The family-run company, O’Callaghan Hotel invested €30 million to renovate three of its four Dublin hotels, the Alexander, the Davenport hotel and the Stephen’s Green. We observe that there are more and more hotels that decide to renovate in order to attract guests. But is this really important or is it quack remedy?
Nowadays, hotel renovation is not only replacing worn out furniture and mattresses but much more the definition of competition in the hotel industry. A hotel needs to be up to standard, fresh and technologically aligned.
According to hoteliers, they are basically three cycles in a hotel’s life: refurbishment, basic renovation and complete renovation. You need to renovate because if you don’t your guests will fade as fast you do.
First of all, are we going to renovate or reinvent? If we take the example of the O’Callaghan Davenport hotel which will be rebranded as The Davenport, the idea is to refresh the image of the hotel while keeping what made it famous. All the changes that will be done have been made to improve guests experience.
The first thing you want to renovate is the bedrooms because you are thinking that is what is really in the centre of the guest journey. Yes, it’s true but a simple thing to start refurbishing is the lobby. Why the lobby? Because it’s the first impression that matters, a great lobby will be the first thing the guests will see, it needs to be perfect.
For The Davenport, we have decided to make a more elegant and brighter lobby and reception.
Before going upstairs to the bedrooms, let’s think about the great restaurants in Dublin. The restaurant is a truly crucial area of your hotel, it could be what makes it perfect or what will ruin all of your efforts. The key to success in a renovation is the coherence of your hotel, you can’t have a shining hotel and a bad restaurant. This why The Davenport restaurant was also designed in the same spirit as the reception and lobby.
Another area that we tend to forget is the meeting room area, this is what is going to attract your corporates guests. Spacious, practical and high-tech friendly are the keys to a nice meeting room. Once again don’t forget the coherence between all the areas of your hotel. The Davenport meeting rooms will be spacious and bright thanks to natural light coming through big glass windows.
Last but not least the bedrooms need to be perfect. We are talking about top-quality furniture, high-tech facilities and something that we often underestimate a nice and clean bathroom. This is what guests are going to judge first, in order to provide them a perfect experience you need to focus on this part of the renovation.
The renovation started a few weeks ago and is due to be over in September 2018. Will you be there to see our brand-new hotel?
