Major Trends That are Shaping the Hospitality Industry

Major Trends That are Shaping the Hospitality Industry

Since past two decades numerous changes can be noticed in the hospitality sector, and this industry has become one of the fastest growing industries of the world. Moreover, it contributes around 10.4 % of world’s GDP and provides 1 job out of 5 new jobs.

These are the various emerging trends that are brightening the future of the hospitality sector:

Advanced technology

Technology has brought drastic changes in the hospitality sector as it has provided much comfort and control to the guests than before. It has changed the way of interaction between the customers and hotels before, during and after their stay.

Excellent service and on-demand information is provided to the guests with help of artificial intelligence like robots and chatbots. Entry in the rooms is also keyless as doors can be opened with help of mobiles. Apart from this, guests are experiencing better and improved stay with smart room technology.

Authentic Local Experience

Many guests or the travelers wonder to experience the local region or culture of the place they are visiting.  They are desiring to have a real experience of the location as the part of the planning of their trip. Therefore, most of the businesses in this sector are working on fulfilling this demand of their guests. Experimental stay packages are being provided to guests by Hotels by associating with local tour and travel companies. Companies like Airbnb have started services like ‘Airbnb Experiences’ which provides various activities of local interest to the tourists and travelers.

Personalization

Personalization has become an important trend in every industry, and thus in hospitality industry it is a rising trend. All guests in the hotel have their own individual taste and preferences when they come to stay at a hotel, so offering personalized and customized experience to the guests in the key of providing satisfaction to the customers.

Hotels can use personalization in numerous ways. For instance, returning guests can be served in a better way as their preferences can be recognized and they can be treated based on their history of previous visit. Thus, personalization helps an individual to feel more comfortable and relaxed in their chosen hotel for stay. (Les Roches, 2018)

Sustainability

Majority of the guests at hotel are environment conscious and they are always concerned whether the business with which they are dealing is environmentally friendly or not. Due to this, sustainability has become an upward trend in the hospitality sector, and large number of businesses in this sector are promoting eco- friendly environment.

Hotels have started adopting the practices of sustainability and are using the processes that are environmentally friendly such as

v  Air conditioners and lights automatically turn off when nobody is around.

v  Adopting recycle and reuse policies such as towel reuse.

v  Restaurants are also using paper straws to eliminate the use of plastic.

v  Hotels are using mobile key entries instead of using plastic keycards which reduces the use of plastic.

v  Travelers that are environment conscious are careful about the carbon footprints and they expect less wastage of the resources wherever they visit. So, hotels need to be environmental savvy and should adopt the same while serving their guests.

Health and Wellness

Guests not only seek comfort, but they expect more than this in their accommodation. Travelers are looking for services that take care of their health and wellness. So, hospitality industry has adopted this trend as many hotels are providing services like:

v  Health spas

v  Fitness centers

v  Fitness equipment’s in room

v  Healthy food options

v  Air purifiers

All these trends play an essential role in shaping the future of hospitality sector. Since, these trends are unique but are customer oriented and focuses on the taste and preferences of guests.

(Openkey, n.d.)

References

Les Roches. (2018, July 19). Retrieved from https://lesroches.edu/blog/latest-personalisation-trends-hotel-industry/

Openkey. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.openkey.co/5-hospitality-industry-trends/