HT - June 2019

PLUS! • 4 WAYS TO TRANSFORM into an Insights-Driven Enterprise • SOLVING the Off-Premise Paradox • HT-NEXT 2019 Innovation Report

Choice Hotels International, IHG, Hyatt, and The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas make up this year’s Hotel Visionary Award winners.

Pictured (l to r): Lisa LoRusso, Vice President, Revenue Management Systems and Tools, IHG; Tom Evans, CMO, The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas; Jennifer Green, Product Director – Property Solutions, Hyatt; Sireesha Kunduri, Vice President of Engineering for Distribution and Revenue Management, Choice Hotels International

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contents

JUN E 20 1 9 Vo l . 2 3 . 5

exclusive digital CONTENT This month on www.hospitalitytech.com

FEATURES & CASE STUDIES • How Trump Las Vegas Restaurant Transformed Its A/V Experience

• Dunkin’ Sharpens Focus on Digital Initiatives • Playa Hotels & Resorts CEO Discusses How New Tech Is Driving Growth

C O V E R S T O R Y PAG E 10

By Michal Christine Escobar, Senior Editor - Hotels

2019 HOTEL VISIONARIES This year’s Hotel Visionary Award winners — Choice Hotels International, IHG, Hyatt, and The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas — demonstrate how embracing innovation, from artificial intelligence to a hyper-focus on integration, can yield big business benefits.

DEPARTMENTS: 4 EDITOR’S NOTE 5 NEWS 6 VANTAGE POINT 8 EVENTS INSIGHTS

16 POINT OF SALE

• Choice Hotels Offers Owners Data/ Analytics Tech to Improve Revenue, Reduce Costs MURTEC Innovation Report MURTEC 2019 attracted almost 900 technology executives from restaurants and solution providers — an 8.5% increase in the number of operators and an 11% growth in the number of participating companies overall versus last year. Download the report to see what you missed at https://hospitalitytech.com/24thannual-murtec-powering-possible

Solving the Off-Premise Paradox Demands of takeout and delivery present challenges and yield solutions for restaurants to leverage the benefits of omni-channel digital strategies

EXCLUSIV E RESEA RCH

Diner expectations require restaurants to provide customized, data-driven digital experiences

2019 Restaurant Technology Study Digital is no longer a differentiator; it is now the baseline for all brands. In this report, restaurants share where they’ve increased their budgets and priorities to gain a competitive edge.

Download the study today: https:// hospitalitytech.com/2019-restaurant-technology-study-exponentialdigital-drives-quantum-convenience

26 HT-NEXT INNOVATION REPORT

E-N E WS L E TTE R

HT-NEXT 2019: Authentic Innovation

The HT Alert is delivered every Tuesday and Thursday to your inbox, making it the most reliable source for IT news and trends.

Manage your subscriptions at www.hospitalitytech.com

21 SPECIAL REPORT

4 Ways to Transform into an Insights-Driven Enterprise

Executives from top hotel and technology companies gather to collaborate and share success stories, key challenges and solutions for four days of networking in New Orleans W W W.T W I T T E R .C O M / H T M A G A Z I N E

W W W. L I N K E D I N .C O M / I N / H O S P I TA L I T Y T E C H N O LO G Y

W W W. FA C E B O O K .C O M / H O S P I TA L I T Y T E C H N O LO G Y

YO U T U B E .C O M / H O S P I TA L I T Y T E C H M A G

HOSPITALITY TECHNOLOGY (USPS 0016-745, ISSN 1520-491X) is published eight times per year as monthly except combined issues for January/February, July/August, September/October and November/December by EnsembleIQ, Editorial and Advertising Offices: 8550 W. Bryn Mawr Ave., Ste. 200, Chicago, IL 60631; (973) 607-1300. Periodicals postage paid at Chicago, Illinois and additional entries. Subscription rates: $89.00 per year in the United States; $99.00 per year in Canada. All other countries: $109.00. Single copies (pre-paid only): $20 in the U.S.; $22 in Canada; elsewhere, $25; add $5.00 for shipping and handling per order. Copyright © 2019 by EnsembleIQ. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission from the publisher. Reprints, permissions and licensing, please contact Wright’s Media at ensembleiq@wrightsmedia.com or (877) 652-5295. POSTMASTER: Please send address changes to HOSPITALITY TECHNOLOGY, P.O. BOX 1842, LOWELL, MA 01853-1842. PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

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editor’s note Between a Mouse and an Expectation As I write this, I am less than 24 hours away from boarding a plane for the mecca of magical experiences…Disney World.

The not-so-magical part involves the not-quite-four-year-old I will be traveling with, as I envision a not-so-small world of meltdowns. I hear they serve adult beverages at the Dumbo ride now, so there is that.

Perhaps more daunting, is managing the expectations of my husband. He is primed for this to be frictionless. After all, Disney should know us: we’ve told them when we’re coming; what rides we are going on; where and when we are eating; our color preferences (depicted on MagicBands). The mouse must pay if anything goes awry (shakes fist at sky).

He is not an outlier in how consumers view brand relationships. Lisa LoRusso, VP revenue management systems, IHG, a 2019 Hotel Visionary Enterprise Innovator honoree, says, “Consumers feel a greater sense of loyalty to a brand when they’ve played a key role in the creation of their experience.”

As hotels and restaurants empower guests to dictate everything throughout the customer journey, there is greater investment in the relationship. With that comes heightened expectation that requests will be executed exactly as specified.

This is a theme repeated throughout this issue: guests determining how brands deliver services. Visionary winners highlighted in the cover story, address this with chatbot and streaming tech. Restaurants support delivery and takeout options.

I hope the experience awaiting my little family exceeds expectations. This is where the hospitality industry must go — into the business of exceeding expectations, because merely meeting them won’t be enough.

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Steve Brooks Dir., Purchasing & IT, Tumbleweed Restaurants Mike Dickersbach Director of IT Capital HEI Hotels Simon Eng VP of IT, CTF Development Brian Garavuso CIO, Diamond Resorts Intl Nelson Garrido Senior VP Information Technology, Thayer Lodging, Brookfield Hotel Properties Michael Hassel Dir. IT, Momofuko Holdings Ted Hopcroft Vice President of Technology and Professional Services, Americas iT, Marriott

Corey Kline VP IT, Noodles & Company Rocky Lucia Dir. IT, Fireman Hospitality Group Brian Pearson CIO, Stacked R. P. Rama VP Technology, JHM Hotels David Starmer CIO, Sonesta Hotels Joe Tenczar VP, Information & Technology/CIO, Sonny’s BBQ Marcus Wasdin CIO, Atlanta Hawks & State Farm Arena

VICE PRESIDENT/GROUP BRAND DIRECTOR Abigail A. Lorden alorden@ensembleiq.com EDITORIAL EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Dorothy Creamer, dcreamer@ensembleiq.com SENIOR EDITOR, RESTAURANTS Anna Wolfe, awolfe@ensembleiq.com SENIOR EDITOR, HOTELS Michal Christine Escobar, mescobar@ensembleiq.com SALES SENIOR ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE Leah Segarra, lsegarra@ensembleiq.com SENIOR ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE Katherine Ware, kware@ensembleiq.com ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE Noell Dimmig, ndimmig@ensembleiq.com EVENTS EVP, EVENTS & CONFERENCES Ed Several, eseveral@ensembleiq.com DIRECTOR, EVENT PLANNING Pat Benkner, pbenkner@ensembleiq.com DIRECTOR EVENT CONTENT John Hall, jhall@ensembleiq.com AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT DIRECTOR OF AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT Gail Reboletti, greboletti@ensembleiq.com AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT MANAGER Shelly Patton, spatton@ensembleiq.com ONLINE MEDIA DIRECTOR, PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT Jason Ward, jward@ensembleiq.com ONLINE EVENT PRODUCER Whitney Gregson, wgregson@ensembleiq.com PROJECT MANAGEMENT/PRODUCTION/ART VICE PRESIDENT, PRODUCTION Derek Estey, destey@ensembleiq.com CREATIVE DIRECTOR Colette Magliaro, cmagliaro@ensembleiq.com PRODUCTION MANAGER Pat Wisser, pwisser@ensembleiq.com ART DIRECTOR Lauren DiMeo, ldimeo@ensembleiq.com

