Roberts, to cover the summer and fall seasons. Listen and learn as we discuss planning posts around: holidays, events, hotel amenities/features, and local stories. If you are interested in learning more about how Travel Media Group can help plan your hotel’s social calendar, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 87 - Planning Your Hotel's 2022 Social Calendar Part II Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is part two of two of our episode: Planning Your Hotel's Social Calendar for 2022. If you missed part one, we already reviewed the winter and spring seasons for the 2022 year. In this episode, we are going to continue the conversation with Aislynn for our summer and fall months. Enjoy. Let's keep it rolling as we head into the summer. I know we've got a couple of major holidays. The kids are out of school. Let's talk about holidays in the summer.
Aislynn Roberts: Yeah. Great. So summer's really great time. As you mentioned, kids are out of school, so there's a little bit more time available for parents and families to do things. So when we're talking about holidays, you have Father's Day, 4th of July. So there's always a really great opportunity where you can showcase those holidays to invite people to come in for an extended weekend or celebrate dad this year and book a stay with us, type of posts. A great way to highlight the holiday. So it's easy to do, but also you can promote something about the property, a feature or an amenity in the same time. And then you have some smaller holidays. Like, for instance, in July, there's an All-American pet photo day. Simple posts to share a photo of your pet or a pet and ask your followers to share photos of their own pets. Quick and easy to do and it could yield high activity because people love to share photos of their pets and they love to see photos of other people's pets. So while you're getting this really great fun, simple post out there, you also have the opportunity to promote your property being pet friendly and that all pets are welcome. And we can't wait to see your four-legged family friends.
Ryan Embree: Yes. If you ever want to get some quick engagement on a post, all you have to do is find the nearest pet and post that on social media, because I guarantee you are going to get a lot of likes and share. People, like you said, Aislynn, they are obsessed with their pets. But really summer just feels like an entire holiday in itself. You know, it is never a bad time to post about it being summer. This is when we are the busiest in our industry. So making sure that we are hosting, you know, encouraging and inspiring travel is so important and that kind of overflows into the event side. Right, Aislynn?
Aislynn Roberts: Yeah, absolutely. So like you said, there's always something going on during the summer months. And in fact, a lot of artists who actually had concerts and tours booked for 2020 that they had to cancel, they've already rebooked either for the end of 2021 and leading into 2022. So there's going to be so much more happening in the new year than we had in the last two years. So definitely take a look at what's planned for your area. Sports venues are always really big. You have a lot going on with those teams that are either local, whether they're professional or even sometimes we have,
In part 1 of 2 of this special edition of the Suite Spot, we help hotels start to fill their 2022 calendars and strategize social campaigns. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Client Success Team Lead, Aislynn Roberts to cover the winter and spring seasons. Listen and learn as we discuss planning posts around: holidays, events, hotel amenities/features, and local stories. Check out part 2 when Ryan and Aislynn cover the summer and fall months. If you are interested in learning more about how Travel Media Group can help plan your hotel’s social calendar, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 86 - Planning Your Hotel's 2022 Social Media Calendar Part I Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot. Where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot podcast. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening, wherever you are listening from. Got a great episode, as always, for you today. I cannot believe it, but it is October of 2021, which means we are headed into the last quarter of this year and headed into a brand new 2022. We've had a rough couple years, but we are looking with some optimism and looking forward to next year. So with me today to talk about 2022, because we can never start planning early enough for next year, is Client Success Team Lead, Aislynn Roberts. Aislynn, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Aislynn Roberts: Thanks, Ryan. Happy to be back.
Ryan Embree: As I've mentioned before, we've got a great episode, but what we're going to be talking about today is helping our listeners plan their 2022 social calendar for their hotel. This is something that is extremely important to do at least at some point before going into the new year. Now we're not going to go over every single specific post that you need to be doing for an entire year's worth, but I thought it would be helpful to go ahead and roll through some of the seasons. We know how seasonal this industry is, and then we'll share some tips and best practices to help fill your calendar and give you some tips along the way. That sound like a plan, Aislynn?
Aislynn Roberts: Yeah. Sounds great.
Ryan Embree: Awesome. Well, let's start with the winter; somewhat of a slower month. Aislynn, where do we start when we're, when we're starting to plan that social calendar for winter 2022?
Aislynn Roberts: Definitely, when you're getting started with content, I like to recommend to my partners to start with the big stuff, the stuff that's known, it's pretty easy to talk about. So when we look at that, it's always holidays, right? So what holidays are happening during the winter: New Year's Eve, New Year's Day, you got Christmas, Christmas Eve, Hanukkah is also during winter, and then you move into smaller holidays that are maybe like three-day weekends. You have President's Day, Columbus day. Occasionally some people, some regions observe that and some don't and then also Martin Luther King, Jr weekend. So when we're talking about social content, it's always great to post about those major holidays because it's something everyone pretty much knows about. They might be planning an extended weekend trip or thinking about it. They get an extra day off of work or during those times. So it's really easy to create content and plan for them. But you also want to think about some of the smaller days. There is a national day of calendar that you can just pull great inspiration from to always fill your social media content calendar up. So for instance, in January alone, you have National Trivia Day and Plan for Vacation Day is the last Tuesday in January. These are really great content ideas just to dri...
In this special edition episode of Suite Spot, we recap the recent 2021 Lodging Conference, which took place at the beautiful JW Marriott Desert Ridge Resort in Phoenix, AZ. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Travel Media Group’s Director of Enterprise Sales, Danielle Rummel, as they analyze the current state and future of the post-pandemic hotel industry. Listen and learn as they discuss shifting guest expectations, emerging trends, and how to overcome labor challenges. This episode is a great way to get insight into what the road to recovery for the hospitality industry looks like for hoteliers.
Suite Spot Podcast · 85 - Lodging Conference 2021 Special Edition Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for listening. Today we've got a special edition of the Suite Spot and I am so excited. I've been waiting for a couple years to finally do one of these, episodes again. We used to do them all the time. As I've mentioned on this podcast before, Travel Media Group, we are at the forefront of digital marketing in the hotel industry. So we are trying to get to every single conference out there to try to figure out the trends, what is going on in the hotel industry. And one of the best conferences and events year after year continues to be the Lodging Conference out in Arizona. So 2021 gave us the opportunity to attend that conference. And with me today, I have Danielle Rummel. She is the Director of Enterprise Sales at Travel Media Group. Danielle, first off, welcome to the Suite Spot.
Danielle Rummel: Thank you so much for having me, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Yeah. And this is your first time here on the Suite Spot, but not your first time to the Lodging Conference. So I want to go ahead and start off. We always love to do these kind of recap episodes with these live events, because we know hoteliers might not be able to make it out to all of these events that we're going to. So let's start off just from maybe a macro level, Danielle, and just talking about, maybe, what was the big theme? Cause there always seems to be this theme and topic from these events. What was this year's theme?
Danielle Rummel: Well, I think nobody's going to be surprised by this, but the theme of this year's conference was definitely resilience and our industry has been hit hard by the global pandemic with COVID and that is no surprise to anyone. We've also been hit hard in the past by the economy in 2008, when the economy fell, as well as in 9/11. And much to everybody's surprise, we recovered then. And I think it's safe to say that we are the only ones not surprised this time that we are on our way back and we are as resilient as ever. And it's very exciting to be in this industry now, as we come back and look at all of the opportunities, how much everything has evolved, how we have been forced to change, but potentially make some changes for the better to improve guest experience and improve on everything that we are offering. So it was really exciting to be at the Lodging Conference, we had 1,900 attendees, so that was one of the largest conferences we've seen yet. And everybody was so excited to just see people face-to-face, in-person and really get out there and talk about what we've experienced, collaborate with each other on what we see moving forward and ways that we can really support not only each other, our owners management companies, vendors, but really support guests in this exciting time as they get back on the road.
Ryan Embree:
In this episode of the Suite Spot, Host Ryan Embree discusses how hotels can market their breakfast offerings in order to set and exceed expectations for future guests. Hotel breakfast was one of the most impacted pieces of the guest experience during the pandemic and it’s critical for hoteliers to communicate accurate messaging and information surrounding breakfast offerings for travelers moving forward. Ryan shares some innovative ideas around how to market your hotel’s breakfast amenity on social media and how to leverage online review response as an effective communication tool. This episode is a great resource for hoteliers looking to relaunch and refresh their breakfast options for 2022 and beyond. If you are interested in learning more about how Travel Media Group can help market your hotel’s breakfast options or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 84 - How to Market Your Hotel's Breakfast Options Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you so much for listening wherever you are listening from out there. We've got a great episode for you today. It's just myself, but we're going to be talking about really just a minor piece of the travelers' hotel experience with some major, major implications. In fact, we do an annual episode counting down the top five sentiment tags that our professional review response team identifies and uncovers in guest reviews of all of our hotel partners' reviews that we respond to. So we are talking more than a hundred thousand reviews that we are responding to annually. We take all of that data and we look at those sentiment tags and we uncover the top five. We're actually going to be having our 2021 episode here within the next couple episodes.
Ryan Embree: But back in 2020, one of those tags was breakfast. As I mentioned before, very small piece of the traveler experience, but such an impact on the entire stay. Breakfast has become almost this expectation for a lot of hotels; that free hot breakfast is such a feature and amenity that can't be overstated to a guest. But an extremely popular tag, even in the times of 2020, where we didn't see a lot of travelers come through, this was a hot subject because hotels really had to rethink the breakfast experience at their property. Now, prior to COVID, you know, you could have business travelers sitting there with a cup of coffee in the morning and newspaper, kind of taking their time, a family enjoying their breakfast, you know, pancakes, waffles, everything like that, breakfast buffets, all of that good stuff. But now the game has kind of changed there. Hotels had to go to breakfast on the go.
Ryan Embree: They still had to provide breakfast to their guests, but in a different light. Now in 2021, as the Delta variant is making a huge impact on hospitality, and as we enter the fall and winter months, the expectations for breakfast has completely changed from traveler to traveler. We've mentioned this in multiple podcasts, a lot of the educational webinars that I'm doing right now, the spectrum of guest expectations are all over the place. It's never been like this in the history of the industry before. You could have a traveler walk into your hotel lobby expecting that hot breakfast buffet like they had before, back in 2019 and prior. And they don't want to change in that breakfast experience. And then you could have the guests right after come into your lobby and want a breakfast on the go.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we celebrate another exciting solution update launch with Host Ryan Embree and VP of Product & Technology, Jason Lee. Ryan and Jason roll out and explore the new advanced sentiment analysis and reporting for hotels.
The episode starts with Jason defining what review sentiment is and what was behind his team’s initiative to enhance Travel Media Group’s sentiment analytics and reporting. Ryan and Jason then walk through several use cases for leveraging sentiment analysis and how hoteliers could use this data to make better operational and capital decisions for their property. They wrap up the episode talking about how this new update fits in TMG’s suite of reputation solutions and how much it will cost hotel partners.
If you are interested in finding out more about Travel Media Group’s new advanced sentiment analytics or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 83 - Advanced Sentiment Analysis and Reporting
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening, wherever you are listening from out there. We've got another jam-packed, exciting episode for you today. With me today, is a very familiar guest, you've heard his voice on here and with this guest typically comes some very cool, exciting new news. Jason Lee, Vice President of Product Development and Technology at Travel Media Group. Jason, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: All right. Thank you, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, and we've got some exciting updates to announce on this episode and it all starts with sentiment analysis and a complete revamp and upgrade and advanced reporting for the sentiment analysis for reviews. So Jason, before we jump into these updates, I want to just start at a basic level. We've done it before, but I think it's best to reset and explain to some of our listeners, what exactly is sentiment analysis when we're talking about hotel's online reviews?
Jason Lee: Okay, so when you think about sentiment, you think about what is maybe the mood of the person writing the review, right? That could be part of sentiment, like, is this person satisfied? Is this person unhappy/happy? Are they a mix of emotions, right? So there's that part of sentiment, but then there's also the other parts of it, which detail what caused that emotion. So we use something that a lot of people use, especially in machine learning or AI, which is natural language processing. So it basically takes all of this text. So you have tons and tons of text that guests have given you over time. And we take that text and then we're able to break that down into various layers. So one layer would be the sentiment of that text, which would be whether someone, whether someone was maybe generally happy or unhappy, but then we could then break it into elements. And then where there, they might be happy, neutral, or unhappy with those elements. So, so it kind of starts with natural language processing and then determining sentiment. Then it turns into clustering aspects or clustering topics. And these would be things like this happened in the room that had happened in the lobby. Did it, you know, what, where, where are we talking about? And then it, then it goes more into detail into what exactly happened in that space. So if it was something with cleanliness, what was not clean, and maybe there was more than one thing, but, but basically taking all that text and then pushing it into these like more digestible pieces of data and then, and then displaying that. So, so you can see over time if, from cleanliness, if it's, if it's something that is specific, like,
In this special edition of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree discusses the recent Hotel Digital Marketing Workshop Event hosted by Travel Media Group. This season’s theme was titled “How to Keep Occupancy Hot this Fall” and focused on capturing occupancy as children return to school, beginning a slow drop in leisure travel. Ryan talks about the key takeaways and common themes that he uncovered in these 1-on-1 meetings with hoteliers.
This episode keeps its finger on the pulse of the hotel industry and listeners will gain insights into the upcoming fall season. If you are looking for more information on TMG’s Hotel Digital Marketing Workshops or want to submit a topic for a future episode, reach out to us at 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 82 - 1 on 1 Hotel Workshop Takeaways & Insights Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. And welcome to the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening, no matter where you are coming from today, we've got a special episode and special edition of the Suite Spot. Really excited to share this episode with you all. Will be a little bit of a quicker episode, but super insightful. Now at Travel Media Group, to give you some background, obviously COVID-19 and the pandemic in 2020 impacted our business, just like the hotel industry as a whole. Travel Media Group, we've been in business for over 30 years and we only work with hotels. So seeing the impact that COVID-19 and this pandemic had on the industry as a whole was absolutely devastating. And, you know, we were having conversations with hoteliers throughout the entirety of the pandemic and were really feeling what they were feeling. Hotels made a lot of adaptions during the COVID-19 pandemic in order to meet the needs and expectations of guests during this health crisis. At Travel Media Group, we did the same to meet the needs and serve our customers.
Ryan Embree: One of those really cool initiatives that we started here at Travel Media Group actually began as a virtual trade show, and we didn't have the opportunity to meet face to face to our hoteliers like we'd done for so many years, really decades of going to these events and trade shows: AAHOA, Choice Hotels, Wyndham, Best Western, all of these that we typically will see. So one of the things that the pandemic forced us to do was adapt to this new normal setting. And with that, we did a virtual trade show where we would meet virtually with our hoteliers and get to talk to them about their properties, what they were experiencing and try to come up with creative ways and ideas to get more business to a property. So that kind of evolved in 2020 into now, 2021, where we do one-on-one workshops with hotels virtually to talk specifically about their property.
Ryan Embree: Our educational webinars are awesome because they cover a specific subject, but for hoteliers that are looking for a tailored, specific approach for their location and their property, these workshops seem to be a really great channel and way to do that for hotels. So in saying that we have just completed our fall 2021 marketing workshop. And the episode today is actually going to be five distinct takeaways and insights that we were able to uncover in these workshop meetings and sessions with hoteliers. So let's go ahead and jump right in the first takeaway from our hotel marketing workshops was that people are traveling now. It doesn't sound like a very resounding takeaway, but when we did this back in the spring of 2021, people were just starting to begin to travel again, we weren't seeing those occupancy bursts like we're seeing right now. And like we did over the summer. Now, obviously with the Delta variant, we know that there could be some impacts on that for occupancy.
Ryan Embree: We know during the fall time that historically even pre-pandemic have bee...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we take a trip down the traveler’s booking path and explore what role social media and reputation play in a guest's decision-making. Host Ryan Embree and VP of Product & Technology, Jason Lee share how to improve your hotel’s chances of guest conversion.
Jason and Ryan start in the research stage, where they discuss what travelers are looking for on social media and online reputation sites. They continue to the booking phase, where travelers start to get excited and form an idea of what to expect on their trip. Finally, they discuss post-stay, where travelers determine if those expectations fell short, were met, or exceeded, sharing their feedback on review sites that impact other travelers in different stages of the booking process.
If you are interested in finding out how your hotel’s online presence is impacting traveler conversion or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 81 - How Social Media And Online Reviews Impact Conversion Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree, Director of Marketing at Travel Media Group. Thank you for joining me today on this very exciting episode. And with me today, a familiar face, we haven't heard from him in a while, but he's back on the Suite Spot that is Mr. Jason Lee, Vice President of Product Development and Technology at Travel Media Group. Jason, it's great to hear from you.
Jason Lee: All right. It's great to be back on, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Yeah. We've got a really exciting episode today, you know, as I was kind of looking at what is going on right now in the industry. You know, on the Suite Spot, we're always trying to be at the forefront of trends, patterns, and what's going on. You know, one of the topics that I just could not believe that we hadn't covered yet – the traveler's journey, but the way that social media reviews and review response are having an impact on booking conversion. And I think the interesting part was, is if we did this episode, when we started the Suite Spot years ago, I think this conversation today would be completely different because that social media and reputation side of things have really started to blend over the past couple years, but it's having some real big impacts on purchasing decisions. And obviously you throw COVID-19 and the pandemic, it just complicates things even more because travelers are now looking at this stuff closer than ever. So, Jason, I'm glad you're here with me on this episode. We'll kind of bounce some ideas, but I think the best way to kind of go through this traveler's booking journey is just to go step-by-step because most often than not as guests and as travelers do, we have one particular purchase path. Now that purchase path might be over the course of six months, or it could be over the course of six days, but typically it's going to follow this path. So you, the listener follow along, we're going to go through this purchasing path and figure out how social media and reviews impact booking conversion. Jason, let's start with research. So obviously this is a huge place for reputation.
Jason Lee: Yeah, I think, you know, I think there is the, I mean, whether you call it research or consideration, I think this is past the point of where you are considering, should I take a vacation or should I travel now? You're in a spot where it's like, you're going to travel and now you're really trying to find the best accommodation. And I think that's where a lot of stuff starts to really take ef...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree is joined by Travel Media Group's Content Manager, Marissa Kinzel, to discuss how to market a hotel property's new renovations and updates.
With some hotels seeing 2020 as an opportunity to make updates and changes to their property, this episode is a great roadmap for how to advertise them to travelers online. Marissa and Ryan brainstorm ideas for how to communicate important messaging about your new renovations on channels like social media and online reputation sites. They demonstrate how you can use review response as a renovation marketing tool and how to leverage guest sentiment in your hotel’s online reviews to make the most of your updates.
To learn more about how Travel Media Group’s digital marketing solutions can help promote your hotel’s renovations online or to submit a question or topic for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 80 - How To Market Your New Hotel Renovations Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree. And with me today, a very familiar voice, she has been on the Suite Spot so much we should almost call her a co-host at this point, but I will welcome in Marissa Kinzel, Content Manager at Travel Media Group. Marissa, welcome back to the Suite Spot, once again.
Marissa Kinzel: Thank you so much again for having me.
Ryan Embree: We got a very exciting episode and topic for you all. We're going to be talking about how to market your hotel's renovations. You know, as bad as last year was for the hotel industry as a whole, some properties took 2020 as an opportunity to do some much needed renovations and updates to the property. Less travelers, meant less disruption for guests onsite, and hopefully that means quicker date of completions, of these updates. But finishing those renovations is only half the battle and it's time to promote and market your new hotel updates and renovation to travelers. And that's where this episode comes in. So today we're going to walk through some different ways and channels that you can use to leverage your hotel's renovations online. Let's go ahead and get started Marissa with social media. One of the first things hotels need to do once renovations are complete is to update their online listings. Typically, hoteliers are quick to update places like their website and OTA booking sites because this is where travelers are making those booking and purchasing decisions, but they neglect to do so on social media: Facebook, Instagram. You know, I've done a handful of consultations when looking at a hote's Facebook photos and heard the common phrase of, "Wait a second, that's not what my room, what my lobby, what my pool looks like." You know, it reminds me of a story that a hotelier told me once, really a metaphor when it comes to renovations, and it really is like purchasing a brand new car, but keeping that car in the garage so that no one can see it. That's what doing renovations and not updating your sites like social media is doing. You've had this huge capital investment, all this time and money and effort spent, all this headaches into renovations. And yet you're not sharing it with travelers that are probably most excited to see what you've done with the property. And another great place on social media to consider updating is your profile picture. It doesn't have to be your permanent profile picture, but maybe a temporary one or the header where you can highlight and showcase these new renovations. You know, again,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree partners up with Content Manager Marissa Kinzel to count down their Top 5 summer social media ideas for hotels.
Ryan and Marissa discuss the type of social content that travelers are looking for – especially during the summer – and what impact these posts can have on guest conversion. They talk about how this summer is different from years' past and how highlighting these differences using social media can instill confidence in travelers searching for a place to stay. This episode is a great blueprint on how to heat up your hotel’s social profiles this summer.
If you're looking to learn more information about how to get the most out of your hotel’s social strategy all year round or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 79 - Top 5 Summer Social Media Ideas For Hotels Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing, I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello and welcome everyone, this is your host, Ryan Embree, welcoming you to the Suite Spot for another episode today, episode number 79. I can't believe it, we have done 79 of these podcast episodes. Thank you, first off, to everyone, all the hoteliers that are listening out there for all the support, we absolutely love doing this and sharing ideas, and we've got a great episode for you today. We are right in the thick of summer, one of the hottest times, no pun intended, for hotels when it comes to occupancy, we are in recovery mode from the COVID-19 pandemic. So today we are going to be talking about the top five summer social media ideas for hotels. And with me today, I brought in some backup who is becoming a very familiar voice here on the Suite Spot, that is the Content Manager at Travel Media Group, Marissa Kinzel. Marissa, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Marissa Kinzel: Thank you again for having me Ryan, happy to be back.
Ryan Embree: Yes, and today we are going to talk about how to make the most of social media during this busy summer season. We're going to make it easier for you, the listener to follow along, we're going to go through the top five. Now, these aren't necessarily in order, but they are some of the best tips and best practices that we have at Travel Media Group that we tell our hotel partners and implement in our social media strategies and solutions for our hotel partners. So Marissa let's get started with number one. The number one summer social media idea we have for hotels is to be posting about your room and room types. Now, I know this doesn't sound like a groundbreaking idea, but you'd be surprised on how many social profiles that we come across for hotels, where we have to scroll almost an entire month before we actually even see what a room looks like at the property. We know from having our website solutions and providing vanity websites for hotels, rooms is one of the most visited page on a property's website. They want to know where they're staying. We want to provide them with a lot of information on rooms. So Marissa, how can we take advantage of posting about our rooms on social media in the summer?
Marissa Kinzel: So the best way to start when it comes to highlighting your rooms and your room types, so you're going to want to highlight the versatility of your rooms and include features that are really good for summer travelers. So you want to talk about if you've got refrigerators available, whether to borrow or they're already isn the rooms, have you got awesome bathrooms that help you clean off after a long fun day at the beach, and even something as simple as talking about your amazing AC to help people beat the ...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree is joined by Travel Media Group's Content Manager, Marissa Kinzel, to discuss the cross-section of business and leisure in the travel industry. They define what "bleisure" travelers are, and share ideas about how hotels can market their properties to attract this type of traveler post-COVID.
Marissa shares tips for posting to social media and deals hotels can offer that will catch a bleisure traveler's attention. Ryan shares specific ideas for using LinkedIn to showcase business spaces and how to talk about your amenities to appeal to both the business and leisure parts of a travelers' trip.
To get more information about becoming a special guest on the Suite Spot or to submit a question or topic for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone, and welcome. You are listening to the The Suite Spot a hospitality marketing podcast. Thank you for listening today. We have another amazing episode for you today. This one is centered all around a new traveler that we might not have known existed a couple years ago, but it is a trending topic in the industry. It's becoming more prevalent and hotels are actually filling their properties with these types of travelers. And it's actually a combination of two types of travelers that we've come to know and love. That's our business traveler and our leisure traveler. So before we get started, with me today, I'm going to introduce our guest with me. That is the Content Manager at Travel Media Group, Marissa Kinzel, Marissa, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot.
Marissa Kinzel: Thank you so much for having me, Ryan. I'm happy to be back.
Ryan Embree: Yes. And very excited to get your insight and wealth of knowledge on this particular subject. We have spent over a year now talking about everything in the hotel industry that is being represented as a quote-unquote, "new normal," what hoteliers can do to adapt and change their hotel marketing strategies. And we've got this new traveler, this bleisure traveler, business, leisure combined. So what we're going to do today, Marissa, is we're going to go back and forth. We're going to do some brainstorming for listeners today and maybe share some ideas on how these hotels can attract this new bleisure traveler. What's important to them? Why are they traveling? And if we can put a strategy and target them appropriately, that's going to lead us to some more bookings and more business on that path to recovery. Let's go ahead and get started. One of the main ways that we know travelers are now getting their information is through social media messaging, communication, trying to figure out as much information before actually booking.
