Luxury Hoteliers Magazine 3rd Quarter 2016 | Seite 12

the brands they buy into; to share in the
same values, to feel part of a likeminded
community and to play a role in their
history.
We need to think about the Luxury
experience as a journey we take
our customers on. One that builds
anticipation in advance of purchase and
that sustains their engagement long
afterwards.
To quote you from your session at the
ILHA’s European Summit in Athens,
the “Modern Luxury Customer is
looking for meaningful and enriching
experiences that go beyond product and
service alone.” How can hotels create
these experiences and also bring the
world of luxury closer to their staff?
I believe that, for any Luxury hotel
group serious about building their brand
in today’s environment, it’s almost
impossible to achieve the success they
want off the back of product or service
standards and SOPs alone. Although
these are just as vital as ever, what so
often differentiates the strongest brands
are their distinctive and meaningful
guest experiences – and the way they
bring these to life.

12 ILHA

Luxury Hospitality experiences can be
thought about in a number of ways. For
instance; as an individual experience,
delivering a service that feels genuine
and personally relevant; as a social
experience, the result of bringing
together a diverse community of guests
and locals; as an intellectual experience,
including the cultural and aesthetic
stimulation your hotel provides; or as an
emotional experience, the way in which
you speak to the values of your guests.
Although all of these different luxury
experiences respond to the rising
expectations of modern Luxury
consumers, the success of their delivery
depends entirely upon the role of the
hotel’s staff. For your people to truly
deliver an experience that is sensitive to
the individual characters of your guests
– as well as to the values, attitudes and
sensibilities which unite them – they
must be able to empathize with your
guests and the lifestyles they lead.
When we set about defining our own
guest experience at Quorvus Collection
– ‘to reflect the distinctive character of
local culture’ – we thought about how
our people could bring this aspirational
experience to life from a variety of angles.

One of the ways in which we supported
this was by designing a dedicated, digital
engagement platform. Essentially, a
proprietary microsite that connects
all of our employees across the world
and which keeps them abreast of
recent developments from the world
of Modern Luxury. With access to
information on headline cultural events
(both global and destination-specific),
case studies on the most exciting luxury
brands and opinion pieces on the latest
trends in hospitality – it’s a resource
both to inform their guest relations as
well as to inspire and share new bestpractice ideas.
As more and more Luxury hotel brands
now begin to focus on the unique
lifestyle and experience they can
offer their guests, the players which
stand apart will be those that deliver
theirs most credibly. Whether it’s
through the content they share, the
experiences they offer, or the Learning
and Development opportunities they
provide – brands which allow their
employees to ‘live’ and engage with the
Luxury lifestyle they help to create, will
be those which understand their guests
the best.