Honestly, there are probably not many people in the world who are planning on opening up a new hotel just yet. The travel and hospitality industry has taken such as huge hit since the start of the covid pandemic and it is still in the very early stage of recovery, but the new variants are threatening this.
However, if you are an optimist and already looking forward to a time where there are fewer restrictions and we can begin to travel again relatively freely, then opening a hotel in the future would not be such a farfetched idea. Below we look at some of the things you will need to open up a hotel, post-pandemic.
1) Room scheduling software
You will need Room scheduling software that will help you to book and allocate rooms, removing the manual work and recording. Not only will this make your system run much more efficiently, but it will reduce the number of paper records stored and therefore everything will be much easier to track. This is also important for contact tracing and understanding your guests. This will be one of the bigger investments but one with equally large benefits.
2) Touchless everything
From doors, hand sanitisers, bins to water dispensers, minimising the number of surfaces we touch is essential to preventing the spread of covid. It also allows us to reduce waste as we have seen people go crazy and take liberties once they are allowed to take control of ‘complementary’ items. When opening up after the pandemic, it is useful to add these features to the premises, giving guests the feeling of safety.
3) Sterilisation equipment
Rooms can no longer be rapidly cleaned within an hour and not with the old mop and bleach; now, hospital-grade sterilisation equipment is going to be required. We don’t know what the guests will get up to inside the rooms and we cannot expect them to be responsible enough to leave everything as when they arrived, so sterilising the air and surfaces will become the norm. Air purifiers will need to be left inside for a few hours before the new guests arrive to ensure that any airborne bacteria is caught, and UV sterilisers will be used on surfaces that were once just wiped down with furniture polish and a cloth.
4) Smart thermostats
Reducing energy wastage and cutting costs used to result in a worse guest experience, but not anymore. Smart thermostats are a great investment that allows you to set ideal temperatures for the guest, reducing cooling and heating wastage, working to reduce your overall bills. These devices can also work on the room ventilation – important for keeping the airflow moving and not stagnant, which can aid the transmission of covid.
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