Ryan Embree: Once they've booked, they're even going to places like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, to get that comfort level and confidence up before their actual trip. So when we're talking about bleisure travel, one of the things that we want to keep in mind is: this is a dual-purpose trip. So promoting amenities like the pool, you know, if you have a beach or another onsite amenity, fitness center, that might be attractive to the leisure side of their trip, but they're also going to be interested in things like Wi-Fi, business centers, meeting spaces. This is the place that they're going to use for the business side of their trip and how they're going to be working from your hotel.
Marissa Kinzel: I agree completely. I think that trying to advertise both things that are attractive in a leisure sense and things that are attractive in...
In part 2 of 2 of this special edition of the Suite Spot, we take a moment to recognize stories of resilience and excellence in hospitality throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
Host Ryan Embree highlights some incredible hospitality professionals across the country and what they did to make them a hospitality hero during this trying time for our industry. This a feel-good episode that showcases the qualities and values that are at the heart of the hotel industry.
To get more information about becoming a special guest on the Suite Spot or to submit a question or topic for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot. Where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone, and welcome to the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Today's episode is going to be part two of our Hospitality Heroes segment. Recognizing those hotel employees that went above and beyond during the COVID-19 pandemic. Enjoy.
Ryan Embree: Our next Hospitality hero is Debra Roberts, Laundry, Houseman and Breakfast staff at Gibson Hotels. Debra is nominated by Brandy Crawford. Brandy writes, "Debra is truly a team player, always offering to pick up shifts. So we're short staff. She's also dedicated to making sure all of our guests are happy. She'll bring in items for coworkers and our guests if they mentioned they liked something. I wish I could clone 10 of her because she is that amazing. Great attitude always reaches out to manager with follow-ups on items needed. And she'll also tell me not to do something, as she can take care of it when she comes in for her shift. She goes above and beyond daily. She has been my go-to person for the last 15 years." Wow. 15 years in the hospitality industry. A lot of hoteliers haven't experienced anything like this before. Great job Debra, and very cool story to hear. Continue the great work.
Ryan Embree: Our next Hospitality Hero is Scott McKay, general manager at the Capitol Hotel Hartford, Avalon Hospitality Group. Scott is nominated by Robin Grazioso. Robin writes, "Scott held down the fort. He made sure all the operation aspects, including housekeeping, were done, meaning doing it himself. Front desk: he pulled multiple shifts a day; sales: trying to find business in any organization that was traveling and continued to be GM reaching out to organizations that were helping the homeless or those less fortunate to see how we could assist during the pandemic. Not one time did Scott complain and absolutely stepped up to the plate going above and beyond. He was actually closing sales leads for 2022." Wow. What a great story of a positive mindset. Scott, you're doing some incredible work over there. Keep up the great work.
Ryan Embree: Our next Hospitality Hero is Seth Kines, founder and CEO at Scarlet Boom. Seth is nominated by Drew Dunstan. Drew writes at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Seth lost his hospitality job that he held for years. He decided to turn a negative into a positive and created Scarlet Boom: hotel sales and marketing firm. And less than a year, Scarlet boom has partnered with more than 30 hotels and hired five full-time hospitality professionals who were also laid off from their hotels during the pandemic. Seth and Scarlet have been able to create jobs in the middle of a pandemic that has devastated our industry, and we need to share his success story." Well done, Seth, that's an awesome story like Drew described there. Definitely turning a negative into a positive and reaching out and helping our hospitality brothers and sisters out there. Thank you so much for sharing Drew and congratulations Seth.
On this special edition of the Suite Spot, we are joined by AD1 Global’s Director of Marketing and e-Commerce, Jon McMillian. Host Ryan Embree interviews Jon and gets his thoughts on the state of the hotel industry today and where we are headed.
Jon shares the start of his journey in hospitality and discusses his experience managing marketing and e-commerce through a global pandemic. He demonstrates how to distinguish properties in your hotel group portfolio from local competition and how to get buy-in from your hotel staff for new initiatives at the property level. Ryan and Jon wrap up the episode discussing the long-standing partnership between Travel Media Group and AD1 Global, showcasing how TMG's digital solutions perfectly suited the needs of his group.
To get more information about becoming a special guest on the Suite Spot or to submit a question or topic for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 76 - Moving Forward with AD1 Global's Jon McMillian
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree, with me today, a very special guest, he is a first timer to the Suite Spot. That is Jon McMillian, Corporate Director of Marketing and E-commerce at AD1 Global. So John, welcome to the Suite Spot
Jon McMillian: Thank you, Ryan. It's a pleasure to be here.
Ryan Embree: Awesome, and just a little bit about you. You are the Global Director of E-commerce and Marketing. Jon oversees the digital marketing, public relations, social media, and promotional activities for each of the AD1 Global properties. He's responsible for developing and carrying out the company's digital marketing plans, as well as ensuring that hotels stay up to date with technology. A senior marketing executive with more than 17 years of experience, his range of expertise includes e-commerce, advertising, public relations, SEO, SEM, social, and email marketing, branding, mobile, and big data and analytics. So John got a lot of experience there, very excited to pick your brain and get some insights to our listeners. I want to just start out, like we do with a lot of our guests on the Suite Spot, just asking how you got your start in hospitality and the journey that led you to AD1 Global.
Jon McMillian: Well, I think my journey, you know, was, was interesting, at least to me, in terms of that I started off in the Air Force, in public relations that in the sense is related to hospitality. Part of my job was to sell the Air Force to the general public, inviting visitors to the base and conducting tours from the school children, US Senators, Russian Generals in the like. So that's where I kind of got my start all be it into actual hospitality itself, happened many years later, after a stent in SEO industry, working for companies such as Tropicana, you may have heard of before and overwhelming resorts for them, and simply with email marketing, which quickly transitioned into corporate directors because it was at its infancy,SEO, SEM email marketing, things of that nature. You know, we're talking many moons ago, not to date myself, but I started off with an Odyssey computer way, way, way, way back in the hot tub time machine doing programming. And so I've always had a love for computers and a love for people. So you put the two together that kind of makes it e-commerce and marketing.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely. It's a very perfect marriage there. And you know, we hear a lot of those stories. Hospitality is rooted in a bunch of industries. So, you know,
In part 1 of 2 of this special edition of the Suite Spot, we take a moment to recognize stories of resilience and excellence in hospitality throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Host Ryan Embree highlights some incredible hospitality professionals across the country and what they did to make them a hospitality hero during this trying time for our industry. This a feel-good episode that showcases the qualities and values that are at the heart of the hotel industry.
Suite Spot Podcast · 75 - TMG Hospitality Heroes Part I
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in, and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. And thank you for listening to Travel Media Group's hotel marketing podcast, the Suite Spot. Today, we have an extremely cool episode: one of, if not the best episodes that we've had yet on this podcast, I'm extremely excited to share it with you all today. This is something that we've been working on here at Travel Media Group over the past month. And it was an idea brought up because of the difficult times that the hotel industry had in 2020. We have been on the other side of so many great stories from our customers about resiliency and their ability to adapt on the fly. And we thought that it would be so cool to take a moment and just recognize those hoteliers and hospitality professionals out there that just went above and beyond during the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting these stories of resiliency and excellence in hospitality, even in the toughest of times.
Ryan Embree: So what we're going to do today is we're going to name some of these Hospitality Heroes and tell their stories on this podcast. Like I said, I'm very excited and we've got a bunch of Hospitality Heroes out there. So let's go ahead and get started. The first Hospitality Hero that we're going to highlight today is Crystal Thompson, Assistant General Manager at the Holiday Inn Express and Suites Alliance. Now Crystal was nominated by Jenna and Jenna writes: "Crystal Thompson was my sole employee during the beginning of the pandemic and has went above and beyond to help the hotel thrive throughout the entire ordeal. She has stepped in and covered any shifts that needed to be covered, changed her schedule completely around to accommodate the hotel and has done way more than is expected of her in all departments." And this is a trend that we're going to hear for almost all of these stories. Hoteliers, just getting out of their comfort zone, covering shifts, working late nights, doing extra things and wearing different hats around the property because essentially they were forced to during this time where staffing was really cut down to a minimum.
Ryan Embree: Our next hospitality hero is Diane M. Saumell. She's the General Manager at the Coakley and Williams La Quinta Inn and Suites by Wyndham Orlando IDrive Theme Parks. And Diana was nominated by Ken Shore. Ken writes, "Diana has been an amazing leader during the pandemic hospitality crisis. She's managed guests' expectations along with preserving associate jobs and managing cash flow to where we have not had to ask the owners for any additional working capital. Her guest's comment scores were amazing during the pandemic where her property exceeded the brand averages." So this is so impressive to see that brand scores and reputation was exceeded during this extremely difficult time. We've talked about the importance of getting reviews during the COVID-19 pandemic and how difficult it was and how the guest's expectations were an all-time high, not just for a comfortable experience, but for their safety and health.
Ryan Embree: Now Ken Shore also nominates another Hospitality Hero: Carla Selp...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we dig into the archives to unveil a never-before-heard episode on how hotels can prep for the busy summer season. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Director of Marketing, Anne Sandoval, to share tips and tricks on how to get the most out of this exciting time of year.
Ryan and Anne start off by talking about why it’s critical for hotels to maintain their online presence – especially as recovery and travel ramp up for the summer. They share social media strategies to capture guest interest, like promoting local events and attractions. Anne talks about the relationship between guests and review opportunities. They finish the episode by stressing the importance of organization and consistency during such a crucial period for hotels.
If you are interested in learning more about optimizing your hotel’s digital marketing for the busy season, you can reach us by calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Suite Spot Podcast · 74 - Prepping Your Hotel For The Busy Season
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Hello everyone, this is Ryan Embree, host of the Suite Spot, what you're about to listen to today was actually an episode that we had prepped over a year ago. Like many things, this episode was interrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, but we felt with the hotel industry really starting to recover and starting to see some strong numbers heading into the spring and summer seasons, a lot of these tips and best practices that we shared in this episode really can be applied to right now. So with that being said, we hope you enjoy and learn some really great tips on how to prep your hotel for the busy season.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello, hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, as always, Ryan Embree working on a great episode for you today. I think hoteliers, around the country, are getting really excited. We're coming out of the winter into the spring and summer season soon. So today's episode is actually a follow up from a topic that we covered all the way back in October 2019, where we were really prepping our hotels for the slow season, things that we could do with our social media, our reputation - to just get geared up and ready for kind of a slower time for hotels around the country. Today we're going to talk about the other side of that, an extension of that episode. We're going to look at how hoteliers can really prep their properties for the busiest time of the year. So with me today, to share some insights, is a very frequent guest of the Suite Spot and that is our Director of Marketing, Anne Sandoval. So Anne, welcome again to the Suite Spot.
Anne Sandoval: Hey Ryan, thanks for having me back.
Ryan Embree: As I mentioned, I'm excited. Hoteliers are excited, we're starting to get geared up, travelers are starting to plan their vacations, road trips. We're excited. How can we start prepping our hotels for this busy, busy season? So I wanted to first start with the question of why. We know time is of the essence in a hotelier's world, so why should hoteliers even spend the time or prep their digital presence for this season, if they know they're already going to be busy?
Anne Sandoval: That's a great question and I think a lot of hoteliers are probably asking it, but we know that no matter what time of year it is, travelers are using a variety of channels to help make their booking decisions, but during and leading up to those busy summer months, we've got an influx of travelers looking at Google listings, online review websites, OTA search results, and on social media.
In this special edition of the Suite Spot, we announce the launch of a brand new YouTube segment – the TMG Concierge Desk. Host Ryan Embree introduces the new segment and explains how it will serve as a valuable resource for hoteliers.
Ryan shares some of the very first episodes of the TMG Concierge Desk, including topics such as improving a hotel’s reputation, responding to reviews when COVID-19 is mentioned, and increasing occupancy and ADR. This episode is an exciting sneak peek into a new innovative initiative produced by the Travel Media Group team.
If you are interested in learning more about Travel Media Group’s hotel digital marketing solutions, you can reach us by calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Suite Spot Podcast · 73 - Hotel Industry Q & A on TMG's Concierge Desk
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, this is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you all for joining me today, we've got a very exciting episode for you. On this podcast, we are known to have some really exciting announcements when it comes to our solutions, updates, upgrades, and today is going to be one of those episodes. We have just recently launched a brand new YouTube segment called the TMG Concierge Desk. And it is a segment where we answer some of the industry top questions and discuss some of the current events. So what we thought we'd do today, to introduce you to this brand new segment is we are going to actually roll through some of the questions and videos from this new TMG Concierge Desk and discuss why we felt that this question was important and relevant to today's hotelier. We're going to start with our Product Director at Travel Media Group, Patrick O'Brien, who answers the question, what is the fastest way to improve your hotel's reputation? So let's hear from Patrick on his answer.
Patrick O'Brien: The fastest way to improve your hotel's reputation is actually very easy. The first thing you want to do as a hotel is just actively engage in your online reputation. Now, the way that you go about that is going to be a little different, but I would say probably the best places to start, first and foremost, if you are taking every guest that checks in and checks out of your hotel and simply asking them to leave a review and making it very easy for them to do that, whether it be sending them links to your TripAdvisor page, Google, sending them surveys, giving them a number to contact the general manager of the property, somehow make it very easy for them to leave that feedback. The second thing that you want to do, to actively engage in your online reputation, is to really understand and analyze what each of those reviews is saying about your property. And when you're pulling in all of that information, I would start with looking at the areas where maybe there has been a miscommunication of expectations, and that's really why people will leave bad reviews. So if you can identify those, then you can approach that by updating your website, you know, using social media, using review response, to clear up those expectations and communicate that better. You can also work with your front desk to make sure when people are checking in, that they understand what to expect while they're on property. Now, the next step in there is to use all that information and understand really any operational improvements that you may need to make at your property. And some of those can be very minor, some of those may be, you know, major operational improvements,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we share all the exciting, positive signs of recovery in the hotel industry. Brand Ambassador and Host of the Suite Spot Ryan Embree shares factors inside and outside of the hotel industry that all point towards positive signs for travel moving forward.
Ryan examines some travel industry data including occupancy levels, hotel rooms sold, and TSA numbers: all of which have been trending positively for hoteliers. He looks at outside factors that bode well for the hotel industry like vaccine distribution, slowly-lifting COVID restrictions, and overall traveler sentiment. He also looks at some positive internal data collected by Travel Media Group, such as review response numbers and hotelier sentiment. This is a feel-good episode that should get hotels excited about the industry’s future as we move into the busy spring and summer months.
If you are looking for digital marketing recommendations for your hotel this upcoming spring and summer season, call or text us at 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 72 - Positive Signs of Hotel Industry Recovery
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, this is Ryan Embree, Brand Ambassador at Travel Media Group and host of the Suite Spot. Got a very exciting episode for you today - been looking forward to this episode - what feels like for a very, very long time. As we've done episodes of the Suite Spot, we've always been trying to look for the positives during and following this COVID-19 pandemic, because it has had such an impact on the hospitality, and hotel industry specifically. So what I thought we do today is - we are starting to see now more than just a glimmer of hope - we're starting to see multiple positive signs of recovery within the hotel industry, which I'm super excited about, I'm sure you, the hotel listener, is very excited about today. This episode is going to be circled all around, identifying those positive signs and potentially looking at some factors that might give us kind of a trail map or blueprint of where this recovery is headed and some ways to maybe gain some competitive advantages. But really at the heart of this episode, is just going to be talking about these signs of recovery and really should, hopefully, launch us into the spring and summer of really, really great numbers and just somewhat back to normal, you know, for some hotels, it's been a year since we've seen some of these.
Ryan Embree: So we're going to start with some outside, industry factors. And the first thing that we look at, when we look at signs of hotel recovery, are the numbers. Now STR does an incredible job - if you haven't checked it out already, please do str.com - they provide some incredible analytics for the hotel and hospitality industry, and they're constantly putting out new information and data. So the most recent data that we saw, was more than 21 million rooms sold. I remember when we had an episode last April in 2020, that mark was only a million. To see that exceed 21 million rooms is a huge, huge indicator that we're gaining momentum, which is what we like to see, including some top 25 markets, including Tampa, which had an occupancy most recently at 81.8% and Phoenix at 77.1%. So those are top 25 markets all at 75% occupied or higher. Tampa obviously benefiting from spring break, but we expect those numbers, with the warmer temperatures, right around the corner to start to increase. Now, looking back at historical data, we are only 83% of occupancy regained from that 2019 benchmark.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we explore the importance of post-stay surveys for hotels. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Product Director and head of Travel Media Group’s reputation solutions, Patrick O’Brien, to discuss why the feedback uncovered in these surveys is critical to a hotel’s success.
Patrick and Ryan start the episode by explaining the difference between guest reviews and guest surveys. They walk through each question included in Travel Media Group’s post-stay survey and what insights the property can gain from the guest’s feedback. Finally, Patrick shares some creative ideas for other questions that our partners have included in their hotels' post-stay surveys.
If you are interested in learning more about Travel Media Group’s post-stay survey solution, you can reach us by calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com
Suite Spot Podcast · 71 - Why Post-Stay Guest Surveys Are Essential
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, and welcome to the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree. We've got a jam packed episode for you today. I am very excited about it. I'm very excited about our guest. He is our Product Director at Travel Media Group and head of our reputation solutions, Patrick O'Brien. Patrick, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Patrick O'Brien: Well, thank you very much for having me.
Ryan Embree: And this episode is going to be all about guest surveys - why they're critical and essential to your hotel's success, how we can leverage our guest's responses to these surveys, and we're even going to include some of the questions from our very own Travel Media Group post-stay survey that we provide for our hotel partners. So let's go ahead and get started Patrick. We know that guest surveys is a major part of Travel Media Group's reputation management solution, I want to start today's episode, because when I say guest surveys, there's a pretty distinct difference there between a guest survey and a guest review. Can you first explain that? And then we'll get into the guest surveys a little bit.
Patrick O'Brien: Sure, so Ryan, a guest review really will be any feedback left publicly online on sites like Google, TripAdvisor, Booking.com, Expedia, Hotels.com, etc, so while some could argue that not all public feedback is really fair or even sometimes legitimate, it is typically one of the most used resources that prospective travelers will turn to before making a booking decision, so it really kind of impacts the prospective traveler view of your hotel. And while the hotel can typically take part in that conversation via review responses, they don't have any influence necessarily on whether or not that conversation and feedback takes place. Surveys, on the other hand are typically feedback solicited directly from a hotel's guests, with the goal to provide the hotel insights into what is working and what is not, but really keeping that conversation one-to-one and offline. So you really can think of, you know, the online reviews being that tool that prospective guests are using to look at your hotel, and the online surveys, really being a tool kept internally to help the hotel understand what's going on at their business, but just because the surveys are kept offline, it doesn't mean that someone who fills out a survey can't then go back and leave a review as well. So that can be really good, if the feedback in the survey was positive, it may not be quite as good if the feedback was negative.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, I feel like the hotel industry has gone through this love-hate relationship with any type o...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we share a beginner’s guide for hoteliers live streaming on social media. Host Ryan Embree gives some ideas for topics hotels can use when going live, and best practices to keep in mind when recording.
Ryan talks through some of the different objectives for live streaming, such as educating, showcasing, or entertaining. He reveals some of the most creative live streaming ideas that he has seen in the industry and ways that you can tailor them to fit your hotel. He also discusses the best way to leverage the different audiences on each social media platform to secure bookings. This episode is a great blueprint for hoteliers looking to incorporate live streaming into their social media strategy.
If you are looking for more social media tips or learning about Travel Media Group’s social media solutions call or text us at 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 70 - Tips and Ideas for Hotels Going LIVE on Social Media
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Welcome to episode number 70. We have a great episode, very excited to share this with you all today, we are going to be talking all about a - somewhat newer feature to the social media realm - but we know this has really picked up since the pandemic, so I thought it was important to have an episode on this and share for some of you out there - some hoteliers out there - that might be looking for some creative ways to connect and communicate to their travelers. So what we're going to be talking about today is live streaming. Now this is just a beginner course on really how to get started. We're going to have some tips and some ideas specific to the hotel industry and hotel world out there, that you might be able to adapt at your property.
Ryan Embree: Let's talk about, first of all, what is live streaming, for those that are not familiar? The book definition is going live or live streaming refers to transmitting or receiving live video and audio coverage over the internet. As I mentioned, it has become increasingly popular with social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and now even LinkedIn, is adding that feature to its platform. As COVID-19 began to take hold live streaming became even more popular and businesses, including hotels, started to utilize it as a way to connect and communicate to consumers. So in today's episode, we're going to talk about some best practices for going live and even share some ideas that you might be able to adapt for your own at the property. The first thing you need to do is to make sure that you're prepared and have a plan for your live stream. Once you press that start live button there is no turning back, so make sure you are prepared. First thing you want to consider is where am I going to record? Well, the ideal spot is a place with really strong internet connection. You don't want any sort of frozen or lagging in your video, that's definitely not going to help with engagement and follower views. The other thing is lighting, making sure that it's not too dark, not too bright. Making sure you're in a place with good sound quality, so an echo-y hotel lobby or a windy day outside might not be the ideal place to live stream. So definitely take some practice videos before actually going live to figure out what that video looks like and sounds like. If you really, really want to take your live stream to the next level, you could even look up some lapel microphones to help with that sound quality.
Ryan Embree: You also want to consider the video angle.
In follow up to an episode produced in early 2020, this episode of the Suite Spot discusses the relationship with Travel Media Group’s Client Success Team and Hotel Recovery Post- COVID-19. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Client Success Team Lead Aislynn Roberts to update us on how hotelier sentiment has changed since the beginning of the pandemic.
Ryan and Aislynn talk about the crucial role that hotel digital marketing plays in a hotel’s recovery, and the creative ways hoteliers are connecting with guests to accelerate their recovery pace. Aislynn shares some innovative stories from Travel Media Group hotel partners and includes best practices for hoteliers not yet seeing the revenue bounceback expected. This episode is a great tool for hoteliers looking to spark ideas for targeting and capturing occupancy.
If you are looking for help or more information from Aislynn and her client success team call or text us at 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 69 - Client Success & Hotel Recovery Post-COVID-19 Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, thank you all for listening today. We're getting to a very exciting time - depending on where you're at right now - it could be frigid, frigid cold, but we see just on the horizon, the warm spring and summer seasons are coming just around the corner, which typically means for the hotel industry, a little bit of a boost in occupancy, which we could all use right now. So we are going to continue our theme of just recovery and accelerating speed towards getting that occupancy and ADR to "normal levels." We're seeing a lot of good news outside with vaccines that continues to see progress, were starting to see more and more people travel. We know that interest in travel is at an all time high. There's just so much pent up demand out there. So today what we're going to be talking about is one of the differentiators of Travel Media Group and partnering with us. And that is, not only do we provide you with the digital marketing solutions, you know, top of class solutions, but we also supply you with a team dedicated to our hotel partners. And we're going to really talk through the role of what we call client success team and where they fit in, in hotel recovery. So with me today, I have Aislynn Roberts, she is our client success team lead. Aislynn, it's been a while since you've been on the Suite Spot, but I want to welcome you again for coming on with me.
Aislynn Roberts: Thanks Ryan. It's great to be here.
Ryan Embree: And we've got a great episode for you today, but I want to start before we roll into it, with just for those who might be unfamiliar with the client success team, so I kind of gave a high level definition of what your team does, but just walk us through your role and the relationship that client success team has with Travel Media Group hotel partners.
Aislynn Roberts: Yeah, sure, so the client success team works alongside our hotel partners throughout their customer journey with Travel Media Group. When a hotelier begins a partnership with us, they are assigned a dedicated client success representative that walks them through the program on boarding seamlessly to ensure their program gets off to a good start right away. We provide training to all team members before the start and ongoing as needed in times of turnover. And we stay regularly connected throughout The first 60 days of the program to ensure all team members are comfortable with the system and new processes, providing encouragement to them,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we take a look at what it will take for hotels to accelerate their speed of recovery in 2021. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Travel Media Group’s Marketing Coordinator, Marissa Kinzel, to discuss and share ideas.
Ryan and Marissa start the episode by talking about how hoteliers can utilize social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Linkedin to gain an edge over local competition. Next, they explain the role a hotel’s online reputation plays in recovery speed and how a strong online reputation impacts traveler booking decisions. They wrap up by discussing direct bookings and how TMG’s OneView™ can help manage and organize all guest content online.
To learn more about boosting your hotel’s pace of revenue recovery or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 68 - Boosting Your Hotel's Speed to Recovery
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, this is Ryan Embree, host of the Suite Spot. Welcome to another episode and thank you for listening today. We have a excellent episode for you, themed all around boosting your hotel's speed to recovery. So right now, as we've turned the page to 2021, we are all looking for those little ways to gain advantage over our competitors and ways that we can really pick up the pace and accelerate our pace towards recovery. Now, there are a lot of factors out there, obviously, that are going to be presented as unknown to us: COVID vaccinations, COVID variants, but we are going to go ahead and make some positive assumptions today that we are on the right track to recovery. So I want to bring in our guest with me today to kind of talk through some of this stuff, Marissa Kinzel, Marketing Coordinator. You've been with us before on the Suite Spot, but I'm going to welcome you again to the Suite Spot.
