Dear Insiders,
We provided you with hospitality news and background knowledge this year 51 times and we informed you 5 times more quickly than any other medium with our "Breaking News". We, the editorial and publishing staff, look back on 12 fast-moving months. hospitalityInside.com has developed further in a positive way. In the meantime, our readers can be found in 15 countries, and the editorial team of freelancers now has 16 heads in seven countries.
In our second year, the hospitality as well as the media industry recognises us ever more. hospitalityInside.com has been quoted in several different media again and again, our collaboration with the Focus economic magazine with respect to the ranking of the "550 best hotels of the world" in September brought a significant boost in image and lots of logins. The interest in hospitalityInside.com coming from abroad has also increased considerably. In November, we switched to another server to do our daily online work and make your surfing more comfortable.
The hotel and tourism industry as well as the world of investments are looking for reliable content. That is what we experienced in 2006 – due to many request concerning links, partnerships and trade fair collaboration. We have only realised a few of them. New alliances have to be thought out well for the benefit of both sides.
The year started with hospitalityInside.com becoming a media partner of the first ITB hotel congress "ITB Hospitality Day", which made me responsible for the content and for hosting the day. This premiere was a complete success – for the Berlin trade fair and for us, so that we are proud to design the next ITB hotel congress in 2007. In spring, we became partners of Cornell University/Center of Hospitality Research. This honourable offer was the culmination of a four-day trip to Cornell, where I was invited to participate in a discussion about travel trends as the only European journalist. Our exchange of thoughts and information has already proven to be highly fruitful. We want to expand this new professional friendship in the next year, especially with the Cornell German Chapter, which accepted us in a very friendly manner.
Not only was this autumn dominated by further target group-oriented media partnerships with the International Hotel Conference in Rome, with design hotels on the occasion of their "Future Forum" in Vienna, and with Heuer-Dialog at the leisure real estate congress in Munich, but also by further developing our network.
Therefore, a second platform under the umbrella of hospitalityInside has been provided since October. It is a window of solutions and innovation for hoteliers – everything prepared in an informative and compact way. This represents a new approach in the media. Providers do not present their solutions in the form of brief and stiff advertisements, but as explanatory, content-oriented texts including links and e-mail contacts. Here, you can also expect understandable first-hand information. That is why we decided to call this information offer "hospitalitySolutions.info".
In 2007, the editorial and commercial information will be joined by the third column – "hospitalityShop.biz" – which will further expand the range of information offered by hospitalityInside GmbH. The shop will concentrate on information about the hospitality industry from a research point of view.
We expect another exciting year in which we shall extend a number of new things and, of course, refine those that already exist. Despite this, we know that there is a demand for quality media in the second year of our existence. Stay with us, but please speak openly about critical things. We are a young medium with an open ear for you. Satisfied readers are the best ambassadors – that is why we are happy if you would recommend us to your colleagues and customers.
In the name of the publishing house and the entire editorial staff, I would like to say thank you very much, dear Insiders, for your loyalty and goodwill in 2006.
Yours, Maria Puetz-Willems
Editor-in-Chief
The next issue of hospitalityInside.com will be published on January 12, 2007.