SUBCRIPTIONS 978-671-0449, ensembleiq@e-circ.net

RESEARCH ADVISORY BOARD Mike Blake CEO, HTNG Natasa Christodoulidou Associate Professor California State University Cihan Cobanoglu, PhD School of Hotel & Restaurant Management University of South Florida Daniel J. Connolly Ph.D. Professor of Business Administration Drake University Russell Dazzio Chairman, R&R Hospitality Mehmet Erdem Assistant Professor, UNLV Hotel College

Lee Holman Lead Retail Analyst, IHL Consulting Jason Lambiris CEO, Apex Digital Jungsun (Sunny) Kim, PhD Assistant Professor, William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration, UNLV Fred LeFranc President & CEO, Results thru Strategy Barry N. Shufeld Interim CIO, ECP-PF Holdings Group Rohit Verma Associate Professor, Cornell University

8550 W. BRYN MAWR AVE. STE. 200 CHICAGO, IL 60631 PHONE: +1 773-992-4450 FAX: +1 773-992-4455

CORPORATE OFFICERS EXECUTIVE CHAIRMAN Alan Glass CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER David Shanker CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER Dan McCarthy CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER Joel Hughes CHIEF INNOVATION OFFICER Tanner Van Dusen CHIEF HUMAN RESOURCES OFFICER Ann Jadown EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, EVENTS & CONFERENCES Ed Several

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news & insights

By Anna Wolfe, Senior Editor - Restaurants

AI Poised to Transform Drive-Thrus Artificial intelligence (AI) is coming soon to a drivethrough near you. McDonald’s and Sonic Drive-In have both announced rollouts of AI-powered solutions for the quick service brands’ respective drivethrus and drive-ins. On the heels of its acquisition of Dynamic Yield, McDonald’s has installed digital menu boards powered by Dynamic Yield’s machine learning at 700 of its U.S. locations. The personalization and decision logic technology varies suggested offers by time of day, weather and trending menu items, and its suggestions will make peak times easier on restaurant operations and crew, said president and CEO, Steve Easterbrook, in an April 30th earnings call with analysts.

McDonald’s also plans to link the technology to its self-ordering kiosks and mobile app.

Last month at the National Restaurant Association Show, Sonic Drive-In gave a sneak peek of the AI-powered voice-ordering technology it will pilot at select locations. Mastercard and Zivelo teamed up to create the AI-powered voice ordering assistant, which will integrate with a dynamic

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menu display. The menu will automatically update and the display will be customized either for a specific customer or for external factors such as weather, time of day, seasonality and location.

“We see facets of our brand, our restaurants, and AI technology converging in a way that makes for a special customer experience,” said Jon Dorch, vice president of integrated customer engagement. “We anticipate AI integration will also provide opportunities to streamline repeat orders, personalize suggestions based on data, and offer rewards that are truly relevant.”

of restaurants say automated services & operations is a top strategic objective for 2019.

SOURCE: Hospitality Technology’s 2019 Restaurant Technology Study

73% Don’t Trust AI Voice Technology Management

Moves

Nearly three-quarters of people (73%) say they are somewhat or very unlikely to trust a tool such as artificial intelligence (AI) voice technology to correctly make simple calls or send emails for them. This data comes from Clutch, a B2B ratings and reviews firm, and Ciklum, a global digital solutions company. Clutch and Ciklum surveyed 501 people in the U.S. who called businesses at least three times in the past six months to understand their comfort level with conversational AI tools.

More than 8 in 10 respondents (81%) want AI voice technology to declare itself as a robot before proceeding with a call. Overall, the survey indicates that people are presently uncomfortable with conversational AI but will likely embrace it as it grows in popularity and accuracy.

• Chris Andrews joins Smoothie King as CIO. • John Davison named President and CEO for Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts.

• Dream Hotel Group appoints Jeff Lee Vice President, Food and Beverage.

• Allegiant taps Paul Berry as Vice President of Hotel Operations.

• Nathan’s Famous names James Walker Senior Vice President, Restaurants.

• Dan Gertsacov joins Focus Brands as Global Chief Marketing Officer.

• Steve Pelton named CEO of The Second Cup. • MOOYAH hires Tony Darden as President, COO. • Heather McCrory named CEO North & Central America for Accor.

• Jim Stevens is tapped as President of Golden Chick.

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vantage point Facing Financial Management Challenges

By Pam Bakker, Controller & Dir. of HR, Laird Management

A cloud-based system saves Laird Management 8+hours each month What was your first job?

A deli clerk at a local grocery store in Evansville, Ind. Who inspires you?

My mom. She was a single parent and I never wanted for anything. She found a way to pay for me and my brothers to do extracurricular activities.

What are your hobbies?

Reading, camping and watching my two kids play sports.

What technologies excite you?

The thought of AI in the accounting space.

What is your favorite vacation spot?

The beach. The sound of the waves is very relaxing.

When you think about the key aspects of running a hospitality business, the heart and soul of the operation is your financial system. Without one, you run the risk of stifling growth due to tedious manual processes or making business decisions based on gut instinct instead of real-time data.

Laird Management owns and operates 32 Burger King restaurants in Arizona with more than 650 employees. Our team celebrates growth and expansion, and we’re excited to take on a new business to franchise, but there was a time when this growth would have been more work than reward due to the financial technology systems we had in place.

It’s no secret that franchisee organizations face a unique set of financial management challenges. We need to consolidate financial data across locations for management and reporting purposes, while still measuring the individual business impact of each entity. Complications don’t stop there. The extensive process of adding new locations means configuring the software with an expanded chart of accounts, new bank accounts, rules for inter-entity transactions, and more.

At one time, our finance team was weighed down by manual processes.

They spent hours each week on tasks like consolidating our “due to” and “due from” transactions across locations. Our monthly close was taking up to 20 days, and it required eight to 10 hours just to produce two basic monthly balance sheets and P&L reports for our investors and management team. In addition, we were con-

stantly on-boarding new employees, which meant the need to input and document financial processes in a way that made it simple for new managers to see accurate, up-to-date numbers and growth data.

This wasn’t sustainable, so we began the search for a scalable financial management solution that would enable growth while delivering accurate reporting for the organization, as well as provide access to financial information for our individual restaurants.

Ultimately, we chose a cloudbased system called Sage Intacct.

We saw improvements almost immediately, not only in our existing operations and reporting, but also in the way our finance and executive team was able to function. It eliminated tedious, manual tasks. As a result, we’ve streamlined our approach, cutting reporting time from 10 hours to just two, while simultaneously expanding the amount of data we can share.

Monthly restaurant-specific (or company-wide) reports can be generated at the press of a button. The system delivers accurate, real-time reports that have improved our communications and status updates.

Our financial management team has more time to analyze results to determine our best next steps for growth.

Our team can analyze spending on trash removal and other contracts to identify potential cost-savings, and make analytic, data-driven decisions on where to focus our efforts. With a streamlined, simplified approach, we can push our team to make strategic decisions. HT

Pam Bakker has been at Laird Management for 13 years, where she serves as both the Controller and the Director of Human Resources. Pam has a BS in Business Management from the University of Phoenix, and an MBA in Human Resource Management from Walden University.

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EV ENT S

insights

By Joe Rembold, Innovation Architect, Delaware North

Omnichannel Moves to Omniscient and Omnipresent Hotel executives at HT-NEXT discuss what the next phase of omnichannel will look like

At HT-NEXT 2019, I had the opportunity to moderate a discussion that focused on how hoteliers can or should be replacing an omnichannel experience with an omniscient and omnipresent experience. The topic suggests a review of the omnichannel experience that guests and travelers encounter – supported by the hoteliers and businesses in hospitality, but that is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

While considering the topic in preparation for this discussion, I found myself contemplating several questions, including: What process is needed to drive hoteliers to look beyond the omnichannel experience; what are the actionable moments in the here and now; and what are the intended outcomes? I hoped to get these questions answered during this discussion.

