22nd February 2021
David Eccles is an Experienced Senior General Manager with a demonstrated history of working in the hospitality industry.
HGEM reached out to David to gain his perspective on the unique opportunities and challenges that 2021 will bring for the hospitality industry.
What do you think 2021 is going to be like for hospitality? What are the opportunities?
Hospitality in 2021 will "boom" once things return to normal; I feel a huge demand for hospitality is incoming as consumers look forward to going out and enjoying themselves once more. The companies that invested in teams, new products and better service delivery will come out of this very strong. The ones that simply open their doors again, expecting better than average results, with no plan, will very quickly struggle.
The opportunities are:
- Customers looking to celebrate missed events of note.
- Embrace new tools: we have all learnt in lockdown to serve clients in a more efficient way but re-introduce the friendly engagement that has been potentially missed.
- Invest in team, training, and the infrastructure of venues to ensure that brand loyalty is regained.
What kind of foundation can companies start laying now, ready for when the country starts opening again, to maximise the opportunities?
- Invest in training.
- Invest in your product.
- Change menus and be creative.
- Treat day one of your venue as a brand-new opening.
- Have core team members still working if possible, engage team in working groups.
- Communicate with your customers whilst in Lockdown, let them know what you're up to.
What do you see as the key innovations this year?
- Use of apps for customers.
- Table service for everything where possible.
- Use of Digital Menus and Digital communications.
- Making venues multi-functional to attract other markets.
How important is digital transformation for Hospitality and what have you implemented or planning.
We intend to have a digital app in place for guests to place and pay for orders from their tables. However, let’s not get carried away with this. Remember we are in hospitality and the danger of going too far down this route is that we loose personal service which is the biggest driver for guests to enjoy an event and return.
