P
ower
The
of
Branding
By Colin Cowie
As consumers continue to elevate their
standards, the travel and hospitality industry
must keep up. The matter of the fact is: these
popular hotel brands can no longer do so alone.
The new trend is to integrate top-notch brands
that are widely recognized into every aspect of
the consumer experience, from the designer
fragrance they smell as soon as they awaken
to the luxurious Egyptian thread sheets on
their beds at night, the celebrity chef in the
restaurant to the high-end spa operator.
It is no longer enough for a 5-star hotel to
feature its own spa, as the traveler wants brands
they know and love. This makes the La Prairie
Spa at the Ritz Carlton New York a success, as
well as the Bliss spas and bathroom amenities
at W hotels nationwide. Even at sea, customers
are now treated to Canyon Ranch spa facilities
and services on Oceania and Celebrity Cruises.
The rock star of hands and feet is Bastien
62 ILHA
Gonzalez at all of the One and Only’s, where
a simultaneous choreographed manicure
and pedicure can price upwards of $300 for
treatment.
Features placed in hotel rooms like Alexa or
Siri, Apple TV, and Netflix in addition to cable
comfort the consumer in-room, while curated
playlists in the lobby and diffusers in the
elevator ensure maximum luxury throughout
the entire property. Even the biggest names
in the industry, like the St. Regis, the Ritz
Carlton, and the Four Seasons are listening to
consumers and enhancing their strengths with
help from external curators. These are people
whose job it is to scour the overcrowded
marketplace and ruthlessly edit until they
find the appropriate assortment that is on-
brand for the hotel, for example, Chef Jean
Georges at the Trump International or Public
Hotel.