The conversation was fueled by both theories and examples of execution from stakeholders at G6 Hospitality, Hyatt, Delaware North, and solution provider and sponsor Tech Mahindra. The conversation started with thoughts about the guest experience within the omnichannel. In particular, the discussion touched upon the approach that Google is taking by becoming a one-stop shop for sorting queries for direct bookings to OTAs and what that really meant for the guest experience.

OTAs spend quite a bit of time trying to tie the travel experience together into a tidy package of flight, hotel, car rentals and activities, but Google’s new approach to push booking directly with hotels from the consumer’s search results could fragment that business model. Executives agreed that it is imperative to find the right balance in that ecosystem and that it will become just another way of doing business.

The executives also agreed that more often than not hoteliers generally don’t consider walkups as a component of the omnichannel experience. Jessie Burgess, CIO of G6 Hospitality, noted that a considerable fraction of G6 business in the omnichannel comes from travelers on the road looking for a place to spend the night simply by using roadside signage. Burgess highlighted that Motel 6 has traditionally operated in that model

since the early 1960s, and it remains a part of the brand’s strategic focus.

During this conversation, we also discussed how a guest’s omnichannel experience makes it much more necessary for staff to be omnipresent. Hotel executives commented on the need for the next phase of property management systems to be purpose driven to deliver on a connected ecosystem that would empower staff to be aware of any and all guest requests as well as what has or has not been attended to in a timely fashion. Burgess noted that Motel 6 uses a PMS designed specifically to allow its staff to provide top-notch customer service and exceptional housekeeping. It places a high priority on these two amenities since these two services are typically lacking in the economy sector.

Knowing the Hotel Guest: Omnichannel’s First Order of Business As the discussion progressed, Lawson Kelly, Hyatt Global CTO, outlined the primary application of omnichannel strategies as being able to utilize the technology stack to coordinate and distill decisionmaking data. The challenge with interconnecting data points relies on selecting the right technology as there isn’t a single technology that “checks all the boxes.”

Omnichannel in and of itself is a broad topic and can be interpreted in many different ways.

However, all of the hoteliers seemed to agree that omnichannel strategies can result in a more engaging experience for guests.

The next phase of omnichannel transcends segment types as hotels from economy, to business, to mid-market, or resort will need to utilize omnichannel practices to provide the omniscient and omnipresent tools that both guests and employees desire. HT

Joe Rembold is an Innovation Architect for Delaware North, a global hospitality company.

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Pictured (l to r): Lisa LoRusso, Vice President, Revenue Management Systems and Tools, IHG; Tom Evans, CMO, The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas; Jennifer Green, Product Director – Property Solutions, Hyatt; Sireesha Kunduri, Vice President of Engineering for Distribution and Revenue Management, Choice Hotels International Photographed by Vito Palmisano

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CHOICE HOTELS INTERNATIONAL, IHG, HYATT, AND THE COSMOPOLITAN OF LAS VEGAS MAKE UP THIS YEAR’S HOTEL VISIONARY AWARD WINNERS MICHAL CHRISTINE ESCOBAR, SENIOR EDITOR - HOTELS

ENTERPRISE INNOVATOR

Now in its 15th year, the Hotel Visionary Awards seek to honor hotel companies for outstanding leadership in customer-facing and enterprise innovation. This year’s winners were announced during the 2019 HT-NEXT Awards program, sponsored by Datatrend (www.datatrend.com), in New Orleans on April 10. Honorees proved that hospitality is at the forefront of the new crusade for customized convenience. Both guests and employees continue to seek streamlined and effective methods for communicating and receiving or providing service. This year’s winners demonstrate how embracing innovation, from artificial intelligence to a hyper-focus on integration, can yield big business benefits.The 2019 Visionaries are: Choice Hotels International, IHG, Hyatt and The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas.

Here are their stories...

IHG In 1965, IHG (www.ihg.com) introduced HOLIDEX, the first computerized hotel reservation system.

Over the years, the company customized HOLIDEX to address the changing needs of owners, hotel colleagues and guests. But travelers’ expectations have continued to evolve and today’s guests seek efficiency, flexibility, and a completely new dream, shop and book experience. To give guests what they are looking for, IHG realized it required a new technology platform that would enable its applications to work together seamlessly while also allowing the company to evolve as the market continues to change.

The result is IHG Concerto, the most sophisticated cloudbased technology platform in the industry.

Concerto ensures all systems are discrete and interface with each other through a unified services layer.

IHG’s Global Technology division bundled like functions and eliminated interdependencies. Systems can now work with each other but also stand alone. This enables IHG to upgrade its systems by enhancing existing systems, or switching out systems entirely, without jeopardizing the entire IHG ecosystem.

“The IHG Concerto platform provides flexibility for the future,” noted Lisa LoRusso, IHG Vice President, Revenue Management Systems and Tools. “If we find, or create, a better solution for an existing capability, we can replace that system without impacting the others. Concerto allows us to grow well into the future — for perhaps another 50 years just as HOLIDEX served us.”

As an added bonus, the IHG team introduced a new common user experience. Instead of jumping between applications, users can access capabilities across systems through a common interface.

“Today, Concerto’s focus on improved user efficiency means hotel colleagues can complete many tasks more quickly, allowing them to spend more time with guests,” LoRusso said. “That extra minute or two of focused attention during check in or while managing a reservation can make a lasting, positive impression.”

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COVER STORY

A key solution within Concerto is the next-generation Guest Reservation System (GRS) created in partnership with Amadeus (https://amadeus.com). This system is a powerful global platform for hotels to manage guest interaction that’s intuitive for hotel teams and will help IHG accelerate its vision to revolutionize and personalize the guest experience through technology.

“Because of Amadeus’ experience in the airline industry, they were an ideal partner to build the core Guest Reservations System while we focused on our knowledge of the hospitality industry and further enhancement of our in-house proprietary systems, along with other third party systems,” LoRusso explained.

The GRS solution requires extremely high resiliency, as well as low latency. All inventory and items are in an “active” state with bookings being managed live with automatic failover if needed.

The capabilities of the new GRS will also enable IHG to move towards attribute-based selling like highlighting views and room size, and allow hotels to inventory and sell non-traditional items. As the ecosystems mature, IHG will be able to provide even more ways for guests to further customize their stays.

“In the future, our ability to create personalized offers will help guests feel more satisfied and more connected to IHG and our portfolio of brands,” LoRusso explained. “Research shows consumers feel a greater sense of loyalty to a brand when they’ve played a key role in the creation of their experience.”

During 2018, IHG implemented Concerto at more than 5,600 hotels in more than 100 countries — all while IHG aggressively grew its business year-over-year. In the next few years, IHG’s Concerto will begin to realize its true potential, LoRusso predicts.

“Owners will have a new portal in Concerto to help them manage their business; guests will be able to customize stays and have a new arrivals experience,” she explains. “Hotels will be able to make personalized offers based on new data and insights about our guests, and manage groups and events in a whole new way.”

ENTERPRISE INNOVATOR

CHOICE HOTELS INTERNATIONAL Choice Hotels International (www.choicehotels.com) is one of the world’s largest hotel companies with more than 7,000 franchised hotels in more than 40 countries and territories. Prior to 2018, the company was running on a 27-year-old global reservation system (GRS) — created before the internet was a primary booking channel. While the legacy system performed reliably, Choice needed to

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bring new business capabilities to market faster and decrease the amount of time it took to onboard new OTA, switch, and metasearch partners. In addition, Choice faced the very real prospect that its GRS physical hardware could not keep pace with ever-increasing annual peak season activity.

Choice recognized the need to take bold action.

