On a recent consulting project, my company was appointed to assist a hotel that has been open just over one year, to redefine the F&B offering and to also deliver a more substantial bottom line. During this period, I noticed the minimal strategic approach in the development of the concept in the preliminary stages and found the need to write the below to assist any other hoteliers or restaurateurs in strategic planning.
The term "modular construction" once conjured images of small construction trailers or antiquated mobile home clusters just off the highway—not the most alluring draw for high-end developers and top-tier hotel companies, nor for their gentried clientele. Today, however, the concept of modular construction has evolved, with developers across the U.S. adopting a modular approach to building 2- to 4-star select-service, full-service, and even boutique hotels. This article gives a brief overview of the evolution of modular construction, as well as the potential benefits and challenges in terms of cost, timelines, and financing when harnessing this method to build hotels.What is Modular Construction? What are Its Benefits?Modular construction involves a process in which individual "modules" or "pods" are constructed or pre-fabricated off site within a controlled plant environment. The modules are then fitted together in ways that allow the unit to function as a unified structure.
I recently attended a presentation where the presenter used a hamburger as an analogy for a cost-segregation study. While most people just see a hamburger, he sees a beef patty, lettuce, tomato, cheese, and a bun. That is to say, he doesn't see a single piece of real estate, but numerous smaller assets that comprise the larger asset. The same can be said of a purchase price allocation (PPA).
If you're looking to buy a hotel, what makes more sense as an investment? A high-end luxury hotel or a lifestyle, boutique establishment? We would all like to be rich enough to buy a trophy hotel in central London, Paris or Singapore. Imagine the kudos in being able to invite your friends round for dinner. But in reality, what presents the better value in terms of returns?
When you are in the process of launching a food startup, it is important to take insurance into consideration, as it can enable you to mitigate the plethora of risks involved in starting your business and working with customers. Preparing ahead of time for potentially difficult scenarios is a great way to ensure future success. Without insurance, you face a variety of financial risks, when you should be focused on amazing food ideas.
How is the concept of "luxury" perceived and what hotel brands come to mind when you hear the word "luxury"? The word carries a sense of prestige and exclusivity that only selected brands can fulfill. In today's era, this term is often overused, causing the meaning to be diluted. At the same time, as luxury becomes democratic, qualities (such as exclusivity) which had once been associated with it, have become less important to modern day customers.
In the past few months, my neighborhood in Toronto has seen two, five-alarm fires. Fortunately, in both cases, there was no loss of life nor personal injuries reported. In one instance, a residence only a few months after completion experienced an attic conflagration, destroying a family's dream of a domestic paradise. As for the other, a recently renovated, century-old racquet club inferno left more than a thousand members 'in the cold' with no preferred meeting place or exercise facility.
Abstract: Analysts typically use two types of methods to value hotels: comparable sales and the present value of income (sometimes calculated as discounted cash flow). This report explores whether one model is superior to the other, and whether combining both models results in more precise hotel valuations. This evaluation addresses the issue of which property characteristics and income calculations are the most effective in explaining variation in the prices of hotels, how the descending influence of hotel property characteristics and income present value components determine the prices of hotels, and whether hedonic and income-based models produce similar estimates of hotel values. The findings show that using an approach based on comparable sales or one based on incomes results in similar value estimates. Beyond that, the analysis finds that combining both models does not result in more precise hotel valuations.
We recently launched a research study "The impacts of staff turnover on a hotel's Income Statement" which revealed that a 30% voluntary staff turnover rate could cause a potential loss of AED 8 million on the top-line and AED 6 million on the bottom-line. If your hotel is experiencing high number of departing staff, it would be advisable to take a step back to review your people strategy.
"Diversifying into more than one property sector is not new in the South African context, but it's a growing trend that's impacting the hotel pipeline," says Wayne Troughton, CEO of specialist global hospitality and real estate consultancy, HTI Consulting.
