EHL's "Future of Hospitality" contest participants came up with many thought-provoking ideas. Our panel of experts had great difficulty in selecting only one concept to use as inspiration for the next video in our "Future of Hospitality" series.
In the end, two ideas emerged as best answering the current challenges faced by the hospitality industry: The Nature Hotel Room in a Megalopolis concept (by Melchior Knellwolf) and the Transforming bedroom concept (by Herve Duprat).
YU VIRTUAL combines elements form both of these concepts. The video illustrates ways technology and ultra-personalization could be used to enhance guest experience and well-being.
What inspired their ideas?
Melchior Knellwolf found the inspiration for his concept in both his awareness of the growing significance of technological developments in our lives, and within his own personal development
My first step was to take my time and slow down my rhythm of life. We live in a chaotic world, with stimulating and stressful jobs.
He believe his efforts paid off in terms of performance, creative thinking and the ability to achieve inner peace from tense situations. And, since – as he puts it, “being closer to yourself means being closer to nature”, Melchior also realized how important a natural environment was in order to reach a peaceful and relaxed state. “So”, he continued,“by understanding the importance of both nature and technology, I thought that using "hiding technology" to produce a natural environment was an innovative move”.
Herve Duprat explains his reasoning behing his vision of a 100% modular hotel room:
Our planet is more and more populated, and cities will become more crowded, making space scarce and the need for multifunctional rooms evident. Smaller spaces will need to be maximized to their fullest, and furniture will need to adapt.
Herve continues,“in handling this constraint, technology will help create a better environment and make it possible to still enjoy the luxury of space and the convenience of modern life style, while coping with lesser space, yet offering maximum comfort.”
What other factors will impact the future of the hospitality industry?
Our two innovators highlighted customer satisfaction as one of the industry’s focal points, and considered challenges posed by mixing human elements with technology-driven solutions.
In Melchior Knellwolf's words:
hospitality means welcoming people, and welcoming people is and can only be properly done by humans. In a world that is going faster than we are, where technology dictates the future, we must never forget that our job is first to be as human as possible. So let’s not forget to take care of ourselves, and take care of our customers in a very open-minded, open-hearted and human way.
Herve Duprat sees future software development playing an important role in guest experience.
More Apps, will pop up to enhance customers' experience and satisfaction. With more personal data being collected throughout our lives and made easily available for commercial uses, service providers will increasingly rely on this information to answer guest needs more efficiently. Human touch will still be important, though in a more consumable and focused manner.
Finally, another "Future of Hospitality" idea sparked a lot of interest and engagement from our audience: the Revolutionizing All-Inclusive Travel concept imagined by Alexander Robert Groutides. We felt it would only be fair to also reward it with a special "Jury Prize" in this friendly competition.
The concept is based on the idea that an essential factor contributing to our industry’s future will be “the ability to re-invent how travel is sold and how the traveler is served, to provide tailored experiences to meet customer’s expectations and achieve their satisfaction, while contributing to local engagement, and thus forging an enhanced experience overall.”
EHL highly values the contribution of all participants in its Future of Hospitality project. We recognize the value of their ideas, which we hope will also encourage future hospitality professionals to innovate, think outside the box, and drive the future global hospitality industry.
