Case study 7 - Changing from chain affiliation to become independent

Client: Hotel moving from chain management to become an independent standalone hotel

Background: the hotel in the south of France was moving from chain management to become an independent stand-alone operation.

Consultant/s: Doreen Boulding

Project date: Mid October 2005 - April 2006

Project objective: to assist the hotel management team through the change.

Project scope

• To provide due diligence services for sales, marketing, front office, web site (online), GDS distribution, moving from a corporate environment to a standalone privately owned hotel.
• To ensure that all sales, marketing and front office information that was relevant to managing the business was retained, so that revenues were not reduced due to the change over. This had to take into account that the hotel team no longer had centralised support for sales and marketing, revenue management and IT, nor a world-wide centralised reservation system. The hotel required a new distribution company and new web site connection and possibly a new web site.

Methodology

• A due diligence survey was created to ascertain the responsibilities and information held by the chain and the hotel.
• At the same, the experience and authority of the hotel employees were assessed so that key responsibilities could be allocated to the relevant team members.
• Key processes and technologies were reviewed and changed as necessary.

Results

• Due diligence questionnaire was created and updated with action plan
• Databases, sales reports, sales and marketing plan were reviewed and sorted into market segments and by country
• A comparison of distribution companies with fees and services was presented
• A GDS switch action plan was created to ensure that existing business was not lost
• The web site reviewed and updated taking into account the new standalone status
• Sales action plan was created for the following six months per market segment and implemented
• All collateral was reviewed and recreated so that it could be reproduced with minimal changes and at low cost
• Fourteen group enquiries were received in the first quarter of 2006 - compared to two in the whole of 2005
• Contracts with seven internet and four tour operators in the UK were signed

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