A
Muse
of Luxury Hospitality
Signature “Wow” Stories
By Alexia Charoupa
Creating signature guest experience
moments requires a certain ingenuity,
and in the current competitive
market, hoteliers are called upon
to choreograph their resources and
services in a way that personalizes
novelty, engages their guests, and
establishes a deep connection to their
brand.
This is done through Extraordinary
Personally Scripted Hospitality Stories.
Narratives are powerful in moving,
inspiring, and orchestrating emotional
connections that make a person feel
unique and define the connection
between the most top-tier hotels and
their guests. Today, more and more
hotels tailor their hospitality strategies
towards the adoption of an experiential
orientation through stories. They
script unique, extraordinary narratives
and stage experiences, individually
44 ILHA
customized and personally meaningful
for each guest persona.
We see that even the amenities of
the luxury suites become experiential,
namely intangible, immaterial values:
the personal pianist in the Royal Suite
at The Goring Hotel, London, the
Genealogist at Trump International Golf
Links & Hotel, Ireland, the surf butler
at St. Regis Monarch Beach, private ski
lessons with triple Olympic medalist
Florence Masnada at L’ Apogee
Courchevel,France etc.
Moreover, in hotels we sell experiences.
Selling an experience means creating a
memory, a narratable memory, namely
a story.
The following is a signature story that I
orchestrated.
The story of
,
a guest of The Romanos, a Luxury
Collection Resort, Starwood Hotels and
Resorts and Linear B clay plates of the
12th century B.C.
Immersed in the cultural heritage of
Messinia, from my role as Concierge at
The Romanos, I learned in summer 2015
the history and the evolutionary path of
the Greek alphabet, entranced by the fact
that the first writing system of Europe
was the Linear B, which was deciphered
in Messinia, Greece, and Nestor’s palace
(the king of Ancient Pylos).
This emotional souvenir I gave as a gift
to one of my clients.
It was mid-July when I met Mrs. X,
a very chic and enlightened lady. I
recommended several dining options to
her and every night she would come to
my desk and warmheartedly thank me,
describing in detail her evening.