295 | Doing Well: Coronavirus pandemic advances wellness design and programs in hotels
Summary: <br> {caption}OUTSIDE IN: Hotel of Tomorrow, a forum of more than 300 collaborators gathered by The Gettys Group of Chicago, identified biophilia as an emerging design trend in hospitality that integrates nature into buildings and shifts more activities outdoors. Hotel of Tomorrow participants believe the concept is going to exponentially grow because the coronavirus pandemic has caused pent-up people the world over to crave and appreciate the wide outdoors.{/caption}<br> COVID-19 sharpens hospitality’s focus on mind, body and spirit <br> In a worldwide survey of travel consumers, the Wellness Tourism Association in July <a href="https://www.wellnesstourismassociation.org/nearly-4000-consumers-reveal-wellness-vacation-motivations-post-pandemic-travel/">reported</a> it found most respondents crave more “nature-based” experiences.<br> The association based in Denver, Colorado, surveyed 4,000 consumers from 48 countries from May through June. It found people’s top motivation in wellness travel is “to return to everyday life rejuvenated.”<br> A close runner-up is “to experience activities outdoors.”<br> The sharper focus on overall wellness in travel during the global coronavirus pandemic is causing hotel owners and operators to think beyond the now-normal COVID-19 clean-and-safe protocols. Hotels will start to deploy technology, programming and materials that build anti-COVID spaces where guests can live, work and sleep and come home feeling better than when they left, experts say.<br> Given that the coronavirus pandemic has driven many people toward outdoor activities, it’s no surprise that people want to breathe free and create their own safe spaces within a natural environment.<br> One company that’s leading thought on how to deliver what travel consumers crave these days is The Gettys Group.<br> The Chicago-based hospitality design company revived its Hotel of Tomorrow think tank in July to explore how to create solutions to challenges wrought by the pandemic.<br> <a href="https://gettys.com/">The Gettys Group</a> first established the forum in 2003 with about a hundred hospitality-related developers, designers, manufacturers, owners and operators from all over the world who put their minds together to imagine the future of hospitality and travel and how to respond.<br> It held workshops for a few years before the program went on hiatus in 2006, but out of that came Botlr, <a href="https://www.savioke.com/">Savioke’s robotic butler</a> first used by Aloft Hotels to deliver on guests’ requests for such things as towels, toiletries and items from the hotel retail center.<br> This year, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/ron-swidler-521a848/">Ron Swidler</a>, chief innovation officer at The Gettys Group, said the forum drew ideas from 325 collaborators and came up with five top concepts, which it announced in September in its <a href="https://www.gettys.com/news/insights/trendline-issue-09-five-big-ideas-and-the-trends-that-drove-them/">Trendline report</a>.<br> At the top of the stack is the bed. But not just any bed. Bed XYZ is designed to deliver a night’s sleep so fulfilling it meets the traveler’s number-one desire to be rejuvenated during their stay.<br> <br> {caption}SLEEPING WELL: Bed XYZ is the top idea to emerge from Hotel of Tomorrow, a global think tank The Gettys Group design firm formed to tackle challenges and capitalize on emerging trends in the hospitality industry. Episode 295 of Lodging Leaders podcast explores how the coronavirus pandemic is advancing wellness design and programs in hotels.{/caption}<br> Simply sleeping is, of course, important but Bed XYZ offers so much more. It is a technology-enhanced system that controls the room’s environment and monitors guest’s sleeping patterns, much like an Apple Watch.<br> The bedding materials are antimicrobial and antibacterial, meaning they absorb and repel bad things, including viruses.