“Many companies in the travel sector hadn’t updated their GRS infrastructure in decades — well before the advent of e-commerce and mobile,” said Sireesha Kunduri, vice president of engineering for distribution and revenue management. “Legacy systems were showing their age as increased digital consumer demands challenged our systems’ ability to operate safely and efficiently. Ultimately, our systems weren’t designed to handle today’s volume and ever-changing consumer behaviors. We knew we needed to lead this digital evolution and get Choice future ready.”

This left Choice Hotels with a dilemma: Build or buy a new GRS? There had been tales of travel companies trying the “build” option and ultimately failing, causing widescale financial and reputational harm. Choice was undeterred by precedent. Not only was the company confident in its in-house engineering capabilities, there wasn’t a product on the market that met Choice’s requirements — two factors that tipped the scales in favor of developing a new cloud-based GRS platform in-house. The result was choiceEDGE. “Choice Hotels is the first major hotel company to code our own, proprietary GRS and global distribution system,” Kunduri explained. “We succeeded where others failed. While other companies have purchased third-party software off-the-shelf, we knew the best option for our 7,000 franchised hotels was to use our in-house engineers to design a custom solution. After all, no one knows our business better than us.”

Using Amazon Web Services (AWS, https://aws. amazon.com) as its cloud platform provider, Choice developed an entirely new platform based on modern technologies and techniques from the ground up, leveraging technologies available in AWS. This micro-servicebased platform includes sophisticated DevOps facilities for continuous integration and deployment of new software, high-volume message processing, system health and statistics monitoring, tagging and tracking specific service calls.

Choice also teamed up with Amazon’s experts to identify uses for machine learning across its businesses and guide its teams in the development of new machine learning-enabled features, products, and processes. This has allowed Choice to achieve several new capabilities, from providing a more personalized customer experience to identifying systems issues — and resolving those issues without human intervention. “choiceEDGE also allows Choice to meet customers

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2019 HOTEL VISIONARIES

where they are in the voice-enabled digital world,” Kunduri says. “The system feeds this information to shoppers, whether they are looking for a hotel room on their mobile phones, laptop, or Google assistant — or via call centers and travel agents.”

When it finally came time to migrate to the new GRS, Choice’s goal was to ensure zero system downtime. This meant it had to migrate hotels gradually onto the GRS, allowing both systems to run simultaneously, with each system running in sync and updating in real-time. This is in stark contrast to other companies who took a “light switch” approach, which is riskier and can create service interruptions for guests and hotel owners alike. “Our franchisees depend on our systems to fuel their small business,” said Kunduri. “I’m proud to report that not only did Choice fulfill our goal of no downtime, but the project — which is the largest technology endeavor in company history — was also completed on schedule.”

Since the deployment of choiceEDGE, Choice Hotels has seen several major benefits: • choiceEDGE uptime is 99.9% and the shopping and booking response times are twice as fast as legacy systems.

• Unintentional overbooking is down 80 percent, thanks to the system’s ability to push room and rate data to third-party partners faster than ever.

• The time required to onboard partners now takes days instead of weeks or even months.

Beyond what choiceEDGE can do today, it’s the future that excites Kunduri.

“The ability to scale has also allowed us to pursue exciting new growth opportunities that position Choice as a platform company,” said Kunduri. “We’re positioned to meet guests’ needs better than ever before.”

CUSTOMER-FACING INNOVATOR

THE COSMOPOLITAN OF LAS VEGAS The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas (www.cosmopolitanlasvegas. com) prides itself on being one of the largest “boutique” hotels in the world. While it has more than 3,000 rooms, 27 restaurants, 13 retail shops, a sprawling casino floor, three distinct pools, an array of entertainment experiences and more than two million Identity Membership & Rewards loyalty members, its goal is for guests to receive the same attention and personalization on property as they would at a small-scale hotel.

“We also desired to increase guest spend and direct bookings, specifically by converting third-party bookers to future direct bookers,” said Tom Evans, CMO. The resort decided that the best way to achieve these goals was to add a digital touchpoint to create a direct

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relationship with guests. Enter Rose, a sassy chatbot that uses artificial intelligence and a natural language processing-based platform in conjunction with Reply.ai.

Developed by The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas and its digital agency R/GA Chicago (www.rga.com), Rose is available to guests as both an SMS and online chat service powered by more than 1,000 automations as well as long-time guest service and concierge employees. Upon check-in, guests receive Rose’s direct phone number which they can text at any point during their stay. Ease-of-use was of paramount importance to The Cosmopolitan. With a simple text, Rose becomes guests’ personal host and makes it seamless for guests to experience everything the resort has to offer — from getting more towels to discovering the best dessert on property. She can even lead them through immersive art, dining, nightlife and scenic tours or tell jokes.

“Rose creates an emotional, personal connection with guests through her quick-witted personality and vast knowledge of The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas,” said Evans. “It is through her ability to educate guests about all the resort has to offer while guiding them to book activities like restaurant reservations or spa appointments, that we really see her capabilities.”

Upon Rose’s 2017 launch, she was able to answer 80 percent of guest’s questions automatically and has only gotten smarter in the years following. Her accuracy and fun, quick-witted responses are due in large part to her integration with Reply.ai, a technology partner that specializes in personalized, one-on-one engagement at scale through the use of artificial intelligence.

“Following the implementation of AI with Rose, she now has the ability to use conversational data to learn from it over time, ultimately helping enhance the guest experience,” Evans notes.

Additionally, Rose’s NLP can help her process guest services requests, transferring guests to humans as needed. If she detects that a guest has an issue or concern about a room or service, she can immediately call upon a guest service agent or more internal teams for a quick and seamless resolution. However, this transfer to a live human is not hidden from guest view.

“When Rose is unable to answer a guest question, she lets you know she is going to ‘fetch one of her humans’ to help,” Evans explains. “The handoff is explicit from bot to human and from human back to bot.”

Rose is also connected to The Cosmopolitan’s casino loyalty platform, making her the first chatbot to directly serve casino and loyalty customers. This allows her to tell a customer their rewards status, tier level, how many points are needed to reach the next tier, and can offer personalized promotional offers. If Rose is ever “stumped” by a casino-related question, she transfers to a casino service agent who can text back answers to the customer in real time.

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COVER STORY

In the first year of incremental rollout, 15,000 guests texted Rose and more than 70 percent were “highly engaged,” or texted with Rose on more than three separate occasions — far exceeding the goal of 45 percent. The guests who use her also tend to spend quite a bit more while at the resort. Guests who used Rose were 33 percent more satisfied with their stay based on guest feedback and spent an average of 15 percent more while on property.

Since her inception, Rose has evolved from a revenue generating tool to an instrumental part of the guest experience. In 2018, The Cosmopolitan had created a Digital Guest Services Team to ensure the resort had “Rose coverage” almost 24 hours a day, and could meet its 60-second response time goal if a human was needed to assist a guest, Evans notes.

CUSTOMER-FACING INNOVATOR

HYATT When it comes to giving guests what they want, Hyatt (www.hyatt.com) recognized that guests expect to consume content in a hotel room the same way they do at home: via streaming service provider. In fact, when researching streaming versus linear TV content, Hyatt found that U.S. adults spend 42 percent more minutes (approximately two hours) watching OTT content compared to linear content. However, finding an easy-to-use streaming or OTT product that would also provide guests with a consistent guest experience proved to be quite difficult as Hyatt had to take into consideration a number of factors that could impact the guest experience, says Jeff Bzdawka, Senior Vice President of Global Hotel Technology.

“When making the decision around a streaming capability, the top priority was ensuring the technology was able to support the most common types of devices guests carry and providing an array of entertainment choices,” he notes.

“Guests use a variety of items — smartphones, tablets, laptops — and we wanted to ensure we were providing a solution that worked best with their devices. Additionally, the solution needed to be cost effective for owners and operators.”

To ensure it gave guests the perfect solution, Hyatt monitored the streaming space and watched the evolution of a wide variety of solutions, including SONIFI (www. sonifi.com) which first brought its solution to the market in late 2015. However, it wasn’t until 2017 that SONIFI’s STAYCAST solution — powered by Google Chromecast — was announced as Hyatt’s preferred vendor for streaming.

