Is Technology Working for You?

The hospitality industry is certainly an interesting beast. I've been in the industry for almost a year now and I've made a few observations.

It is absolutely huge. There are numbers published regularly talking about record profits, increasing ADRs, and how wonderful everything is. And what I've realized is that these published numbers aren't telling the whole story. These publishers are GREATLY underestimating the industry on a whole. Most articles focus on the United States, or the chain hotels in the US and Canada. But these aren't the only hotels out there. I think the world forgets the small mom and pops in every community in the world. There are millions* of small properties out there that fall through the cracks.

There's also extremely high end boutique properties that get left out of the mainstream. High end fishing lodges on the coast of British Columbia, high end Cat and Heli Skiing lodges in the BC Interior. These lodges are full all the time, they bring HUGE tourism dollars into our local market. I get caught up sometimes in the city life and forget how wonderful BC is. Anyway, I digress, let me get back to my point.

The industry is huge. There are more properties out there than we consider. The big chains hotels, franchised drive-bys, independents, high end boutique niche hotels, and the list goes on. Here's my point: because the industry is so big, it is very difficult to implement a change that affects the entire population of hotels and lodges. The hospitality is a huge lumbering beast, one that doesnt react quickly to change. And change is a constant in today's internet rich society.

I sell software into this industry. That is, I try to. Part of my challenge is that this change can be very scary. Embracing technology is something that I've become accustomed to, but people in the hospitality industry sometimes have trouble with that. It's certainly not a bad thing. It's just a thing.

I found an article the other day that speaks to this point. Check it out here: http://www.hotelmotel.com/hotelmotel/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=436226
The article talks about technology and how to keep it working for you. How to embrace the change and avoid being overwhelmed. Not a bad thing to keep in mind.

I'll leave it here.

*Maybe not millions, but there's a lot.