During my time as a General Manager, Board Director and shareholder of Paten Hotels, an independent hotel group of four 3 and 4 star hotels in England, from 1992 to 2008 I learnt a lot about the challenges and issues which independent hoteliers face on a day by day basis to keep their businesses growing, improving sales, quality and the customer experience whilst having to deal with increasing competition, legislation and increasing costs.
Having successfully been part of the team that sold Paten Hotels in April 2008, great timing given the economic situation since then, I moved on to trying to acquire my first hotel as well as setting up Complete Hotels Services to provide consultancy services to independent hoteliers.
The consultancy side has progressed well and I have a number of clients who seem pleased with the results and the added value which I have managed to bring to their business however, the search for a hotel to acquire goes on and has been one of constant ups and downs, getting excited about possible opportunities one day only to be disappointed the next day as businesses prove to be over valued, (how can something making a loss have any value as a business!) and in exceedingly poor condition (chain hotels especially).
The aim of my blog is twofold. Firstly, to provide me with a platform to publish my rants, raves, dislikes and opinions about what is great and not so great about hotels, restaurants, pubs and the hospitality industry in general and secondly (more positively) to share some simple ideas and thoughts about how, in my opinion, hoteliers can improve their sales, marketing and operations without having to spend a fortune.
I hope that you will enjoy reading the blog and return on a regular basis, and if you feel compelled to post a comment then feel free to do so.
Robert Smith
Director
Complete Hotels Services
http://www.completehotelsservices.co.uk/
Wednesday 26 August 2009
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