-
 Benchmark Hospitality Acquires New Properties
at Record Pace with Support from Ramesys
June 2002 - Benchmark Hospitality moves quickly when it comes to acquiring new properties. They are able to be successful at this because they can react quickly and confidently. Their formula for success includes an IT partner that is able to keep up with their pace, no matter how little advance notice is given.

Benchmark (www.benchmarkhospitality.com) operates luxury resorts, hotels, spas, golf clubs and conference centers. With 25 properties across the United States, Canada and Japan, Benchmark has taken the lead among its peers with properties that are designed, managed and marketed to meet the specific needs of meeting planners. 

Benchmark has considerably expanded their corporate profile over the last year, and in the last few months alone have added several new upscale resort conference center properties. These properties include: 

  • The Chattanoogan, a 202 room conference center in Chattanooga, Tennessee
  • Turtle Bay Resort, a 500 room luxury conference resort in Oahu, Hawaii
  • Glade Springs Resort, a 154 room property nestled in West Virginia�s Allegheny Mountains
  • Virginia Crossings, a 183 room conference facility in Richmond, Virginia
  • The soon-to-be-opened Stonewall Jackson Resort, a 196 room premier state park in Roanoke, West Virginia. 
"Over the past year, we have really been on a roll with new property acquisitions. Benchmark is working very hard to broaden our horizons with new properties and product offerings," said Rodney Thiel, Vice President of Information Technology for Benchmark Hospitality.

Many of the properties added to the Benchmark portfolio have been new constructions. The remainder have been conversion projects, converting the property from their existing management group to the Benchmark group. In many cases, the time frame for 


Turtle Bay Resort
57-091 Kamehameha Highway 
Kahuku, Oahu, Hawaii
conversion was very short and in some instances only a few days from the time the contract was signed. As many of the properties were using proprietary property management solutions, the conversion of IT was one of Benchmark�s biggest concerns. 

Benchmark selected the Maestro Property Management Solution from Ramesys (www.us.ramesys.com) in 1998 and has been partnering with them to roll out this solution as their corporate standard since. According to Thiel, "We had to have an IT partner that we were confidant would be able to keep up with our rapid pace, installing and training employees on the system with very short notice.� 

Ramesys Hospitality, a seasoned hospitality solutions vendor with a strong reputation for implementation expertise and system delivery, was up for the challenge. Ramesys staff diligently work around the clock to facilitate all aspects of the installations including system set-up, interface installation, staff training, data conversion and bringing the property live. All necessary tasks are completed on budget and on time. 
 

In early 2002, Benchmark informed Ramesys that they had acquired the Virginia Crossings property. Ramesys was notified that the property would be leaving their current management company in ten days. Ramesys trainers promptly arrived at Virginia Crossings, and within three weeks, Maestro was completely managing the property and all employees had been trained on the system.

In addition to the change in the size of their portfolio, Benchmark has also experienced changes in a variety 


Virginia Crossings Resort
1000 Virginia Center Parkway
Glen Allen, Virginia
of business trends that include the regionalization of their marketplace, decreases in lead-time for booking and increases in Internet booking. They needed their IT solutions to support these trends.

With Maestro's integrated yield management tool already in place and the web reservations module installed, Benchmark needed a tool to help them know who their guests were and to be able to market to them more effectively in the form of direct mail campaigns, rewards programs and company incentives. To support their partnership, the decision was made by Ramesys to map their Business Intelligence Tool, MPower, directly against the Maestro database. 

MPower is used extensively in the hospitality industry as a head office data polling, data warehousing, and analytical tool. Mapped against the Maestro database, Benchmark is currently installing this powerful information and marketing tool at several of its properties to help them better understand the changes in their business demands.

According to Thiel, �We depend on Ramesys as our technology partner to provide solutions that reflect the ongoing needs of our organization. We feel they have done this successfully for us with the addition of their MPower Data Management Tool and their Web Reservations Module.�

He added, �We began our relationship with Ramesys in 1998 as a result of their outstanding product offering and implementation expertise in the industry. Our partnership has continued to grow and reflects the changes that we are experiencing as a company and in the industry as a whole. We have every confidence in Ramesys and our partnership, and feel that our business requirements will be well met in the future with Ramesys' understanding of our needs, service expertise and product depth."

About Ramesys

Ramesys is one of the world�s leading suppliers of IT enterprise solutions focused on hotels and hotel chains of all size and type. Particularly strong in hotel chain rollouts,  Ramesys is also dominant in the independent hotel sector where they support around 800 properties nationwide.

Solutions Overview

CORPORATE/ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS
1)  MPower Data Warehouse: MPower operates by creating a data warehouse that monitors reservation, guest and financial activity. Customized reports, including forecasting, financial and guest patterns, are then produced. MPower delivers site level data, in addition to consolidating information on hotel chains. It crosses the multi-PMS boundary with the ability to work with any PMS.
2)  Chain Management Solution: CMS includes Central Reservations (CRes), Front Desk (PMS) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) modules. It gives a hotel group the capability of booking from one central inventory into all properties. It centralizes guest history, enabling properties to run marketing campaigns and mailings against one single database. This integrated solution enables the last room to be sold as accurately and effectively as the first.

PROPERTY MANAGEMENT SOLUTIONS
1)  Maestro: Maestro is a full featured, Windows based, ODBC compliant PMS, with integrated hospitality modules suited for full service properties. Modules include Front Office, Sales and Catering, Web Reservations, Work Order and Club and Spa Management.
2)  ImagInn: ImagInn is designed to allow small to mid size properties the ability to manage reservations, guest accounting and history, rates, marketing and more. Over 2,000 properties are enjoying its benefits daily.

TELECOMMUNICATION SOLUTIONS
Ramesys offers a range of telecommunication solutions including Mitel, Hitachi and Iwatsu PBX systems, InnOvation and Emissary voicemail, telephones, TelElectronics call accounting unit and custom message-on-hold programs.

Don�t miss Ramesys at Hitec. Visit them in Booth 718 to learn more about the components of their Enterprise Solution and other top of the line solutions.


 
Contact:
Ramesys Hospitality
1 Cragwood Road, Suite 202
South Plainfield, NJ 07080 
Phone: 1 800 RAMESYS or
908 941 1300 
Fax: 908 941 1312
E-mail: [email protected]
Web: www.us.ramesys.com
Benchmark Hospitality 
2170 Buckthorne Place, Suite 400
The Woodlands, TX 77380
1-888-846-6338
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.benchmarkhospitality.com

 
Also See Tage Corporation Benefits with Enterprise Solution from Ramesys / May 2002 


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