A total of 365 hotel chain development pipelines were reported in Africa in 2016, with 64,231 rooms. This is according to a report by the W-Hospitality Group; that provides advisory services in the hotel, tourism, leisure, and real estate industries to investors. This is a record 29.2% increase, from the 2015 numbers of 270 hotels and 49,715 rooms in the pipeline activity. Furthermore, a JLL hotel research (Jones Lang LaSalle) predicts an investment of $1.7 billion in 2017, in hotels in Sub-Saharan Africa with $1.9 billion more in 2018. This is expected to increase the hotel rooms in the region from the current approximate of 257,000.
A month has passed since my initial conversation with Pizza Rossa founder and CEO Corrado Accardi. Since then, we have continued our exchange about the fast casual dining industry. Because I was keen to see him in action, Corrado and I met at his restaurant in the City of London and started going through our agenda items, which included, this time around, third-party delivery companies as well as marketing and social media. Naturally, we also had some time to share a couple of slices of his delicious, newly developed 100% organic pizza. However, as an important and large, last-minute order to cater a co-working space came in, Corrado decided to deliver it himself, and so we finished our conversation in a London black cab. Try to imagine 20 to 25 18-inchcartons of square pizzas stacked up in the back of a car, windows steaming from the heat of the freshly prepared goods and two guys talking shop whilst trying to direct the cab driver through the maze of London's East End… That's what I call being a true hands-on entrepreneur!
Travel is big business. In fact, it is one of the biggest businesses around. In the US alone, travel accounts for over 10% of the country's GDP (World Travel & Tourism Council). But it is a hard business for tech companies, and infamously a very non-friendly market for startups.
Recently Italian financial markets have had a negative influence from the result of Brexit and the lately bank crisis. Therefore, the pursuit of protected goods like properties increased. Italian houses prices have been declining since 2008, especially in some metropolitan cities and tourist resorts. According to the ISTAT (the Italian National Institute of Statistics), the prices have fallen by 13.7% from Q1 2010 to Q1 2015. While in the first 3 quarters of 2016, the prices fell by 0.9% over the same period of the last year.
A study of the "Mega Vacation Rental" business model (companies with a minimum of fifty and often hundreds of rental units) shows some significant differences when comparing their operations and metrics to their established hotel industry brethren.
We are sitting in a meeting with the CMO and a new marketing operations director from a large, well-established company. They had called and asked for a meeting to help kick their marketing metrics and dashboard up a notch.
The Hospitality industry is one of the most volatile to invest in. The mantra 'customer is king' must have emanated from this Industry because there is no other sector where customer satisfaction is more emphasized as it is in hospitality. While you might offer the most luxurious facilities, overlooking simple issues can instantly lead to a criticism from your customers. In this age of instant communication, the situation is even worse because the information about your poor services will be shared rapidly. As a hotel maintenance manager, you should always be on the lookout for any glitches that can lower customer satisfaction levels. This is however easier said than done; from floor management, to house-keeping management and much more. The job profile is really hectic. This is where Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) comes in handy. The system helps optimize hotel maintenance, thus assuring high customer levels throughout. To understand better how CMMS software helps you achieve outstanding customer satisfaction, consider the following factors:
Like it or not, corporate governance is about to change in a big way. President-elect Donald Trump has already been talking tough about "dismantling" the Dodd-Frank Act. Many of the Dodd-Frank policies were put in place to curb banks from causing another financial crisis, but others like "Say on Pay" make little sense. While the U.S. Congress and Trump battle it out in 2017, there are a number of trends and actions in corporate governance that public boards should be thinking about in the New Year:
I was recently interviewed by GlobeSt.com to discuss Chinese investment in the United States, including why the US is an attractive market for Chinese dollars, how it helps the US economy, and what it means for the Chinese market. Some selected excerpts from our conversation are below.
An internal audit is a good way to begin to review your competitiveness. Internal assessments or audits help uncover and highlight asset and people relationships key to positively impacting customers' results. The purpose of the audit is to assess your organization's resources and capabilities. A good competitive asset assessment methodology requires two key ingredients, a champion and a framework...