January 13, 2025 • 28 mins
How can technology enhance genuine human connection in hospitality? In this episode, William Costley, COO of Time Hotels, reveals how the right tech stack can empower teams to deliver exceptional guest experiences while maintaining a strong service culture.
Key Takeaways:
- Discover the critical role of a Property Management System (PMS) in integrating various hotel operations and enhancing guest interactions.
- Learn about Time Hotels' innovative approach to expanding their brand portfolio, including the launch of lifestyle brands focused on sustainability and wellness.
- Understand the importance of a robust Request for Proposal (RFP) process in selecting a revenue management system that aligns with your hotel's unique needs and operational scale.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Every customer knows when you connect with them.
Every human being knows when yougenuinely connect. So tech is to
help us genuinely connect, butthe interaction between a team
member and a guest is ultimatelyhospitality. So tech will never
take that away.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
From Hotel Tech Report, it's Hotel Tech Insider,
a show about the future ofhotels and the technology that
powers them.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Today, we're speaking with William Cossley, the chief
operating officer of TimeHotels. We talked through
William's recent experiencechoosing a new revenue
management system and how heensured his team chose the best
system on the market. We alsolearned how they work to
maintain a service culturethroughout their rapid
expansion. William, thank you somuch for being on the podcast.
(00:51):
I'm very excited to get to knowyou a bit better and learn about
all the exciting things you'redoing at Time Hotels.
To get started, I would love foryou to introduce yourself, tell
us about your role, a little bitabout your company, and some of
the things that you're workingon.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Sure. Well, first of all, thank you, Adrian, for the
invitation. It's great to bespeaking with you in evening
time Dubai and daytime over thepond. My role as chief operating
officer of Times Hotel. Irecently joined just about 8
months ago.
The key things that I've beenfocusing on actually, a lot has
to do with tech and how we'regonna use it moving forward. But
(01:29):
a little bit about the hotelcompany. So Tyme Hotels is a
regional Middle East company. Itwas started in Dubai about 12
years ago. Time Hotels is ourmajor brand.
We have Time Express. Part ofthe exciting journey for me in
the last 8 months is developingnew brands, building out a
strategy to grow and develop thecompany moving forward. And at
(01:53):
the same time, it's obviouslyvery important that we review
all our technical architecturesand stacks that we've got
throughout the organization. Andas we grow and actually move
into some new countries, thatobviously will have an impact as
well. But it's very exciting.
We are looking to, in the next 3to 5 years, go from 20 hotels to
(02:15):
a 100. Being established now,more big investors and companies
are actually reaching out to usto ask us, would we be
interested, to potentiallymanage one of their assets?
Where when you're small, youhave to be a little bit more
hungry and a little bit moreproactive in terms of to try to
get new deals as biginternational operators,
(02:37):
obviously, of many brands and isa very competitive environment,
not just in the Middle East, butin Africa where we want to grow
and in Southeast Asia as well.So it's a very exciting time.
Grow the company, review ourprocesses and systems as we
expand, launch new brands intothe market, and at the same
time, how does our whole techstack and our current
(03:00):
architecture fit into thatdevelopment plan as well.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
For the growth that you're anticipating, are those
owned assets, or does yourcompany manage or franchise? How
does that work?
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Right now, we are mostly an asset light company,
so we manage other people'sassets. We do have actually
another company that we've beenfocused on to be a third party
operator as well because in theMiddle East, it's actually it's
very interesting because in theUS, the hospitality business is
mostly franchise in terms of thebig international operators.
(03:36):
Over the last decade in Europe,that really has become the
business model in Europe now.What is maybe 10 years ago, 90%
were management contracts, now90% are franchises. And this is
now slowly in the last couple ofyears become far more prevalent
in this part of the world.
And come back to being flexibleand adaptable. You know, we have
(03:58):
to be able to offer differentbusiness models to investors and
current owners, of hotels herein the region. But we are asset
light. However, if we find ahotel in a great location, we
wouldn't mind consideringleasing a hotel. But,
ultimately, asset light andmanaging other people's assets
(04:18):
is our core, and that willprobably be our core moving
forward as well.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Tell me a little bit about the brand. You mentioned
there's one kind of flagshipbrand, but you're potentially
launching some other brands.What would you say the
differences between the brandsare, and what sets you apart
from competitors?
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Well, Tyme Hotels is if you want to reconcile it with
big international brands, it'sthe flagship brand. So for
Hilton is Hilton. For Marriott,it will be Marriott. So for
Thyme Hotels, our upscale brandis Thyme Hotels. Thyme Hotels
will be our upscale brand.
Our midscale brand is ThymeExpress. So that's if you want
(04:57):
to align it with stars ratings,that would be like our 3 star
brand. We have just where wewill be launching, so it's not
official yet. But we did sign 2hotels in the Maldives for 2 new
lifestyle brands. 1 is calledVivi by Thyme, which will be a
soft brand, whereas Thyme Hotelsand ThymeXpress are really hard
(05:19):
brands.
Vivi by Thyme will be ourmidscale, upscale lifestyle
brand. And our lifestyle brandis Halo by Thyme, which will be
our upper upscale brand as well.Our key focus for this will be
really on sustainability,wellness, holistic approach. And
(05:40):
then we are finalizing a luxurybrand and a collaboration with
quite a famous designer in Italycalled that will be Rotella
Hotels, which will be our luxurybrand as well. But at the
moment, we signed what's beenfantastic.
We signed 2 brand new hotels inthe Maldives. What a way to
launch new brands as a brand newasset. So we'll be built to
(06:03):
spec. And so our by time and ourhello by time, they'll be our
1st 2 official lifestyle hotelsfor these brands. However, if
there is an opportunity to get aconversion hotel before they are
completed by q 4 2026, then, ofcourse, you know, we'd be
delighted to expand them prior.