Marissa Kinzel: Thank you very much, Ryan. I'm glad to be back.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, and we've got a great episode for you today. Obviously, at Travel Media Group, our expertise is in the hotel digital marketing space, that is the only vertical that we work with is hotels. So I thought what we do today, Marissa is really take it step-by-step and talk about a hotel's digital marketing strategy, and maybe ways that they can gain that competitive edge and again, boost speed to recovery. So let's go ahead and get started with social media. And I think the first thing that we really need to do as a hotelier is set some SMART social media goals for 2021. So obviously at the end of the day, social media, we have learned during this past year has been a great channel for us to communicate and connect with guests. The end goal, we always want to obviously see that revenue come from platforms and streams, like social media, but I think what hoteliers tend to forget is kind of that in between space there. So you've got social media and then you've got generating revenue. What do you need to do in between there? And I think in order to kind of boost that speed to recovery, the first thing you need to do is really set some SMART social media goals, because there's actually quite a number of things that you can set out to accomplish on your Facebook, your Instagram, your LinkedIn. One of those is follower count, maybe getting people to start following you and expanding that reach and audience. Another one is engagement, growth, we've all seen those posts on our feeds that say, "like and share this post" and see how many likes we can get, see how many shares that we can get, so there's different social media goals.
Marissa Kinzel: Yeah,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree is once again joined by Vice President of Product and Technology, Jason Lee. This time, they're talking about the importance of social listening. Jason and Ryan start the episode by defining social listening and what it means to hoteliers and their business.
Jason walks through different social media platforms – like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram – and the unique ways guests interact with hotels on each. Jason and Ryan discuss the benefits and drawbacks of using social listening as a guest relations tool. And finally, Jason shares how the TMG development team has prioritized social listening with updates to the TMG OneView® Feed.
To learn more about how Travel Media Group is helping hoteliers connect with their guests using social listening or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 67 - Social Listening 101
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, this is your host, Ryan Embree. Another great episode today, with a very frequent guest of the show. I've said it before, when we have him on, usually this means new innovations and updates. So I, once again, will welcome Jason Lee, Vice President of Product Development and Technology at Travel Media Group. Jason, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: Ryan, thank you for having me, again.
Ryan Embree: I'm super excited to have you on today because we have a really cool subject that I think has just become more and more prevalent, not just in hotels, but just business in general, as social media has really evolved throughout the last couple years and now businesses are kind of catching up to the curve and they're learning how to listen to - in this case, for hotels - travelers online, but just really consumers in general. So what we're going to talk about is social listening. So right off the bat, Jason, let's go ahead and define what social listening is in regards to this episode and what it means to you.
Jason Lee: Well, social listening is - it's a little bit different than reputation and it's a little bit different than what we have talked about before, which would be that traditional outbound social media or even responses to social media. So social listening really is about detection and capturing information that past guests or future guests are saying about your location, but they're not saying it to everyone, they're saying it to their audience. So this would be when you're mentioned - so your business is mentioned or your hotel is mentioned in a post or in a tweet or your tagged - and so it could be something as simple as, "I just checked into my room - you know, and then they mention the name of your hotel - and everything looks awesome #greatweekend" or something. So something like that goes out to that person's audience, it is not put on your page. You wouldn't really ever see that if it wasn't for bringing that data to light. So the fact that you were mentioned or tagged is how we pull that information in, but it becomes really valuable information and it's surprising how much of that is out there. How often hotels are mentioned, you know, it positively and negatively.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, it's interesting to see, you know, as I talk about the evolution again of social media, where this all stemmed from, obviously social media from the very beginning was supposed to be a person to person interaction, but then all of a sudden users started to realize and businesses alike, at the same time, I can start having a conversation with a busine...
In the first Suite Spot episode of 2021, host Ryan Embree identifies five unique ways hotels can attract groups using LinkedIn. Ryan shares tips on how to optimize your hotel’s LinkedIn and get your employees at the property involved. He talks about the importance of making the right connections on LinkedIn, including the best groups and associations to join to capture group business. This episode is a great guide on how to leverage LinkedIn post-COVID-19 to impact group occupancy and revenue at your hotel.
If you're looking to learn more information about how Travel Media Group can help with your hotel’s Linkedin strategy or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 66 - 5 Ways To Attract Groups Using LinkedIn
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, the first Suite Spot episode of 2021. I want to thank all of our listeners out there - yes, we've made it and we're super excited - 2021, a year of hope and recovery hopefully for our industry. Today, we've got a great episode, we're going to continue talking about LinkedIn, and specifically what we're going to do today is review the five ways to attract groups using LinkedIn, because we know one of the biggest impacts that COVID-19 has had on the hotel industry is its effect on group business and occupancy. So some of the creative ways hoteliers are combating this occupancy loss is by leveraging social media sites, especially LinkedIn for groups. When we look at the demographics overall for LinkedIn, we're looking at professionals, tech savvy travelers. It's a place of positivity, so businesses are sharing updates, they're sharing exciting news that people can get positive around and excited around. And it's a really great way to attract and market groups. So let's go ahead and talk through five ways to attract groups using LinkedIn.
Ryan Embree: And the first, is really one of the tips and best practices that we talk about for all of our social media, that's optimizing your profile. Now, for some of you out there that might not have a business or even a personal LinkedIn account, that might mean - optimizing your profile - just building it. But once you build that, there are a multitude of things that you can do to optimize that profile. Some of the things include: industry - obviously hospitality or hotel - your company size, your website URL - so you want to place that direct booking link in there so that we can funnel traffic to those booking sites - groups and individual travelers, descriptions - now, description is very important, we're going to kind of talk about that in a second - logo - that logo could be for your brand, if you're an independent property, a really nice shot of the property, or if you have a logo for the property itself - making sure you're updating things like your street address, and then LinkedIn actually has the opportunity for you to fill in a custom button - so for most hotels out there, that's going to be a "book now" button like we put on other social media sites, like Facebook. Now, going back to description, description is very important because you really want to highlight what makes your property unique and what could appeal to individuals that are responsible for booking groups. So when we're talking about group travel, you know, an example could be in your description, "upgraded four star hotel, with first-class amenities and spacious meeting space, great for groups, events, and weddings." When we're also talking about optimizing our profile,
On this year-end edition of the Suite Spot, we welcome Travel Media Group’s Vice President and General Manager, Dana Singer to the podcast. Host Ryan Embree reflects with Dana on the events of this crazy 2020 calendar year.
Dana reviews some of the adjustments that Travel Media Group has made in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the digital marketing landscape for hotels. Ryan and Dana discuss both accomplishments and products launched in 2020 by the Travel Media Group product development team. Dana also shares what she is most excited about and hopeful for in 2021 as the hotel industry transitions into recovery.
To get more information about partnering with Travel Media Group in 2021 or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 65 - 2020 In Review With Dana Singer
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. Today's episode is number 65 and it is actually the last Suite Spot episode of 2020. Yes, folks, we made it. I want to thank everyone out there for taking the time to support the Suite Spot and listening. It's hard to believe, but we've been doing this now for two years and I'm very, very excited about this episode. We have a very special guest - second time on the Suite Spot with us - Dana Singer Vice President and General Manager of Travel Media Group. Dana, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Dana Singer: Thank you, Ryan. It's great to be here.
Ryan Embree: And we've got a great episode for you today. We actually had you on last time around this time a year ago, just to kind of talk about the history and culture at Travel Media Group, but since that time it's almost felt like a lifetime with 2020, and that's going to be exactly what this episode is today. 2020 has been a very stressful year, especially for our industry, and it's really forced a lot of businesses to kind of change the way that things are "normally" done. I'm curious what adjustments did Travel Media Group make in response to the pandemic, Dana?
Dana Singer: Yeah, well Ryan, it's certainly an understatement to say that it's been an unprecedented year in the hospitality industry as a whole. And as we look back, as COVID-19 swept the nation earlier in the year, in the spring, it presented both challenges and opportunities for us at Travel Media Group to overcome right alongside our hotel partners. And through continuous innovation and just really an unwavering commitment to providing exceptional results for our clients, we launched several exciting updates throughout the year while also delivering crucial support during the pandemic. When I think about when the first stay at home orders were issued across the United States and hotels began temporary closures or staff reductions, we knew that we had an important role to play in helping our partners manage through these really far reaching impacts and offer our support at the highest level possible. And our dedicated client success team and our product specialists, all worked tirelessly to ensure that we could assist our clients with timely updates to their websites, social media, and review response guidelines. And as part of our COVID-19 response, we hosted a three-part webinar series to help hoteliers identify ways to maximize revenue in the midst of everything that was going on. And our webinars focused on managing communication strategies, optimizing market share, and offsetting group travel loss to ensure that we covered major industry areas that were negatively impacted by the pandemic.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we announce another exciting update for 2020: the addition of LinkedIn to Travel Media Group’s social media solution. Host Ryan Embree is joined by the leader of the product development team, Jason Lee to discuss this powerful B2B social platform.
Jason shares what makes LinkedIn unique from other social platforms and how hoteliers can leverage LinkedIn for lead generation and potential revenue streams. Ryan and Jason talk about the evolution of LinkedIn since the beginning of the pandemic and the role it will play in corporate and group travel recovery in 2021. This episode is a great starting point for developing a successful LinkedIn strategy for any type of hotel.
If you are looking to learn more information about Travel Media Group’s social media solution, now featuring Linkedin, or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 64 - Marketing Your Hotel on Linkedin Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, got a great episode for you today. Very familiar guest and voice on the Suite Spot with me, Jason Lee, Vice President of Product Development and Technology. And when you hear Jason with me, it typically means an exciting announcement, and we have one for you today. We're going to center our entire episode around this topic and that is the new addition to Travel Media Group's social media solution, Linkedin. Jason, welcome to the Suite Spot, tell us a little bit about this new update.
Jason Lee: Awesome. Thanks for having me Ryan, and you know LinkedIn it's such an interesting outlet from a social media perspective because I think you have this sort of grouping of social media outlets like Facebook and Instagram and Twitter, that are really designed for sort of - I hate to say leisure purpose because there's advertising other things that happen on there - but it really is sort of like, I flip through my feed, I maybe get news on there, I get updates from friends, and I see images, and I kind of go down that road. When I go to LinkedIn, it's something different. This is business to business contacts. This is me maybe reading pieces about the industry that I'm involved in, that I know recruiting happens there. There's all sorts of things that happen on LinkedIn that don't happen really anywhere else. And yet it is very similar to other social media outlets in that you can create content and you can do things and interact with an audience that might have interest in the thing that you are talking about or the business that you belong to. So I think that's what makes LinkedIn really special and really unique and extremely important to hotels right now, as we're hopefully going into the post-COVID time and hotels are starting to look at what sort of market segment is corporate today, at my hotel. What is it and how is it going to happen? Where am I going to get it from? Are people going to come back and start traveling again? Are there going to be meetings again? How soon does that happen? And what are things that I can do at a local level utilizing tools like LinkedIn to maybe spearhead that effort. So that's what I think the importance of LinkedIn is. I know it's kind of like a bigger umbrella kind of statement about it, but I believe that's where a really interesting strategy can develop going after corporate and group business using LinkedIn as a platform.
Ryan Embree: Yeah and I want to talk about that strategy a little bit, because I think, for me, when I think of LinkedIn,
In this special edition of the Suite Spot, our review response team at Travel Media Group analyzes and identifies the Top 5 sentiment tags of 2020. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Product Director, Patrick O’Brien to discuss COVID-19's impact on traveler reviews and each of the most popular sentiment tags. Patrick also shares some best practices on how to respond to online reviews when these tags are mentioned and ways to get creative and provide a unique hotel experience for guests during this time.
If you are interested in learning more about Travel Media Group’s Respond & Resolve™ program, you can reach us by calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Suite Spot Podcast · 63 - Top 5 Sentiment Tags in 2020 Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree, we have a very special episode for you today, been looking forward to this episode for a very long time. It's actually one of the most popular episodes that we've done since we've started the Suite Spot and with me today is our special guest, Product Director at Travel Media Group, Patrick O'Brien. Patrick, welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Patrick O'Brien: Thank you very much for having me glad to be here.
Ryan Embree: Yeah and we're excited today because Patrick and I, what we're doing, is that we are going to look at the top five sentiment tags of 2020. So it's been an absolutely crazy year: COVID-19, election year, all these significant things going on in our industry, yet customers still leaving reviews. And at Travel Media Group, obviously we have our Respond and Resolve solution, which responds to reviews - but we don't necessarily just respond. Patrick, your team actually goes in and provides insights to hoteliers. Before we get started, could you explain just a little bit behind what this sentiment analysis is and how your team actually pulls that out of the guest feedback?
Patrick O'Brien: So, you know, with every review that comes in our team is obviously reading the review in advance so that we can respond to it, but we're actually going through and looking at various elements within the review and we score those based on, you know, positive, negative and neutral sentiment. And where it's a little bit different, sometimes I think there's some AI engines out there that do it and sometimes they basically do it based off of the star rating of the review, and I think that's fast and efficient. However, what it misses is the ability to really identify when maybe negative sentiment is left within the positive review or there are positive attributes to a negative review. And having, you know, human interaction within there, we're able to sort of elicit those meanings a bit more accurately in the review so that we can really understand, you know, not every positive review is, you know, all roses and not every negative review is all bad. So we can start to dissect when things are maybe not good with a specific experience, what elements were things that the hotel could market on capitalize on, and you know, what elements do they need to work better at improving? So we really go in and each review is hand scored by someone on our team.
Ryan Embree: And it's fascinating to take a look at all of that data, all that sentiment and analytics, put together like something we're going to do today - but just to put in perspective Patrick, how many reviews is your team responding to? Let's just talk about reviews first.
Patrick O'Brien: Sure yeah. So, you know, this year,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree helps hoteliers prepare for the upcoming 2020 winter season and shares his thoughts on what to expect. Ryan takes a look at two major factors impacting travelers' booking decisions this winter: the weather and area-specific COVID-19 restrictions. He walks through multiple examples of social posts and marketing strategies that properties can implement to give them the best opportunity to attract and capture leisure travelers. This episode is an excellent blueprint for hoteliers looking for a place to start when creating a winter marketing strategy for their property.
If you are looking to learn more information about how Travel Media Group can help your hotel increase winter occupancy or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 62 - Capturing Leisure Travel This Winter
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, this is your host Ryan Embree. Welcome to episode number 62. We are getting to that time of year, the winter season, typically a slower season. We've done many episodes in the past talking about how occupancy slows this time of year. We have the holidays, which gives us a nice little bump, but what can we expect this year? You know, it's a bunch of question marks that we've seen since the resurgence of COVID-19. There's a bunch of question marks. So what's this winter season going to bring for our industry? And is it something that we're going to be looking forward to? And are there things that we can do on our end, on the operations and the sales and marketing side, to help maybe put some more heads and beds and help that occupancy grow during this, again typical, slower time of year.
Ryan Embree: So that is what this episode is all about. Very excited to share this with you, actually goes hand in hand with our educational webinars, which we do every month at Travel Media Group. If you haven't checked those out, I encourage you to do so on our YouTube page. This webinar was titled, "There's No Place Like Hotels for the Holidays: Targeting Leisure Travelers this Winter." So that's what we're going to be talking about in today's episode is attracting and capturing those leisure travelers during the winter season. And I want to start by really kind of having you envision a grid, a grid split into four distinct quadrants and where your property is really located on this grid is really going to be based off of two key factors. The first is weather, now for most of the country, when I say winter, that means cold weather. It drives people indoors and typically again, slows our occupancy numbers, but there's also places in the country that stay relatively warm where cold travelers travel to and flock to this time of year. So that's where our headquarters are in Orlando, Florida. Now the next major factor is new and it's 2020 driven, but it has an enormous impact on guests as they're considering whether to book and go on vacation this winter, and that's going to be the level of COVID restrictions in your area. So again, in some parts of the country, there are still some highly restrictive requirements put in by local cities and regions. But in other locations, restrictions have really begun to ease and loosen as time has passed.
Ryan Embree: So what we're going to do today is we're going to travel from quadrant for quadrant, whether you're warm weather, cold weather, you have high restrictions or low restrictions, and we're going to come up and create a custom marketing and advertising plan specifically geared a...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we highlight the launch of Travel Media Group’s OneView® Feed 2.0. Jason Lee, VP of Product & Technology, joins host Ryan Embree to talk about this exciting update and what it means for TMG’s hotel partners.
Jason shares how social media and online reputation have evolved since the initial launch of TMG OneView® back in 2018. He showcases some of the feed’s newest features like improved sorting, expanded sentiment analytics, and new multi-property reporting. Ryan and Jason walk through some real-world examples of how both individuals and groups can take advantage of this innovative OneView® update.
If you are interested in learning more about Travel Media Group’s new OneView® Feed 2.0 or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 61 - TMG OneView Feed 2.0
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening to the Suite Spot. We have an exciting update to announce, a great episode with a guest that has been with me quite a few times this year, but we're here to invite him back. That is TMG's Vice President of Product Development and Technology, Jason Lee. Jason, thanks again for being on the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: Thanks for having me once again, Ryan. Obviously, I did not offend you in previous episodes, so you've allowed me back. So I appreciate it.
Ryan Embree: No, you've actually been given us some clues and been alluding to this episode's topic, which is an exciting update with TMG's OneView™ and that's exactly what we're going to be talking about today, so just recently we have launched TMG's OneView Feed 2.0. So I know you and your team have been hard at work on this, I want to start by asking Jason, when did you and your team decide to kind of make this update to TMG's OneView™ feed and why did you feel it necessary?
Jason Lee: Well, you know, when we launched OneView™, as you know, you were there during the early days when we launched it. We launched it with sort of a different purpose than what it is today. We launched it to be kind of an autonomous feed. So you'd have reputation and social media for hoteliers to just be able to use. You know, so we kind of envisioned it as this like sort of additional tool that a hotelier could jump into, respond to reviews, respond to social media comments, and we didn't see it in the early stages as something that could be a lot more in terms of driving backend engine to a lot of our other solutions. So the original structure of the feed and the original structure of OneView™ was really - I wouldn't say one dimensional because it had quite a few little pieces to it - but it definitely didn't fit the model that is what we're doing today with reputation and social media.
Ryan Embree: And it's incredibly versatile now, and you're right, we launched this back in 2018. So that's two years ago and just the amount of change that has happened in the user generated content space, when it comes to how reputation sites are performing right now, how they're trying to attract more travelers to their sites - like TripAdvisor, almost creating accounts and feeds like a social media platform - and then even Facebook, while they don't necessarily call it reviews, they've changed it to recommendations, but now they have an intense focus on getting more and more recommendations. So just in the span of two years, there's been kind of this evolution of those outside spaces, which OneView™ does such a great job of pulling in. So how was your team able to evolve this solution to kind of match what was happening in the industry?
Jason Lee: So where we started with OneView™ and where we're at today, I think a lot of the evolution has to do with the environment, as you said,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree is joined by Travel Media Group’s Marketing Coordinator, Marissa Kinzel, to discuss marketing your hotel to Generation Z post-COVID-19.
Ryan and Marissa break down key characteristics and traits of Generation Z and explore how hoteliers can appeal to them by using online communication channels like websites and social media. Marissa shares her thoughts on how Gen Z will adapt to the “new normal” in regards to the hotel experience, and how they will shape the industry in the next 5-10 years. As more members of this young generation start traveling again, this episode serves as a great guide to help attract and capture more of their business. To get more information about reaching Generation Z online or submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 60 - Marketing Your Hotel To Gen Z Post-COVID-19
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, this is Ryan Embree, your host of the Suite Spot. Thank you all for listening. We've got a great episode, episode number 60. Can't believe I'm actually saying that. It's been a heck of a ride, but happy and hope you are enjoying it out there. We are having a lot of fun on our end producing these. So with me today, even though we've had 60 episodes, this is actually her first time joining us today, that is Travel Media Group's Marketing Coordinator, Marissa Kinzel. Marissa, thank you so much for joining me on the Suite Spot today.
Marissa Kinzel: Of course, I'm glad to be here.
Ryan Embree: So we've got some very important topics to discuss, over the past couple several episodes we've been talking about post-pandemic recovery, but today what we're going to do is actually hone in on Generation Z and how we can market our hotel to Generation Z in this post-COVID era. So I wanted to start today's episode Marissa, just by defining Generation Z and sharing some of their characteristics and traits.
Marissa Kinzel: Sure thing, as someone who is on the line between younger millennial and Gen Z myself, I think this definition is a really important one to make since businesses will often conflate millennials and Gen Z into one like conglomerate entity. So for Gen Z, we're looking at a group of people who were born as early as 1995, Pew research will say 1997 and as late as 2012 or 2014, depending on where you look. So for the most part, Gen Z refers to those who are currently around 14 to 25 years old and surprisingly, they make up 40% of the consumer population. One of their most significant characteristics is that they're considered digital natives. This is a term that means most Gen Zer's will have had either the internet, a computer, or a smartphone for the majority of their living memory. These individuals also value truth and honesty, and they have an incredible capacity for filtering information shown to them as they grew up in the information age.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, that's very true. Like you said, they've had those smartphones, computers ,and internet all at the palm of their hands. So they've had so much information given to them, that they are better than maybe other Generations and deciphering and filtering that information like you said. So when we're marketing to them, it's really, really important that we're strategic with our marketing and advertising for them. You know, what we're talking about is kind of, again, how COVID-19 will impact the way they use technology in their everyday lives. Can you kind of talk to that a little bit?
Marissa Kinzel: Sure. Gen Z is already really used to integrating technology into their...
In this special edition of the Suite Spot, we discuss the recent 2020 Skift Global Forum. Host Ryan Embree had the opportunity to virtually attend the event, which brought together some of the biggest names and brands in the travel industry. In this episode, Ryan shares his five biggest takeaways from the 3-day forum.
Listen as he reveals the thoughts of CEOs from major hotel brands and OTAs as they navigate the COVID-19 pandemic. Their insights guide the discussion on what the future of the hotel industry will look like moving forward and when we can expect to see full industry recovery.
Suite Spot Podcast · 59 - 2020 Skift Global Forum Special Edition
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. Today's episode is a special edition, as you've heard before at Travel Media Group, we like to attend all hospitality trade shows and events across the country. We've had some special episodes and special additions of the Suite Spot where we've talked about HITEC and we've talked about Lodging Conference. So, you know, we are at the forefront of all of these industry events and trying to share it with you, the listener, some of our insights and takeaways. So with 2020, there's been a slew of adjustments that these events have needed to taken, but fortunately, I have had the opportunity to attend Skift's Global Forum, which took place September 21st to the 23rd, 2020. Like most events across the country, this was done virtually, but it was a great event. There was a ton of industry leaders, guest speakers that were there, CEOs of major brands like IHG and Marriott, major players in OTAs: Booking.com, Expedia.
Ryan Embree: So it was really just a great session on industry leaders kind of coming together and taking a look at where we're headed and what challenges hotels are facing right now in 2020 and going into 2021. So today what we're going to do for this episode is we are going to talk about five main takeaways that I got, the five themes really of the forum and kind of speak to some of what the guest speakers were talking about, to give you again, the listener, a good idea of where everyone's mindsets are, because that's what it is right now in 2020, is there is a lot of uncertainty out there and it takes events like this to really get us together to kind of paint a path forward. So the first big topic we're going to talk about that was brought up by nearly everyone on the panels and sessions that were presented was recovery.
Ryan Embree: It was very interesting to hear everyone's input on what they thought about industry recovery timeline. They even would actually do polls during sessions to kind of figure out what the audience and attendees' thoughts were on some of these, and one of those was based around recovery. And the majority of people answered, what is the timeline for recovery, as saying that no one knows and it's not realistic to kind of guess right now. And I think that was the overall sentiment with the industry leaders that were talking during this. They were obviously very hopeful. You always have had that sentiment of hospitality strong. We're gonna come back stronger. Things are going to get better. We're going to recover. And you could hear that in some of the CEOs and brands that were speaking, but there was also that tone of it's going to take a long time. This is a recovery. I mean, we shut down, not only our countries, our states, our cities, we completely shut down our industry for an entire month. So it's not going to be something that we can just kind of jump back into right away.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we talk to Client Success Representative and social media enthusiast Jessica Pickering. Jessica joins host Ryan Embree to share inventive ways to spark creativity and engagement on your hotel’s social media.
Ryan and Jessica cover how different social platforms can be leveraged uniquely to achieve property objectives and goals. Jessica shares what a typical call sounds like with a hotel partnered with Travel Media Group’s social solutions, and her strategic planning efforts for every client. Jessica also touches on influencer marketing and shares a few examples of successful social campaigns and posts.
