From concept to culture: How passion shapes hotel design & guest loyalty
Diego Calvo shares how Concept Hotel Group achieves 43% direct bookings by prioritizing cultural storytelling and brand identity over traditional marketing tactics.
Struggling to stand out in a crowded hotel market? It’s not about more rooms or more discounts. It’s about identity.
In this episode of Hotel Moment, Diego Calvo (CEO and Co-founder of Concept Hotel Group) joins Dylan Cole (Revinate’s Managing Director, EMEA) to discuss how cultural identity drives results. By building a brand guests actually want to be part of, Diego’s team sees up to 43% direct bookings — without relying on OTAs or heavy discounting.
Diego starts with the story. Music, mood, and narrative are defined before a single architect is briefed. The result? Hotels so distinct and memorable that guests search for them by name.
Diego also explores a different approach to loyalty that rewards connection over spend and community over transactions.
Listen and learn how to build a brand that guests search for my name.
Meet your host
Karen Stephens
As Chief Marketing Officer at Revinate, Karen is focused on driving long-term growth by building Revinate’s brand equity, product marketing, and customer acquisition strategies. Her deep connections with hospitality industry leaders play a key role in crafting strategic partnerships. Karen has more than 25 years of expertise in global hospitality technology and online distribution — including managing global accounts in travel and hospitality organizations such as Travelocity and lastminute.com
As the host of The Hotel Moment podcast, she interviews top players in the hospitality industry. Karen has been with Revinate for over 11 years, leading our global GTM teams. Her most recent transition was from Chief Revenue Officer, where she led the team in their highest booking quarter to date in Q4 2023.
Meet your host
Dylan Cole
Dylan Cole began his career as a TV personality in South Korea. He then brought his love for travel and technology to Revinate where he played a vital part in establishing Revinate’s position in the US market, followed by the Asia Pacific region and now in Europe. Dylan is currently the Managing Director of Revinate Europe and is based in Amsterdam.
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About Revinate
Revinate is a direct booking platform that leads the hospitality industry in driving direct revenue and increased profitability.
Our products and our people combine to give hoteliers the superpowers they need to crush their goals. With Revinate, hoteliers shift share away from OTAs and drive tangible results across an individual property or a portfolio. Our industry-leading, AI-powered customer data platform collects, unifies, and synthesizes data to give hoteliers a foundational advantage.
Hoteliers gain critical intelligence — guest lifetime spend, stay preferences, ancillary revenue, and more. With Revinate's Rich Guest Profiles™ data, hoteliers don't need to guess who their most profitable guests are or struggle to drive conversions across email, voice, messaging, and digital channels.
Revinate's direct booking platform and omnichannel communication technology powers 1.1 billion Rich Guest Profiles across 12,500+ hotels to drive over $24 billion in direct revenue.
Media Contact
Media Team
Media team | Revinate [email protected] +1 415 671 4703