But so that's just a little bitabout where the brands will fit
(06:26):
between midscale up to luxury.And there'll be more official
announcements coming out by theend of the year. But because we
signed it to Namal, there's anannouncement at FHI recently in
Dubai, we can easily discuss ittoday.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
So let's talk about your tech stack. I know you're
currently sort of reviewing thesystems that you have in place
and making sure that everythingmakes sense and is performing
well and the way you need it. Sotalk me through what would you
say is the most critical pieceof your tech stack right now?
Speaker 1 (06:57):
I think for any hospitality company, the most
important part of, hotels techstack is is PMS. Ultimately,
because the PMS connects witheverything. PMS connects
obviously directly andindirectly with the guests
through our, you know, check-in,check out, our guests through
management systems, our key cardsystems, Wi Fi, IPTV. But then
(07:24):
also from a commercialperspective, it connects with
our CRS, our central reservationsystem, our CRM, our central
relationship management system,CMS, content management system,
our RMS for some of our hotels,because, obviously, our PMS is a
single source of the truth. Andthen, of course, there's F and B
(07:45):
point of sale systems thatconnects to spa systems that
connects to so, ultimately, themost important piece of tech
stack in a hotel is this PMSjust because it's so fundamental
to managing relationships bothinternally and externally.
And, actually, what we did thistime, just before arrived, was
to have a strategic partnershipwith Shishi, which are growing
(08:09):
fast. We are the 1st companythat's in the Middle East to
sign with them. Predominantly,in the past, everybody was
Fidelio. That was used to be theonly option. Right?
And globally, and opera, thenwhen Oracle took over as well.
But we've decided to go withShiji, which we found is a great
partner. I think, you know, theywant to grow, and we were a
small chain that give them theopportunity to get into the
(08:33):
region. And being the 1st, wehad built excellent relations
with them and is really goingfrom strength to strength. So as
I mentioned earlier, if there'sone thing that any new hotels
that we really, really need toconvince an owner is is to go
with as a proprietary timehotels PMS.
(08:55):
On top of that, over the lastfew months, we've been looking
at our commercial stack as well.You know, some of our hotels
have get not a lot of keys.Some, you know, it goes from,
like, 48 key hotel to a 776bedroom hotel. So you can
imagine the type of technologyrequired can vary dramatically.
And you also find that sometimesa lot of the big tech companies
(09:18):
have flat fees, which are notcommercially viable for smaller
hotels.
And that's something which whenwe've been negotiating with a
couple of vendors, we've beenselling, guys. You need to have
a reality check here. If youwant all of them, if you want
the big ones, you need to takesome of our smaller key cam
hotels, and you need to make itrealistic for the ownership so
(09:39):
it becomes commercially viable.So we've actually been looking
at our CRS, our CRM, our CMS,and introducing revenue
management system as wellbecause none of our hotels today
had that post COVID. So we'vejust moved over our CRS system.
So we've moved over to Amadeus,which from another vendor, which
(10:02):
I won't name. So not respect,but they do know, so don't
worry. So we've been areactually right in the middle of
the integration for our hotels.And this is one of the important
things going back to him. Allour hotels been on Shiji.
It's been much more seamless andeasier to convert with Amadeus
(10:23):
because they've already got alot of the integration between
both of these systems in placealready. And so that's made it
very easy for us. That will makeit very easy for our other
commercial online partners likeOTAs, like our, wholesalers. So
the connectivity for them willbe very seamless as well. So
(10:44):
that's one of the key reasons wewent with Amadeus.
And similarly as well that theyhave got other solutions for CMS
CRM, which at the moment workwith other vendors. But when
those contracts expire, itcertainly will provide us other
options. And as I say, when youget all your key commercial
(11:05):
platforms, if there was only 2vendors, it really just makes it
much, much easier to managesystems internally as you can do
enterprise changes much quicker.If you need to do any updates,
it's much easier as well thangoing to 3, 4, or 5 vendors to
try and upgrade something. Sothis has been taken up a lot of
(11:27):
time and also implementing, as Isay, in a smaller company, for
example, revenue managementsystems.
We took an independent companyto do the RFP for us. This takes
away internal preferences. Youknow, some of my colleagues have
worked with differentinternational companies that use
different systems. So this takesaway any preference in that
(11:50):
respect. And it was reallycritical to have an RFP so that
there's a genuine apple forapple comparison when it comes
to functionality, when it comesto cost, when it comes to user
friendliness, when it comes tointegration with our other
systems.
For example, you know, beingable to integrate with with and
other other systems that we'vegot. So we actually have chosen
(12:14):
3 of our hotels. Actually, we'regonna start in January with
Flyer or our revenue managementsystem. We went through a robust
RFP process. We went down to 3vendors.
We had the initialpresentations, and then we
decided to go with flyer as wefelt that they were the right
fit, both functionality wise,both on added value to our
(12:39):
company, to the hotelsthemselves, and obviously price
as well. So it's not just aprice deal. You know? It has to
really add value to the businessand our commercial
opportunities.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
So during that RFP process, did you have some
specific criteria that you werelooking for, or how did you
narrow down all those vendors tothe final 3? And then how did
you make the ultimate decisionwith Flyer?
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Well, through the RFP process, we obviously developed
our metrics in terms of whatwere important things to the
business. So we have, like,hotel residences. So we have
large hotels 770 keys, which areseasonal, for example, in Macca.
So grips is very important. Soso that some of the criteria was
a grip capability, forecastingcapability, because some just
(13:27):
manage the revenue, but don'tnecessarily automate
forecasting.
For us, enterprise aboveproperty revenue management was
another thing. The userfriendliness of that because we
have a centralized reservationsand revenue management platform
based on our Cairo office. So itwas looking at the user
friendliness of that. Obviously,cost, training, service
(13:50):
provision, length of contract aswell, because some big vendors
want you 3, 4, 5 years. Andthese days with tech, it can
change so quickly.