If you are looking for more information about Travel Media Group’s social media solutions or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 58 - Social Media Tips And Tricks Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello, everyone welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. Thank you all for listening and joining me today. Got a great episode. It's been a while since we've kind of touched on this subject, but we are going to be talking about Social Media. It seems to - when we get feedback from our listeners, even from our current partners, and prospects that we talk to at Travel Media Group - this seems to just be such a hot topic right now with the pandemic. So with me today we've got a first time guest, but I'm super excited to have her on the Suite Spot with me today, that is Client Success Representative Jessica Pickering. Jessica, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot.
Jessica Pickering: Thanks Ryan. Thank you so much for having me.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, and we're excited to have you, like I said, this is a hot topic right now. I think hoteliers have really stepped back since the beginning of this pandemic and taken a look at their Social Media, the way that they're communicating, and connecting with guests. And one of the most apparent ways that they can do that is by using platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. So that is what we're going to focus on today. I wanted to start since you are a new guest, let's go ahead and start by explaining your role at Travel Media Group with us, Jessica.
Jessica Pickering: Yeah, so I am a Client Success Representative with Travel Media Group and my team's daily focus is on our client's experience and really making sure that we're available to support them in any way that we can. We take a proactive approach in reaching out to our clients regularly to train, educate, and provide them with tips on how to reach their goals. But we also provide reporting and help track results and performance so that our hoteliers have a good understanding of areas they are performing well in, as well as areas that may have an opportunity for improvement.
Ryan Embree: So when a hotel or group of hotels, partners with Travel Media Group Jessica and the Client Success team are the ones that are reaching out on a monthly, sometimes bimonthly basis, depending on the partner and really talking through them like solutions like Social Media, coming up with some innovative ideas. I brought you on specifically because I know Social Media is a passion of yours, we've talked off air about this, can you kind of explain why?
Jessica Pickering: Yeah, so for me personally, Social Media has always been an outlet for my photography and just my favorite way to stay connected with the people that I care about. It's also a really awesome way to get emmersed into things that I'm interested in. So I love art and travel content.
This episode of Suite Spot is all about the multi-property functionality of Travel Media Group’s user-generated content management system: TMG OneView®. Host Ryan Embree is joined by VP of Product Development & Technology Jason Lee to review how management groups and multi-property owners are leveraging this tool to streamline and optimize hotel operations.
Jason shares why it was critical to incorporate multi-property reporting and capabilities within TMG’s OneView® feed. He trades ideas with Ryan on how he would utilize OneView® as a multi-property content management tool. Since TMG's OneView® feed is a versatile tool for multi-property environments, Jason also showcases how different positions within a management group organization’s hierarchy might use it uniquely.
If you are interested in learning more about accessing your management group’s TMG OneView® feed or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 57 - Multi Property Reporting & Capabilities with TMG's OneView™ Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check in and we check what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is Ryan Embree coming to you live from my home office here in Orlando, Florida. With me today, we have another familiar guest and a familiar voice, Jason Lee. He is our Vice President of Product development and Technology. Jason, you probably have been with us the most in 2020, so far, so we'll have to come up with some sort of award, but I appreciate you being on with us, Jason.
Jason Lee: Alright, thank you very much.
Ryan Embree: You know, you've been on the Suite Spot before to talk about the awesomeness of TMG's OneView platform, but today we're going to focus on OneView's multi-property capabilities, reporting, and functionality. So before we dive too deep into the subject, let's start by briefly describing what OneView is and what the purpose behind it was?
Jason Lee: Okay. Yeah, so OneView, the name kind of gives away some of it, but basically it's a place where you can interact with all of your user-generated content and that user-generated content could be content that is interacted by users. So a typical example, probably the biggest example of user-generated content in our industry or in the hotel industry is reviews. So that's not to say that people can't leave comments, right? They leave comments on social media, they could write on your wall. There's lots of places where feedback can be given or where comments can be given, but what OneView does is it actually combines all of these into a centralized place and it allows the hotel to be able to interact with that data. So you can not only interact with the individual pieces of data, like the individual reviews or the individual social comments, or even instant messages from social media, but you're also able then to look at like deeper sets of analytics, like what is the history of this type of review or what's the history of this site? Where do I stand in terms of how I look online? How does this affecting possibly my booking? And so all of these things play together, but that's where OneView brings it into one place. It makes it very easy for you to take a look at it. Also providing alerts and daily updates on what's been going on inside of the realm of feedback.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, I think it's such an important tool for a hotelier, where over the past decade it feels like there have been opening up lines of communication between the hotel and the guests. So you can leave different reviews on OTAs, more and more social media places and actions where people are trying to reach yo...
In another special edition of the Suite Spot, Senior Vice President of Lodging Insights at STR, Jan Freitag returns to the podcast for an insightful conversation. Jan and his team at STR are continuing to closely monitor industry data and trends post-COVID-19.
Jan and Ryan discuss changes in the industry since they last spoke in June (You can hear that conversation by listening to Episode 51). In this episode, Jan talks about the health of the US hotel pipeline and predicts what we can expect to see in new build growth moving forward. Jan shares which markets are experiencing an increase in occupancy and which types of travelers are filling rooms right now. Ryan and Jan also talk about the impact that back-to-school will have on travel, and they speculate about what the rest of 2020 could look like for hoteliers.
For more information and insights from the STR team, visit their COVID-19 resource center at STR.com. To submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 56 - COVID Hotel Industry Trends With Jan Freitag Pt. II
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree, but you are in for quite a treat. We have once again, a special guest that joined us a couple episodes ago. He has been the calming presence in these turbulent times that we're going through right now and that is Senior Vice President of Lodging Insights at STR, Jan Freitag. So Jan welcome back to the Suite Spot.
Jan Freitag: Thank you, Ryan. I appreciate the opportunity to be with you, to be back with you. I'm not sure that I'm such a calming influence. The data that we're putting out, is getting better, I guess, you know, it's not that great, but yeah, it's been quite a ride since the beginning, quite a ride since we last talked. So I'm happy to chat more about what we're seeing in the industry today.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely and that's what this episode is completely about. I felt like the last episode was just a couple of days ago, but it also feels like it's been months in between - kind of like our lives are feeling right now in this pandemic. So, you know, speaking of that last time, we were starting to see those early signs of recovery. We were seeing some encouraging signs out there. You and your team were sharing some great information, then all of a sudden, not so fast, the rises in cases in the United States came in the month of July. How has that impacted the industry's recovery and STR future projections?
Jan Freitag: Yeah, so it is nice to see that the U S occupancy for the week ending August the 15th actually hit 50%, 50.2%. Now it's true, that that is only for the hotels that are open, you know, and so just under 5% of rooms are still temporarily closed. That is totally skewed towards the upper end, right? Full service, luxury, ana upper upscale hotels are more likely closed than economy properties, where we are basically completely open again. But so occupancy, 50%, half the rooms are occupied, great. Leisure travel continues to dominate, weekend travel, weekend occupancies, you know, 57% continue to be very, very healthy, and extended stay continues to outperform, lower end continues to outperform. All of that, all of those are good signs. And I think we've seen that through July and I think we're probably gonna see that little bit more through August. The big question, the hundred billion dollar question is, "What happens after Labor Day, right?" When kids are back in school virtual or real, whatever, but we're not as eager to get back out on the road,
In this episode of Suite Spot, we talk about the adaptations hoteliers are making to their property websites in the midst of this pandemic. Travel Media Group Senior Website Product Analyst, Stephanie Courtois, joins host Ryan Embree to share how she, alongside the Travel Media Group product team, prepared our hotel partners' websites for COVID-19 and after.
Stephanie and Ryan discuss the different options hoteliers can utilize to communicate important information pertaining to COVID-19 through their hotel's vanity site. For franchised hotels, Stephanie stresses the importance of highlighting changes specific to the individual property while aligning with overall brand messaging. She also shares search results analytics about COVID-19 landing pages created by the Travel Media Group team and the high impact it has on a traveler’s impression and expectations of a property.
To learn more information about upgrading and updating your hotel’s vanity website or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 55 - Adapting Your Hotels Website During COVID - 19
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is episode #55 and we have another great episode for you today, packed with information on hotel marketing. Today, we are actually going to dive into a subject that at Travel Media Group we specialize in among other things, but something we probably haven't talked about in awhile, but it's super, super important, and that is your hotel's website. And we're going to talk about your hotel's website during this time of COVID-19, some of the adaptations that we've been seeing that hoteliers are making, and really how you can evolve your website to make it work best for you in this post COVID recovery stage that the hotel industry is going through right now. So with me today, I thought I'd bring on one of our Travel Media Group experts and senior product analyst, Stephanie Courtois. Stephanie, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot today.
Stephanie Courtois: Thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree: And we're going to be talking all about websites and again, that is your specialty. So you've had a lot of conversations through every phase of this pandemic, from the very beginning, to the shutdown in April and May, and now as we get into the summer part of that recovery stages. So the way I'd like to look at it from a high level is this pandemic has really given hoteliers a unique opportunity and reason to evaluate the way that they're communicating to travelers and guests online. So almost the silver lining to reevaluate how you're using those communication tools. How has the COVID-19 crisis highlighted the importance of using a hotel vanity site as a communication tool?
Stephanie Courtois: So with the ever evolving nature of the pandemic, it's super important that hoteliers communicate to guests the active measures they're taking for their safety, whether that be mask mandates, enhanced cleaning protocols, social distancing markers, amenity limitations, or even closures, guests need to be aware of the changes your making at the property. So for a franchised property, they have the brand initiatives for guidance, and those are usually displayed as travel advisories on the brand page. But generally they're pretty broad. They kind of go over their entire hotel suite and collections as a whole and don't really hone in to what you're doing specifically at the property. And that even goes for independent properties, they are just thrown into the thick of it and need to come up...
In this episode of Suite Spot, Ryan Embree reflects on some of the post-pandemic effects of our everyday lives when it comes to travel. Ryan recounts the significant changes to the traveler experience of a hotel stay in summer 2019 versus summer 2020. He talks about how hoteliers have adapted their websites, social media, and online reputation to meet the needs and expectations of travelers in the midst of a global pandemic.
Learn about various guest touchpoints like check-in and check out and how they have been impacted by COVID-19. This episode provides perspective on all that has changed in the past several months while appreciating those things that within the hotel experience have stayed the same.
If you have any questions or need assistance during this time please feel free to reach out to us by either calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Suite Spot Podcast · 54 - The Changing Traveler Experience: 2019 vs 2020
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you all for listening today. You've heard us talk about over the past couple of podcast episodes about the new normal. You've probably read articles about it, you've heard industry experts talk about, what can travelers expect in this new normal? What is our world going to look like in this new normal, after the pandemic? And as we start to see recovery that new normal is going to drop that "new" part and it's just going to become normal for us. And I think one of the best ways to reflect on this "new normal" is to really take a look at where we've come from. It's been a very, very long, but also short four months into this pandemic. So what we're going to do on today's episode - and this might sting for a couple hoteliers out there - but I think it's important to do, is really walk through the entire traveler's journey and experience and compare summer 2020 to summer 2019, so just one year ago.
Ryan Embree: I challenge you to kind of listen for all of the changes, because day to day, as we're kind of living and going through the operations, we might not see as many changes as we notice when we reflect back on just one year ago. So let's go ahead and get started. And we're going to start where a lot of travelers start, in that traveler's journey, the way that travelers and guests are looking to book and make a purchase decision, when it comes about a hotel stay. Now in summer 2019, as hoteliers we were excited, the summer, you've got the kids out of school, this means family vacations, this is our busiest time of year. We're expecting all ages to be traveling, so maybe some older generations, as well as younger and families. Events that were going on, that we paid very, very close attention to summer events, whether that be concerts, sporting events, conventions, our travel was coming from all over the world, really nationwide travel and people were flying and we had our typical walk-ins people that would go ahead and just walk through our door, kind of check what our rates were for the night without maybe doing that much research, but we were still getting those travelers.
Ryan Embree: We fast forward to 2020. You know, all of a sudden our travelers are going to be skewed a little bit younger. We've talked about this as we start to recover those younger travelers are going to be the first ones to feel more comfortable and safe starting to get into the travel world. We know that a lot of events have been canceled in 2020 due to the pandemic. Sporting events,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we discuss what to do when your hotel receives an online review related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Host, Ryan Embree, is joined by review response expert and Respond & Resolve™ Product Manager, Kristeena Seckinger, who walks us through which COVID-19 red flags to watch out for in your hotel’s online reviews and how to handle them effectively and appropriately.
Ryan and Kristeena describe how traveler sentiment and tone in online reviews have evolved since the beginning of the pandemic and the role that setting proper expectations plays in generating positive reviews online. They also share best practices on how to best prepare for the increase of online reviews as the industry begins its recovery.
If you have any additional questions about your responding COVID-19 reviews online or would like more information on Travel Media Group”s Respond & Resolve™ solution, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 53 - Responding To COVID - 19 Online Reviews
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing, I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, this is your host Ryan Embree here for Episode #53. Very excited about this episode, we are going to be talking about responding to online reviews. So I know we've kind of had some of these episodes in the past. We've talked about COVID-19 and the impact that it's had on some of our other digital marketing channels: online reputation, social media, but we really haven't got into responding to online reviews. It's one of those things that this pandemic has changed so many aspects of the hotel experience, that new normal, that we're always talking about and hearing about. But one of the things that has stayed consistent is the importance of responding to your reviews professionally and in a timely manner, because this is the type of information that travelers are looking at more than ever when they're determining whether they're going to book with your property, or another property, or even necessarily book in general and take a vacation. So with me today, I brought on the expert of review response, she's joined me before on the Suite Spot, but this is her first time joining me from her remote office, so I will welcome in Kristeena Seckinger, she is our Respond and Resolve™ Product Manager. Kristeena, thank you so much for joining the Suite Spot.
Kristeena Seckinger: Hi Ryan and thanks for having me again.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely. So let's start with how you and your review response team have adjusted since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Kristeena Seckinger: Well, there's definitely been a lot of adjusting for everyone since the beginning of the pandemic and my team is no exception to that. I would say back in March, when all of this started, the review flow really slowed down drastically, which was definitely an adjustment for the fast pace that we were used to before. But since then, as the states began opening and everything started returning to almost normal, we have seen a huge increase in review flow again. And with that increase of reviews and everything that's going on, our team has continued to craft those customized responses that really represent the hotel's voice and message that they want to deliver to their guests right now. And one of the great things about our program, the Respond & Resolve™, is that our team understands that now it's more important than ever to make sure our responses are meeting those client needs and delivering that specific information to all of our guests and travelers.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we turn our attention to COVID-19 hotel industry recovery and what hoteliers can do to build traveler confidence. Host Ryan Embree is joined remotely by Travel Media Group’s Director of Marketing, Anne Sandoval, to share best practices for increasing guests' comfort level.
Ryan and Anne start by discussing the evolution of hotel’s messaging throughout the pandemic across their digital marketing channels like social media and vanity websites. They talk about the most effective places online to relay the changes that have been implemented at the property to ensure the safety of their guests. Finally, they identify the signals that hoteliers should keep an eye out for online which indicates that travelers are feeling more comfortable and confident in your property.
If you are looking for more creative ideas on how to build traveler confidence post-COVID-19, visit Travel Media Group’s COVID-19 hotel marketing resource center online or reach out to us by phone or text at 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 52 - Building Traveler Confidence For Recovery
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. I want to take a quick second to thank all of our listeners for all of your support out there, I can't believe it's been over 50 episodes that we have been providing this information. I hope you're enjoying it out there, with me today is our Marketing Director, Anne Sandoval. Anne, I know you just joined me remotely a couple episodes ago, but here you are again. So thank you again, for being on the Suite Spot.
Anne Sandoval: Thanks. It's great to be back.
Ryan Embree: Anne, you know, we're in a completely different place when we were the last time we spoke and I believe things are moving so fast right now during this pandemic, but the good news is we're starting to see signs of recovery. But, as we enter into the next several months, the question is still looming out there for all hoteliers, when will we get to this "new normal" everyone's talking about. Like I said, we're starting to see signs of recovery every single day from occupancy, demand, we see flight numbers are up. So people are starting to emerge from these stay at home orders, all that pent up demand. We've heard the term revenge travel, which I absolutely love. I think there is going to be a huge, huge demand here coming up in the summer. Time, will eventually and organically get us to that new normal, but what we're going to talk about today are some ways to potentially speed up your hotel's recovery. Everyone wants to try to get back to where they were and hopefully even further than we were, by instilling consumer confidence and comfort levels. The only way that travelers are going to feel safe is if you can instill some sort of confidence and comfort that they are going to be safe at your property, when you host them. So last time we did speak Anne, we covered the five characteristics and attributes of crisis management communication. So what messages we were sending out to our customers at a time where it was a lot of uncertainty, right? We were just getting the stay at home orders, states were starting to lock down, we didn't know what the future holds, now that we have somewhat of a clear vision of how we're going to recover. How should a hotel's messaging have evolved since that time?
Anne Sandoval: That's a really great question and before I talk about the things that have changed, I just quickly would like to touch on a few important things that I think should remain the same and ...
In this special edition of the Suite Spot, we sit down with Senior Vice President of Lodging Insights at STR, Jan Freitag. Jan and his team at STR have been hard at work collecting and analyzing hotel data across the globe during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Jan and Ryan take a look at how the COVID-19 crisis compares to past industry crises and how to look for clues in other global markets to predict what we might see moving forward in the U.S. hotel industry. Jan also shares what recovery signs hoteliers should keep an eye out for to signal the return of leisure transient travel, corporate business travel, and group travel. Jan also discusses what he calls a “high touch to high tech” evolution that will be the new normal in a post-COVID-19 hotel world.
For more information and insights from the STR team, visit their COVID-19 resource center at STR.com. To submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 51 - COVID Hotel Industry Trends With Jan Freitag Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to the Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello, everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot: episode number 51. This is your host Ryan Embree coming to you, once again, live from my Orlando, home office. We've got an amazing episode for you today. I am super excited for the special guest that we have coming on the Suite Spot with us. He has been a voice that a lot of you have probably been listening to throughout this whole pandemic, COVID-19 situation. And that is Senior Vice President of Lodging Insights at STR, Jan Freitag. So I'm going to have Jan with me on today and we are going to talk data from STR, recovery, and cover all of those good topics. Alright Jan, thank you again so much for joining us. Let's go ahead and jump right into it.
Jan Freitag: Yeah, thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree: You know in your position as Senior Vice President of Lodging Insights at STR your team is really uniquely positioned to identify trends in global hospitality markets. You know, I'm wondering with the data almost changing day by day, how is your team navigating the challenge of COVID-19, which again has really provided a significant disruption to original forecast for this year and beyond?
Jan Freitag: So it is true the data is changing day by day, by now we can luckily say that the data is getting less bad. So we sort of peaked, if you want to use that word, or troughed out at the bottom the week of April the 11th and ever since then, our week of demand data in the United States has steadily improved bit by bit by bit specifically on the weekends. We've seen occupancies actually increasing week over week over week, which is a nice thing to see. We're navigating this just like everybody else. We're reporting the data. We ask our clients to trust the data. We are making the best of the data and trying to point out where things are really hurting and where things are getting a little bit better, you know. And STR as a company, it's nice to see that our Beijing office is actually back in the office, but all the other offices are still working from home globally.
Ryan Embree: That is awesome to hear and we are constantly looking for any of those signals of good news. So even something as small as people coming back into the office, that is a good signal for our industry. You know, in difficult times like this, we sometimes try to find comparisons from the past to help us understand where we're going through and, you know, maybe give us that hope moving forward. Now in your webinars Jan, you mentioned prior challenging times 9/11 and the great recession 2008.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we celebrate another hotel digital marketing innovation created by Travel Media Group’s product development team led by VP of Product & Technology, Jason Lee. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Jason to discuss 1st Impression Score®, a first of its kind hospitality and reputation metric.
Jason shares what separates 1st Impression Score® with other reputation metrics in hospitality and why it was necessary to create it now. Jason explains the 4 factors that impact the 1st Impression Score® and gives tips on what a hotel can do to improve their score. Jason and Ryan also speak to what role traveler first impressions play in a COVID-19 travel world. The TMG 1st Impression Score® is a powerful tool that hotels can use to see how reputation influences revenue in real-time.
If you are interested in learning more about unlocking your hotel’s 1st Impression Score® or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 50 - 1st Impression Score™ Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree coming to you once again from my home office here in Orlando. We've got a great and exciting episode for you. I am joined, once again, remotely with Travel Media Group's Vice President of Product Development and Technology. You know his voice well, that is Mr. Jason Lee. Jason, thank you again for joining me on the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: Alright, thanks for having me Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely and we've got a really exciting topic today, another innovation and digital tool for hoteliers that we're extremely excited to talk about and share with you all on the Suite Spot. I want to start this episode by congratulating you, Jason, you and your team on creating this tool. It's called the 1st Impression score. It's one of a kind, but you know, don't let me explain it. Let's hear it from you. What is the 1st impression score for someone that's never heard of that before?
Jason Lee: So it's a brand new metric at looking at reputation. So if you think about reputation, for those of you listening to this, if you're using a tool that's provided by your brand or are you using some other tool or maybe even using Travel Media Group's tools, you're used to seeing reputation given to you as it occurs, right? So I receive a review, the contents of that review, the score of that review, all of that kind of comes in. So I can see my last 30 days, here's how many reviews came in, here's some sentiment data possibly around this, and so you're seeing reviews in time, right? But that is not how the guest experiences your reviews, the guest experiences your reviews as they display, as they show, right? So, I see your lifetime score in one phase of my research, but then I might encounter your actual reviews on that first page of the review site. So now I'm looking at the lifetime score and I'm also looking at further data on that first page, but that first page worth of reviews could have nothing to do with the last 30 days or even 60 days. And now even in this time, it could have nothing to do with the last 90 days, right? So that data that's there is influencing guests to stay with you or not stay with you and that has nothing to do with traditional modeling of reputation. And so we developed 1st impression score, we developed it, by the way, long before COVID we'd been working on this for awhile. And this metric is brand new, so it is a completely new way of looking at it. We call it 1st impression because it truly is the guest's impression of your repu...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we discuss the stories and sentiments that we have been hearing from our hotel partners across the country who have been impacted by COVID-19. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Client Success & Operations Manager Edwin Pomales to discuss how his team has evolved their conversations with our partners to support hotels along the path to recovery.
Ryan and Edwin share the proactive steps hotels should be taking to instill traveler confidence and comfort in their property’s response to COVID-19. They know that every hotel’s situation is unique, but with strategic action planning and careful crisis communication, hotels can gain a competitive advantage on the road to industry recovery. Edwin also shares his thoughts on how his team plans to adapt to this “new normal” that hoteliers and travelers alike will begin to experience.
If you are looking for help or insight with a recovery plan for your hotel call or text us at 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 49 - Client Success During COVID - 19
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, continuing to give you some content from my home office here in Orlando, Florida. Hoping everyone out there listening is safe and healthy. We're going to be continuing our COVID-19 podcast series. We've covered a lot so far during this time, we've covered leveraging social media and communication, we talked about the top five things to do during a crisis, and we talked about, most recently, about reputation management. So if you've been following along, we are going to continue our COVID-19 series and with me today, I'm going to bring in Edwin Pomales who is Travel Media Group's Client Success and Operations Manager. At Travel Media Group, since this crisis we've had a lot of communication with our hoteliers at every single stage of this. So I thought it would be a really good idea to bring Edwin on and kind of discuss, you know, what we've been hearing from our hotel partners and what type of advice we've been sharing to try to generate some ideas for you, the listeners, the hoteliers, to implement at your property to get us ready for that recovery that we've been hearing so much about. I'm going to go ahead and welcome Edwin to the Suite Spot. Thanks Edwin everyone for being on.
Edwin Pomales: Hey Ryan, thanks for having me. Definitely happy to be here today.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely, Edwin. So let's jump right into it. Your teams are in constant contact with hoteliers through this entire process from the beginning of COVID-19 to now as we start to see ease on restrictions and we start to see maybe that light at the end of the tunnel and that recovery phase. I'm wondering how has COVID-19 impacted your team's interactions with Travel Media Group's hotel partners?
Edwin Pomales: Ryan, it's interesting because over the years we've definitely worked hard to build strong relationships with all of our clients. We really do pride ourselves on being a proactive team and try to stay in tune with the goals and the challenges of our partners. You know, when I say proactive, you know a lot of customer service departments are more reactive, right? You have an issue, you reach out to them, they try to fix the issue for you. Where at here at Travel Media Group with my Client Success Team we're actively reaching out to our clients and game planning with them, figuring out what, you know, based upon what time of year it is or what their goals are at that time. Really trying to figure out how to execute. So with COVID,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree is joined by TMG's Product Director Patrick O’Brien to discuss the role that online reputation plays during COVID-19.
Ryan and Patrick break down the influential power that online reviews are playing in consumer’s booking decisions during this time and the potential negative and lasting impact a bad review today can have on your business. Patrick shares some best practices that his professional review response team has implemented during this time when travelers are paying more attention than ever to every hotel’s reviews and responses. This episode details what the evolution of online reputation looks like as hotels start to enter into the recovery phase.
