For a hotel guest a clean bed and plate are not enough any more. Experience of something unusual is what counts now.

Year 2018 in Polish hotel real estate market should be better than previous one, when 110 new hotels were categorised - as provided in a ProValue’s survey included in Colliers International’s 'Market Insights' report. ProValue experts estimate quicker development based on significant increase in number of hotels planned and under construction, not only in Warsaw or Tri-City (Gdańsk, Gdynia, Sopot), but also in other major regional cities. Moreover, Polish tourist resorts record increased demand for hotel services. In 2017 local resorts noted entry of such international brands as Marriott in Sopot (rebranding) and Radisson Blu Resort in Świnoujście. Moreover, the following are planned: Hilton Garden Inn in Kołobrzeg, Radisson Blu Hotel & Residence and Four Points by Sheraton in Zakopane, Radisson Blu Resort & SPA in Szklarska Poręba, Hilton Garden Inn in Wałpusz (Mazury lake district).

Not only numbers

In opinion of Karol Weber, hotel inspector and author of the Enjoyyourstay.pl blog, we see renaissance of hotel services. Watching changes within last few years, he points out mainly to those related to new trends. What’s interesting, some of them exclude one another.

On one hand, new technologies move market towards smart hotels offering everything via mobile phone - from on-line booking to light or temperature management in your room. On the other hand, while looking for unusual places, close to nature, we will find places off the cellphone grid and without internet access - Karol Weber says.

According to Weber, hotel chains build the brand image based on values dear to the kind of guests they want to acquire, and in order to stand out among others. They declare support for human rights, equal rights, sustained development, or charity activities. Very strong trends include ecology (green certificates for new buildings are something obvious now) and wellness.

Power of experience

Weber points out to the fact that hotels and B&B/boarding houses develop in the context of extraordinary, surprising experience. They are not places you simply sleep and eat at anymore, they are a social space. This applies not only to small, boutique places, but also to large chains. New trends influence revolutionary changes, for example in the design of a hotel lobby. In order to shorten the distance between guests and the hotel staff, high reception counters are replaced with desks and sofas to sit on, as for example in Mercure Kraków Stare Miasto.

Guests’ expectations have radically changed within the last few years. Today, people staying at ibis Styles, Sofitel, Mercure, Novotel or MGallery want to experience not only something nice, but most of all something unique and extraordinary - explains Joanna Świerkosz, marketing, quality and loyalty programmes manager of Orbis and AccorHotels Eastern Europe Group.

At slow pace

The new generation of tourists redefined traditional notion of luxury. Something perceived so far as exclusive, now starts to mean unique.

New luxury is an unusual experience, custom adventures allowing for personal fulfillment. While travelling we want to gain new skills, hear absorbing stories, meet people who will share their passion with us. We prefer to spend our hard-earned money on such experience, related to savouring of something small, but reachable, something we can touch - Aleksandra Klonowska-Szałek, co-founder of Slowhop.com portal explains.

Portal, created over a year ago, specialises in searching and describing places known for passion of their creators in Poland. It would never be able to compete with giants such as Booking or Airbnb, but it did find its market niche by presenting unobvious offer. It presents over 170 carefully selected places, notes over 160 thousand visits and over one thousand booking inquiries every month. It is just about to expand abroad (starting from the Czech Republic).

At first, our guests are most delighted by interiors furnished with 200-years-old original furniture. They admire old wooden floors, stone or wattle and daub walls uncovered from under plaster, or original wooden ceilings. They could easily see the same in an open-air museum, but here this is not an exhibition only. They can put their clothes in old wardrobes, sit on 19th century chairs that bear marks of the craftsman who made them and are one of a kind - Magdalena Tracz, owner of Dzikie Róże in Janice, describes reactions of tourists travelling with Slowhop.

One may look for extraordinary atmosphere at the slow pace both in palaces and small manor houses turned into boutique hotels (e.g. Pałac Nakomiady, Hotel Quadrille in Gdynia, Dwór Dawidy), as well as in old houses, like Dzikie Róże or Dom Tkacza in the Sowie Mountains. Prices are higher than at places offering regular accommodation, and reservation should be made way in advance.

by 

Paweł Berłowski, Puls Biznesu, 16-04-2018