News & Stories

London. A new survey is said to be the first one with a truly global perspective on the structure of management contracts. Food for thought for investors.

Wiesbaden. Managers of international hotel chains will quite happily boast of dizzying figures regarding planned hotel developments. Nevertheless, a long path lies between the pipeline and the hotel opening and the differences in definition of the terms in a Letter of Intent are gigantic. It is all the more exasperating when industry professionals regularly spew transcending announcements out of sheer greed for publicity. If one inquires again later, many explanations and excuses can be heard … hospitalityInside.com has dug deeper into the subject with hotel groups of varying profiles and market priorities: With B&B, Choice, IHG, Kempinski, Marriott, Mélia and Starwood as well as with the consultants and real estate brokers at Christie+Co and JJL.

Augsburg. Sponsored content is booming, but two-thirds of all readers feel deceived if they notice that it is. A current study from the USA demonstrates this. Their authors ask company and brand decision-makers to do a better job.

Berlin. Loyal travellers: Just in time for the travel season, the InterContinental Hotel Group has revealed that every third participant in their loyalty programme redeems their points to complete trips.

Tettnang. Of the 84 million holiday trips that German citizens undertake in the year, market researchers can identify two million as a wellness trip and most define them as recovery from the stress of everyday life. Working persons and pensioners account for the majority of the guests. The hoteliers who consciously take note of this have already noted two important corner points for their pre-, up-, post and cross-selling strategy in the spa. However, it is exactly this that is lacking in the actual practice. In spite of the great potential within the wellness market that the market numbers indicate, many wellness hotels complain of stagnant or decreasing revenues outside the high season. "A reason for this is that the primary motives and the wishes of the wellness guests are not yet precisely identified," sums up Dagmar Rizzato, Director of the spa consulting firm of the same name in Tettnang." As a result, there are rarely creative approaches toward inspiring the guest before or during the wellness booking." The consultant recounts here how this can be managed.

Vienna. Nutrition is an issue which is increasingly shaping the demands of hotel guests. Following on from a few forerunners focussed on organic food, vegetarian cuisine is now increasingly finding its way on to the menus of top hotels to hiking lodges. Some "organic" hotels have even converted to "veggie" hotels. Hoteliers send their chefs for further training, increase the vegan options for half-boarders and a whole region now serves at least one vegan dish. A new health trend gains ground.

Berlin. The official execution of the March announcement took place last Monday: 86.93 percent of the stockholders agreed to the "domination agreement" by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. at the Design Hotels Plc General Meeting. As a result and for the first time in the history of the hotel industry, a hotel consortium and marketing/distribution association has become a brand of a global hotel chain. Not one hotel of the 270 Design Hotels resembles the other. What happens now with these creative, private hotels from every grid falling under the roof of a chain?

Berlin. How does the luxury customer travel? How can the hotelier welcome them before, during and after their trip, surprise them and enthuse? ITB Berlin uploaded their 1st "Luxury Webinar" last week. Claudia Roth, former Vice President EMEA for The Leading Hotels of the World and today, coach and consultant for luxury brands, as well as hospitalityInside Editor in Chief Maria Puetz-Willems talked to webinar participants from all over the world. Their question: "The Luxury Customer Journey - a revolution or back to the hospitality roots?"

Madrid. "NH Collection", already announced as new top brand of the Spanish hotel group in March, counts 23 hotels meanwhile.

Santo André/Munich. Germany is the World Cup 2014 Champion!! This is also how the staff members have felt since Sunday at Campo Bahia, the team hotel of the German National Football Team in Santo André, a town just 30 kilometres to the north of the Porto Seguro, Brazil seaside resort. Everyone is proud: Over the past four weeks, Jogi Loew and his boys lived in the newly-built resort and had been looked after by 90 hotel staff members and the 40-person team of the Deutschen Fussballbunds and guarded by an entire armada of security... The hotel was ready at around one o'clock in the morning and at eight o'clock in the morning, the German Football Association Team stood before the door – "this was an extremely cold start, from zero to 100", Professor Stephan Gerhard sighed two days ago while looking back, but is now greatly relieved. The Treugast Solutions from Munich was responsible for the completion of the resort. "This was the best German World Cup accommodation of all time!" German Football Association President Wolfgang Niersbach praised upon departure. And the master football players attested to the Campo Bahia in conversations with their colleagues: "This was the best World Cup accommodation of all 32 in Brazil!" So much praise is the true gold for Stephan Gerhard. He himself had not seen one, single live game there. His look back on Campo Bahia.