Asset management with hotels and hotel furniture

The economy has slowly been recovering which has led to businesses finally turning a profit. The travel and hospitality industry was arguably hit the hardest. There was no doubt the recession made businesses take a much closer look at their business strategy. With less money around, everything became about survival. Hotels were wringing every last bit of value they could from their assets. Half-filling two hotels will never generate as much value as completely filling a single building. Despite budgets returning and economic improvements, hotels are still under pressure to increase profits and ‘go green’. And to do so, hotels are looking at what assets they have and how they can reuse them to get more value. It’s clear this is a time of opportunity. People have been talking about sustainability for years – and now hotels are taking steps towards change by making full use of their existing assets in order to reduce their costs and understand the importance of asset management while providing a quality experience for guests away from home. The continual acquisition of new furniture is expensive. Furniture refinishing however, is something that both the government and universities do regularly. Furniture acquisition takes a toll both on the bottom-line and the environment - old furniture needs to be disposed of, often ending up in a landfill, and the new furniture then has to be manufactured and delivered to the location, which is costly in many ways. But there are alternatives: by investing in renovations and partnering with refinishing specialists instead of trashing existing hotel furniture, both the costs and environmental impacts are reduced significantly. At the same time organizations have the opportunity to become more sustainable and ROI dramatically increases. rnFor years, hotels have operated with profitability in mind, but not completely in focus. As guests demanded more amenities, hotels would spend more, but in turn charge more. This way of doing things became normal, part of the culture. But this culture of not worrying about money, and continually buying new assets, is not really compatible with sustainable practices. Now, hotels are starting to look at ways to reuse existing assets – such as furniture refinishing or modifying existing pieces such as armoires – but this must be adopted throughout the entire industry. In many ways, the recession has unified hotels in making better use of budgets and reducing environmental impact. Reusing or repurposing existing assets like hotel furniture is crucial if they are to do this. Otherwise the business is likely to overspend, and any attempt at sustainability and potentially survival, is doomed to failure. Sustainable initiatives such as asset management are environmentally friendly and make solid business sense. Never were words more true - for hotels and businesses in general, the time to act is now.