So we don't want to becommitted, you know, to longer
terms in that respect as well.Because we're a small company,
and one of our advantages is wecan be flexible and adaptable
(14:10):
and agile. But if you're lockedin for a 5 year contract with an
almost watertight Americanvendor contract, You know, it's
maybe you're in for 4 and a halfyears. You may get out 6 months
earlier. But if a vendor iswilling to say, okay then,
you're new.
You're not well known globally.Give me 12 months, and we can
(14:30):
review it. And then, you know,if we feel it's working well,
then we can continue, or we canlook for something. So the
flexibility of the vendor whenit came to contracting was very
important because technologygrows so far just move so fast.
We don't want to be locked infor long periods of time, which
was the norm.
To be honest, it still is forsome big international
companies. But when you'resmaller, you need to maintain
(14:52):
your agility and youradaptability in the market. So
these were a lot of thequestions that we put forward to
them. Use of friendliness aswell was very important because
when you get a presentation froma vendor like Flyer or any other
vendors out there, for us, itwas simplicity. Don't give me
all the bells and whistles, andI'll be here for 1 hour looking
(15:14):
at things.
You're clicking and clicking andclicking. Just these are the key
things I need to know. Show methem. And at the same time, for
us, forecasting was a big thing,and the data analytics, which
was another thing. And flyer, Ihave to say, between all the
vendors for RMS, their dataanalytics reporting, I mean, for
(15:36):
me, it was fantastic, Reallyfantastic.
And AI forecasting, not havingto load history of your
performance for the last 3years, but using AI, we can
almost plug and play within 2weeks, and we're ready to go
with future forecasting events.So that was some of the key
things that made us go withthem.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
How do you think about technology versus human
interaction? Can you talk to meabout your guest experience and
and the role technology playsthere?
Speaker 1 (16:07):
Sure. I mean, this is something I'm very, very
passionate about. Tech is anenabler of the guest experience.
It is not the guest experience.So tech should be there to make
things easier and take away themundane processing parts of
hospitality and service deliveryis should be used for data
(16:29):
collection as well.
And having that data on ourguest is so as you quote, you're
right. Let's say, first of all,garbage in, garbage out. So you
need to make sure you're puttingquality data in, but then when
is that is how do you then useit? So tech IC is in a marvelous
tool to consolidate data, toconsolidate preferences of our
(16:53):
guests, to take away a lot offriction from our guest
experience as well when they'rephysically in a hotel. But for
me, the guest experiencefundamentally is me and the
guest.
The hardware and the software oftech are great enablers. But for
(17:13):
me, software is from the heart.You sell from the heart. You
know, I think one of the mostinteresting observations I made
during COVID was that, and Idon't even want to remember
everybody wearing a mask, butyou remember that dream when
everybody wore a mask, you couldstill tell some they were
smiling, couldn't they, evenwearing the mask. And it was
(17:33):
because it was coming from theheart and it was coming out of
the eyes.
And even without seeing themouth and, you know, raising
north and that's for me is everycustomer knows when you connect
with them. Every human beingknows when you genuinely
connect. So tech is to help usgenuinely connect, but the
(17:55):
interaction between a teammember and a guest is ultimately
hospitality. So tech will nevertake that away. No matter what
system you've got, you couldhave all these systems.
But if there's not a culture ofgenuine service and hospitality,
it's irrelevant. You can haveall the tech in the world, but
you're still not gonna drivegreat memorable guest
(18:17):
experiences. And guests arelooking for experiences more
than anything. Now it's not justa bit coming and staying. They
want to have a positiveexperience and the hotel or in
the environment around thehotel.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
And for guests at Tyme Hotels, where do they
encounter technology duringtheir stay experience, and are
there certain parts of the guestjourney where it's only human
interaction, or is the techmostly behind the scenes? How
does that look from the guest'sview?
Speaker 1 (18:49):
At this moment in time, most of the tech is behind
the scenes, and most of theguest interaction is obviously
with the team members. It'squite interesting because some
of the normal equipment in aguest room now is almost
redundant. Like if you take atelevision and a television in
the past up until a few yearsago, really, it was to watch TV
(19:10):
in your room and watch a moviein the room. Today, it's just an
extension of your mobile phone.I've got apps from all over.
I've got my Netflix app. I'vegot my Amazon Prime app. I've
got my app for my football,soccer in America. I've got my
app for my UK channels backhome. And so, actually, watching
a TV in a room is completelyredundant.
(19:32):
Now it's what guest are askingis I need to connect to the TV,
not I want to watch the TV. Sothese sort of things are very,
very important. I think the nextthing that will become the norm
in a room or changefunctionality, because I don't
think anybody's fully been ableto make the phone, you know,
(19:52):
manage your curtains, manageyour lights, manage the
temperature in the room. There'sso much tech out there that
might think they do it. Butagain, getting back to
integration, I haven't seen onethat works really well because
most of the tech is not hotelsto protect it.
My belief is that guests want tobe in control of their
(20:13):
environment. So we have to beable to create the systems that
guests can get through thetelephone because everybody uses
a phone for everything. Right?And, the most obvious one at the
moment is, you know, the TV isnow an extension of your
telephone because that's whatall your apps are. And I think
next will be giving the guestsfull control of everything in
(20:36):
the room.
So whatever company can come upwith a seamless, frictionless
application, I think they willdo extremely well because I
think there's so many guests andsomeone in hotel companies would
love that. My home is inScotland. It's minus 2 at the
moment. So I'm on my phone andmy app, and I'm controlling my
(20:57):
boilers back home. But there'snot really a company yet who's
curated something forhospitality.
And I really believe that thiswould be for a guest, front
facing. I think this would be akey thing. As I say, you know,
most guests know, you know,again, in the past, they said,
do you have a spa or a swimmingpool or a gym? And if you never
(21:20):
did not use it these days,customers are even saying, you
know, do you have a smart TV?Because we know that not all
hotels are smart TVs and somepeople are making decisions to
stay in a hotel based on, can Iconnect?
