The ultimate hotel experience

Hotels have always been about more than simply having a place to rest your head for a few nights. A visit to a hotel is often an experience unto itself, with hotels acting as their own contained worlds offering a collection of unique facilities and opportunities in one place. A hotel’s exact function might differ depending on its location, price and star rating, but even the simple luxury of breakfast included or a good pillow makes a hotel stay something to remember. Having said that, the landscape is steadily, but radically, changing both for hotels and their customers, and hoteliers must endeavour to keep up. Hotels should always be looking to offer more to their guests, whilst accentuating and improving the assets they already have. Typically, a major hotel will look to provide a comfortable, well-maintained and aesthetically pleasing room, with good food and convenient access to activities and adventures nearby. Therefore, with a hotel stay comes a certain peace of mind, as in an unfamiliar place a hotel room becomes a haven of comfort and luxury for guests who stay. Guests can relax and rely on the staff who work there to ensure they’re comfortable and looked after, and this can be a huge luxury and a welcome break from often chaotic working weeks. Conceptually, the hotel can be all things to all people; it is a means of convenience and functionality, as well as a means of treating yourself and enjoying a well deserved break. As previously stated though, the game is changing for all involved. The rise of Airbnb and similar alternatives means that hotels have to stand out and offer more than just a comfortable bed and a place to rest. Instead, hotels need to put the spotlight on the extras they can provide, that will make their guests’ experience all the more memorable. The special nature of the ‘hotel experience’ has to become a vital part of a hotel’s operations again if they’re to compete with the growing popularity of competitors in the space. Hotel alternatives (and an awareness of their merits) are only on the up, so the hotel experience must grow and modernise alongside it them. The good news is that the range of opportunities available to hotels in terms of diversification is also bigger than ever. Along with top quality restaurants and bars, many hotels - from the Novotel Manchester West to the DoubleTree by Hilton in Bristol - offer high end fitness and gym facilities extremely popular with guests travelling for both business and pleasure. The Park Inn by Radisson Birmingham holds specialised walking, running and cycling routes, and spas are now almost commonplace. Even quirkier offerings, like beekeeping and in-room yoga sessions at St. Ermin’s (also in London) offer further examples of the ways in which hotels can innovate in order to maximise their space, resources and guest satisfaction. Likewise, the enviable facilities boasted by many hotels dictate that restricting them to overnight guests is, if anything, counterproductive. Meeting and conference rooms are rarely easy to come by, particularly if holding a meeting in a different city, but many hotels already have these available and ready for use; probably in a great location to boot. Hotels also face the challenge that is accessibility and exclusivity. It’s only natural to view hotels as something you’d only use when travelling, but this doesn’t have to be the case. One key notion behind the ongoing evolution of the hotel experience is that it does not have to come hand-in-hand with holidays. In fact, it does not even necessarily have to come with a room and an overnight stay. Therefore, another task for hotels is to make everything they offer more accessible to a wider range of people, by being willing to allow guests to perceive their function in a slightly different way. This process is already underway, as many hotels are starting to offer ‘day rooms’ with no overnight stay attached, for up to 75% less than their nightly cost. This opens hotels and their array of facilities up to those who seek to use them in a more cost-effective way. If you’re also able to give local people the opportunity to enjoy the benefits of hotels close to their home for a short ‘day-cation’, you widen your market considerably. And isn’t this the aim? The popular view of hotels as places of opulence and indulgence is both an asset and a setback. The luxury of hotels is what make them appealing, but also creates an idea that they will always have high costs, or are exclusively for people who are travelling. It’s time hotels looked to break free of restricting stereotypes and offer more than a bed in a nice room, in order to attract new customers and make a stay at their establishment a stay to remember. Food for thought, I hope. By Simon Botto, CEO of DayBreakHotels