BERLIN — If the European hotel industry is an athlete — and it has been running fast, if not also uphill, during the last 18 months — then now is the time for muscles to be stretched, new running shoes to be worn and fresh training plans to be formulated.

On the second day of the International Hotel Investment Forum, discussions turned toward new business models and increased alignment between operators, owners, third-party management and other players.

Yotel, a firm built on hotel management contracts, announced at the conference it has set up a franchise division and will target more partnerships in that model.

“Our objective is to align our business with our landlords’ objectives, and we feel confirmed in our concept as we come out of this crisis. Partners asked for the [franchise] model, and we said, ‘No, no, no, we are not ready,’ but we are now,” said Hubert Viriot, CEO of Yotel.

Accor announced its 42nd brand, Emblems, an upscale conversion collection product, which will include what it calls “emblematic luxury hotels.”

Michael Deitemeyer, president and CEO of third-party management firm Aimbridge Hospitality — and it has been very encouraging to see a good contingent of U.S.-based hoteliers present at IHIF — said his company has gone through a pandemic pivot of changing its reporting procedures to better analyze specific hotel types.

He said the firm required dynamic analysis so team members know they are analyzing a property in the correct way. Properties differ, and individual analysis of each asset is a key way to help hotels perform better during the pandemic and when they emerge from it.

Hilton President and CEO Chris Nassetta said the pandemic changed everything, and it is right for the hotel industry to change, too, although he added he believed in four or five years' time the industry will look largely like it did in 2019, albeit with a little more leisure travel.

“We’ll have two or three years of disruption, and this absolutely will change travel patterns, behaviors and budgets. It will shift things,” he said.

Change and adapt, for we all know what happens to entities and species that do not, especially in Europe that has been given a violent push in the last 18 months.

Sustainability is a huge focus of this this year’s conference, and panelists said that the pandemic should remind everyone on what will constitute a better planet when the world does not have to worry so much about COVID-19.

Pieter Elbers, president and CEO, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, said that if he had been asked two years ago, he would have said KLM had put in place all the right processes and initiatives to do its part in reversing climate change and other environmental damages.

“I would have said, ‘We’re good,’ but now it seems we are not good enough. We must use the momentum we are seeing now for large companies to be able to join forces. I think we can do it through new technology,” he said.

“Luxury tended to be conversions anyway, historic buildings, which had experience built into them already, but we have also pushed ourselves in conversions in our mainstream brands. Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, for example, are hard-coded, strong brands, so how do you plug one of these into an existing building?”
— Willemijn Geels, vice president of development, Europe, IHG Hotels & Resorts

“My board keeps reminding me what a fantastic time it was to buy NH Hotels, just before the pandemic. In Thailand, we are used to natural disasters, [Middle East respiratory syndrome], political crises. We think if there is not an annual crisis then there must be something wrong in the world.”
— Dillip Rajakarier, group CEO, Minor International

Editor’s note: Chris Nassetta serves on Hotel News Now’s parent company CoStar Group’s board of directors.