For help with improving your hotel’s reputation during COVID-19 or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Suite Spot Podcast · 48 - Reputation Management During COVID-19
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree, as always. Still recording live from my home studio here. With me today we have another remote guest that we've decided to bring in to the Suite Spot. Also a frequent guest of the Suite Spot, that is Product Director of Travel Media Group, Patrick O'Brien. So let me get started by welcoming Patrick again to the Suite Spot.
Patrick O'Brien: Thanks Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Patrick, up to this point, you know, as Product Director, you work with all of our solutions at Travel Media Group, but really kind of where you started was the reputation side of things. So I know we've talked up to this point about the COVID-19 crisis and our educational series through our blogs, our webinars, and through this podcast. But I thought a really insightful episode would be to bring you on Patrick and really drill into reputation because I think reputation sometimes gets lost on hoteliers. You know, we talk about, you know, what are we going to do about our bookings? What are we going to do about generating more business? If you could, let's start by just saying why are reviews still important right now for hoteliers?
Patrick O'Brien: Yeah, so I think that the, you know, the initial thought from hoteliers is occupancy is down. People aren't staying at our hotel and so, you know, as you mentioned, reviews are there for, not important. But technically we're faced right now with a unique time where hotel demand in effect, according to Smith Travel Research is at zero. We're still booking around a million rooms a night. But, you know, it's created a new benchmark of what demand is when there is no demand. So being faced with that as a hotelier, your options are very limited in the number of guests that are going to be in your market and looking for a hotel room. So first and foremost reviews are a fantastic way to let guests know that your hotel is still open, that it is safe, and also, you know, potentially what amenities may or may not still be available because something that you have up and running today may no longer be up and running tomorrow. This is all done through sort of a verification process of other guests. So it's not necessarily just you saying, "Hey, this is what we're doing." It's other guests going in and identifying, "Hey, this a good hotel to be able to stay at or this is not a good hotel to stay at." We talked about in the past how reviews are vitally important to your business because it helps the guests set their expectations prior to arrival and this is even more important today. You have to think that for the most part,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we continue sharing helpful insights and tips to help hoteliers combat the unprecedented COVID-19 crisis. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Travel Media Group’s Director of Marketing, Anne Sandoval, to discuss 5 Strategies of Crisis Response.
Anne, who studied crisis management and has a graduate certificate in corporate communication, talks us through each component of crisis response. Ryan and Anne then apply these crisis response strategies to the hotel industry. They share insightful statistics surrounding these strategies and give some specific examples of how they can be implemented at a property level. These 5 crisis response components – responsiveness, transparency, accountability, consistency, and action – build the foundation of an effective game plan for managing this global emergency.
If you are looking for more information on the hotel industry and coronavirus visit Travel Media Group’s COVID-19 hotel marketing resource center online or reach out to us by phone or text at 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree recording remotely again during this COVID-19 crisis. And with me today we have another frequent guest of the Suite Spot, also recording remotely for the first time, Anne Sandoval. So Anne, I know you've been with us a couple times, definitely a different location than when we are usually recording, but want to welcome you to the Suite Spot.
Anne Sandoval: Hey Ryan, thanks for having me. I definitely prefer when we are able to record face to face, but I'm glad this is working out. It's awesome. I'm so happy to be here, once again.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely, feeling very thankful that we're able to give all of our listeners content, insights, and education on the current ongoing COVID-19 crisis today. We've got a really great episode that I think is going to be very relevant to what's going on and best practices and tips on how hoteliers can implement ways to handle this COVID -19 crisis that really we've never been through before. So Anne, is not only our Director of Marketing at Travel Media Group, but has studied at the University of Central Florida with a master's in mass communication and a certificate of corporate communication and has studied crisis management. So I thought no better person to bring on with us today to talk about some of the components and strategies of crisis response than Anne. And what we're going to do today, in this episode, is we're actually going to go through the five components or strategies of crisis response. We're going to go through each one, we're going to talk to them from a high level of how these tips and strategies would work just overall, and then we're really gonna drill down into the hotel industry and how we can apply that to the hotel that you may be managing during this crisis today. So let's go ahead and get started with the first tip.
Anne Sandoval: Of course, yeah. Thanks Ryan for that introduction. So the first component of crisis response that's important to talk about is responsiveness. And the reason I'm going to mention it first is because it's so time sensitive. Some industry experts say that you have just 15 minutes to respond when a crisis occurs. And you might be thinking, "Why is that, 15 minutes sounds almost unreasonably fast?" But the reason is because now information is shared 24/7/365 and consumer expectations are higher than ever. If it's a small crisis, like a negative tweet about your business, it might seem a little more reasonable to respond...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we continue our discussion on COVID-19 and the virus’s impact on the hotel industry. Host Ryan Embree welcomes Jason Lee, Vice President of Product & Technology, back to the Suite Spot to get his perspective and insights on this unprecedented global crisis.
With years of experience as a hotel owner and general manager, Jason shares the similarities and differences between this crisis and those from the past, like 9/11 or the Great Recession. Ryan and Jason give tips and ideas on how to reassure your hotel’s guests and future travelers utilizing social media, online reviews, and review responses. They provide some thoughtful advice on how to “stay in the today” and control what you can in these uncertain times.
If you are looking for help with a hotel action plan during this time, reach out to us by phone or text at 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We are continuing our educational content on the current COVID-19 situation that our industry is in, our nation, and globally is in. So for this discussion today, I figured I'd pull in a little backup, a very seasoned veteran of the hospitality industry. You've heard his voice many times here on the Suite Spot, that is Mr. Jason Lee, he is our vice president of product development and technology who joins me remotely. So usually we're in the office together, but Jason, I appreciate you taking the time to join me today.
Jason Lee: Awesome. Thank you for having me, Ryan. Yeah, it is a departure from being able to look you in the eye, but I do appreciate you having me on.
Ryan Embree: Yeah, absolutely and we'll kind of jump right into it. As I mentioned before, you know, we did an episode in the past about the beginning steps to this situation. It's been a couple of weeks since, so I figured, let's go ahead and get you in here. You've been on both sides of the front desk as a general manager, owner, and then on the other side working with Travel Media Group, you know, so I wanted to get your input on, because you've been through this, you've been through some sort of crisis, whether that's something like 2001 in 9/11 or the 2008 financial crisis, you know, we have those ebbs and flows in our industry and in our economy. How is this crisis, this COVID-19 crisis, in 2020 different from maybe those that you've experienced before?
Jason Lee: Well, I mean, I think there's the good and the bad of the situation and the bad is just how drastic the occupancy swing was. So in other areas, like even during 9/11, there was obviously a huge swing in travel in general, so people didn't want to travel. The people didn't have money or didn't have as much discretionary money at the 2008 financial crisis, but in this case, it's something where it's a full shutdown of everything, you know, so it's a shutdown of restaurants, its a shutdown of travel, of just movement - so that's the bad side. The bad side is like how drastic of a cut it is. The good side, unlike the other ones, is that there is a clear end in sight. And even though it may not seem clear from maybe nightly news or from the stuff you read, there is a clear end from every country that's experienced this, where you see the path back and this is something that is temporary. It's something that has an end and so it's understanding that and being able to weather this time period. So with the financial crisis, the uncertainty and like the literal like cut of discretionary money or people's uncertainty about their financial future,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we discuss the COVID-19 crisis facing hoteliers around the globe today. Host Ryan Embree helps navigate these unprecedented times in the hospitality industry and shares words of encouragement on behalf of Travel Media Group.
Ryan discusses the vital role that communication channels like social media and online review response will play in connecting to both current guests and future travelers during this time. This episode provides content ideas during the COVID-19 crisis and recommendations on how to repurpose your energy and staff if your hotel is experiencing a dip in occupancy. He also shares some quick tips on how hoteliers can begin to prepare for the eventual market recovery that will take place post-virus.
If you would like to share your story through this difficult time or see if Travel Media Group can be of any type of assistance, reach out to us by phone or text at 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host Ryan Embree. So before we get started today, I want to share that all of us here at Travel Media Group understand what a difficult time this is for hoteliers. This is an unprecedented situation that we've never seen before. At Travel Media Group, we've been in the travel/hotel industry for 40 years. I'm sure a lot of our listeners and hoteliers have that much experience, sometimes even more experience than that, and we know how difficult this is. We've had many of our hotel partners, both that have worked with us and aren't currently working with us, reach out because this is a time where all of us need to come together as a community to help one another out. So I just wanted to, before we get started, kind of share that message with you from Travel Media Group.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host Ryan Embree recording live from my new at home work office. I'm sure a lot of our listeners might be in different places, this past week has really been challenging and kind of turned a lot of our world's upside down with Coronavirus, COVID-19. So today's episode is really gonna center all around that. There are a lot of hoteliers out there, a lot of our hotel partners at Travel Media Group asking the questions of where do I start, when is this going to end, how is this going to impact the industry as a whole? Most importantly for you - how will this impact my business? And we are really at a point and a stage where every single room counts, every single percentage of occupancy - and that's not a place that we've been in this industry for a very long time.
Ryan Embree: We were riding record highs on ADR, REVPAR, demand. And then all of a sudden we came to this complete stop. So we put this episode together just as a way to try to start to make sense, kind of, give some tips, some best practices on how to best handle this. As you know, this is the first time that we're going through this as a community, as an industry, as a whole. So with Travel Media Group's expertise in the digital marketing side, you know, we thought we'd get some great information and tips out there on how you can start connecting and communicating with your guests. And that's really where this all stems from is communication. Communication is key. You want to go ahead and create an action plan. If you could speak directly to your traveler, if you could convey a message to them or have a conversation which each one of your reservations for the next couple nights, what would you say to them?
Ryan Embree: How would you assure them that your hotel is going to be safe?
In this episode of The Suite Spot, we discuss how embracing experiential travel helps hotels make lasting connections with their guests. Ryan welcomes President of Sightline Hospitality, Kirk Pederson to the podcast to discuss how to implement experiential travel in meaningful ways.
Kirk shares his hospitality experience, complete with examples of interesting guest experiences he's helped implement at partner hotels across the country. Ryan and Kirk discuss how special guest experiences translate to engaging social media content, and how to continue to connect with guests through review responses. They wrap up the conversation by discussing Sightline's commitment to instilling a "Culture of Welcome" across their portfolio. This is an episode you don't want to miss!
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. We have a very special guest going to be joining me today, and we are pleased to welcome Kirk Pederson, president of Sightline Hospitality onto the Suite Spot. He's a 30 year veteran in the industry, which has a wealth of knowledge and resume full of hospitality experience in operations, food and beverage development, acquisitions. Kirk's diverse background, both in the public and private sectors resulted in the direct oversight of over 5 billion of independent and branded hotels and resorts. We're very fortunate to have him today on the Suite Spot to share some insights with us. So without further ado, let me welcome you Kirk to the Suite Spot.
Kirk Pederson: Thanks, Ryan. Man, you make me sound old. I don't like hearing about all of that experience you know, when people mention it, because now I just feel like I'm getting older.
Ryan Embree: No, you bring all that wisdom and experience. We love to see it. You know, especially in an industry where a lot of people's stories start off in operations, you know, we've talked to a lot of hoteliers that start off at the front desk or have their first job at a hotel and they work their way up, so it's super exciting. With that in mind, as we do with all of our new guests, we love to learn kind of your hospitality and hotel background and story. So what was the journey that led you to Sightline Hospitality?
Kirk Pederson: As I mentioned it's a long journey, right? Yeah, I'm one of the fortunate ones. I think I knew very early on that I wanted to be in the hotel business. I was staying at the Hyatt Regency in Waikiki when I was 10 years old and really saw the hotel operations from the General Manager's perspective. And, you know, that day I said to my dad, I want that job, like that's I want to do for a living. I want to wear khakis and an Aloha shirt and be the general manager of a five star resort in Hawaii. And you know, I didn't really think much about that. So I found myself getting jobs in high school. You know, I worked in country clubs and restaurants, and really kind of fell in love with the entire hospitality industry. I thought for a while I was going to be a chef, I still love to cook. You know again, followed that dream of being that hotel General Manager, went to hotel school UNLV, and got out of college and decided I wanted to go into a management training program. And so I did that and I was on my way man to being my first general manager job in Key Largo, Florida. I got a call from our HR department and they said, "Hey, there's this job in development and they're looking for somebody who has a finance background and a hotel background." I minored in finance in school as well and always liked that. And I said, "Nope,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we discuss how to improve your hotel’s city rank on TripAdvisor, no matter where your property currently stands. Host Ryan Embree is joined by guest Patrick O’Brien, TMG's Product Director and reputation solutions expert.
Ryan and Patrick explain how to achieve both short- and long-term reputation goals for your hotel. Patrick walks us through how to rise into the top 10, top 5, and eventually top 3 of your market on TripAdvisor. He also shares best practices on how to sustain reputation excellence once your hotel is at the top of your city rank. Ryan and Patrick also discuss redefining reputation success based on market size.
To learn more about improving your hotel’s city rank on TripAdvisor or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embree. Today, we've got a great episode for you today. Some of our most popular episodes and educational content really surrounds TripAdvisor. We know the importance of TripAdvisor and what type of impact that can make on revenue. Your hotel's reputation is one of those things that can really impact a traveler's booking decision. So I feel like the educational content we put out about TripAdvisor, that's why it's so well received. So in tune with that, I have invited in our product director, Patrick O'Brien, who will be joining us - you've been on the Suite Spot a couple times now.
Patrick O'Brien: Yes I have, thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely, so today we're going to talk about TripAdvisor. You know, we've done a lot of episodes around optimizing your TripAdvisor account and really getting the most out of it. I thought a great idea for an episode today would be really how can make some movement, because that's what we're constantly looking to do, right? Is improve our reputation online, see that city rank go up the ladder, and get into a competitive space where you are at the forefront of a traveler's booking decision and tip the scales in your favor. Let's go ahead and start a hotel that's out there. They're just now getting into TripAdvisor. You know, they've listened to a couple episodes on how to optimize their TripAdvisor, but you know, they haven't really focused on their reputation much, but in 2020 they're looking to really improve their reputation right away. So these hotels in maybe in the bottom 25% of their city, what are a few easy steps that they can do to start seeing improvement right now?
Patrick O'Brien: Well, first and foremost, I think, you know, don't throw your hands up in the air and be like, "Okay, we're at the bottom of the pack, there's nothing that we can do." It is simply just about getting more positive reviews. If you are at a 2.5 star rating, every four or five star rating that you get is going to have a significant impact and it's going to have a significant impact fairly quickly. All of that is going to help increase your average because the average really is a kind of a compound equation. So you know the more of those four and five star reviews you can get, you're going to lift that average up pretty quickly. In addition, part of TripAdvisor's city rank algorithm revolves around recency of reviews. So the more recent the review is, the heavier it is weighted. The idea there really being around that this is the experience that a guest coming today would have. So, you know, you'll start to see a faster kinda growth and impact by those more positive reviews. So it is coming up with a strategy to go out and,
In this episode of the Suite Spot, host Ryan Embree is joined by Vice President of Product and Technology, Jason Lee, to walk through the emergence of content marketing and the importance of strategic social media for the hotel industry. Jason and Ryan discuss social media as “the great connector” and how hoteliers can use occupancy drivers like events in content marketing for their hotels.
Jason gives his advice on how to identify these local occupancy drivers and the best way to leverage them through social media posting. They also discuss how using influencer marketing and social media advertising can strengthen your hotel’s overall marketing strategy. This episode is the perfect guide on how to evolve your hotel’s social media strategy for the new decade.
To learn more about how we are helping hoteliers optimize their property’s social media strategies or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, this is Ryan Embree, as always, your host. Before we get started on today's episode, I have a very exciting announcement. Thank you all of our listeners for all of your continued support, we have just hit the 10,000 listen mark on our podcast, the Suite Spot, so thank you again for all your continued support out there. We love that you guys are listening and engaging in this type of content. It really means a lot to us. So with that being said, we have another exciting episode with a very familiar voice of the Suite Spot that is Jason Lee, he is our vice president of product development and technology. So I'll go ahead and welcome Jason in this morning, welcome Jason, back to the Suite Spot.
Jason Lee: Thank you Ryan.
Ryan Embree: And we are going to have a really exciting discussion today. You can call it a couple things - you can call it content marketing, you can call it the evolution of Social Media - being that it's a new decade, I think this is a great time to kind of talk about, whether we've recognized it or not, Social Media has really turned a corner on what it can be and how hoteliers are leveraging Social Media. So could you just walk us through, I mean, being on the product side, developing a solution like Social Media. How has Social Media for hotels evolved over just the past maybe five years to a decade?
Jason Lee: You know, I think as new generations come up - new generations of travelers, new generations of users - they've basically grown up with technology. If you are a person under 30 you've grown up with this technology, so this technology has been a part of your childhood, your teenage life, and now going into your adult life, this is no longer, so this is a utility - like Google - like other other types of utilities where I go to find information where I go to see stuff about my friends, where I go to see images, where I go to be entertained. And this is something that is different than something that says like, you know, I guess the thought of I'm wasting my time in this one area or I'm wasting my time, you know, on Facebook or on Instagram. Now it's really more about this is where branding happens, this is where influencing happens, and this is where people are going to see, "Hey is this a credible product?" What are other people saying about this? Or I'm being introduced for the very first time to this by this medium and this medium is trusted because I'm trusting the person that is showing me this through this medium. So Social Media, I has become something that is really, you know,
On this special edition of the Suite Spot, we host Travel Media Group’s Vice President and General Manager, Dana Singer. Ryan Embree and Dana share thoughts on what sets the Travel Media Group experience apart for our hotel partners.
Ryan and Dana take a trip down memory lane and reflect on Travel Media Group’s successes and achievements of the last decade. Dana shares her vision for the culture at Travel Media Group and how that culture impacts our hotel partnerships. Dana also gives a sneak peek on what she is most excited about in the new decade and what to expect.
To get more information about working with TMG or to submit a question or topic for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. We got a great episode for you today. It is long overdue, we have a special new guest with us today, she is VP and General Manager at Travel Media Group and that's Dana Singer. Thank you so much for joining us today on the Suite Spot, like I said, it's long overdue, but we're super happy that you decided to join us.
Dana Singer: Yeah, thanks Ryan. It's great to be here, I've been looking forward to it for a while now and can't think of a better way to kick off the new year.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely, new year and new decade as we talked about in the last episode. And we're going to go right into it and with this being your first time, what we like to do with our new guests is give a little bit of background about your experience at Travel Media Group, the role that you have as Vice President and General Manager of Travel Media Group. Can you just give us a little insight on that?
Dana Singer: Sure. Yeah, I joined Travel Media Group back in December of 2012 and it was at a time when the business was at a really important inflection point in terms of the emerging trends in hotel marketing and what we needed to do to ensure our longterm success. And it was at this time that we realized the need to expand our offerings and to begin to make even greater investments into product development. So after implementing a full restructuring of our sales and service teams to best meet the needs of today's hoteliers, all across the US. I had the opportunity to move into my current role, where I head up our overall vision and implementation of strategies.
Ryan Embree: And you mentioned that inflection point and especially around that 2012, we were seeing a lot of digital trends really start to emerge. Travel Media Group as a company has really evolved significantly under your leadership. Can you share with us a little bit more about that evolution and the vision for what you see as next?
Dana Singer: It's always inspiring to look back at our journey and how we got to where we are today and for over 35 years TMG has been dedicated to helping hoteliers attract more guests and this is a really important foundation for us. Today our business is all about providing our partners with a competitive edge through marketing and business insights to help them effectively manage guest feedback. And our commitment to exclusively serving the hotel industry is something that we're very, very passionate about. Our expertise and understanding the importance of managing the hotel guest experience has resulted in the development and continuous innovation of best in class solutions.
Ryan Embree: That's one of the things that I have a lot of pride in working Travel Media Group cause I feel like obviously we've had that shift of solutions,
In this episode of Suite Spot, Ryan Embree reflects on the past year and past decade, focusing on trending Google searches in the hotel industry. Ryan reviews which travel-related search terms have risen in popularity in the 2010s and which search terms have all but disappeared in the modern-day traveler’s search. He shares best practices and tips on how to capitalize on these popular search terms and how you can leverage these trends to improve your business. This episode is a great way to kick off the new decade and make sure that your hotel’s sales and marketing strategies are aligned with today’s traveler.
If you have any questions about 2020 travel trends or how Travel Media Group can help your hotel, reach out to us by either calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Resources
https://thetravelaisle.com/travel-trends-2010-to-2020/
https://www.travelmediagroup.com/what-hidden-instagram-likes-mean-for-your-hotel/
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, this is Ryan Embree, welcome to the first episode of the Suite Spot of 2020. Thank you all for listening. Hope everyone out there had a happy new year and we are getting geared up for an incredible 2020. So this is actually, hard to believe, episode 40 of the Suite Spot. So again, thank you to all of our listeners out there and all of the support that you've given us. We've got a really great episode today to kick off not only the new year, but the new decade. We are going to be taking a look at something called travel trends of the last decade. So this was a really cool article that we found at thetravelaisle.com. You can find this article in our show notes and what this article did was looked at some hospitality and hotel unique terms starting in 2010 all the way to the end of 2019 and kind of showed the trends of where those terms were headed in the case of Google searches. So when consumers would go to Google and they would type in a specific search or query these terms, either gained in popularity towards the end of the decade or we saw them that might not be that relevant and decrease in popularity in searches throughout the 2010's. A common theme that we're going to talk about today in this episode is the theme of how quickly things change in this industry and how staying on top of these hot travel trends are really going to impact your business. So let's go ahead and start with the first term.
Ryan Embree: So the first term we're going to talk about is actually the search of, "Instagram Spots." Now Instagram became popular at the beginning of the decade around 2010 and the popularity since has peaked in July 2019, so this has been a term that has really, really taken off and increased and what travelers are searching for when they're looking for places to potentially pick for their vacation. What are some ways that you can leverage travelers that are searching for, "Instagram spots" for your hotel? Well, one of the ways we've talked about in episodes past is really your hotel Instagram-able. Now I know that kind of sounds like a silly word there, but if you can find a place or create a space for your travelers that is creative, that is aesthetically pleasing, they're going to start to take pictures in front of that place. Whether it's a fountain, a faux wall, a nice view in your hotel lobby. Sometimes that's enough to really get people to start taking pictures. So if you can make an Instagram-able moment or an Instagram-able space in your lobby, your hotel, your amenities, that's going to create some popularity there on your social media platf...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we share how to get your hotel’s TripAdvisor listing ready for the new year. Host, Ryan Embree, is joined by Respond & Resolve™ Product Manager, Kristeena Seckinger to walk through the process of claiming and optimizing your hotel’s Tripadvisor profile.
Kristeena and Ryan tackle some frequently asked questions about TripAdvisor including: how to update your property’s photos, how to remove TripAdvisor reviews, and can you wipe your TripAdvisor account. This episode gives important insight into what you need to do to make sure you are getting the most out of your hotel’s TripAdvisor.
If you have a question about your hotel’s TripAdvisor account or need help managing it, call or text 407-984-7455.
Resources
https://www.travelmediagroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/TMG-Travel-TripAdvisor-Trust.pdf
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone, this is Ryan Embree, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. Today marks our 39th episode and last of 2019, very hard to believe. Thank you all for listening today. We've got a great episode for you today. This topic and subject was really brought up by a white paper that was recently published on travelmediagroup.com called "Travel, TripAdvisor, and Trust: How TripAdvisor Influences Traveler Booking Decisions" and now we've known over the last decade that TripAdvisor is one of the most influential places where travelers are looking when making their booking decisions. And with the end of 2019, going into the new year, we thought what we would do today is really prepare your hotel - make sure that you're getting everything out of TripAdvisor - so that when travelers are coming to your TripAdvisor account, they are seeing the most recent, up to date information. Because we know that these traveler's sites and review sites, they're ever-changing, they're ever evolving, just like our industry. So we need to make sure that all the new features that are out there, we're sharing with our hoteliers to make sure, again, you're in the best position to capture these travelers. So I would think of no better guest to invite on the Suite Spot than our own Kristeena Seckinger, who is our Respond and Resolve Product Manager. So Kristeena, you work a lot with TripAdvisor and really all online review sites, right?
Kristeena S.: Yes, every day.
Ryan Embree: Awesome. So you've got some great knowledge on - really from the basics of claiming your TripAdvisor, which we're going to talk about today, all the way down to making critical decisions about your account : potentially wiping your account, starting a new TripAdvisor, how you can remove reviews. These are all questions that we hear every single day about TripAdvisor that sometimes, you know, hoteliers might have a basic understanding of the site, but not those unique details. So I thought it'd be a really good episode to go ahead and get your TripAdvisor ready for the new year 2020. So let's start off with the basics, what's the first thing a hotelier should do if they've never managed their TripAdvisor before?
Kristeena S.: The first step for any hotelier should be to claim their TripAdvisor page. This is a really relatively easy process that doesn't take long at all. All you have to do is find your property page on TripAdvisor and you want to scroll all the way to the bottom of the page right before the frequently asked questions section and there's going to be a button there that says, "Claim your listing." From there, you'll be prompted to sign into your TripAdvisor account or create a new one if you don't have o...