But it's a simple thing. Butback in the day, you went to a
hotel to experience things younever had at home. Right? Now it
sounds almost flipping. Like,you get things at home now that
(21:41):
you don't get in hotels, whichfrustrates you even more.
So I think that's the next stepwhere technology will truly be
frictionless for our guestexperience will be when they can
connect through the phone towhat they want. They're in
control, not us.
Speaker 3 (21:54):
I'm curious to dig in to the ReviewPro tool. How has
analyzing guest review datahelped you uncover insights?
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Well, let me give you just a quick overview. The
ReviewPro consolidates everyonline guest feedback for your
hotel and your competitor. Sofor example, you know, I'll take
every online sales of a 250online guest review, the
tripadvisor, booking.com, Googleholiday check. I mean, those
(22:26):
just hundreds of them out there.So this consolidates every
single guest feedback.
It actually aggregates it fordifferent parts of the guest
experience. It compels youagainst yourself. It compels you
against your competition even soyou can benchmark yourself. It
is multilingual. So if you wantto translate into any language,
it provides it.
(22:46):
So if we get even a reply inRussian, we can the tool
translates into English so wecan understand. We can either
reply in Russian, which is thepreferred, you know, try and
reply in the language of thegear sculpture. And then it
tells you what's trending up.What's trending down. What are
you doing good on the, be it asan English language, as a Arabic
in terms of your trending up ordown?
(23:07):
So it's good. So manyopportunities to really cut up
and analyze different parts ofthe business. Also, does it for
the competition? So I'll giveyou an example. Some of your
listeners would know aboutrevenue management system.
Sorry. STR. So STR tells you howyou compare your RevPAR against
the competition. But in thepast, you could only do that
(23:30):
when you were opened. Now, whenwe were opening new hotels and
my old company review crewallows me to go and check the
competition before I'm opened soI can see their scores, what
they do well, what they don't dowell, even to the extent of I
can find out there's somebodynamed a lot, a good team member
who's named on a lot of reviews.
I could proactively tell my HRteam, hey, guys, this guy in
(23:52):
that bar, I've seen his name somany times, go and employ and
poach him. I don't care. Soactually, having your
competitors data as well cantell you what they're doing
well, what they can improve. Soeven though if you're doing
preopening and you want to go onsales calls, the information
you've got in your competitionis really powerful as well. And
it allows you to have reallymeaningful conversations with
(24:16):
competition.
So it compels you every part ofthe hotel, different
nationality. It gives you bynationality as well. It's just
such a great aggregator of data,and it's very simple and is very
quick. You know, you can getreports. It's live.
It's dynamic. It's up to date.It refreshes by the hours, not
by the days. And as I said, it'sreally a great preopening tool.
(24:39):
And at the same time, it's theSTR for guest experience.
So you can really use it tomeasure really benchmark
yourself against thecompetition, which is really
good as well. So, yeah, it's agreat tool. I haven't seen a
better tool that consolidatesguest reviews than review pro.
I'm sure there's many out there,but it would have to be really
special to use up ReviewPro. AndI don't get any commission from
(25:03):
Shishi.
Don't worry.
Speaker 3 (25:06):
I wanna have just one more question. Drawing on your
experience at different brandsworking around the world, what
would you say are 1 or 2qualities that a hotelier should
have in order to be successfultoday?
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Number 1, and it's not even today. I think it's in
the past, It's in the presentand it will be in the future.
You must embrace change. Maybeeven in life, you know, being
able to embrace change and adaptis really, really important.
Business is moving so fast.
So dynamically, it's reallyimportant to embrace change.
(25:41):
Don't fight it because it'sgoing to happen. It's
inevitable. So as how do youoptimize and how do you drive
and get competitive advantage inthe change process? Been in many
companies and I've experiencedcompanies and people within a
company who have an embracedchange and has been painful.
And I've seen people reallythrive both individually and as
(26:03):
as a company. So I think number1 is is really embrace change
and be agile and adaptable.Number 2, God gave us 2 eyes, 2
ears, and 1 mouth. And I thinkhe was trying to tell us
something that we should listentwice as much as we speak. I
think listening is a verypowerful tool that is
(26:23):
underestimated.
I think in the hospitalityindustry, the more you listen
and observe, you'll make muchbetter decisions you'll be far
more engaging. You'll solveproblems better and you'll
create truly great guestexperiences because you're
really listening to what theguest wants. So I think that's
not, so number 1 is change,embrace it and, you know, be
(26:46):
agile through the process.Number 2 is listening. And
number 3 again is, you know,just be positive.
It's infectious. I think whenyou work in a team, having a
positive energy within yourdepartment really adds
tremendous value. Andhospitality is just teamwork.
(27:10):
Nobody does anything bythemselves. You know?
And we are all interdependent,and if we're all really
embracing the dynamics of changein the fast pace of what's
happening in our hotels, if welisten to each other, and if we
remain positive, we'll have agreat working environment and a
great environment for guests toget a great guest experience.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
Well, thank you for sharing. And thank you so much
for taking the time to speakwith us. It was really lovely
chatting with you and learningall about the exciting things
that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
Thank you, and you have a great day ahead.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
That's all for today's episode. Thanks for
listening to Hotel Tech Insiderproduced by hotel tech
report.com. Our goal with thispodcast is to show you how the
best in the business areleveraging technology to grow
their properties and outperformthe concept by using innovative
digital tools and strategies. Iencourage all of our listeners
to go try at least one of thesestrategies or tools that you
(28:05):
learned from today's episode.Successful digital
transformation is all aboutconsistent small experiments
over a long period of time, sodon't wait until tomorrow to try
something new.
