We sat down with Kevin Gemsa, Revenue Manager at Hey Lou HOTELS, to talk about how they adopted our revenue management system (RMS) to elevate their market share and take their revenue strategy to the next level.
Introducing Hey Lou HOTELS
Hey Lou is an innovative and sustainable hotel concept with seven properties across Germany.
At the heart of what we do is the belief in using AI and digitalization to simplify daily hotel management and offer our guests a seamless, personalized, online journey.
Tech stack
- PMS: MEWS
- CRS: Siteminder
- Booking engine: GauVendi
The problem
Our revenue management process was entirely manual. Updating rates for seven properties took up so much of our time that it left little room for planning ahead or focusing on strategic growth.
We needed an automated solution that would not only streamline repetitive tasks but also help us focus on long-term strategy and planning for key periods and events.
Choosing Duetto
After exploring several options, Duetto stood out for its perfect blend of advanced technology and user-friendly features. What really impressed us was its ability to adjust rates in real time using dynamic pricing capabilities, combined with robust analytics that empowered us to make data-driven decisions.
Duetto’s focus on innovation and its deep understanding of the hospitality industry perfectly aligned with our mission to leverage technology for delivering smarter, more personalized guest experiences. It wasn’t just about finding a platform — it was about finding the right partner to help streamline our operations and elevate our pricing strategy to new heights.
Onboarding
The onboarding process was a breeze. In just a few weeks, all seven of our properties were fully set up and running, with Duetto’s incredibly supportive customer success team on hand to ensure everything ran smoothly.
We adopted GameChanger to optimize bookings, Scoreboard for accurate reporting and forecasting, BlockBuster to maximize profitability from group business segments, and Advance for dynamic pricing optimization using market demand and events data.
The platform's seamless integration with our property management system (PMS), combined with its intuitive design, allowed our team to quickly become proficient users.
The onboarding experience went above and beyond our expectations and gave us a solid foundation for a great partnership.
“Investing in an RMS is a key, but success depends on finding one that fits your company’s strategy and philosophy.”
- Martin Kemmer, Founder and CEO of Hey Lou HOTELS
The results
Adopting Duetto’s tech stack completely evolved our revenue strategy. We’ve gone from playing catch up to proactively driving our growth.
1. Smarter pricing decisions
Activating the autopilot feature has revolutionized our daily pricing decisions, making them more efficient and effective. This shift has freed up time for in-depth analysis and planning, enabling us to craft dynamic and optimized pricing strategies. We’re now making more informed decisions across all our properties.
2. More revenue opportunities
While we already had a robust strategic guide, Duetto empowered us to bring this strategy to life in a more dynamic and efficient way. The introduction of restriction strategies has given us better control and flexibility, letting us tap into revenue opportunities we were previously missing out on.
3. Better forecasting
We now have a clearer understanding of our property's demand patterns. As a result, we've been able to plan targeted campaigns that have positively impacted our brand's recognition, recognize need periods early, rethink our marketing and sales approaches, and optimize our staffing plans.
4. Simplified group quotation process
BlockBuster has simplified the pricing process for group inquiries, allowing us to secure more group bookings while minimizing displacement.
My advice
In a fast-paced industry, you need a system that’s innovative and flexible enough to adapt to market changes. A good RMS should rely on accurate and relevant data to deliver valuable insights and automate pricing decisions.
By choosing the right RMS, you can optimize pricing, maximize revenue, and stay competitive. But it’s still essential to have a skilled rRevenue mManager guiding your strategy.