Through this platform, Hyatt provides guests with the ability to stream content from 2,000+ apps to the inroom TV using the World of Hyatt iOS or Android mobile apps as the control. Guests do not need to enter personal information; they simply pair their mobile device to the

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in-room TV through Hyatt’s exclusive integration with the World of Hyatt mobile app.

When deploying any new technology, hotel owners are often worried about how long deployment will take and if the deployment process will affect the hotel’s bottom line. “The deployment process is simple, and we work with our hotels to ensure they meet the necessary infrastructure requirements,” explains Bzdawka. “From there, SONIFI leads the implementation and deployment with the hotels. On average it takes less than 10 minutes per room, and we average about 60 rooms per day. Our exclusive STAYCAST integration with the World of Hyatt mobile app is enabled and tested for each hotel once the hotel is completely installed.”

The solution offered an industry first: Hyatt effectively decoupled linear content from interactive features.

Historically these features have been managed by the same hardware whether that is the TV or the Set-Top-Box (STB). By decoupling, Hyatt not only has greater freedom to deliver the capabilities across a wider variety of hardware (TVs, STBs, etc.) with less chance of impacting the experience for guests, but also reduced linear channel and content provider costs. By leveraging the Chromecast as a set top box, Hyatt properties are able to enjoy additional energy savings as there is less hardware in the room. This innovation results in CapEx savings while delivering on a flexible and expandable platform.

The placement of STAYCAST also serves as an inroom monitoring device to help detect underperforming guest WiFi signals before the guest does. No room visits are required to remotely monitor network health. Viewing a dashboard with aggregated data or using regular reports identifies any issues or isolated weak spots. This monitoring is also helping Hyatt understand minimum bandwidth requirements to ensure a positive guest experience.

“A benefit of STAYCAST is that it experiences internet connectivity in a similar manner to a guest’s mobile device,” Bzdawka explains. “Through STAYCAST monitoring, we are able to see the quality of the WiFi signal and are able to better understand how our network is experienced by guests.”

Since its initial deployment in 2017, Hyatt has seen usage of the STAYCAST streaming solution skyrocket. In 2017, guests averaged five streaming sessions per stay and approximately 353 unique apps were cast onto the in-room television. In 2018, guests were still averaging five streaming sessions per stay, but the number of unique apps cast increased to more than one thousand. Additionally, Hyatt found that more international apps were being cast by hotel guests, with 144 international apps cast in 2018 versus 74 in 2017.

STAYCAST will be available in the majority of Hyatt’s properties by March 31, 2020. Hyatt plans to use the platform to further enhance the in-room entertainment experience. HT

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TECHNOLOGY TRANSFORMING HOTELS®

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POS

By Anna Wolfe, Senior Editor - Restaurants

Demands of takeout and delivery present challenges and yield solutions for restaurants to leverage the benefits of omni-channel digital strategies

Between 2018 and 2023, delivery is projected to grow at more than three times the rate of onpremise sales, with the preponderance going to digital orders, according to L.E.K. Consulting’s report, “Meal on Wheels: The Digital Ordering and Delivery Restaurant Revolution.” From mobile ordering for in-store pickup to placing an order for third-party delivery, the customer experience is more digitally driven than ever. To deliver, both literally and figuratively, restaurants need to optimize technology infrastructure, with consideration for user experience, operations and data usage.

Diners opting for takeout and delivery are seeking convenience and will not tolerate clunky ordering processes. According to The NPD Group’s report, “Delivering Digital Convenience,” restaurant digital orders have grown at a 23% annual rate since 2013 and are predicted to triple by 2020.

A restaurant’s app or website represents 70% of digital orders, and the remaining orders are through third-party apps or other types of apps or websites.

“Digital orders will remain an outsized source of growth for the restaurant industry over the next few years, and operators who desire to grow need to embrace a digital strategy,” said David Portalatin, NPD food industry advisor, in a statement.

Managing an influx of orders from multiple channels can be crippling if the proper technology isn’t in place. As the number of channels through which customers can engage with restaurants continues to grow and evolve, there’s increasing need for omnichannel communication across restaurant systems.

When it comes to third-party delivery, many operators are hindered by legacy platforms and point-to-point integrations.

Direct integration of third-party delivery orders into the POS led to labor savings and order accuracy for Venezia’s NY Style Pizzeria’s (www. venezias.com) five locations in Arizona. Venezia’s signed on with several of the national third-party delivery services two years ago. In the beginning it was difficult because the orders were not integrated into the POS. “We had to constantly watch tablets or email for orders and re-enter them,” explains Domenick Montanile, president. “Every week we were comping orders because of incorrect data entry. When you’re entering the order manually, there’s a chance for human error — sometimes wrong items are entered, address apartment numbers are wrong.”

A partnership with Chowly (www.chowly.com), a third-party delivery order integrator that worked with Speedline (www.speedline.com), Venezia’s POS system, eliminated the need for manual order entry. Montanile notes the labor savings and increased order accuracy the company now enjoys as key benefits.

Pictured: eatsa was an early adopter of self-service kiosks and secure cubbies for order pickup.

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SP ONSORE D

POS TECH SHOWCASE 2019

CONTENT

Mobile Ordering on Any Device With the expansion of mobile technology in hospitality, savvy consumers expect premium service while hospitality venues want to serve more guests without compromising service levels or staff workflows. It’s no secret the smartphone has changed the way we live. It’s also having a profound effect on the way guests order and pay for things like food, drinks and retail items.

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TECHNOLOGY/ SOLUTION TYPE: Advanced mobile ordering on any guest device

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Location-based Mobile Ordering and Delivery

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Device-agnostic for Flexible Guest Interaction

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Integration with InfoGenesis® POS and KDS Tools

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Secure Payments with rGuest® Pay

With a quick QR Code scan, rGuest Buy OnDemand allows guests to place orders from anywhere across the property. rGuest® Buy OnDemand allows guests to place and pay for orders using their own device – phone, tablet or laptop. With a quick QRC scan, it’s easy to order from anywhere across the property. At the pool, in the lounge, on the golf course or in the guest’s room, the technology uses location-based codes, table numbers or room numbers to designate where to deliver guest orders. The high demand for prompt service can be challenging to meet. Fortunately, on-demand purchasing technology is creating new revenue opportunities that simply weren’t possible until today.

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POS 1000 Degrees Pizzeria (www.1000 degreespizza.com) launched its concept in 2014, but quickly adapted its format for third-party delivery. Its first locations were around 2,500 square feet in highly visible A-list areas. That was before the rise of third-party delivery. Forseeing the trend to order delivery and eat at home, the company downsized its floorplan.

“As soon as these [third-party delivery] apps began to come up everywhere, we knew we’d be relying on delivery in the future,” explains John Feltes, director of franchise operations. “We brought locations down to approximately 1,600-1,800 square feet to reduce overhead. We could go into small shopping centers. With those savings, we could take that cut of 25-30% (for third-party delivery fees).”

The New Jersey-based franchisor operates 44 locations and works with 25+ delivery services.

Since its inception, 1000 Degrees has used Revel Systems (https://revelsystems.com) integrated online ordering. Revel offers a cloud-based point of sale (POS) that has an API that directly integrates with delivery platforms or can be indirectly integrated. For some of its locations, third-party delivery now accounts for up to 40% of sales, Feltes explains.

Third-party delivery has presented quality control concerns for Kevin Melott with Reid Dorsett’s Chick-fil-A franchise (https://www.chick-fil-a.com) in Bloomington, Minn. Dorsett found a way for his Chick-fil-A to retain control of its lunch catering orders while driving sales with Foodsby (www.foodsby.com). The platform allows office professionals in participating office buildings to place orders online or from the Foodsby mobile app with local restaurants and get it delivered for $1.99. Orders are managed and aggregated via Foodsby.com and the restaurant makes and delivers all of the meals at once. To retrieve the orders, the catering manager logs into the Foodsby website, prints the order which removes them from the queue. Each building receiving an order has a different symbol to mark the orders. Orders are loaded onto and moved into the building on a kiosk cart. Customers are notified when the order is delivered. Orders have to be placed by a specified time for same-day lunch delivery, and restaurant partners can select specific

days that they would like to be featured on the app. Dorsett’s Chick-fil-A offers a limited menu; it’s a chance for the catering department to get out Chick-fil-A’s “hero” products.