In this special edition episode of the Suite Spot, we discuss the recent 2019 Phocuswright Conference in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Host Ryan Embree is joined by VP of Product & Technology, Jason Lee, and Customer Success & Operations Manager, Edwin Pomales, to discuss key takeaways from the event. Listen as Jason and Edwin share their perspective on the conference’s theme “Are We There Yet” and the relationship between technology and the hospitality industry.
They also describe some of their favorite hospitality startups which competed at the conference. This episode is a great resource for hoteliers looking to see what technological advances and innovations are on the horizon for industry in 2020 and beyond.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. We're here with another episode today, a very special edition. As you know, at Travel Media Group we are at the forefront of the industry and love to attend all of the conferences and events that surround the hotel and hospitality industry. We have been attending the Phocuswright conference now for many years. So we always like to do kind of a recap of some of what we learned, some of what we saw, what we think is on the horizon. So with me today is Jason Lee, our Vice president of Product Development and Technology and Edwin Pomales, who is our Client Success and Operations Manager, both who attended the Phocuswright conference in early November. So they are with me today to kind of talk about the Phocuswright conference, some of your key takeaways. Edwin, this is actually your first time going to the conference. For our listeners who might not have heard of Phocuswright before or who have never attended this conference, can you give us some of your input from a first-time attendee?
Edwin Pomales: Absolutely. I think Phocuswright is a hospitality-focused technology-focused conference where every segment of travel is represented from flight to transportation to hospitality and hotels. Being a first time visitor to the conference was great insight into the consumer focus that every branch and every segment of hospitality is trying to figure out and really try to cater to. So it was a great experience.
Ryan Embree: So it's a unique intersection, like you were saying, you know, you've got your OTAs there, you also have your hotel brands there, even sites like TripAdvisor are all attending, so it's very, very interesting to get everyone's input, but it's all kind of centered around that technology aspect of the industry, which as we know is very important and quickly changing. So Jason, that kind of swings it over to you. You know, you're an experienced veteran, who has gone to the Phocuswright conference for many years now. Can you give us maybe the difference from this year's Phocuswright in comparison to years past?
Jason Lee: This year the theme or the kind of main title was "Are We There Yet" kind of a pun on like a kid in the back of a car asking if we're yet. But in this case, it's, is the hospitality technology side of things there yet, in terms of creating connected travel? And so you heard a lot of different companies talking about the connected traveler. And so basically like Edwin said, the conference represents all these various aspects of travel, but I think the infrastructure that holds all that stuff together is funky. And so sometimes the connected traveler gets, they get like maybe halfway there in terms of flight and hotel, but the rest of it is kind of funky. And so, it's a lot of the OTAs we're talking about this, a lot of the other technology partners going into brands all talking abou...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we talk about a different type of guest at your hotel: pets. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Director of Marketing and pet lover Anne Sandoval to talk creative ways to market your pet-friendly hotel to travelers.
In the What’s News segment, Ryan shares some incredible statistics from a Booking.com report about pets and the hotel industry. Ryan and Anne also look at a New York Times article sharing stories of unique ways hotels are implementing pet-friendliness in their everyday operations. They also share tips on small pet-friendly changes that can be made at your hotel. Learn how to impress pet owners and create special moments for your furry guests at your property.
If you are a pet-friendly hotel and need help with your property’s digital marketing or have a question for us, call or text 407-984-7455.
Resources
https://travelpredictions2020.com https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/23/travel/rescue-dogs-hotels.html https://lodgingmagazine.com/la-quinta-helps-business-travelers-take-a-paws-with-therapy-dogs/
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening. In today's episode we are going to be talking about a different type of guests at your property - pets. We know how important our pets are to us and to our guests. We're going to be speaking to some statistics that say just how important they are. Being a pet friendly hotel has its own challenges but also some really great opportunities to market yourself as a pet friendly hotel. So with me today, I have our Director of Marketing, she's been a guest on the Suite Spot many a time, also a pet owner herself, Anne Sandoval. Welcome back to the sweet spot Anne.
Anne Sandoval: Thanks Ryan, I'm especially excited to be here for this episode. Our listeners can't tell, but you can tell I'm wearing my French bulldog shirt today in honor of this topic, so very excited.
Ryan Embree: I love it and you know we at the Suite Spot, we're almost 40 episodes in and we talk about all types of different hotels. We talk about franchise, independent, bed and breakfast hotels, but one of the topics that we haven't yet covered are pet friendly hotels and that pet friendly tag could really fall under any of those categories. So I found this specifically very interesting in our What's News segment of today's episode was a graphic that Booking.com had just released called, "Travel Predictions 2020" so they did a survey of future travelers and kind of looking towards the future on what might be the next big thing. That's what we're always looking for in this industry. And they found some pretty interesting statistics surrounding pets when it comes to lodging and the hotel industry. So I'm going to go ahead and share a couple of those: 55% of global pet owners, so more than half are saying that their pet is as important to them as their children. 42% agree that they would choose a holiday destination based on whether they could take their pet, which is incredible statistic when we're talking about when we're looking for travelers to come into our area or choose our location, that is incredibly important to keep that in mind, and finally when we're talking about revenue for a hotel - 49% of guests are willing to pay more to stay at an accommodation for a pet friendly hotel, which I think that we've come as pet owners - I think that we've probably become accustomed with in the hotel industry having to pay some sort of pet deposit or fee for having our pet with us during a hotel stay, but this is an extremely important, again for hoteliers to know when it comes to how we can gain extra revenue.
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we dedicate our time to helping hoteliers navigate through major changes and transitions that happen at their properties. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Client Success & Operations Manager Edwin Pomales to discuss overcoming 5 major challenges that most hotels face at one time or another.
From planned changes like renovations and flag transitions to unexpected changes like employee turnover and natural disasters, Ryan and Edwin cover it all. They share several examples of how Edwin’s client success team at Travel Media Group supports our hotel partners through these challenging times and they give tips on how to minimize disruption for your hotel business.
If you are experiencing any one of these significant changes at your hotel and have a question about how to best handle it, call or text us at 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Today we have a great episode for you, could be a little bit stressful on some of the stuff that we're talking about, but ultimately it's gonna help you in challenging times at your hotel. So with me today, I brought in Edwin Pomales, who is our client success and operations manager. Edwin, you've been on the Suite Spot now several different times for several different subjects, but wanted to welcome you in again for today's episode.
Edwin Pomales: Yeah, glad to be back, Ryan. Thank you for the invite and I'm really excited to talk about these things. And I think you're right, sometimes it can be stressful at the property level. So I think it's some really good information we're going to go over today.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely, so let's go ahead and just start with your client success team. Where do you see their role when it comes to helping our partners with their hotel marketing?
Edwin Pomales: First and most importantly it's going to be there for support, during the different things that are happening on the property level. It is important that we're able to be there for GMs and owners to help them through situations that may be unique to their property, but we may be more accustomed to being that we work with so many properties. And on the flip side really integration, just making sure that any processes that they have in place at the property level, the full staff knows about it, everybody is familiar with the goals of it, and with that comes follow up on a regular basis. So support and integration of ideas are two major goals for our client success team.
Ryan Embree: And that's what we're going to talk about today because hotels are 365 days a year, 24/7. When you have a business like that, things can change in a moment's notice. So that's where your team comes in. Kinda helps ease that tension, that seamless transition. And when those major changes do happen, we have processes in place to make sure that it doesn't get too overwhelming because we know the day to day life of a hotelier is overwhelming as it is, now you add all of these changes to it, it can really have an impact. We want to make sure that impact is as small as possible. So what we're going to do today, just to set the agenda, not to put you on the spot Edwin, but we're going to go through five major changes that happen in the hotel industry. Some of these changes are planned and some of them are unplanned. So we're going to walk through each one of those and we're going to talk about tips and best practices that your team uses from Travel Media Group's end on how we deal with this for our par...
In this episode of Suite Spot, Ryan Embree discusses the importance of user-generated content in the hotel industry. Ryan shares where to locate user-generated content about your hotel online and how to leverage that information to better your business. He provides best practices on how to find issues shared in user-generated content like reviews and social media posts, and tips on how to fix the issues. Ryan also demonstrates how TMG OneView can help hoteliers easily consolidate all the user-generated content online about their hotels.
If you have any questions about user-generated content or how Travel Media Group can help your hotel, reach out to us by either calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot I am your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you for listening today, we've got a great episode. Today we're going to talk about something that is very prevalent in the hotel industry. I know that we talk about it all the time to our hotel partners and that is user generated content or UGC. User generated content is defined as any form of content such as images, videos, text, and audio that has been posted by users. So in the hotel industry that would be our guests, our travelers - platforms like review sites, social media platforms, this is where our guests are posting that sort of content. And in the hotel industry we're really starting to see the evolution of user generated content and where it fits into the decision making process when travelers are doing their research. We're starting to see a blend of both social media and review sites.
Ryan Embree: So today you can leave reviews on social media sites like Facebook and do those recommendations, but you could also create a personal profile on review sites like TripAdvisor. So again, this user generated content is starting to blend more and more. And the good news is that there's more content than ever before out there about your hotel online, but it's bad news if you don't know what to do with that. So in this episode, what we're going to look at is really how you can leverage that user generated content to navigate any sort of potential pitfalls or problems that you can uncover at your property and really capitalize on any opportunities that you can really mine from this data out there. So where can you find the data you need to identify potential pitfalls or even take advantage of those revenue opportunities? And that's everywhere. Reviews, social media, all of that user generated content.
Ryan Embree: Now you would think with guest reviews, it's easy to identify those pitfalls and problems, right? Because that's exactly what a review is. It's telling you what you're doing right and what is wrong with your hotel. Now that's true in some ways, but let's walk through this story. A traveler checks into your hotel. They're extremely tired from a long drive and just want to to sleep, right? We've come across those guests all the time. They just want a place to rest their head after a long day. At home this guest prefers a harder than normal mattress to support their back, especially after being in a car all day driving. Now this guest happens unfortunately to be next to some very loud neighbors, but instead of calling the front desk, they stay in their room getting more and more upset with each hour that passes. The next day after checkout, this guest leaves a one star review about your property, complaining about the softness of the mattress and the noi...
In this episode of the Suite Spot, we help hoteliers prepare their properties for the slow season by discussing the best ways to optimize their hotel’s social media profiles. Kelly Albritton, Senior Product Analyst, joins host Ryan Embree to share insights from her experience working in Travel Media Group’s social media department.
Ryan and Kelly cover important topics in this episode, from setting up automated messages on your social media accounts to leveraging social media ads to target new guests. Kelly suggests ideas on posting and how to measure the success of the social media campaigns your hotel runs. This is episode is a great guide on how to get more likes, engagement, and followers to your hotel’s social media profiles.
If you are looking to learn more information about our social media solution or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello, hello everyone this is your host, Ryan Embree and welcome to the Suite Spot. In today's episode we are going to talk about the up and coming slow season that is approaching, historically when we get in the winter, we know in the hotel and hospitality industry seems to - the wheels start turning a little bit slower. So we're going to try today to give you some tips and best practices on how to use social media during the slow season to help with occupancy, help with ADR, help with social media growth. So in saying that, I've got an expert special guest with us today, senior product analyst, Kelly Albritton who works at Travel Media Group's social media department. She has been with the company now for almost five years. So we're really excited to have her on. So thank you Kelly for joining me today.
Kelly Albritton: Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree: So let's jump right in and talk about social media during your slow season, what would be kind of the first tip or best practice that you would tell a hotelier to get ready for the slow season?
Kelly Albritton: Well the first thing I would tell them is to optimize your accounts and make sure everything is looking right. Making sure that your Facebook and your social media accounts have a fresh look and their a fresh destination every time that your potential guests might come visit your page. So you need fresh pictures. Think about the last time that you took property photos. Do they need to be updated? Then you can also use the images to transform your cover images, so you have the ability to create a slideshow or add videos to your cover image. So the first thing they're seeing is always different.
Ryan Embree: We talk about expectation when it comes to travelers and when they're researching your property, whether it be on OTA sites, Facebook, other social media platforms. You want to make sure that those pictures that you're presenting them are the best representation of your property. One, but also sets the right expectation. So it's absolutely vital to make sure that those pictures are being refreshed. Now there's a couple of things that you guys do with adding some of Facebook's features for hotels. What are some of those things that you can add to a Facebook page for example, for a hotel?
Kelly Albritton: Well probably the most important is adding a book now button on the top right corner of your page just so that it's easily available and you want to make sure during the slow season that this is leading to the correct website. So make sure you check your book now button and the about information to make sure all the information is correct.
In this special edition of the Suite Spot, we take a look at the Top 5 trending tags in online reviews today. Host, Ryan Embree is joined by the leader of the Travel Media Group review response team, Patrick O’Brien. Patrick and Ryan countdown each review sentiment tag, explaining what Patrick’s team looks for in the review and how they approach their response. They also give valuable tips on how to market the tags that are trending positively for your hotel and fix the tags that are trending negatively.
If you are interested in joining Travel Media Group as an online review response partner, you can reach us by calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Welcome to another edition of the Suite Spot, today we have a very special edition which is focused all around review response and with me today I have a very special guest, Mr. Patrick O'Brien, aka Mr. Review Response, he's our product development manager at Travel Media Group and he runs our respond and resolve department. Patrick want to welcome you to the Suite Spot.
Patrick O'Brien: Thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree: Today, we're going to do something I'm really excited about because Patrick, you and your team have been very hard at work, we're going to get to some numbers here in a second, but we're going to go through the top five sentiment tags that we find in reviews. So just to give our listeners a little bit of a background on the respond and resolve solution, how many reviews does your team respond to a month, right now?
Patrick O'Brien: Right now we're probably averaging around 22,000 - 24,000 reviews for hotels each month. They vary from positive to negative across the board.
Ryan Embree: 22,000 - 24,000 that isn't an incredible number. So you and your team are extremely busy. You also shared with me before this episode, year to date. So in 2019 we're over 135,000 reviews that your team has responded to. So you guys really are the experts in hotel review response. Now when we talk about tags, can you kind of explain what I mean by a sentiment tags within a review?
Patrick O'Brien: When most people look at review response, the idea is I've gotta, you know, follow up with this customer who left me some type of feedback. But I think when you actually look at reviews, they're probably some of the best business intelligence that you can get cause these are people letting you know in high volume what's working at your hotel and what's not working at your hotel, and ideally for what's working at your hotel, what people who are coming to your market and specifically coming to your property are really excited about, what's adding the value to that stay. So we've identified about 45 to 50 different elements and so we look for those in every review. That allows you to take really what is very subjective with a, you know, a review that's been left and quantify it and break it down into what was that review really about? Were they talking positively about the cleanliness of the property, about the sleep quality at the property? Some of the amenities that I offer, did they like them, do they not like them? For me, the sentiment tags and the reporting also can help a hotel really dive into when they are looking to either justify or to make capital investment decisions. You can use that analysis and that data that's collected in all of those reviews to let you know, if I'm going to spend $500,000 to make improvements at my property out of these options, what is it going to give me the best bang for my buck?
In this episode of Suite Spot, we discuss a research study recently conducted by Booking.com regarding Generation Z and travel. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Director of Marketing, Anne Sandoval, to explore the different traits of this maturing generation and their travel preferences.
Ryan and Anne breakdown the data by identifying six distinct travel trends concerning Generation Z’s travel habits. Next, they share ideas on how to use digital marketing to attract and gain more share of Generation Z travelers. They also discuss social media influencers, adventure travel, and more ways to inspire this young generation to travel.
To get more information about reaching Generation Z online or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Resources: https://destinationgenz.com/
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot, I am your host Ryan Embree, and if you're a frequent listener of the Suite Spot, you'll know that the first ever episode that we did here was about reaching millennials on Social Media. Now today we're going to take this a step further and talk about another demographic and that's Generation Z. Now, Booking.com recently released a comprehensive research study called Gen Z Unpacked where they surveyed Generation Z , which they consider between the ages of 16 and 24. They asked them about what was important to them when they travel and were able to get some really cool analytics about this up and coming generation. If you're looking for the study itself, you can reference the link in our show notes. I'm joined by Anne Sandoval, our Director of Marketing, and we are going to be discussing six trends and traits that we've found in these statistics. We're going to break those down and then we're going to talk from a digital marketing standpoint, how you can leverage these statistics to make sure you are prepared to market and advertise your hotel to Generation Z as they mature and as they start traveling more and more. So without further ado, I'll go ahead and welcome Anne to another episode of the Suite Spot. It's great to have you on again Anne.
Anne Sandoval: Thanks for having me again, Ryan. I'm happy to be here.
Ryan Embree: So let's go ahead and get started with the first trend that we uncovered in these statistics, which is Generation Z's relationship with solo travel. One of the statistics that Booking.com revealed to us was that 34% of Generation Z planned to travel on their own at least once within the next decade. So a huge difference from, you know, maybe the other generations and hotels are really going to have to start accommodating for solo travelers. So Anne, how can hotels maybe just some tips and best practices on how they can do that.
Anne Sandoval: Well, the first thing that comes to mind for me with solo travel is safety. You already have some great features at your property that are intended to help travelers feel like they and their belongings are safe and secure. So you can share with travelers amenities that you have, including an in-room safe. You can highlight other features like your well lit hallways, indoor corridors, and digital key cards to imply that you have traveler's safety as a priority. The other really interesting stat that Booking shared is that 33% of Gen Z travelers prefer to be on their own in general when they travel. So this really implies that they're not necessarily looking for a lot of human interaction, which is a little counterintuitive sometimes in hospitality. So you may want to consider incorporating technology...
On this episode of Suite Spot, we have the distinct pleasure of welcoming special guest Mike Parent, Senior Vice President of Sales & Marketing at Coakley & Williams Hotel Management Company, to the podcast. Host Ryan Embree interviews Mike on the subject of multi-property hotel marketing as he shares a wealth of hospitality experience and knowledge.
Mike speaks to Coakley Williams’ philosophy of curating a unique and targeted marketing strategy for each property within their portfolio. Mike also shares his approach to implementing effective marketing campaigns for new acquisitions and new-build properties. We discuss the balance of traditional and digital marketing technologies in today’s hotel landscape. This episode is a must-listen for anyone in the industry looking to learn more about building a successful hotel marketing campaign.
To get more information about becoming a special guest on the Suite Spot or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello and welcome, this is Ryan Embree your host of the Suite Spot. Another episode we have in a very special episode with a, another very special guest, Mr Mike Parent who is the Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Coakley and Williams Hotel Management Company, have the pleasure of introducing him for the first time to the Suite Spot. Mike is an innovator whose creative ideas has developed new revenue streams for hotel properties that he works with. And I want to go ahead and welcome Mike to the Suite Spot today, so thank you for joining me, Mike.
Mike Parent: Thank you, Ryan, great to be with you. I appreciate you, including me.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely, absolutely, and what we do with a lot of our guests on the Suite Spot, just to get a little background of how you started in the industry, the hotel industry itself. I think one of the things that makes it so unique is that everyone can come from really any place in hospitality. So I always find it absolutely fascinating to ask our guests, "Tell us a little bit about your background, how you got started in the industry and maybe the journey that led you to Coakley Williams."
Mike Parent: Sure. Well, I've been in the industry for many years. I started as a desk clerk at a hotel in Washington DC. I took a summer job while I was in college pursuing my degree in radio/TV broadcasting. For the first five years of my hotel career I worked mostly in operations. I was a desk clerk, I was a night auditor, I did maintenance during the winter, I was assistant manager of a hotel, but I was eventually exposed to hotel sales when I worked for a larger hotel and I saw what they were doing in sales and that really got my interest. So my first sales gig was for a new hotel that was opening near the Watergate in Washington DC called Guest Quarters. That brand is now evolved into the Doubletree brand, which is part of the Hilton family. But since Guest Quarters my hotel sales journey as you call it, has taken me through many major branded and independent hotels, several management companies and two senior level positions at major brands. I was Director of Sales and Marketing for Taj Hotels of India when they had six hotels in Washington DC and I was also Vice President of new hotels sales support at Choice Hotels International.
Ryan Embree: That's awesome. So again, quite the plethora of knowledge and experience there. I find it such a common trend that a lot of people in the industry, you know, just got started as a, you know, front desk clerk, you know,
On this special edition of Suite Spot, we welcome hotel owner, entrepreneur, consultant, and social media influencer, Rupesh Patel to the studio. Ryan and Rupesh trade thoughts on the correlation between a hotel’s online reputation and revenue success. Rupesh shares his secrets on how to increase feedback from guests and grow the number of online reviews for your hotel. They also talk about the importance of responding to reviews and the rising expectations of guests and brands when it comes to online review response. Rupesh also explains how social media can also be leveraged for success. As a TMG client and brand advocate, Rupesh explains how using TMG solutions and prioritizing guest experience can have a positive influence on a hotel's bottom line.
To get more information about becoming a special guest on the Suite Spot or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone and welcome to another exciting episode of the Suite Spot. I am your host, Ryan Embree, super special edition. We are very, very excited for this episode because not only is this a special edition, but we have a special guest in house with us and that is Mr Rupesh Patel. So I'd like to welcome him to the Suite Spot for the first and hopefully not the last time. He is a hotel owner, manager, entrepreneur, consultant, social media influencer, I'm sure there's about five or six more titles that I'm missing there, Rupesh but thank you for coming on the Suite Spot with us.
Rupesh Patel: Hey, you missed pizza guy.
Ryan Embree: Pizza guy, pizza guy, absolutely. So I want to get started, obviously a lot of people are familiar with you. They might follow you on Linkedin or Instagram and kind of know your story. So instead of asking, you know, your background in the industry, it felt like I could switch it up a little bit and just ask kind of what your earliest memory of being in a hotel and how that might've influenced you later in life.
Rupesh Patel: Absolutely. So I grew up in the business, like a lot of people or a lot of people that I know. Fifth grade, summer of fifth grade, my dad says we're moving to Florida. And I grew up in Houston, Texas, right? Was raised there, I was born in England, moved to Texas when I was six months old, and one day my dad says "I'm leaving for like five months and I'll be back." And the next thing you know, fifth grade ends and my dad's like, we're moving to Florida. I'm like, "Oh my God, I'm going to miss out on my neighbors that I was best friends with and everybody I knew in Texas," right? We moved and he said, "We bought a motel in South Florida". And I said, "okay, we know nothing about motels," Right? And so we, made the journey. We drove, I think it was like 20 hours from Texas to South Florida and we moved into this motel. It was a 52 room motel and it was a motel, motel built in like the forties. And we lived on property and we did that for a long time. My parents just sold it a year and a half ago now. Oh yes, so they had it for a long time. And so I grew up doing everything like front desk, housekeeping, laundry, sweeping, actually sweeping. There was no blowers back in the day that we could afford sweeping the parking lot, cigarette buds, all of that stuff, right? And so it was a great experience, learned a lot and saw a lot of crazy things like most people do in the hotel business
Ryan Embree: And in Florida as well. So, but I'm sure that experience of doing everything in the hotel, doing almost every single task, I think it's served you probably a lot in where you are toda...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we celebrate the one year anniversary of Travel Media Group’s user-generated content management system: TMG OneView®. Host Ryan Embree is joined by the architect of OneView and VP of Product Development & Technology Jason Lee.
Jason shares the inspiration behind OneView and how it is unlike any other reputation or social media tool in the hotel industry today. Ryan and Jason discuss OneView’s versatility as a multi-user collaboration tool and scalability in a multi-property environment. They also share expert tips on how users can most of their OneView feed and give a sneak peek for what could be next for this amazing tool.
If you are interested in learning more about accessing your hotel’s TMG OneView® feed or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Please Note: OneView free trial offer expires 12/31/2019
Related Links: www.tmgoneview.com/onboard
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello and welcome. Everyone knew another exciting episode of the Suite Spot. I am very excited about this episode today we are going to be talking about Travel Media Group's, OneView feed with the architect and vice president of product and development and technology, Jason Lee himself. So he joins us again on another episode of the Suite Spot. So welcome in Jason.
Jason Lee: Thank you very much Ryan. Glad to be here.
Ryan Embree: And this episode has been long overdue. You know obviously such an innovation, OneView is as a tool for current customers and for hoteliers themselves. I think it's taken us so long to get you on here to talk about this tool is because it's been just constantly innovated. So we're really, really excited to kind of share what OneView is all about the features and benefits that it brings the hoteliers every day when it comes to user generated content. So I figured we'd start there. Just give us a brief description of maybe how you would describe it to a hotelier.
Jason Lee: So OneView is sort of like its namesake, right? It's a single view of a bunch of information. So like other business intelligence platforms you might, you might have at your hotel where you're seeing rate information, you're seeing, occupancy and ADR. This is a place that is a centralized hub where you can see not only reputation, which, which other platforms have as well. But also specifically social media, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter. So you can actually see and interact with all of those pieces of data. So OneView would be really, a centralized view and platform for action on reputation in social media. So where guests are trying to communicate with you externally, this is the place where you can pick up that information and then you can actually communicate back.
