NIVY Watch in Hospitality

The travel & tourism industry is everywhere and makes up for a whopping 10.4% of the world's GDP in 2019 (statistica.com). Whenever we visit another city, we are contributing to that number. In the US alone, 13.13 million people work directly in the hospitality and leisure industry. With all the changes over the last few years in hospitality, it is an industry that has to constantly innovate. According to Binwise.com 60% of restaurants fail within the first year and a scary 80% within the first 5 years. Clearly not an easy industry, this use case report will look at how technology such as NIVY can help.

Data that matters

Cost of employment is one of the highest numbers on most companies books. Pair that with training, recruitment, employee benefits and HR departments, the numbers get even higher.

NIVY has the ability to provide a whole wealth of data to the employer and enable quicker, smoother communication with the employee. Let’s have a look at some use cases that could benefit from NIVY.

Room Turnaround

Hotels have to maximize their occupancy during the busy month and with some hotels having 100s of rooms, that can be quite a challenge.

Think about a large hotel with 500+ rooms. At an 80% occupancy and with the average person staying 2 nights in a hotel, that is 200 rooms that need a turnaround every day.

To add to the already large amount of work that needs to be done, the turnaround staff can generally only access the rooms between check-out and check-in, that window can be as small as 3 hours in some cases.

Now, imagine a person checks out at 6am to catch a flight, how do you inform the turnaround crew? Do they have company mobile phones? Or maybe a system on a laptop or computer?

This is where NIVY could be utilized to integrate with the internal booking system, it would automatically send a notification to the turnaround crew’s mobile devices. They would know exactly what room they could clean in real time. The device could even use the location beacons to identify the nearest crew member to the room, all automatically, without the need for human intervention.

Bartending/Table Service

How about in a restaurant environment? How can NIVY help improve the service quality and efficiency?

Let’s have a look at how we call a server to our table – the awkward trying to catch eye contact or waving a hand in the air. We could get rid of all of this with a small service button on the table that alerts the relevant water or waitress, this could also be used in the kitchen to replace traditional pager systems for alerting the waiter/waitress when the food is ready to be served.

We could get rid of all of this with a small service button on the table that alerts the relevant waiter or waitress, this could also be used in the kitchen to replace traditional pager systems for alerting when the food is ready to be served.

The data from the watches can then be used to improve efficiencies. Imagine that each server has 10 tables each, but you see one server is taking double the amount of steps because their tables are further away. It sounds simple, but that means that

The server is exhausting themselves
The clients sitting on the further 10 tables, most likely get slower service

By taking simple steps based on the data, restaurants can provide better service, a better employee environment and increase profitability.

Client Tracking

Above all, let’s not forget about our clients. This won’t suit all organizations, but some would be able to benefit greatly.

Imagine arriving at a spa for a weekend to relax with your partner. You are both given NIVY Watches branded to the Spa. The watch will give you tips and advice on the various products around the hotel, can be used to notify you of any classes that are about to start and be used to call for service anywhere in the Spa with the staff knowing your precise location.

You may say, why not an app? I already have a smartwatch!

But, Most people want to relax when they go to a spa. It is a time to switch off from the outside world. A watch that is only there to assist you and help you relax is not the same as a smartwatch which notifies you every time your latest electric bill comes through.

Conclusion

Smartwatches are only now finding their way into professional applications. They provide an almost impersonalized environment to communicate in an efficient and practical manner.

We know smartwatches are here to stay, and the hospitality industry will continue to grow. Together, we can help build sustainable, quality businesses that are future proofed and process efficient.