Do you know a hotelier who wouldbe great to feature on this
show, or do you think that yourstory would bring a lot of value
to our audience? Reach out to medirectly on LinkedIn by
searching for Jordan Hollander.For more episodes like this,
(28:29):
follow Hotel Tech Insider on allmajor streaming platforms like
Spotify and Apple Music.
Every customer knows when you connect with them.
Every human being knows when yougenuinely connect. So tech is to
help us genuinely connect, butthe interaction between a team
member and a guest is ultimatelyhospitality. So tech will never
take that away.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
From Hotel Tech Report, it's Hotel Tech Insider,
a show about the future ofhotels and the technology that
powers them.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Today, we're speaking with William Cossley, the chief
operating officer of TimeHotels. We talked through
William's recent experiencechoosing a new revenue
management system and how heensured his team chose the best
system on the market. We alsolearned how they work to
maintain a service culturethroughout their rapid
expansion. William, thank you somuch for being on the podcast.
(00:51):
I'm very excited to get to knowyou a bit better and learn about
all the exciting things you'redoing at Time Hotels.
To get started, I would love foryou to introduce yourself, tell
us about your role, a little bitabout your company, and some of
the things that you're workingon.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Sure. Well, first of all, thank you, Adrian, for the
invitation. It's great to bespeaking with you in evening
time Dubai and daytime over thepond. My role as chief operating
officer of Times Hotel. Irecently joined just about 8
months ago.
The key things that I've beenfocusing on actually, a lot has
to do with tech and how we'regonna use it moving forward. But
(01:29):
a little bit about the hotelcompany. So Tyme Hotels is a
regional Middle East company. Itwas started in Dubai about 12
years ago. Time Hotels is ourmajor brand.
We have Time Express. Part ofthe exciting journey for me in
the last 8 months is developingnew brands, building out a
strategy to grow and develop thecompany moving forward. And at
(01:53):
the same time, it's obviouslyvery important that we review
all our technical architecturesand stacks that we've got
throughout the organization. Andas we grow and actually move
into some new countries, thatobviously will have an impact as
well. But it's very exciting.
We are looking to, in the next 3to 5 years, go from 20 hotels to
(02:15):
a 100. Being established now,more big investors and companies
are actually reaching out to usto ask us, would we be
interested, to potentiallymanage one of their assets?
Where when you're small, youhave to be a little bit more
hungry and a little bit moreproactive in terms of to try to
get new deals as biginternational operators,
(02:37):
obviously, of many brands and isa very competitive environment,
not just in the Middle East, butin Africa where we want to grow
and in Southeast Asia as well.So it's a very exciting time.
Grow the company, review ourprocesses and systems as we
expand, launch new brands intothe market, and at the same
time, how does our whole techstack and our current
(03:00):
architecture fit into thatdevelopment plan as well.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
For the growth that you're anticipating, are those
owned assets, or does yourcompany manage or franchise? How
does that work?
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Right now, we are mostly an asset light company,
so we manage other people'sassets. We do have actually
another company that we've beenfocused on to be a third party
operator as well because in theMiddle East, it's actually it's
very interesting because in theUS, the hospitality business is
mostly franchise in terms of thebig international operators.
(03:36):
Over the last decade in Europe,that really has become the
business model in Europe now.What is maybe 10 years ago, 90%
were management contracts, now90% are franchises. And this is
now slowly in the last couple ofyears become far more prevalent
in this part of the world.
And come back to being flexibleand adaptable. You know, we have
(03:58):
to be able to offer differentbusiness models to investors and
current owners, of hotels herein the region. But we are asset
light. However, if we find ahotel in a great location, we
wouldn't mind consideringleasing a hotel. But,
ultimately, asset light andmanaging other people's assets
(04:18):
is our core, and that willprobably be our core moving
forward as well.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Tell me a little bit about the brand. You mentioned
there's one kind of flagshipbrand, but you're potentially
launching some other brands.What would you say the
differences between the brandsare, and what sets you apart
from competitors?
Speaker 1 (04:37):
Well, Tyme Hotels is if you want to reconcile it with
big international brands, it'sthe flagship brand. So for
Hilton is Hilton. For Marriott,it will be Marriott. So for
Thyme Hotels, our upscale brandis Thyme Hotels. Thyme Hotels
will be our upscale brand.
Our midscale brand is ThymeExpress. So that's if you want
(04:57):
to align it with stars ratings,that would be like our 3 star
brand. We have just where wewill be launching, so it's not
official yet. But we did sign 2hotels in the Maldives for 2 new
lifestyle brands. 1 is calledVivi by Thyme, which will be a
soft brand, whereas Thyme Hotelsand ThymeXpress are really hard
(05:19):
brands.
Vivi by Thyme will be ourmidscale, upscale lifestyle
brand. And our lifestyle brandis Halo by Thyme, which will be
our upper upscale brand as well.Our key focus for this will be
really on sustainability,wellness, holistic approach. And
(05:40):
then we are finalizing a luxurybrand and a collaboration with
quite a famous designer in Italycalled that will be Rotella
Hotels, which will be our luxurybrand as well. But at the
moment, we signed what's beenfantastic.
We signed 2 brand new hotels inthe Maldives. What a way to
launch new brands as a brand newasset. So we'll be built to
(06:03):
spec. And so our by time and ourhello by time, they'll be our
1st 2 official lifestyle hotelsfor these brands. However, if
there is an opportunity to get aconversion hotel before they are
completed by q 4 2026, then, ofcourse, you know, we'd be
delighted to expand them prior.
But so that's just a little bitabout where the brands will fit
(06:26):
between midscale up to luxury.And there'll be more official
announcements coming out by theend of the year. But because we
signed it to Namal, there's anannouncement at FHI recently in
Dubai, we can easily discuss ittoday.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
So let's talk about your tech stack. I know you're
currently sort of reviewing thesystems that you have in place
and making sure that everythingmakes sense and is performing
well and the way you need it. Sotalk me through what would you
say is the most critical pieceof your tech stack right now?