Ryan Embree: So it's a consolidated place where all forms of communication digitally, where travelers are reaching out to a hotelier, pulled into one place where you can not only view that information but also interact with them.
Jason Lee: Right. So you get a TripAdvisor review and you go in and you can click on respond and I can respond to that TripAdvisor review. Right underneath that TripAdvisor review, it could be a Facebook comment and you could like that comment. You could comment back to that comment. If that person comments on your comment, you can make another comment or like that comment. So you have all these additional layers of, of um, communication. But it also becomes a hub of communication beyond the guest. And that is where all of these, pieces of information that are coming externally into your hotel.
In this special edition episode of Suite Spot, Host Ryan Embree is joined by the head of Travel Media Group’s product and development team, Jason Lee, to share his key takeaways from the recent HITEC 2019 conference in Minneapolis. Ryan and Jason talk about all the hospitality tech innovations that were shared at the conference including Alexa for Hospitality and different AI systems. Jason also shares his ideas for what’s next for technology in the hotel industry and what that means for hoteliers moving forward.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Hello everyone. Welcome to a special edition of the Suite Spot. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. And today's episode we are going to be doing a recap of HITEC 2019 Minneapolis, which I had the pleasure to attend with our Vice President of Product Development Jason Lee who's here to share some notes and thoughts with us about the conference itself. Now, Jason, you are the veteran of these types of conferences you've been multiple times, so just want to get some maybe initial thoughts on this year's conference and comparison to years past.
Jason Lee: Yeah, I think, you know, a lot of these conferences have themes, you know, and our theme for sure this year I think even from the keynote on was making things easier on the guest and booking, and research in-stay, post-stay. Um, but frictionless technology in the travel space where that always hasn't been the case in terms of the kind of technology the hotels deliver or hotel companies deliver to guests. So I think that that definitely was the theme this year in my opinion. Or maybe that's just what I came away with in years past. I think there had been other types of AI or machine learning or these kinds of themes where we are now, that might be a little more commonplace. And, and you know, it's really more about how do you apply these technologies to help guests have a better experience or an experience that they're not feeling like, I'm, I'm using tech. They're just, it's frictionless, you know, it's easy. So, um, and I think that is the next step. That's the, that's the evolution that the hotel industry has to take, especially as we're, you know, starting to sunset legacy technology and booking and legacy GDS tech that is probably, you know, the, I think you're starting to see a lot more, uh, advanced technology happening, uh, at the ground level work guests interact with hotel availability.
Ryan Embree: Customers are looking for that frictionless experience because they're seeing that and experiencing that, um, in every other aspect of their life. So, you know, the hotel industry as a whole has the reputation for kind of lagging behind on some of these technologies. So when a customer walks in and still has to fill out maybe a breakfast form hanging on the outside of their door, you know, that's not the same sort of frictionless technology that they're experiencing on a daily basis and every other aspect of their lives. So the, the customer's expectations are starting to rise. Do you, do you think the hotel industry can keep up? Why do you think they lag so far behind?
Jason Lee: It's always about moving parts. I think that's all technology. It's about how do you, how do you satisfy the demands of privacy, the demands of security, to the maybe the expectations of revenue from a hotel. I want this kind of revenue, or I want this, I want guests to interact with me this way. And before you got into, or we've gotten into the mobile when where people are doing so much more. And I think even in the last couple of years, the statistics in terms of bookings continue to rise.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we focus our attention on the bed and breakfast segment of the hospitality industry. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Director of Marketing Anne Sandoval to talk about how your bed and breakfast property can stay competitive with the rising threats of Airbnb and vacation rentals.
Ryan and Anne give tips on how to modernize your B&B’s marketing strategy and optimize your property’s presence online. They share several examples of how to leverage websites, social media, and online reputation in order to gain market share and grow online revenue. They also speak to the importance of responding to reviews for bed and breakfast property owners and how critical it is to maintain positive reviews online.
If you are interested in receiving a consultation for your bed & breakfast property or to submit a topic request for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of the Suite Spot. I am your host, Ryan Embree. Got another great episode for you today, and one of the best things about working at Travel Media Group is the type and scales of hotels that we get to interact with on a daily basis. From those 500+ room resorts to those smaller hotels, maybe mid-sized hotels all the way down to properties that might be less than 10 rooms a bed and breakfast for example, which is a great transition into what our episode today is going to lead us and we felt like this was important to focus on, the bed and breakfast market, because they are in a situation that's competition with Airbnb and vacation rentals that are coming up along with the local hotels that are also pushing for market share. So in a competitive landscape like we are in 2019, we thought it fitting to talk about your bed and breakfast property and what you can do to market and grow your revenue.
Ryan Embree: So who better to speak with us about marketing for a property than our Director of Marketing Miss Ann Sandoval. Welcome to the show Anne.
Anne Sandoval: Thanks so much for having me again, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely. I wanted to talk to you. Um, you know, right off the bat about kind of where a good starting point is, uh, for these bed and breakfasts owners, um, that might've had this property for years. They haven't had to deal with, again, the competitive landscape of, you know, vacation rentals, airbnb's maybe they condos close to them now are selling for Airbnb's. Where do they start when it comes to creating a marketing strategy?
Anne Sandoval: Yeah. So when we talk about a marketing strategy, a lot of these initial tips are going to be really just the foundation of understanding your property and your local area and really taking a look at what your current situation is so that you can then figure out what new strategies you can implement. So you may already be familiar with the answers to these questions about your property, but I think it's important to ask them and revisit them. First, taking a look at what the advantages and disadvantages are about your property and figuring out what guests love and how you can leverage those things. Next, analyzing the competition in your local area. As Ryan was just talking about, there are more and more lodging opportunities for travelers coming to your location, and so it's important to know if you want to get more market share, where is the market share going right now and what properties out there, maybe on Airbnb or maybe more traditional hotels are your biggest competition, and paying attention to what they're doing to market t...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we discuss reports that Google Reviews surpassed Booking.com as the number one review distribution site. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Jason Lee to explore how Google is positioning itself in the hotel industry and what it means for individual properties moving forward.
Ryan and Jason also give insight about a recent review response study conducted by Revinate. Jason gives his thoughts on why more budget and midscale properties are responding to reviews than luxury properties, and why year over year 5-star response rates are trending down. We also discuss the impact that responding to Google reviews has on SEO.
In the Q&A segment, we put Jason back in the chair of a hotel general manager and ask his thoughts on how he would approach Google reviews for his individual property. To submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hey, hello and, welcome to another episode of the Suite Spot. As always, I am your host, Ryan Embree. Today we've got a great episode, and I am joined by one of our more frequented guests on the show, Mr. Jason Lee, who is the vice president of product development and technology at Travel Media Group, so I'll go ahead and welcome you in. Once again, Jason, thanks for being on the show today.
Jason Lee: Thank you for having me.
Ryan Embree: We're going to get into a lot of topics today and the episode itself is called Google reviews and we're going to talk about the big news coming out about Google reviews, but I wanted to first kind of start talking just about review generation as a whole because Revinate came out with a report here on some really cool analytics when it comes to online reviews, review response, review generation and wanting to get kind of your opinion and your thoughts on some of the information that was found.
Jason Lee: Yeah.
Ryan Embree: Before we get into Google reviews, let's talk about online review generation as a whole and when we still see year over year growth, but we saw the rate of review growth has slowed. Uh, any idea you think, why this is happening?
Jason Lee: Well, I think it's interesting because I think the percentage of year over year has slowed it just because we're maybe starting to see critical mass in response. So you see new travelers coming up that might be more apt to leave reviews or you see a generation of more tech savvy travelers that rely on reviews and are also leaving reviews and getting reviews. You're kind of reaching for a technology crowd that is going to eventually reach critical mass in terms of like, you're not going to see those big giant numbers, um, that you use to see where, you know, I, I remember like in the early days of reputation, it was like every year TripAdvisor was doubling the number from the previous years. Right?
Ryan Embree: Right.
Jason Lee: So it was like this crazy jump and now there's more places to leave reviews. But you've also reached this place where there's, there are more reviews coming in now than ever before. I can tell you that right now, but I can, but also at the same time you're not, you may not see those giant gains like we had before.
Ryan Embree: Right, and that sort of growth is, it's just not sustainable as far as, I mean it gets to a point, like you said, the critical mass. So do you kind of predict the trend of review growth is going to continue year over year?
Jason Lee: I think so. Um, you take a site like Google where Google was really inconsequential in hospitality, uh, in inside of especially hotel reviews.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we tackle the trending topic of vanity websites in the hotel industry. TMG Website Analyst Stephanie Courtois joins Host Ryan Embree to share best practices on how to create and optimize the perfect hotel vanity website for your property.
Stephanie and Ryan cover important steps for building a hotel vanity website, from picking a URL to ensuring the site is responsive and ADA compliant. Stephanie also discusses why it is critical for hoteliers to have vanity websites for their properties. Stephanie concludes the interview by offering tips to hoteliers on how to leverage website analytics and how she shows ROI to her customers.
To learn more information about creating a hotel vanity website for your property or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host. Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Okay. Hello, and welcome everyone to another exciting episode of the Suite Spot. I am your host, Ryan Embree and today we have a very special edition of the Suite Spot and personally very excited to welcome in our guest today. Now if you're a current website customer of Travel Media Group and are partnering with us, then her voice will sound very familiar to you and that is Ms. Stephanie Courtois and she is our Webmaster. Is that correct?
Stephanie C.: Yeah, I'd say so. I've heard that term used. I don't mind it.
Ryan Embree: So Stephanie, you pretty much handle everything that has to do with our hotel partners' websites, and we've been wanting to get you on the Suite Spot to really kind of talk through your process with hoteliers when they start creating a website, you know, maybe some dos and don'ts, best practices and kind of your process when it comes to just vanity websites overall and what you do to optimize them. Now for those listeners that don't know, Stephanie, I thought what we could do off the beginning, uh, to welcome you to the show is kind of get a better sense of your background at Travel Media Group and really just the history of your professional experience.
Stephanie C.:Yeah, absolutely. So I actually started on the advertising side in content creation and branding. So that's really kind of where I got an interest in just communications and just digital marketing in general. So with my bachelor's I got in advertising. I kind of use that mindset to go start at Travel Media Group on our product team, and I was a product administrator. So essentially I had hands on with all of our digital products, social media, respond and resolve, all of that wonderful stuff, and I was able to be hands on. So I managed account creation and just making sure that everything was done to deadline and helping out where any departments were kind of struggling a little bit. So with that said, I also included websites and I felt a very natural gravitation toward websites. It really spoke to me because I was able to do content, and editing, and design, and just really know good photography and really, um, marinating all of the elements into a position. And I eventually moved into that role. So now I am a Webmaster, as Ryan likes to say. And I manage all of our Travel Media Group websites and really get to dive into each property and I get to learn more about each hotel.
Ryan Embree: Awesome. So I thought again, what would be valuable for our listeners to hear is maybe kind of the process, uh, the first maybe couple things that happen when it comes to creating websites. So let's say I'm a hotelier, I've signed up with Travel Media Group to build my perfect vanity website, and I give you and your team a call.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we discuss the growing trend of going green in the hotel industry. Priscilla Osorio, Marketing Content Manager at Travel Media Group, joins host Ryan Embree to give advice to hoteliers on how to implement sustainable initiatives at your property without breaking the bank. A recent Lodging Survey conducted by the AHLA, American Hotel and Lodging Association, in partnership with STR reports indicated that one of the most popular trends among travelers were green initiatives at hotels. In this Suite Spot episode, Ryan and Priscilla brainstorm several ideas for hoteliers looking to get started with green initiatives at their hotels, but might not have the budget to invest in major renovations. From starting a recycling program to selling reusable water bottles and straws to guests, this episode serves as a great beginner’s guide to going green.
If you have some innovative ways that your hotel is going green we would love to hear from you. You can also submit a question by calling or texting 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host. Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: All right. Hello and welcome everyone to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is your host, Ryan Embry. We've got a great episode for you today and in today we're going to start with the, What's News. Before I kind of introduced the topic, we're going to talk about a AHLA survey that was recently conducted partnering with STR, which the, the content and data and analytics was just released in March of 2019. And in the survey, just really gathered some analytics and data in the hospitality sector and was talking about how hotels are advancing guest experiences and some of the top hotel industry trends. And as you can imagine, one of the hot topics was trying to focus efforts on getting millennials. Oh, I'm sure we've all heard that from time to time how important that segment is and trying to convert them.
Ryan Embree: But today we're actually going to talk about another topic that was brought up and that is going green. And it's an incredibly popular trend. In fact, it was pretty astonishing stat here as of 2018 25% of all U.S. Properties, so a quarter of all U.S. properties had received green certification, which is the gold standard of hotel sustainability. Now to put that in perspective, in 2016 this percentage was only at 16% almost 10% higher and just a span of two years. So hoteliers are starting to understand the importance, brands are starting to understand the importance of this going-green trend and customers are starting to appreciate that. And from this data we're going to look at some more statistics within the Suite Spot here, but we're really going to focus on maybe not so much for the hotelier that has enough capital to go ahead and redo their entire hotel and is sustainable or greenway or if you're familiar with lead certification, this is maybe for the hotelier that's just looking to put some new initiatives, almost like a beginner's guide to going green tips and best practices for hoteliers.
Ryan Embree: With me today, I thought we would bring in Priscilla Osorio who recently wrote a blog article in the Travel Media Group blog, which is titled Promoting Healthy Lifestyles at Your Hotel. And I thought this would be a perfect transition into this kind of going green, a topic that we have for today. So first and foremost, I want to welcome Priscilla to the podcast once again.
Priscilla Osorio: Thanks, Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Tell me a little bit about this blog article, some of the ideas, and maybe we can go back and forth on some best practices for this kind of ...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we speak to the unbelievable prosperity that the hotel industry is currently experiencing while preparing hoteliers for a time where revenue growth might slow. Host Ryan Embree teams up with Director of Marketing Anne Sandoval to brainstorm ideas and ways to reach new guest segments to insulate your revenue from an economic slowdown.
Ryan and Anne share advice on how to identify the best opportunities within your guest/audience portfolio and how you can capitalize on those opportunities by leveraging your property’s amenities, features, and location. They also look at cost-effective ways to use digital platforms like social media and review sites to target the ideal market segment for your hotel.
If you are interested in receiving a digital consultation for your hotel or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Thank you for listening to another episode of the Suite Spot. I'm very excited about this episode today. I think it comes at just the right time when we're talking about diversifying the type of guests that your hotel is attracting. And we're going to start in the, What's News from a recently released CBRE report talking about the industry and how it's going to be performing within the next couple of years. Now of course this is just a forecast, but like we've been hearing over the past couple of years, life is good right now in the hotel industry. rev par is up, you know, we had that uh, amazing streak of rev par growth and CBRE is kind of echoing that in this report stating that they found in 2019 they're predicting a 2.5% increase in rev par with an additional 2% increase in 2020. Now, however, in 2021 they're actually projecting a slight decline to rev par of 0.6%. So you know what I wanted to really get through and, and this is kind of what we've been hearing, we've been kind of hearing this trend of cautious optimism for hoteliers.
Ryan Embree: We're in a, we're in a time period right now of extreme growth of rev par growth, you know, revenues and all time high for most hoteliers, but they keep having that cautious optimism idea in our head of, you know, "this is great, but there's going to be a point where this, this train kind of stops" and what we're going to discuss today is really setting you up for that, right? We're in this time period right now of a lot of revenue growth. But what happens if all of a sudden we do hit that blip, you know, whether it be in 2021 whether it be next year, this year, are you prepared for it? So we felt that it was necessary to do a episode like this. You know, right in the heart of this rev-par growth to really prepare yourself for when that, that rev par decrease might happen.
Ryan Embree: So in saying that with me, who better to talk about how to market to new guests than our own, uh, Director of Marketing at Travel Media Group Anne Sandoval. So welcome in Anne.
Anne Sandoval: Thanks for having me Ryan.
Ryan Embree: Like I said at the very beginning of this episode, very excited to kind of talk about this topic because you know, when, when I was in my past role as a digital specialist, you know, I would talk to a lot of hoteliers, you know, they would have a really great sense of where their occupancy was coming from. A majority of their occupancy. You know, I'd talked to a hotelier and they say, "listen, I've got about 80 to 90% of my occupancy coming from oil and gas workers" and I would always present to them that idea of, "okay, well what happens if that occupancy all of a sudden diminished or di...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we discuss one of the fastest growing and most popular social media platforms in 2019, Instagram. On the heels of another exciting innovation from Travel Media Group’s product development team, we introduce the addition of Instagram for hoteliers as a part of our social media solution.
Host, Ryan Embree, is joined by Jason Lee to talk about how hoteliers can leverage and implement Instagram into their digital marketing strategy. Jason shares what type of content should be shared by hoteliers on their business accounts and how to use the Instagram analytics to sharpen their efforts. Ryan and Jason also share their thoughts on influencer marketing and whether it is a good fit for hotels.
If you are looking to learn more information about creating an Instagram for your hotel or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Okay, hello and welcome to another addition and episode of the Suite Spot. And today we are going to be diving into Instagram. You've heard us talk on this podcast a lot about tons of social media solutions for hoteliers, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, but we really haven't explored in that much depth about Instagram. So I thought this would be a good opportunity to really talk about this because it's one of the fastest growing social media platforms out there and businesses are starting to leverage that they're, they're figuring out how to leverage that. And today I am joined by Jason Lee who is a huge proponent of Instagram for hoteliers. And uh, most recently we have actually launched, Instagram for hoteliers as a part of our social media solutions. Is that correct?
Jason Lee: That is correct. Yeah. We, um, now have the ability to post directly to Instagram through our console as well as pickup all of the properties, Instagram posts that they're posting on their own that other people are posting on their page or, or mentioning them. And then also all of the analytics that go along with that, putting comments that come in from that. And actually recently as today, we were actually pulling video, so video actually into the console as well. So really exciting.
Ryan Embree: That's awesome. Congratulations to you and your team. You guys have really been busy with, you know, the new launch of custom social and then adding this to kind of that social media arsenal for hoteliers is really going to take it to the next level. So that kind of transitions me into my first question. Why Instagram? Why did you feel like Instagram was necessary?
Jason Lee: I mean it's really an obvious next step in the evolution of our platform because it is influencing travelers. And so that's really what we look at. What's influencing travelers? What's influencing people to, to take trips? What's influencing people while they're on a trip? And when you look at Instagram and it hits all of those things straight on, including, um, a little bit of a younger set as well. I think the social media platforms are constantly evolving. And you look at Facebook now, and I think I've said this before, maybe even on this show, but I feel like Facebook has almost a utility, you know, it's like a place where there's news and there's a place where their people are posting. There's still a massive amount of people on it. But in terms of personal engagement or entertainment inspiration, I think Instagram is coming out up front. What's interesting too also I think is that Facebook maybe has a little bit of a black eye because of some of the things that have happened from priva...
On this special edition of Suite Spot, we host our first remote guest Pat Kobela, Regional Director of Sales at Chartwell Hotels.
Ryan Embree interviews Pat as she shares some insights and best practices from her years of experience in the hotel industry. Ryan and Pat trade thoughts on what makes a successful sales and marketing strategy in 2019 and Pat gives advice on what has made her so successful in her role at Chartwell Hotels. This episode covers everything from renovations to social media and serves as a great marketing guide for hoteliers.
To get more information about becoming a special guest on the Suite Spot or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. Thank you everyone for listening to the Suite Spot. Today we have a very special episode on the Suite Spot. We're actually going to be joined by a special guest Pat Kobela who is the regional director of sales at Chartwell Hotels and she is one of our very first guests that's not with us in studio. So we're super excited to be doing this with her and want to thank you, Pat for joining us today.
Pat Kobela: Thank you Ryan. I'm excited about this also.
Ryan Embree: Great. So, um, just for a little bit of background. Let's start by letting our listeners to know kind of what your experiences in the hotel industry.
Pat Kobela: Okay, sure. So, um, I have been in various facets of the overall tourism industry for the past probably 30 years. Even during college I was a flight attendant for a private company, then went on to travel agency work and went into hotels. Both, some back of the house operations, front line sales, front office management, that kind of stuff. And (I) really expanded there with my connections and ended up doing some tourism publishing, advertising, again also in the tourism end of the industry, and then ultimately owning my own business for advertising, AD agency type of work and, ultimately becoming a consultant in, um, for hotels and the tourism industry. So, and now I'm currently with Chartwell Hotels and the regional director is a fairly new position, um, for the nine hotels. So that's growing and we're expanding from there.
Ryan Embree: That's awesome Pat. And I'm sure a lot of that experience has served you well in the position, you know at every facet and kind of a corner of the travel industry, you know, from your early stages of starting as a travel agent to, you know, the advertising and marketing side. And with that, you've brought a lot of fresh perspective and ideas that you've shared actually with myself and our director of marketing without kind of giving away, uh, you know, all your secrets. You know, I would know we've talked about some unique and creative ideas you've worked with even with the CVBs (Convention and Visitors Bureau). Um, could you share some of those ideas?
Pat Kobela: Sure. So, um, I have always been a really big proponent of CVBs, or DMOs (Destination Marketing Organizations), TPAs (Tourism Promotion Agencies) sometimes they're called just different variations of CVB in different areas because they really are the force behind bringing awareness to a local region. And what's all in that region, and how they want to bring that to the general public, and maybe even some specific market segments. And they're very key. And that, and, and unfortunately, there are many communities that don't even understand what a CVB does unless maybe you're in a metropolitan area where they're constantly bringing in, you know, huge conferences, and big events, and tournaments and such. But, you know,
In this episode of Suite Spot, we explore the exciting, recent announcement of Travel Media Group’s newest solution: Custom Social. Joey Schuster, Product Development Manager, joins host Ryan Embree to share all the exciting features and benefits of this new solution.
Ryan and Joey discuss the benefits of having a social media strategy in 2019 and how publishing unique, creative posts specific to your hotel helps drive community growth and traveler engagement. Joey shares the recent successes of Custom Social and what separates Travel Media Group’s custom social solution from others. Travel Media Group is the best fit for hoteliers looking to run successful, revenue generating social media campaigns.
If you are looking to learn more information about our new custom social solution or want to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree,
Ryan Embree: If you can believe it, we are already at episode number 20 of the Suite Spot, and I want to first thank everyone for taking the time to listen. We've got a great episode for you today. Um, it's been a while since we've talked about social media, but it's one of the things here at Travel Media Group that we are digital experts in and we love to talk about with our hoteliers because we know the importance of it. With that being said, we've got a really special guest with us. He is our product development manager at Travel Media Group for both social media and websites solutions for our hotel partners. And that is Mr. Joey Schuster.
Joey Schuster: Thanks for having me.
Ryan Embree: Well I wanted to first get started Joey, uh, by asking, you know, from a product development manager having something like social media for hotels. I'm sure you get asked all the time cause I know I do one more out and about at conferences and tech shows. Social media has been constantly changing with new apps coming on Facebook, new analytics, Um, and then we're even talking about, things in the news with privacy. So why is it important for hoteliers in 2019 to keep providing unique and creative posts and utilizing social media?
Joey Schuster: Um, I mean I think it's really because, you know, you have to be, you have to be unique because of the unique audience of people that are visiting your site. So, um, you know, you just have so many, so many different people from different walks of life that have different sense of humors or different backgrounds. And being able to kind of, you know, hopefully tap into all of those different groups, that's, that's what makes, um, social media I think so powerful is just that it is, it's such a massive amount of people that are using it. It's such a diverse group of people using it. Um, and then the creative side, you know, to be unique and creative. The creative side is, is just because is probably the other side of it is because so many people are using it. I mean, people are so desensitized to something that's creative and unique at this point.
Joey Schuster: I mean, you think about the people that are coming up with, with, um, with unique ideas, it becomes more and more difficult because of so many people doing such a great job. You look at somebody like Wendy's and Wendy's does a phenomenal job with their social media, um, because they really did come up with a unique kind of creative way of engaging with their customers. Um, and then you can, you can see the impact that that has on their business. It's, it's phenomenal. You know, the upside to the creative side, I think of it is that, um, you know, you get a lot of chances.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we go behind the scenes with the client support department at Travel Media Group. Host Ryan Embree visits with Aislynn Roberts, Client Support Team Lead, to discuss all the vital work that she and the client support team do to help enhance the digital programs of our hotel partners.
Ryan interviews Aislynn about the team’s role in onboarding, engagement, and facilitating Travel Media Group partners to ensure optimization of their solutions. Aislynn also offers several best practices and tips on how to get the most out of your digital marketing solutions and even shares some of her favorite success stories throughout the years.
To get in touch with your hotel’s client support specialist or to submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: All right. Hello, and welcome everyone. Thank you for listening to another episode of the Suite Spot. This is Episode 19, and we have a very unique special edition episode of Suite Spot today. As you know, at Travel Media Group, we are at the forefront of all things digital marketing for hotels. We attend the leading hotel industry conferences across the nation and we also provide Digital Marketing Solutions. And one of the unique aspects of the solutions that we provide is actually our Client Support Team, and today we're going to get a behind the scenes look at that Client Support service and team, and with that being said, I will welcome in the Client Support Team Lead Ms. Aislynn Roberts. Good morning, Aislynn. How are you?
