Author

Robert Herr

General Manager at The Bürgenstock Selection

Robert Herr is a graduate of École hôtelière de Lausanne with an MBA from Henley Business School and has many years of experience in the luxury hotel industry in seven countries on three continents. Most recently, he was Area General Manager for InterContinental Phenicia and Le Vendome Beirut.

Is the wolf scratching at the door? Lessons learned so far from the COVID era...

The biggest learning about the business strategy is to go back and revisit the original plan and see whether it still holds in the new environment and changing context. This impacts mainly the long and medium-term strategy as the short term has been disrupted tremendously by this one-off event with potential huge long-term impacts.

Is 'data scientist' the next hot position in hotels/hospitality?

I fully agree that our industry is more and more driven by consumer behavior in a digital and data context. The hospitality sector has been slow to respond to the digital age which explains why other technology-driven companies have managed to dominate some of that space and changed the industry fundamentally.

In Step: Owners and Operators moving forward, together (or not)

The unexpected arrival and consequences of the pandemic for owners, operators and managers (OOMs) has shifted focus from just running a profitable business and generating net returns for owners, operators and managers to now having to secure long term liquidity and to a large extent even solvency for the business.

2020 Hotel Transactions and RevPAR

Transaction volume lags RevPAR growth for one, so in the early stages of stagnating or declining RevPAR growth, transaction may very well rise and flatten off at a later stage. Second, after 2018 interest rate increases by the Fed, interest rates have been lowered again in 2019 driving liquidity for asset purchases.