Speaker 1 (06:57):
I think for any hospitality company, the most
important part of, hotels techstack is is PMS. Ultimately,
because the PMS connects witheverything. PMS connects
obviously directly andindirectly with the guests
through our, you know, check-in,check out, our guests through
management systems, our key cardsystems, Wi Fi, IPTV. But then
(07:24):
also from a commercialperspective, it connects with
our CRS, our central reservationsystem, our CRM, our central
relationship management system,CMS, content management system,
our RMS for some of our hotels,because, obviously, our PMS is a
single source of the truth. Andthen, of course, there's F and B
(07:45):
point of sale systems thatconnects to spa systems that
connects to so, ultimately, themost important piece of tech
stack in a hotel is this PMSjust because it's so fundamental
to managing relationships bothinternally and externally.
And, actually, what we did thistime, just before arrived, was
to have a strategic partnershipwith Shishi, which are growing
(08:09):
fast. We are the 1st companythat's in the Middle East to
sign with them. Predominantly,in the past, everybody was
Fidelio. That was used to be theonly option. Right?
And globally, and opera, thenwhen Oracle took over as well.
But we've decided to go withShiji, which we found is a great
partner. I think, you know, theywant to grow, and we were a
small chain that give them theopportunity to get into the
(08:33):
region. And being the 1st, wehad built excellent relations
with them and is really goingfrom strength to strength. So as
I mentioned earlier, if there'sone thing that any new hotels
that we really, really need toconvince an owner is is to go
with as a proprietary timehotels PMS.
(08:55):
On top of that, over the lastfew months, we've been looking
at our commercial stack as well.You know, some of our hotels
have get not a lot of keys.Some, you know, it goes from,
like, 48 key hotel to a 776bedroom hotel. So you can
imagine the type of technologyrequired can vary dramatically.
And you also find that sometimesa lot of the big tech companies
(09:18):
have flat fees, which are notcommercially viable for smaller
hotels.
And that's something which whenwe've been negotiating with a
couple of vendors, we've beenselling, guys. You need to have
a reality check here. If youwant all of them, if you want
the big ones, you need to takesome of our smaller key cam
hotels, and you need to make itrealistic for the ownership so
(09:39):
it becomes commercially viable.So we've actually been looking
at our CRS, our CRM, our CMS,and introducing revenue
management system as wellbecause none of our hotels today
had that post COVID. So we'vejust moved over our CRS system.
So we've moved over to Amadeus,which from another vendor, which
(10:02):
I won't name. So not respect,but they do know, so don't
worry. So we've been areactually right in the middle of
the integration for our hotels.And this is one of the important
things going back to him. Allour hotels been on Shiji.
It's been much more seamless andeasier to convert with Amadeus
(10:23):
because they've already got alot of the integration between
both of these systems in placealready. And so that's made it
very easy for us. That will makeit very easy for our other
commercial online partners likeOTAs, like our, wholesalers. So
the connectivity for them willbe very seamless as well. So
(10:44):
that's one of the key reasons wewent with Amadeus.
And similarly as well that theyhave got other solutions for CMS
CRM, which at the moment workwith other vendors. But when
those contracts expire, itcertainly will provide us other
options. And as I say, when youget all your key commercial
(11:05):
platforms, if there was only 2vendors, it really just makes it
much, much easier to managesystems internally as you can do
enterprise changes much quicker.If you need to do any updates,
it's much easier as well thangoing to 3, 4, or 5 vendors to
try and upgrade something. Sothis has been taken up a lot of
(11:27):
time and also implementing, as Isay, in a smaller company, for
example, revenue managementsystems.
We took an independent companyto do the RFP for us. This takes
away internal preferences. Youknow, some of my colleagues have
worked with differentinternational companies that use
different systems. So this takesaway any preference in that
(11:50):
respect. And it was reallycritical to have an RFP so that
there's a genuine apple forapple comparison when it comes
to functionality, when it comesto cost, when it comes to user
friendliness, when it comes tointegration with our other
systems.
For example, you know, beingable to integrate with with and
other other systems that we'vegot. So we actually have chosen
(12:14):
3 of our hotels. Actually, we'regonna start in January with
Flyer or our revenue managementsystem. We went through a robust
RFP process. We went down to 3vendors.
We had the initialpresentations, and then we
decided to go with flyer as wefelt that they were the right
fit, both functionality wise,both on added value to our
(12:39):
company, to the hotelsthemselves, and obviously price
as well. So it's not just aprice deal. You know? It has to
really add value to the businessand our commercial
opportunities.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
So during that RFP process, did you have some
specific criteria that you werelooking for, or how did you
narrow down all those vendors tothe final 3? And then how did
you make the ultimate decisionwith Flyer?
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Well, through the RFP process, we obviously developed
our metrics in terms of whatwere important things to the
business. So we have, like,hotel residences. So we have
large hotels 770 keys, which areseasonal, for example, in Macca.
So grips is very important. Soso that some of the criteria was
a grip capability, forecastingcapability, because some just
(13:27):
manage the revenue, but don'tnecessarily automate
forecasting.
For us, enterprise aboveproperty revenue management was
another thing. The userfriendliness of that because we
have a centralized reservationsand revenue management platform
based on our Cairo office. So itwas looking at the user
friendliness of that. Obviously,cost, training, service
(13:50):
provision, length of contract aswell, because some big vendors
want you 3, 4, 5 years. Andthese days with tech, it can
change so quickly.
So we don't want to becommitted, you know, to longer
terms in that respect as well.Because we're a small company,
and one of our advantages is wecan be flexible and adaptable
(14:10):
and agile. But if you're lockedin for a 5 year contract with an
almost watertight Americanvendor contract, You know, it's
maybe you're in for 4 and a halfyears. You may get out 6 months
earlier. But if a vendor iswilling to say, okay then,
you're new.
