This week was full of good news for the sector, with France the latest country to have a clear line to reopening hotels. Of those countries which have moved towards cautious reopening of the hospitality sector, there have been photos of happy drinkers wearing helicopter rotor-style hats to enforce social distancing and thankfully few reports of a spike in infections.
Time to claim victory? No, but time to stop panicking. The crisis may still be there, but the panic is subsiding. The guidance for opening is increasingly clear and, as the saying goes, once you have the box, it’s that much easier to work out how to think outside it and innovate within your business. People can breathe again.
That’s not to say that it won’t be hard. The sector continues to lobby vigorously around the world, pointing out to governments that it will need ongoing support as it will not be back to full strength for years. Employees and businesses alike cannot go forward without the appreciation that, with social distancing in place, they just can’t operate as before.
Of the two to three hundred webinars this hack has been party to daily, the theme has been hoteliers, restauranteurs and bar owners plotting how to reopen in a way that has guests safe, reassured and feeling like they’re having a good night out, not like the kids are going to be scared witless by waiting staff in hazmat suits. So, rather than rip out 75% of your restaurant tables, put stuffed animals in the chairs you can’t use. Not mannequins, as some have suggested, we still have to sleep at night.
This is all serving to accelerate trends in operations and in technology in particular, with PnK People’s Kevin Edwards telling us this week to beware impulse purchases - you don’t need a robot - but you do need help being more efficient.
Continuing with things we do need - after a vaccine, fun is right up there on the list. After a series of missives from Accor about how they can keep guests safe and in touch with medical professionals, the company launched a new campaign which it hoped would help guests ‘reignite the love of travel’. The campaign did, yes, feature an image of someone wearing a mask but - and here it comes - in an amusing way. Fun is back.
The advert shows the housebound fantasising about what they’ll get up to when they leave the house: dreaming about yoga on the beach, not the living room floor, scuba diving in the bath, imagining the cat is a lion on safari. We’ve all done it. Yes, often Sangria features, but even the occasional glance up from the screen to catch a slant of sun reminds you that yes, travel is still out there, travel awaits.
So dial back the panic, dial up the fun and get your rotor blade on.