It’s tempting to think of the hospitality sector as a homogeneous whole, certainly if you’re consuming it. You leave the house, pay someone some money, have a good time and come home. Sometimes the next morning, sometimes two weeks later.
Off-brand mental images aside, the core pillars of hospitality - eating & drinking and staying over - are on very different evolutionary tracks.
This was highlighted again this month by Marriott’s decision to license the Sonder brand and add a whole chunk of long-stay properties into its portfolio in the process. Sonder, for those unaware, is a tech-led long-stay brand which was very much the guest of choice at all hotel events, being the accommodation equivalent of Gen Z.
Sadly for Sonder, its IPO did not lead to a lifetime of glory, but a sudden veering into a chasm of wondering what the future held, if indeed a future was to be had at all. Rumours swirled about take-overs and sudden endings and then Marriott appeared and offered to license the brand. License, not buy.
This was great for the share price, which doubled on opening after the news and the group announced a fresh $143m in funding, commenting: “Sonder believes that the strategic agreement with Marriott will enhance Sonder’s value proposition to real estate owners who can expect to realise the unique combination of Sonder’s product and Marriott’s distribution”.
So it’s all good again at Sonder, thanks to Marriott’s brand heft. And at Marriott, a brand has been added without the scary implications of leases or any of that unpleasantness.
In the hotel sector, it appears that a fresh wind is blowing and, possibly, are hotels getting closer to becoming consumer brands? Because, odd though that sounds, they aren’t as yet. This is because the key consumer of a hotel brand is not the guest, but the hotel’s owner, who is the primary recipient of nice meetings and dinners with hotel group executives.
For those reading this in the pub and restaurant sectors, this must seem like tales from universes parallel. The brand targets the guest in your world. So once you’ve processed this bizarre news, the hotel sector needs you. There are other brands competing for hotel guests - Expedia, Airbnb, Booking - who are doing it better and costing hotels money. Why not find your local hotelier and share the knowledge? We’re all in this together.
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