You're not well known globally.Give me 12 months, and we can
(14:30):
review it. And then, you know,if we feel it's working well,
then we can continue, or we canlook for something. So the
flexibility of the vendor whenit came to contracting was very
important because technologygrows so far just move so fast.
We don't want to be locked infor long periods of time, which
was the norm.
To be honest, it still is forsome big international
companies. But when you'resmaller, you need to maintain
(14:52):
your agility and youradaptability in the market. So
these were a lot of thequestions that we put forward to
them. Use of friendliness aswell was very important because
when you get a presentation froma vendor like Flyer or any other
vendors out there, for us, itwas simplicity. Don't give me
all the bells and whistles, andI'll be here for 1 hour looking
(15:14):
at things.
You're clicking and clicking andclicking. Just these are the key
things I need to know. Show methem. And at the same time, for
us, forecasting was a big thing,and the data analytics, which
was another thing. And flyer, Ihave to say, between all the
vendors for RMS, their dataanalytics reporting, I mean, for
(15:36):
me, it was fantastic, Reallyfantastic.
And AI forecasting, not havingto load history of your
performance for the last 3years, but using AI, we can
almost plug and play within 2weeks, and we're ready to go
with future forecasting events.So that was some of the key
things that made us go withthem.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
How do you think about technology versus human
interaction? Can you talk to meabout your guest experience and
and the role technology playsthere?
Speaker 1 (16:07):
Sure. I mean, this is something I'm very, very
passionate about. Tech is anenabler of the guest experience.
It is not the guest experience.So tech should be there to make
things easier and take away themundane processing parts of
hospitality and service deliveryis should be used for data
(16:29):
collection as well.
And having that data on ourguest is so as you quote, you're
right. Let's say, first of all,garbage in, garbage out. So you
need to make sure you're puttingquality data in, but then when
is that is how do you then useit? So tech IC is in a marvelous
tool to consolidate data, toconsolidate preferences of our
(16:53):
guests, to take away a lot offriction from our guest
experience as well when they'rephysically in a hotel. But for
me, the guest experiencefundamentally is me and the
guest.
The hardware and the software oftech are great enablers. But for
(17:13):
me, software is from the heart.You sell from the heart. You
know, I think one of the mostinteresting observations I made
during COVID was that, and Idon't even want to remember
everybody wearing a mask, butyou remember that dream when
everybody wore a mask, you couldstill tell some they were
smiling, couldn't they, evenwearing the mask. And it was
(17:33):
because it was coming from theheart and it was coming out of
the eyes.
And even without seeing themouth and, you know, raising
north and that's for me is everycustomer knows when you connect
with them. Every human beingknows when you genuinely
connect. So tech is to help usgenuinely connect, but the
(17:55):
interaction between a teammember and a guest is ultimately
hospitality. So tech will nevertake that away. No matter what
system you've got, you couldhave all these systems.
But if there's not a culture ofgenuine service and hospitality,
it's irrelevant. You can haveall the tech in the world, but
you're still not gonna drivegreat memorable guest
(18:17):
experiences. And guests arelooking for experiences more
than anything. Now it's not justa bit coming and staying. They
want to have a positiveexperience and the hotel or in
the environment around thehotel.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
And for guests at Tyme Hotels, where do they
encounter technology duringtheir stay experience, and are
there certain parts of the guestjourney where it's only human
interaction, or is the techmostly behind the scenes? How
does that look from the guest'sview?
Speaker 1 (18:49):
At this moment in time, most of the tech is behind
the scenes, and most of theguest interaction is obviously
with the team members. It'squite interesting because some
of the normal equipment in aguest room now is almost
redundant. Like if you take atelevision and a television in
the past up until a few yearsago, really, it was to watch TV
(19:10):
in your room and watch a moviein the room. Today, it's just an
extension of your mobile phone.I've got apps from all over.
I've got my Netflix app. I'vegot my Amazon Prime app. I've
got my app for my football,soccer in America. I've got my
app for my UK channels backhome. And so, actually, watching
a TV in a room is completelyredundant.
(19:32):
Now it's what guest are askingis I need to connect to the TV,
not I want to watch the TV. Sothese sort of things are very,
very important. I think the nextthing that will become the norm
in a room or changefunctionality, because I don't
think anybody's fully been ableto make the phone, you know,
(19:52):
manage your curtains, manageyour lights, manage the
temperature in the room. There'sso much tech out there that
might think they do it. Butagain, getting back to
integration, I haven't seen onethat works really well because
most of the tech is not hotelsto protect it.
My belief is that guests want tobe in control of their
(20:13):
environment. So we have to beable to create the systems that
guests can get through thetelephone because everybody uses
a phone for everything. Right?And, the most obvious one at the
moment is, you know, the TV isnow an extension of your
telephone because that's whatall your apps are. And I think
next will be giving the guestsfull control of everything in
(20:36):
the room.
So whatever company can come upwith a seamless, frictionless
application, I think they willdo extremely well because I
think there's so many guests andsomeone in hotel companies would
love that. My home is inScotland. It's minus 2 at the
moment. So I'm on my phone andmy app, and I'm controlling my
(20:57):
boilers back home. But there'snot really a company yet who's
curated something forhospitality.
And I really believe that thiswould be for a guest, front
facing. I think this would be akey thing. As I say, you know,
most guests know, you know,again, in the past, they said,
do you have a spa or a swimmingpool or a gym? And if you never
(21:20):
did not use it these days,customers are even saying, you
know, do you have a smart TV?Because we know that not all
hotels are smart TVs and somepeople are making decisions to
stay in a hotel based on, can Iconnect?