The four-year partnership has offered a level of control that other platforms don’t. “We know exactly the time the order comes in and we’re able to set the parameters,” Melott says. That control also extends to concerns regarding data safety and security. With data breaches on the rise, Melott made the conscious decision not to integrate into the POS. “How do you keep your house from being robbed? You close the windows and lock the door,” says Melott.

POS: Point of Self-Service The next generation of takeout will be greatly influenced by the increasing adoption of automated service options. By 2020, 85% of all guest transactions will be managed without interaction with a human, according to research from Oracle (www. oracle.com) Food and Beverage’s “What Matters Most to Restaurant Guests.” eatsa (www.eatsa.com), the QSR turned tech company, was an early adopter with self-service ordering and pickup solutions when it debuted in San Francisco in 2015. Customers place orders solely via a mobile app or via self-ordering kiosks and pick up food from personalized cubbies.

Tim Young, CTO and cofounder of eatsa, believes self-service transcends generations as long

Pictured: (Top) Anticipating a growing demand for delivery, 1000 Degrees downsized its footprint so that franchises can reduce overhead and afford third-party delivery fees. (Bottom) Reid Dorsett’s Chick-fil-A franchise uses Foodsby’s platform to drive lunch orders in participating office buildings.

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CLAIM YOUR EXECUTIVE PASS

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POS as it delivers on ease of use and personalization.

“The more personal you can make it, the better customers feel about the experience and the more they want to re-engage,” he says.

Little Caesars (https://littlecaesars.com) is “continually researching to understand what customers want, both now and in the future,” David Scrivano, president and CEO said in a company statement. Last year, the company rolled out Pizza Portal, a heated, self-service mobile order pick-up station that was co-developed with Apex Supply Chain Technologies (https://www.apexsupplychain.com). The company’s solution combines the convenience of mobile ordering and prepayment with heated self-service pickup.

Customers can order favorite menu items or create their own pizza via the “custom pizza builder” on the Little Caesars mobile app, which notifies customers when the order is ready. When customers arrive they can skip the line and go directly to the Pizza Portal pickup and input a 3-digit pin or scan a QR code to open the secured compartment and pick up their order.

“We’re using our Pizza Portal pickup and mobile app to expand our offerings, as well as evolve our business model in an increasingly diverse and digital marketplace,” said Scrivano.

Some brands that have embraced third-party delivery and mobile pickup “are struggling with operations and customer flow,” says Young. “The orders pile up. Even if there’s a pickup zone, guests don’t know if their order is there and have to search through other bags.”

When it comes to order pickup, “we like to create a bit of magic in that moment,” Young says. eatsa’s two locations feature self-service pickup cubbies. It’s an enclosed spotlight system that displays the guest’s name and order number, “which makes the standard fixture come to life,” Young says. It also keeps the order warm and prohibits customers from picking up the wrong order.

Data that Delivers As customers are increasingly accustomed to using digital methods to order, there exists a greater opportunity to leverage systems to mine for data.

“It is all about engaging with them the way they want to engage, and when you do engage

with them, you can capture a digital footprint of them,” says Young.

QSR giant McDonald’s has had great success with third-party delivery worldwide and is working towards obtaining more data. By the end of the year, it plans to integrate delivery into its global mobile app, giving customers two ways to order delivery. In a recent earnings call with analysts, CEO Steve Easterbrook said the move will give McDonald’s ownership of its customer data.

“Whilst protecting all necessary privacy concerns, clearly we will be able to gather more customer data to begin to build up a better understanding of customers behaviors,” Easterbrook says.

Venezia, which sees third-party delivery with integrated ordering as must-haves, recently built its own mobile app for pickup and delivery orders and plans to drive more direct orders through targeted offers. An integrated loyalty program is in the works, Montanile adds.

By the end of the year, 1000 Degrees aims to have 15-20% of its orders coming through its personal app for delivery, in-store pickup and dine in.

Already, Feltes is seeing customers using the app in-store, “like a handheld kiosk.” eatsa has built a digital system that is tightly connected with customer data and the operational data in the back of house — it knows everything that’s going on in the business, according to Young.

“It’s more lucrative to provide digital channels where customers want to interact with you,” Young says. “Looking at data, we know people’s visit patterns, and we’ve learned a lot on how to tweak the experience to drive the best experience to make them long for that brand.” HT

Pictured: Venezia’s is among the restaurants taking a two-pronged approach to delivery. It sees third-party delivery and direct order integration as must-haves, and the pizzeria has its own mobile app for delivery and carry-out orders.

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SPECIAL REPORT

Lisa Terry, Contributing Editor

Overcoming the cultural bias of analytics to empower businesses with data

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n the past, hospitality IT helped executives understand what had already taken place at their business. Today, modern platforms, cloud-based services and tools such as APIs make it possible for operators to enjoy much faster access not just to data, but also real-time insights across the enterprise, enabling them to be much more nimble and responsive to rapidly changing guest demands. Forrester Research Inc. (https:// go.forrester.com) calls these types of companies “insight-driven businesses,” noting that smart en-

terprises that use “data, analytics and software in closed, continuously optimized loops to differentiate and compete are on pace to make $1.8 trillion annually by 2021.”

Operators face an array of challenges in transforming organizations into insights-driven businesses. They include amassing and cleansing all of the needed data as well as overcoming disjointed technology stacks. Hospitality IT leaders say the technical hurdles are more easily surmounted than the cultural ones. After all, hospitality is at its core

Pictured: Montage Hotels imports data from Oracle Simphony Cloud, Opera, its CRM and credit card data into its existing data warehouse to better understand guest spend behavior.

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a people business, and the idea of relying heavily on math to run it strikes many as cold and impersonal.

Helping the workforce view data-driven insights as empowering and not threatening will allow staff members overcome their cultural biases. Ensuring that everyone across the enterprise, from ownership to frontline staff, embraces this shift is key to making this critical transition.

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Infuse Data into the Culture Hospitality staff often pride themselves on their ability to read customers and adjust accordingly, but this is difficult to do at scale. Therefore, it’s important to position datadriven insights as enhancing, rather than displacing, those skills.

Leon USA (https://leon.co) faced two cultural hurdles at once: adapting its UK and Europeforged “naturally fast food” brand to U.S. tastes and infusing more sophisticated data-driven insights into its operations. Leon launched L Street in Washington D.C., starting out with 95% of its European menu and then leveraging Fourth’s (www. fourth.com) latest analytics capabilities to tweak and adjust.

By overlaying net promoter and value for the money scores as well as things like current weather on top of the existing menu, daypart and market basket metrics, “We now find the ability to analyze data and give it context versus just pulling numbers out of the system,” says Glenn Edwards, managing director of Leon USA. That enables a manager, for example, to quickly adapt to new customer behavior patterns by adjusting the next day’s staffing or stock orders.

To get buy-in, the company positions data as a helpful tool and managers as data owners.

Instead of positioning the use of this data as a means to higher company profits, greater efficiency or working staff members harder, Edwards says the company positions the data as an important way to make team members’ lives easier and the customer experience better. This not only leads to greater staff member buy-in but also harmonizes with the company’s values and culture. Additionally, graphical representations of the data makes it easy for workers to absorb new information at a glance.

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Encourage Workers with Incentives and Quick Wins Positive messaging has also been key for New England Authentic Eats, operator of Papa Gino’s Pizzeria (www.papaginos.com) restaurants and D’Angelo Grilled Sandwiches (www. dangelos.com). After a November 2018 bankruptcy and the abrupt closing of nearly 100 stores, the

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new ownership needed not just a new strategy and tools, but also to win back the confidence of its team members.

