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.. International Society of Hospitality Consultants, Great Miami Hotels, Reduce Carbon Monoxide Emissions, Turn Gray Into Gold |
By Stanley Turkel, MHS, ISHC
November 2006 1. Once a year, the prestigious International Society of Hospitality Consultants holds a conference for its 200 worldwide members (of which I am one). Last month, the conference took place in Miami Beach at the Loews Miami Beach Hotel at South Beach. This 700 room hotel is well designed and well operated with a spectacular location on the beach within walking distance of the Miami Beach Convention Center and the heart of South Beach. The conference program covered a wide variety of important subjects including generational training and customer service, the next wave of food and beverage concepts, global destination tourism trends, alternative lodging products, franchise and management contract strategies and the selection of the famous ISHC top ten global hotel industry issues. You can learn more about the ISHC at their website: www.ishc.com. 2. Before attending the ISHC conference, my wife and I took a hotelman's holiday and visited four wonderful hotels in the greater Miami area:
3. Ray Burger, President, Pineapple Hospitality reports: "Already this year, Pineapple Hospitality's lodging clients have replaced 75,000 incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescents - saving 6.8 million kilowatt hours. This is the equivalent of planting 1,332 acres of forests and reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 10 million pounds." What are you waiting for? 4. As reported recently, the population
of the United States surpassed 300 million. Here's an interesting breakdown
of their ages (at the end of 2005):
These demographics indicate an extraordinary opportunity for the hospitality industry. There is, apparently, a large market out there that is growing at a phenomenal rate. However, to reach this market, hotels must understand the needs and requirements of the older traveler and provide services and amenities that appeal to them. Even in a hotel marketplace that is projected to operate at 64% occupancy, there are still 36% of all guest rooms (or 900,000 rooms) that are vacant every night. Therefore, whatever can be done to attract the mature market is worth the effort. After all, there is nothing more perishable than an unsold guest room. In order to turn gray into gold, guest room design for senior citizens must take into account the realities of hearing loss, diminished vision, lessened color perception, poorer short-term memory and weakened upper body strength. While experts agree that hotel facilities for seniors should be designed to offset these difficulties, I believe that, in fact, all hotel guests would benefit from the following improvements: In Guest Rooms 1) Better lighting at the desk, at bedside, in the closet, at the TV set and at room entry.In Bathrooms 1) Apply good non-skid material to both the bathtub floor and the bathroom floor.In Corridors And Elevators 1) Make certain that corridors are well illuminated, especially over guestroom doors to expedite the use of electronic door lock cards.Security And Safety Considerations 1) Convert to an all smoke-free format
Stanley Turkel, MHS, ISHC operates his hotel consulting office as a sole practitioner specializing in franchising issues, asset management and litigation support services. Turkel�s clients are hotel owners and franchisees, investors and lending institutions. Turkel serves on the Board of Advisors and lectures at the NYU Tisch Center for Hospitality, Tourism and Sports Management. He is a member of the prestigious International Society of Hospitality Consultants. His provocative articles on various hotel subjects have been published in the Cornell Quarterly, Lodging Hospitality, Hotel Interactive, Hotel Online, AAHOA Lodging Business, Bottomline, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, etc. If you need help with a hotel operations or franchising problem such as encroachment/impact, termination/liquidated damages or litigation support, don�t hesitate to call 917-628-8549 or email [email protected]. |
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Stanley Turkel, MHS, ISHC
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