Innovation

📈 At the 2024 FSTEC conference in Grapevine, Texas, industry leaders focused on AI and automation in foodservice. Key takeaways: AI is set to revolutionize operations within the next decade, with potential to replace apps on phones. Yum Brands' AI-first approach boosted customer satisfaction at Taco Bell. Tech investments are now essential, with COVID-19 accelerating the adoption rate. Customization of tech solutions is crucial for meeting unique business needs. The use of AI should simplify tasks for employees, focusing on enhancing both front and back-of-house operations.

🔋 AI's rise in the hospitality and restaurant industries leads to better customer service but also higher energy usage. The PJM capacity auction for June 2025-May 2026 cleared at $269.92/MW per day, a significant increase from $28.92/MW for the previous year. Strategies like conducting energy audits are suggested for businesses to manage rising costs.

🏙 Over the 2023 Christmas and New Year’s holidays, more than 115 million Americans traveled, with 6% opting for vacation instead of staying home. Hospitality businesses are encouraged to use programmatic advertising, like Google Display Network, to target potential travelers. Cross-channel campaigns across social media, search engines, email, and display ads are recommended. Mobile advertising is crucial, as many book trips via smartphones; platforms suggested include Google’s Mobile App Promotion Ads and Facebook’s Mobile News Feed Ads. Retargeting campaigns are also vital to capture late bookers.

🏨 A Marriott front desk employee on TikTok (@user9813962494407) with over 16,000 views, reveals the inner workings of hotel check-in systems. Details entered include guest information like email, address, phone number, and car details. Marriott's DOS-based, text code-operated system appears outdated to viewers, resembling software from 1993. Despite being deemed complicated, some users defend its reliability, while others criticize it for being overly complex and not user-friendly. Marriott's response to the video has not been disclosed.

🏨 Modern hotels integrate technology to enhance guest experiences, enabling personalized offers and efficient operations. Automation, like Plusgrade's automated front desk tool, streamlines tasks without replacing human interaction, allowing staff to provide memorable service. Data-driven technologies deliver timely, relevant offers through preferred guest channels, balancing digital convenience with personal recognition. This synergy aims to boost guest satisfaction and hotel ancillary revenue, while reinforcing human connections and service quality.

🪰 Minor Hotels Europe & Americas aims to cut scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions by 46.2% by 2030 from 2019 levels and reduce company-wide emissions by 90% by 2050, aligning with the Paris agreement. The group, with over 350 buildings in 30+ countries, utilizes the Deepki ESG platform to track environmental performance and streamline sustainability efforts for net zero transition, approved by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). The platform aids in automating data collection and enhancing energy efficiency.

📒 A hotel restaurant POS can increase operational efficiency, guest satisfaction, and revenue. A bustling restaurant at a hotel can lose over $290 for every 10 minutes of staff bottlenecks, impacting annual revenue. Advanced POS features and 83% of consumers consider positive online reviews important, which can be boosted by satisfying guests with a seamless POS experience. Key POS features include integration capabilities, cloud-based systems, table management, menu management, inventory tracking, and mobile ordering. Lightspeed, a global POS and payments platform, partners with Cloudbeds to provide such solutions to enhance hospitality businesses.

💾 Google announced it will soon add a digital U.S. passport to Google Wallet, allowing use at select TSA checkpoints. Google Wallet, which launched in July 2022, also stores credit cards and tickets and is available on Android devices and online. In contrast, Apple has been accepting state IDs since 2022 and plans to add California, but has not announced a digital passport. Finland was the first country to enable digital passports in 2023, with Poland, South Korea, and the UK following suit. The U.S. digital passport will use existing TSA tech standards, with no additional tech needed. Google has more than doubled its Wallet users for commutes in the last 18 months and is adding transit tickets for cities like Hamburg, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.