To win back customers, the new management invested in a digital customer engagement platform from Mobivity (www.mobivity.com) to better understand what drives guest behavior and to develop data-driven, customized campaigns to help drive frequency, spend and ultimately growth.

They gained the buy-in of long-term, widely trusted brand owners in each chain to evangelize about the program to staff members, explaining that there would be cash rewards and prizes for team members who helped to market the program.

“The immediacy of the text messaging program was very compelling,” says Deena McKinley, acting CMO. “We had an all-hands meeting where we talked about it with area managers in the field to get them excited. We’re looking at people that hadn’t seen bonuses and incentives in a long time before the ownership change, and to come out of the gate and offer incentives and offer prizing and dollar cash rewards for doing these things really motivated people, and it got them excited about the future.”

The results speak for themselves. Team members (in conjunction with other marketing messaging) prompted guests to sign up for the loyalty program and share their mobile phone numbers.

The subsequent SMS messages garnered nearly 14x the redemption rate of the same offer sent via email. In three months, the campaign drove more than 25k transactions and $125k in attributable revenue.

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Coax Independent Owners to Invest in Insights Before courting the workforce to trust data-driven insights, brands must often first convince franchisees and independent owners to make an investment in technology that may not have immediate — or simple to prove — ROI. Eight-property luxury and ultra-luxury brand Montage Hotels (www.montagehotels.com), for example, does not have the deep pockets of its larger competitors. Gustaf Burman, SVP of IT, was able to use that to its advantage when proposing a strategy to layer new guest behavior analytics capabilities on top of the financial analytics infrastructure it had already established.

“Sometimes it benefits us to be second,” Burman says. “The industry is quite small, and Montage property owners who also work with other luxury brands already using analytics technology can talk about the benefits they have experienced.”

Those new capabilities will import data flows from its Oracle (ww.oracle.com) Simphony Cloud, OPERA, a new CRM system and credit card data

Pictured: Leon USA partnered with Fourth to analyze data and give it context before sharing it with managers. This allows staff to quickly adapt to new customer behavior patterns by altering the next day’s staffing or stock orders.

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into the company’s existing data warehouse to build data cubes. These cubes will help Montage better understand guest spend behavior across lodging, food, ancillary services such as golf and spa, and its club and branded residences.

With so many stakeholders needing to view that data differently — not to mention buy-in to the use of data-driven insights — Montage IT spent lots of time learning and understanding their specific needs and designing dashboards that convey those insights clearly and graphically.

“I think part of it is … how do you easily, securely and without too many hoops to jump through, give real-time access to this data,” Burman says.

One of the company’s plans is to eventually use some type of digital layer to deliver relevant insights directly to mobile devices.

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Adopt Open, Educational and Collaborative Practices Sharing the insights each stakeholder needs to execute his or her piece of the business is invaluable. Helping staff see the big picture can also motivate changes in behavior and attitude.

Austin, Texas-based Kerbey Lane Café (www. kerbeylanecafe.com) adopted an open, educa-

tional approach about three years ago when the company began practicing open book management. Today, any worker who is interested can learn about the P&L and participate in weekly huddles where each location forecasts its costs and sales. Those in leadership positions, from shift leaders on up, collaborate weekly on data and analytics compiled in its Compeat (www.

Compeat.com) Intelligence (RADAR) restaurant management software.

As growth has slowed in the crowded Austin marketplace, the company has shifted from a cost-saving to a sales focus. Team members not only collect guest feedback as part of a campaign to deepen understanding of consumer behavior and preferences, but also to learn about the resulting data alongside financial results to understand goals in context. Scoreboards posted in staff areas reinforce that message.

“The communication piece is vital in making sure that everyone in the company knows what to focus on and that they’re all talking together,” says Michael Jackson, VP of IT. “When you’re looking at that metric, people have stories behind it and then we start connecting the two together. Any assumption goes away, and you make very effective decisions.” HT

Pictured: New England Authentic Eats, operator of D’Angelo Grilled Sandwiches, partnered with Mobivity to better understand what drives guest behavior and then influence frequency and growth.

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HT-NEXT 2019 INNOVATION REPORT

AUTHENTIC INNOVATION EXECUTIVES FROM TOP HOTEL AND TECHNOLOGY COMPANIES GATHER TO COLLABORATE AND SHARE SUCCESS STORIES, KEY CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS FOR FOUR DAYS OF NETWORKING IN NEW ORLEANS Michal Christine Escobar, Senior Editor - Hotels

For the third year, Hospitality Technology magazine and HTNG collaborated to host HT-NEXT, which took place April 8-11 at the Hilton Riverside Hotel in New Orleans. With the theme, “Authentic Innovation,” attendees were challenged to flex their creative muscles by opening keynote speaker Lee Kitchen, the former creativity and innovation catalyst for Disney’s in-house creative problem solving agency Creative Inc. Kitchen got attendees engaged immediately through a series of group exercises where individuals had to role play a honeybee love therapist, an invisible wallpaper salesman and a skydiving elephant instructor. With this exercise, he explained that to be creative problem solvers, one must be open-minded and willing to have fun.

He also told attendees that one of the biggest mistakes companies make is prescribing “creativity” to a certain group of people or sometimes just one person. This practice limits the talent pool and can prevent employers from finding a truly creative solution to a problem.

“Don’t invite only the ‘experts’ into the room for brainstorming,” Kitchen explained. “Always bring someone new in that ‘doesn’t belong.’ Anyone can be creative!”

Later in the day, Kitchen returned to lead a highenergy, interactive innovation workshop. Kitchen told attendees to stop the practice of shouting out words to a single person at the front of the room.

Why? First, the person writing down the words often filters them through his own personal judgement and changes the wording or meaning of the idea.

Second, the practice of shouting the words caters to extroverts and prevents introverts from being heard, and third, the paper with all the great ideas on it often gets lost after the brainstorming session never to be seen again.

A

B A. Former Disney executive Lee Kitchen energized the crowd with his day one opening keynote, followed by an innovation workshop; B. Operators and vendors had the chance to network in a variety of ways during the event, including cocktail receptions.

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HBH88

FOUR TIMES THE CHARGE. Introducing the Bluetooth enabled HBH88 bedside Single Day Alarm clock. With dual AC outlets and two high-powered USB ports, guests can charge up to four devices at once. The Single Day Alarm is easy-to-set up and prevents unwanted alarms from previous guests.

The HBH88 also features a durable braided power cable with a right angle plug. Now treat your guests to a fully charged stay!

For more information, contact Chris Brunt at hotelorders@hoteltech.com, 888-74HOTEL, ext. 370 www.hoteltechnologies.com

DUAL

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Š Hotel Technologies, LLC. iHome is a registered trademark of SDI Technologies, Inc. iPhone and Apple Watch are trademarks of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries. All other marks are trademarks of their respective owners.

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HT-NEXT 2019 INNOVATION REPORT

D

C

C. HT magazine presented the Hotel Visionary Awards live at HT-NEXT! D. Steve Lee of Aprilli – one of three innovation lab speakers – discussed the possibility of self-driving hotel guestrooms in the near future.

Kitchen also advised attendees to get rid of one-hour brainstorming sessions.

“Creativity needs time,” Kitchen explained. Give it as much time as it needs.”

The day also included lightning-paced minisessions highlighting exciting advancements and innovation in the hospitality sector. Topics included: Autonomous Driving Technology and the Future of Hospitality presented by Steve Lee, principal, Aprilli; The Next Generation of Facial Recognition & Authentic Service presented by Yale Goldberg, vice president of Cali Group; and Innovation Starts with the Traveler presented by Sara Pavan, Head of Innovation Partnerships, Amadeus.

Lee described a future where self-driving hotel rooms or autonomous travel suites, complete with bed, bath, television, WiFi and kitchenette would pick up guests at their homes and drive them to destinations anywhere from six to 12 hours away.