But it's a simple thing. Butback in the day, you went to a
hotel to experience things younever had at home. Right? Now it
sounds almost flipping. Like,you get things at home now that
(21:41):
you don't get in hotels, whichfrustrates you even more.
So I think that's the next stepwhere technology will truly be
frictionless for our guestexperience will be when they can
connect through the phone towhat they want. They're in
control, not us.
Speaker 3 (21:54):
I'm curious to dig in to the ReviewPro tool. How has
analyzing guest review datahelped you uncover insights?
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Well, let me give you just a quick overview. The
ReviewPro consolidates everyonline guest feedback for your
hotel and your competitor. Sofor example, you know, I'll take
every online sales of a 250online guest review, the
tripadvisor, booking.com, Googleholiday check. I mean, those
(22:26):
just hundreds of them out there.So this consolidates every
single guest feedback.
It actually aggregates it fordifferent parts of the guest
experience. It compels youagainst yourself. It compels you
against your competition even soyou can benchmark yourself. It
is multilingual. So if you wantto translate into any language,
it provides it.
(22:46):
So if we get even a reply inRussian, we can the tool
translates into English so wecan understand. We can either
reply in Russian, which is thepreferred, you know, try and
reply in the language of thegear sculpture. And then it
tells you what's trending up.What's trending down. What are
you doing good on the, be it asan English language, as a Arabic
in terms of your trending up ordown?
(23:07):
So it's good. So manyopportunities to really cut up
and analyze different parts ofthe business. Also, does it for
the competition? So I'll giveyou an example. Some of your
listeners would know aboutrevenue management system.
Sorry. STR. So STR tells you howyou compare your RevPAR against
the competition. But in thepast, you could only do that
(23:30):
when you were opened. Now, whenwe were opening new hotels and
my old company review crewallows me to go and check the
competition before I'm opened soI can see their scores, what
they do well, what they don't dowell, even to the extent of I
can find out there's somebodynamed a lot, a good team member
who's named on a lot of reviews.
I could proactively tell my HRteam, hey, guys, this guy in
(23:52):
that bar, I've seen his name somany times, go and employ and
poach him. I don't care. Soactually, having your
competitors data as well cantell you what they're doing
well, what they can improve. Soeven though if you're doing
preopening and you want to go onsales calls, the information
you've got in your competitionis really powerful as well. And
it allows you to have reallymeaningful conversations with
(24:16):
competition.
So it compels you every part ofthe hotel, different
nationality. It gives you bynationality as well. It's just
such a great aggregator of data,and it's very simple and is very
quick. You know, you can getreports. It's live.
It's dynamic. It's up to date.It refreshes by the hours, not
by the days. And as I said, it'sreally a great preopening tool.
(24:39):
And at the same time, it's theSTR for guest experience.
So you can really use it tomeasure really benchmark
yourself against thecompetition, which is really
good as well. So, yeah, it's agreat tool. I haven't seen a
better tool that consolidatesguest reviews than review pro.
I'm sure there's many out there,but it would have to be really
special to use up ReviewPro. AndI don't get any commission from
(25:03):
Shishi.
Don't worry.
Speaker 3 (25:06):
I wanna have just one more question. Drawing on your
experience at different brandsworking around the world, what
would you say are 1 or 2qualities that a hotelier should
have in order to be successfultoday?
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Number 1, and it's not even today. I think it's in
the past, It's in the presentand it will be in the future.
You must embrace change. Maybeeven in life, you know, being
able to embrace change and adaptis really, really important.
Business is moving so fast.
So dynamically, it's reallyimportant to embrace change.
(25:41):
Don't fight it because it'sgoing to happen. It's
inevitable. So as how do youoptimize and how do you drive
and get competitive advantage inthe change process? Been in many
companies and I've experiencedcompanies and people within a
company who have an embracedchange and has been painful.
And I've seen people reallythrive both individually and as
(26:03):
as a company. So I think number1 is is really embrace change
and be agile and adaptable.Number 2, God gave us 2 eyes, 2
ears, and 1 mouth. And I thinkhe was trying to tell us
something that we should listentwice as much as we speak. I
think listening is a verypowerful tool that is
(26:23):
underestimated.
I think in the hospitalityindustry, the more you listen
and observe, you'll make muchbetter decisions you'll be far
more engaging. You'll solveproblems better and you'll
create truly great guestexperiences because you're
really listening to what theguest wants. So I think that's
not, so number 1 is change,embrace it and, you know, be
(26:46):
agile through the process.Number 2 is listening. And
number 3 again is, you know,just be positive.
It's infectious. I think whenyou work in a team, having a
positive energy within yourdepartment really adds
tremendous value. Andhospitality is just teamwork.
(27:10):
Nobody does anything bythemselves. You know?
And we are all interdependent,and if we're all really
embracing the dynamics of changein the fast pace of what's
happening in our hotels, if welisten to each other, and if we
remain positive, we'll have agreat working environment and a
great environment for guests toget a great guest experience.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
Well, thank you for sharing. And thank you so much
for taking the time to speakwith us. It was really lovely
chatting with you and learningall about the exciting things
that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
Thank you, and you have a great day ahead.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
That's all for today's episode. Thanks for
listening to Hotel Tech Insiderproduced by hotel tech
report.com. Our goal with thispodcast is to show you how the
best in the business areleveraging technology to grow
their properties and outperformthe concept by using innovative
digital tools and strategies. Iencourage all of our listeners
to go try at least one of thesestrategies or tools that you
(28:05):
learned from today's episode.Successful digital
transformation is all aboutconsistent small experiments
over a long period of time, sodon't wait until tomorrow to try
something new.
Do you know a hotelier who wouldbe great to feature on this
show, or do you think that yourstory would bring a lot of value
to our audience? Reach out to medirectly on LinkedIn by
searching for Jordan Hollander.For more episodes like this,
(28:29):
follow Hotel Tech Insider on allmajor streaming platforms like
Spotify and Apple Music.
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