Aislynn Roberts: Good Morning Ryan. I'm good. I'm glad to be here.
Ryan Embree: Oh, happy to have you. Like I said, it's a super exciting episode to kind of see the back end of what we do for our hotel partners out there and we have a lot of listeners that are currently partnering with us with our hotel marketing solutions. Uh, let's just start kind of by talking about your professional experience and journey within Travel Media Group.
Aislynn Roberts: Yeah, absolutely. So I've been with Travel Media Group for over five years now, and I actually was one of the first specialists, um, to start the Client Support Team. I've had the pleasure of being part of the company and this incredible team as we continue to lead the industry in marketing solutions for hotels. Through this time I've had the honor of working with over 400 hotels utilizing our services and been a part of over five launches as we expand our digital solutions. Because of my hand on experience with many hotels, I moved into a lead role where I continue to work closely with hoteliers and their services and programs with us. But I also work very closely with a team of specialists as we continue to support hoteliers.
Ryan Embree: That's amazing. So you've really been here through a lot of evolutions of our solutions as well as kind of the way that we interact with our hoteliers, the way that we interact with our partners. Just so our listeners can kind of get to know you a little bit better. What, what would you say the favorite part of your current position is?
Aislynn Roberts: Honestly, my favorite thing about being part of the Client Support Team are the daily conversations with hotels and hoteliers in the management team. Um, there's really nothing better about a conversation with a hotelier than when they actually reach out to you, whether it's via call or email and they're just thanking you for assisting them and really helping them to understand this digital world. It's still very unknown to a lot of consumers and business own...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we combat one of the biggest problems facing hoteliers in 2019: recruiting and hiring quality hotel employees. In the What’s News segment, host Ryan Embree, shares some recent unemployment statistics as well as a survey of what experts in the hospitality industry feel the hotel industry needs to do to attract future employees. With historically low unemployment and an industry known for high turnover, hoteliers need to be more innovative than ever in their recruiting and hiring efforts. In the Suite Spot, Ryan shares some creative, cost-effective solutions to finding and retaining top hotel talent.
If you have any feedback or tips on successful hiring practices at your hotel we would love to hear from you. You can reach us by either calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello, and welcome to all of our listeners out there. This is Ryan Embree the host of Suite Spot. Got another great and exciting episode of Suite Spot coming to you live from our Travel Media Group headquarters in Maitland, Florida. And, I am especially excited to be talking about this topic today because as hospitality experts, we travel nationwide to all of the top conferences to really dissect and examine, you know, "what are the hot topics going on in the hotel industry right now?" What's, what are going to be those trends that are going to be at the top of mind of hoteliers, so that we can do our best to facilitate you and helping you out with some of these topics. So the one topic that kept coming up, every single conference that we would attend is that of employment. So this episode today is going to be focused all around employment.
Ryan Embree: How do we attract hospitality and hotel talent and not only attract them to our hotel, but how do we keep them. As we know the hotel industry is notorious for very low retention, lot of fast changing movements within, within our employees, jumping from hotel to hotel. So how do we right now in a time where unemployment is, is at a historical low, how can we keep that talent and how can we keep attracting to our talent pool to help better our business? So speaking of the employment rate, as of December 2018, the unemployment rate is down to 3.9 percent, so under 4 percent. So what is that telling employees of your hotel? Well, it's saying that there are probably a lot of employers out there that are looking for hospitality talent. So if they're not happy in their current position, they can easily switch to the next.
Ryan Embree: So in our What's News today we're going to look at a survey that was done by the International Society of Hospitality Consultants and they asked more than 200 experienced hospitality professional worldwide asking what businesses in the industry need to do to attract future employees.
Ryan Embree: Now, the first as you would have expected is compensation, and that was that was the top answer from those surveyed. Just under 45 percent compensation came in as the number one thing that businesses have to do in the industry to attract future employees, but they also had some other answers here within that survey that were a little surprising.
Ryan Embree: Number two, not too far down at 30 percent was career advancement, benefits, flexibility, training, recruitment. These were the other answers that those that being surveyed were saying that attracts future employees. So what we're going to focus on today is for those hoteliers who might not have the wiggle room to give more compensation and they h...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we welcome in 2019 with several new year reputation resolutions for hoteliers. Ryan counts down the top 5 ways to make sure that your reputation strategy is off to a fast start and sets you up for success throughout the rest of the year. From top to bottom, these resolutions cover all things reputation, from recognizing which online reviews sites are at risk, to responding to every review. This list is a great way to kick off the new year for your hotel.
We would love to hear your feedback on our list and what your 2019 reputation resolutions are. You can reach us by either calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Okay. Hello and welcome everyone. Thank you for listening, wherever you are out there. My name is Ryan Embree, and I am the host of Suite Spot. We kicked off 2019 with our last episode, but we are still here at the beginning of the year, and today we are going to be talking about new year reputation resolutions, so we recognize right now this is the time of the year where hoteliers are gearing up for a full fiscal year. They're setting some goals in place. They've got some ADR goals that they're looking to hit for maybe this year. They're trying to set themselves up for success around the spring and summer times when they get a little bit busier. So we want to make sure you're getting off on the right foot out there by given a list of the top five new year reputation resolutions, and we start our list at number one.
Ryan Embree: We would challenge you to really find and recognize your high-risk areas online that have lower review scores than you're wanting. And, the first way that you can really go about doing this is googling your property in several different ways. Using your city name, using your state, leaving your state out, those are all going to procure very different, uh, Google searches and results. This is what your travelers are doing on an everyday basis when they're trying to find out more information about your property. Once you do that, you can create a list of review sites that you're seeing right there on the first page or even the second page that might be high-risk areas. These are sites that might have a little bit lower review scores, than you necessarily want and could be impacting traveler conversion rate.
Ryan Embree: From there, we're going to move on to number two in our lists, which is set smart goals when it comes to those high-risk online reputation sites and attribute them with ratings and numbers of reviews. So when we talk about smart goals, we talk about, again, specific, measurable, attainable, and realistic timely goals for individual review sites. So as you start googling your property, you see where travelers might be being drawn or attracted to a competitor. Start to come up with some realistic goals for where you want to end 2019. I would encourage you go even back as far as all of 2018 and start counting the amount of reviews that you get. Quantity as we know we talked about is one of the things that TripAdvisor uses an algorithm for ranking. We also want to set expectations as far as the scores that you want to be receiving.
Ryan Embree: I would also encourage you as a best practice is share those with guests. When you're talking to your guests that check out, instead of just hearing someone say, "you know, I had a really great time at your property" and your staff just kind of responding in that, "Oh, if you did, please leave us a review." How about targeting and directing those reviews to a ...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we pick the brain of a true hotel review response expert. Kristeena Seckinger, who has responded to over 100,000 hotel reviews in her career, joins host Ryan Embree to talk about what it takes to be a successful hotel review response writer and shares some best practices for online review response. From the proper length of a review response to which sites are the most important to respond to, Kristeena covers it all regarding review response. Ryan and Kristeena also talk about how to manage brand expectations and standards when it comes to review response and the emotional toll responding to reviews can have on a hotelier.
In the Q&A segment, Kristeena delivers some insightful do and don'ts to a hotelier who is looking to make review response a priority in 2019. To submit a question for future episodes, call or text 407-984-7455.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello and thanks for listening. This is Ryan Embree, your host of the Suite Spot. Happy 2019 to all of our listeners. It's a new year, and we've got a new episode here of Suite Spot. Very excited about the episode we have today. It is going to be circled all around responding to reviews. So today in our What's News, we're going to be looking at a white paper on travelmediagroup.com, which is what makes a good review response writer. And in this white paper you're going to get some best practices, some tools and resources on how to respond to reviews. If you're delegating that to someone at your property, how to make sure that you're getting the most out of them. Or, if you're responding to reviews yourself, making sure you are doing everything you need to do in order to get those great responses out there. We know how the brains have really raised their expectations of hoteliers when it comes to review response. We know how important this is and the standards are getting stricter and stricter when it comes to review response. So with that being said, we've got a really special guest with us. She has actually been with us since the conception of our solution Respond & Resolve where we actually partner with hotels to respond to reviews, our Senior Reputation Analyst Kristeena Seckinger. So without further ado, let's go ahead and welcome in Kristeena. Good Morning Kristeena. How are you?
Kristeena S.: Good morning, Ryan. I'm doing great. How are you doing?
Ryan Embree: I'm excellent. I'm super excited that you had the opportunity to be with us live here on the Suite Spot, and I want to first start off with with kind of an easy question. You, you have, like I mentioned before, you were here at the very beginning of this solution, Respond & Resolve. So since that time, how many reviews have you personally responded to?
Kristeena S.: Well, I have been here over three years now and so within that time I've probably responded to about 117,000 reviews.
Ryan Embree: Wow. That is, that is an incredible number. I have to ask, you know, with so many review sites online today, and you know you being a expert in review response, what would you say your personal opinion is of which is the most important site to make sure your reviews are responded to?
Kristeena S.: Well, there are a lot of factors to look at when thinking about the answer to that question. Previously, I would have said with confidence that maybe TripAdvisor might have been the most important just because they have that brand recognition and travelers are always going to TripAdvisor to look for reviews about the hotel. More and more now, we are seeing more content in Google.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we prepare hoteliers for the upcoming holiday season, which is historically slower for hotels. Ryan counts down the top 5 ways to market your hotel during this year’s winter months. We tackle everything from traditional advertising avenues to best practices on setting your hotel up for future success. This list will help you build a strategy to make sure that you are getting the most revenue out of your business in a time of low occupancy and ADR.
We would love to hear your feedback to our list. What are you doing to optimize your hotel’s revenue during the “off-season”? You can reach us by either calling or texting us at 407-984-7455 or email us at info@travelmediagroup.com.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending and hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello everyone and thank you for listening. Happy holidays. This is your host, Ryan Ryan Embree, and you are listening to the Suite Spot. This is episode 15. We've got a great episode for you today, very excited about it. We felt that, uh, during this holiday season, unless you are in a winter destination, we know that this is typically considered in the industry a off season or slower period. You're starting to see occupancy maybe dipped down a little bit, causing her to come down as well. And hoteliers are constantly looking for ways to put heads in beds and fill their rooms during this slower winter season. And the spirit of that, we are going to have a top five list today of the ways that you can market your hotel during the slow off season. So let's go ahead and jump right in.
Ryan Embree: We're going to start with number five and number five is for hoteliers to start thinking about traditional advertising avenues, some more out of the box, ways to market your hotel. For example, coupons or billboards, you know, 60 percent of travelers during the holiday seasons are searching for hotels and making booking decisions during the holiday season. These could be a travelers that are going on road trips across the country so they might not have a particular plan or do the research that they would for maybe a summer vacation they're making on the spot decisions and for those travelers we know best that places like coupon guides or billboards could really sway a last minute traveler to make that booking decision at your particular property. In saying that, if this is your first time implementing some of these traditional avenues of advertising, I would caution you to really have a system in place to be able to track your ROI. So if you're a have coupons out there, you know, track the number of calls that you're getting from the coupon. Collect those coupons at the front desk. Put in a rate code in your pms to make sure that you're getting a solid ROI. So you can know moving forward, whether that is a channel to market your hotel moving forward.
Ryan Embree: So number four on our list of top ways to market your hotel in the slow season is to grow your guest database and the point of this would be to grow the information about your guests through email marketing so that you can really connect with those guests in the future. So if you haven't already, start collecting emails from your guests when they first arrive at your property. You can. You can use this information for feedback for their stay, but also in the future, in the slower times, like the winter months. You can reach out to them for holiday events or stay again and save packages. We know that a majority of of bookings are now coming from Ota or third party sites.
Ryan Embree: Now that you've had the opportunity to host these guests,
In this special edition episode of Suite Spot, we discuss the recent 2018 Phocuswright conference in Los Angeles. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Patrick O’Brien, product manager and Phocuswright attendee veteran, who gives his take on the innovative technology conference. Hear from Patrick as he talks about the theme of this year’s conference and how it sets the stage for the future of the hotel industry.
Learn what industry leaders from companies like Airbnb, TripAdvisor, and Expedia are saying about what they have in store for the future of their companies. This episode is an excellent glimpse of where the hotel industry is headed in 2019 and beyond.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Today we have a very special edition of the Suite Spot. As digital marketing leaders in the industry, it is always our job to make sure that we are at the forefront of all innovations and conferences that are going on around the industry and we have been busy over the past couple of months to give you that insight. Today our episode is going to be focused around Phocuswright Conference, which was in Los Angeles, California at the end of November. I'm here with a guest, Patrick O'Brien. He is our digital product manager. He's been on Suite Spot before, but he is back to give us his insights on the conference, which we both attended. So let me go ahead and first off, welcome Patrick to the show. Welcome.
Patrick O'Brien: Thank you very much.
Ryan Embree: So I want to first start off uh Phocuswright - this is not your first time going and attending. Um, and really this is a hospitality tech conference, correct?
Patrick O'Brien: Yes.
Ryan Embree: Like all conferences, every single year they have sort of a common theme that you would find for each year. And I'm curious what you felt was the theme of this year, 2018's, Phocuswright Conference.
Patrick O'Brien: Yeah. So I think this is the fifth or sixth year that I have, I've gone to Phocuswright. And there always seems to be some type of new theme in the years past, uh, you know, it's been kind of around mobile and mobile booking and mobile technology around disruption in the sharing economy and what that's going to do to the travel industry. This year, I kind of felt like you had a collective cooling from the travel industry where it's like we've had all this disruption, all of this growth and everything's maturing a little bit more. And you know, you've had the consolidation of all of these OTA sites and the OTA is gobbling up other, other companies and kind of creating this bigger platform. You know, Airbnb is kind of starting to see their growth level out a little bit more. And so it's, it's obviously now, you know, one of the big players in the industry and so now I feel like you had everybody kind of sitting back and looking out and saying, okay, now we have these big companies out there. Um, travel, I think on the whole is, is increasing. What can we do now to continue to build wealth and sort of get a bigger share of the pie. One of the most interesting statistics that I saw year over year and I may get the year wrong, but I think since like 2014 that founding has gone down and funding has gone up. So what that means is that there are less and less startups coming into the industry. But there's more and more money being pumped into the industry. And I think that is kind of a direct result of what we were seeing is: So now you've had all these startups and all of this money go into the industry. They've sort of proven out the ideas that are going to work. Now they're pumping more money into trying to figure ...
In this special edition of Suite Spot, we discuss a hospitality keynote presented at the 2018 Dreamforce Conference in San Francisco. The keynote, "The Future of Travel and Hospitality," was a fireside chat with Marriott International CEO Arne Sorenson.
In this podcast episode, host Ryan Embree is joined by Anne Sandoval, Travel Media Group’s Marketing Director who attended the keynote. We discuss the key takeaways from Arne's insights on Marriott’s relationship with technology.
Resources
Watch the full Dreamforce keynote, The Future of Travel & Hospitality: https://youtu.be/EgDD5hBrkNU
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello and welcome everyone. This is episode 13 and today we are going to have another special edition of Suite Spot. We do this from time to time being leaders and experts in the hospitality field. We travel across the nation to conferences, trade shows that have to pertain with the hospitality industry. And today we are going to be talking about an annual conference of Dreamforce which is hosted by Salesforce in San Francisco. Now, Salesforce isn't necessarily a hospitality-only vertical. Uh, they work across verticals, but there were some really great insights when it came to the hospitality industry. Just to give you a little background on this conference, this year's conference drew over 170,000 attendees. So it's a very popular conference, people traveling from all over the world to experience this week. And today we'll be talking about the hospitality keynote by Marriott International CEO Arne Sorenson. The title of this keynote was the Future of Travel and Hospitality and obviously being in the digital marketing space, we have to be at the forefront of knowing the new technology and future of travel.
Ryan Embree: So we're always interested in talking about that. I have the pleasure to be joined today by our director of marketing, Anne Sandoval, and she had the opportunity to attend this keynote and she is here with me today to share some insights with us. So first and foremost, let me go ahead and welcome you to the Suite Spot, Anne.
Anne Sandoval: Hey Ryan, it's great to be here.
Ryan Embree: So this was a, obviously very popular conference that you attended and you know, as I mentioned, it's not all about the hospitality vertical, but this particular keynote was. It's super interesting, especially when you get to hear firsthand from executives of such a large worldwide global brand like Marriott. And I wondered to first start out, this was kind of something fun that they did. Uh, Arme had mentioned that he traveled anywhere from 200 to 225 nights of the year and they first started off the uh speech by giving his three travel tips. I wanted to kind of get your thoughts on those tips.
Anne Sandoval: Yeah, it was really interesting to hear from someone who spends just so much time in hotels and across time zones and all of his tips really had one thing in common, which I know is a theme that's familiar to the Suite Spot, which is to go local. So his first tip was to get on local time and exercise to help keep your routine. Second, to eat the local food and go sightseeing and third was don't let yourself live as if you're still at home. And I think these are really great takeaways for travelers, but I think it's also helpful for hoteliers to know these tips.
Ryan Embree: Yeah. You know, it's it – at the end of the day, we're all travelers, right? And when we talk to hoteliers, it's almost putting themselves in the shoes of your guest and I think that was such an interesting perspective that he took and to get ins...
In this episode of Suite Spot, we focus on marketing branded and franchised hotels. Host Ryan Embree teams up with the leaders of Travel Media Group’s sales team, Diane Elderkin and Edwin Pomales, to discuss.
In the What's News segment, Ryan shares an article that highlights the 7 latest ways big brands are using content today. The article breaks down the different strategies and methods the brands are using to capitalize on content online. In The Suite Spot, Ryan, Diane, and Edwin share their thoughts on how branded hotels can provide customers with a unique and local experience. Diane and Edwin share what advantages and disadvantages franchised hoteliers and branded hotels face in comparison to independent hotels and home rentals.
Resources:
https://www.todayshotelier.com/2016/08/01/7-of-the-latest-ways-big-brands-are-using-content/
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending and hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello and thank you all for listening. This is Ryan Embree, host of the Suite Spot. This is episode 12 and I'm very excited for this episode today. We are going to be actually piggybacking on an episode that we did earlier this year, episode five, which was a marketing tips for independent hotels. So we got a lot of great feedback from that episode and we wanted to kind of follow up and get the same sort of resources and additional education for maybe those hoteliers out there that have a brand, you know, they also need some help with marketing and give them some kind of tips and best practices on how to best market their branded hotels. So that's going to be our episode today. As we jump into the What's News we're going to be looking at an article from Today's Hotelier. This article, which you can find in our show notes, is, uh, titled the seven of the latest ways big brands are using content.
Ryan Embree: And I found this article absolutely fascinating. What it did is actually seven of the major brands: IHG, Best Western, Motel 6, Choice – even Marriott, and it looked at different ways that they were using content, uh, to really market their hotels. I'll go ahead and give a few examples - I won't give them all. Again, this article is in our show notes today, but the first one I wanted to bring up was a hashtag contest that IHG did. Where they use the #joyoftravel and they use it on all their social media platforms to promote both their own content and posts. But more importantly it was to capture traveler content engagement. Using hashtags for these campaigns can really draw a lot of engagement and can draw a lot of people together for a common purpose. So that is one of the ways that IHG or Holiday Inn was uh using content to market their brands across the board.
Ryan Embree: Another one which I found absolutely interesting was Marriott and Under Armour teaming up and they teamed up to provide running routes for guests that were staying at its Residence Inn properties. So this is two major corporations and businesses teaming up again to draw awareness to the brands and to market. So again, those were just a few examples. It's a really great example of how brands are perceiving content though - they're seeing the value in this content that's out there and noting that if they utilize it in the right way, it can help promote their brand. That's more of a high level, um, you know, bird's eye view when it comes to marketing for a brand. But as we know, we know that there are tons of individual properties and franchisees within that brand. So today's Suite Spot, we're going to bring in two of our experts to talk to us about how you can utilize your brand,
In this special edition episode of Suite Spot, we recap the recent 2018 Lodging Conference. It took place at the beautiful Arizona Biltmore resort in Phoenix, AZ. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Travel Media Group’s Senior Director of Product, Jason Lee as they discuss the current state and future of the hotel industry. Listen and learn, as they analyze the opportunities and threats to the current prosperous era for hoteliers. This episode is a great way to get insight into what the power players and brand leaders are saying about the hotel business today.
Episode Transcript
Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio.
Ryan Embree: Welcome to the Suite Spot where hoteliers check in and we check out what's trending and hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree.
Ryan Embree: Hello and welcome everyone. You are listening to the Suite Spot. This is Ryan Embree, your host. Thank you for listening today. We've got a very special and exciting episode of Suite Spot where we are going to be reflecting on the most recent 2018 Lodging Conference which happened here at the end of September of 2018. I had the pleasure and was fortunate enough to attend the conference myself as well as our guest that we're going to be having on today and we're going to give you a couple of takeaways and get a good grasp on some of the key points. So today let's go ahead and welcome Jason Lee. He's our senior director of product and technology. I was fortunate enough to travel with Jason to the Lodging Conference. He has been to the conference multiple times, so he's going to have a some different insight on what the differences might have been in the past versus this year. So let's go ahead and welcome Jason in. Jason, welcome back to the show.
Jason Lee: Thank you very much. Thanks for having me back. After my last performance, I was hoping that you would invite me back. I didn't know for sure.
Ryan Embree: Absolutely. So today, as mentioned, we're gonna be talking about the Lodging Conference and this isn't the first time you've been, you've been a number of years now. I wanted to get your impression of, you know, this year's overall sentiment and how maybe this year's Lodging Conference has been different than years past.
Jason Lee: Yeah I think like in terms of different from years past, you know, I remember going to the Lodging Conference right after the recession, you know, the 2010 / 2011 times and, and I think there was a lot of like, hey, you know, or we do see some trends going the right way, but are we ever going to get back to 2007 / 2006 levels of occupancy and revenue? Um, and I think, you know, over the last few years we've seen a lot of optimism and a lot of like, hey, the state of the industry. It looks really great and it's really awesome and I think this year you're seeing the same numbers as the previous probably five years of like, Hey, this is good, good growth. Um, but now it's a little more like, how long is this growth gonna go? Can we keep this going? Um, some people, they're feeling very optimistic and thinking that we're, we're, you know, the, that the, uh, the hotel supply line is correct. We're not overbuilding. The influx of travel seems to be going well. Millennial travelers and baby boomer travel seems to be, you know, on the rise. So you're looking at good segmentation and solid revenue projections. Um, but then at the same time it's like, or there could be some sort of economic collapse or there could be some kind of other thing that could happen that could cause a derailment that everything right now looks very, very positive.
Ryan Embree: Right. And we heard "cautious optimism" a lot throughout the conference and you're right, you know, we've been hearing it from brands, we heard it from management groups that,
In this episode of Suite Spot, we take a look at the state of the hotel industry. With an incredible streak of 100+ months of RevPAR growth, it's a great time to reinvest in your hotel. Here are 5 ways you can reinvest in your property for a prosperous future.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we take a look at what it takes to manage and run a successful social media marketing strategy in today’s hotel industry. Priscilla Osorio, Social Media Analyst at Travel Media Group, joins host Ryan Embree to give advice to hoteliers on how to tailor social media content to create an engaging and effective social media campaign.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we discuss guest feedback and the ways today’s hoteliers are leveraging this information to better their businesses. Senior Digital Marketing Specialist Brittany Hill joins Ryan Embree to share best practices on how to obtain feedback from guests and how to leverage it.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we uncover which processes hoteliers can put in place to impact their reputation. Host Ryan Embree is joined by Jason Lee to discuss how at the heart of the matter, it's still all about service.
Amber Wojcek, content manager at Travel Media Group, joins host Ryan Embree to study the impact of voice search in the industry and where it might be heading. We provide tips on how hotels can optimize their websites for voice search and share best practices on voice search traffic conversion.
Diane and Edwin share, from a marketing perspective, what advantages and disadvantages independent hoteliers face in comparison to a branded property. They give different recommendations on how an independent hotel can best share its story to travelers.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we reflect on the recent changes to the TripAdvisor algorithm. Host Ryan Embree is joined by guest Patrick O’Brien, Digital Product Manager and head of the reputation solutions at Travel Media Group.
In this special edition episode of Suite Spot, we discuss the recent 2018 HITEC conference in Houston, TX. This episode serves as a great technology blueprint for the modern-day hotelier.
In this episode of Suite Spot, we examine the growing impact of vacation rentals and private accommodations on today’s hotel industry. Host Ryan Embree is joined by guest Amber Wojcek, Marketing Coordinator at Travel Media Group and author of many of our blogs and white papers.
In the first episode of Suite Spot, we explore the state of millennial travel. Host Ryan Embree is joined by guest Anne Sandoval, Marketing Director at Travel Media Group and adjunct instructor of Social Media at UCF.