During the drive, guests could sleep, eat, work or use the in-room entertainment. They could even have food delivered via drone. Once arriving at their destination, these travel suites would dock at a building — turning into a more traditional hotel room — and provide guests with access to hotel amenities such as spas, restaurants, pools, fitness centers and more. While this technology will be heavily dependent on infrastructure improvements, Lee believes we could see this type of technology become widely available as early as 2030.

Goldberg shared perspective on the potential of facial recognition as well as examples of success with the technology — after strategic adjustments — in the restaurant industry at Cali Group’s CaliBurger locations. After implementing kiosks utilizing facial recognition, the restaurant found that the

technology worked “too well” and could pick up a guest’s face as they walked by on their way to the bathroom — leading guests to think the technology was “creepy.” After scaling back the technology, diners were more amenable to it, and Cali Group expects that facial recognition technology will soon become ubiquitous not only as a means of identification but also for payment technology.

“Facial recognition technology could eliminate the need for loyalty cards, credit cards, even wallets,” Goldberg explained. “But who will step up to create a universal authentication platform? Whoever does will have the same status as Google for internet search and Uber for ride-sharing.”

The day wrapped with a series of breakout sessions and executive roundtables. Breakouts covered topics such as the efficacy and evolution of staff alert technology as well as a deep dive into Hospitality Technology’s 2019 Lodging Technology Study.

During the staff alert technology session, hotel executives from White Lodging Services Corp., Sonesta Hotels and Marriott Vacations Worldwide discussed some of the challenges hotels are facing, including false alarms. Some staff members are wearing the buttons in places that allow them to be pushed as they work. Other staff members heard from union representatives that they should regularly push the buttons to ensure they are working correctly, even if there was no emergency. Other challenges include ensuring staff members regularly check the batteries on the panic buttons for sufficient charge and the difference in cost and location accuracy among staff alert solutions.

Meanwhile, operator-exclusive roundtables allowed hotel executives to discuss in detail topics such as innovating for the enterprise, innovating for

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HT-NEXT 2019 INNOVATION REPORT

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E. Attendees had the opportunity to hear hoteliers discuss tech trends and rollouts F. HTNG workgroup members were able to meet in person to collaborate on guidelines, standards or outputs.

the guest and the pressure hotels are feeling to offer technology in guestrooms that mimic the smart home experience.

Day two started off with Delta Airlines’ Gregory Forbes, director of above wing operations, describing how his company is transforming the airport experience by eliminating friction points so employees can focus on high-quality guest interactions.

According to Forbes, this digital transformation was not just necessary for an improved guest experience but also to help the airline operate efficiently. In a true case of “necessity is the mother of invention,” the company realized that the number of air travelers is expected to double in the next few years, but the airline had already reached the limit of what its agents could do. One way the company is solving for this is by streamlining guest check-ins and ID checks with facial recognition.

Following Delta’s presentation were a series of concurrent sessions that included a variety of panel discussions on topics such as how to improve loyalty among guests, the facts and myths surrounding hotel networks and cellular infrastructure updates including 5G and CBRS technology, how to get buy-in from franchisees when it comes to implementing innovative technologies, as well as the evolution of guest reservation technologies.

Meanwhile, HTNG workgroups took place throughout the day and allowed hoteliers and vendors to collaborate on guidelines, standards or outputs that hoteliers can put to practical use.

The 2019 workgroup topics included: IoT Security and Protocols, Frictionless Check-in from Airport to Hotels, Fiber to the Room and Frictionless Check-in Global Process, Staff Alert Technology, Hospitality

Payments Ecosystem, and Preparing for 5G. After a networking lunch, attendees returned to the general session room to hear Augustine Fou, Independent Cybersecurity & Ad Fraud Researcher, Marketing Science Consulting Group Inc., discuss the impact digital ad fraud is having on hotel marketing strategies. He defined digital ad fraud as ad impressions caused by bots and not by humans.

According to Fou, criminals will set up fake websites that only host ads and have no actual content on them, will purchase fake traffic — bots clicking on their website — and then will sell their websites to companies as legitimate sources for ad views.

“Unlike physical billboards that humans must actually drive past in the real world,” Fou explained, “there is a limitless quantity of digital ads that can be created on fake sites that a human will never visit.”

Fou gave the example of JP Morgan Chase which publicized its contact with ad fraud in a March 29, 2017, New York Times article. Chase stated that it originally had advertisements appearing on 400,000 websites per month. However, only 12,000 or 3% of the websites were leading to activity beyond an impression. After Chase limited its display ads to 5,000 websites it found that its performance metrics were exactly the same.

How does digital ad fraud affect hotel operators? Fou explained that it not only steals money from the operators — if bots and not humans are seeing/clicking on the ads then hotels are not getting bookings/revenue from their ad spend — it also distorts data/analytics reports so hotel executives have no idea who has actually seen an ad.

The day closed with the HT-NEXT Awards Program. The two-part program, comprised of HTNG’s

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HT-NEXT 2019 INNOVATION REPORT

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G

G. Delta Airlines executive Gregory Forbes discussed how his company is streamlining guest check-ins and ID checks with facial recognition H. Cybersecurity & Ad Fraud Researcher Augustine Fou helped attendees better understand digital ad fraud and how they are victimized by it.

TechOvation awards and HT’s Hotel Visionary Awards, sponsored by Datatrend Technologies (https://datatrend.com), kicked off with live presentations of the 2019 TechOvation nominees. After 10 companies each presented its new technologies for four minutes, judges ultimately chose GuestMagic.

AI by InnSpire as this year’s winner. GuestMagic.

AI is an online AI-driven platform for hoteliers that uses machine learning to anticipate guests next steps and to deliver the right service at the right time. It is device agnostic from smartphone to tablet, to TV, to voice, and beyond. Using the digital guest journey as a footprint to enhance every technical touch-point in the guest’s path, the result is a unique guest experience.

During the awards ceremony, HT also announced the winners of its 2019 Hotel Visionary Awards. In the Enterprise Innovator category, Choice Hotels was honored for its in-house development of a guest reservation system, and IHG won for its new technology platform IHG Concerto. In the Customer-Facing Innovator category, Hyatt received top honors for its collaboration to offer guests a consistent, uncomplicated path for streaming their content in the hotel guestroom, and The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas was recognized for the debut of Rose, its quirky chatbot, which not only improved customer satisfaction by 33% but also spent an average of 15% more while on property.

A highlight of the final day of the event was a power-packed IT leadership panel that brought together four executives representing a cross-section of hospitality: Dan Kornick, CIO, Loews Hotels; Page Petry, Chief IT Officer, Americas, Marriott International; Marco Trecroce, SVP & Chief Information Officer, Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts; and

Marcus Wasdin, CIO, Atlanta Hawks & State Farm Arena. During the discussion, the four executives defined their IT strategies, discussed their greatest challenges and gave real-world examples of infrastructure rollouts and more.

According to Petry, one of the greatest disruptors Marriott has had to deal with is finishing a large-scale acquisition. While it can be difficult, she also said it offers “opportunities to clean things up and bring in new technology. It also helps us to look at our tech platforms differently and gives us the opportunity to move platforms forward. Overall the disruption can have positive effects.”

Wasdin meanwhile discussed the massive infrastructure renovation he was put in charge of at the Atlanta Hawks & State Farm Arena. During the renovation, three million pounds of concrete and one million pounds of roofing were ripped out and shifted around which resulted in the arena replacing most — if not all — of its technology infrastructure including WiFi, Cellular DAS, POS, Mobile, and more. It took 18 months with $1 million worth of work happening every day during the off-season.

When it came to reinstalling the WiFi infrastructure, Wasdin decided to partner with Comcast, paying a subscription fee for Comcast employees to monitor and fix any issues associated with the WiFi, freeing his own staff from having to spend time on network issues.

Kornick has followed a similar plan of action when it comes to partnering with technology vendors. “I want my guys to focus on what they do best: driving growth. So we rely on our tech partners to do what they do best, managing their solutions.

Opera can run its solution for me better than I can and do it more securely.” HT

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