The worldwide pandemic isn’t quite over, but these days, the food and beverage departments of hotels are mostly busier than ever. That said, pandemic-related circumstances can change at a moment’s notice and F&B departments must be ready to adjust on the fly.
Contributed by Jeanette Hurt
“What we’re seeing [especially in Las Vegas] is that the world is coming back pretty quickly,” said Jason Lapin, president of Blau + Associates, a Las Vegas-based F&B operator and consultancy. “I want to be cautious, and there’s probably some hard lessons learned over the past year, as an operator and consultant to other operators, but (COVID-19) is taking a backseat to the fact that F&B here is more pent-up business out there than our industry can handle in the current labor market. That is the far bigger conversation right now.”
With labor shortages, Blau had to become more efficient, in not just how staffing is deployed, but also entraining new entry level staff. “We had to revise our training mechanisms to get our staff up to the level of service we need, as well as to give them a lot of support,” Lapin added.
Operating and selling the new paradigm means dealing with labor. “Right now, our main challenges are the lack of variable labor within the overall service industry, as well as increased supply chain disruption, both of which have impacted our daily operations,” said Carlos Cepero, director of food and beverage at The Don CeSar, St. Pete Beach, Florida.
Kelly Giger, director of sales and marketing at The Industrialist Hotel, a Marriott Autograph Collection property in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, said that labor shortages kept the hotel’s restaurant, the Rebel Room, from serving lunch when the hotel first opened in May, but by mid-summer, things eased enough that it is staffed for three meals a day, seven days a week.
But pandemic considerations linger as restrictions and virus mitigation efforts change, and global operators have to remain nimble and able to pivot. “Our culinary portfolio is sought-after, and we are seeing that the pent-up demand for travel is matched by a pent-up demand for incredible culinary moments,” said Martin Chung, senior vice president of operations for Kerzner International, which owns hotels and resorts across the globe. “However, our biggest challenge is one that the global community is also facing – the ability of guests to arrive at our destinations around the world as restrictions continue to change.”
But for Alberico Nunziata, director of food and beverage, The Beverly Hilton, in California, the story is different as he said in late July that his operation was quickly moving towards operating like it did pre-pandemic.
One area that continues to meet customer expectations is the emphasis on health and safety. “Health and safety have always been a top priority across our portfolio, but we have made a lot of those elements more visible to guests to re-enforce that confidence,” Chung said.
Health and safety elements are also being built-in and customized so that they fit in seamlessly throughout properties. At the Bottleworks Hotel in Indianapolis, Indiana, the operator built customized, Art Deco-inspired hand sanitizer stations that are subtly integrated into the hotel’s overall design esthetic. “Obviously, cleanliness remains a big thing,” said Amy Isbell-Williams, the hotel’s general manager.
In Part 2 of this report presented tomorrow, HOTELS will go deeper on the types of service models and marketing techniques have proven successful for F&B operators.
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Yu Lik Ng
September 20, 2021 at 1:55 pmRecovery from the pandemic is at best patchy, varying geographically from city to city, and most definitely from country to country as government policies swing back and forth between protecting lives to protecting livelihoods, all while grappling with reactions from their population, even more so for those heading into any kind of elections.
In Southeast Asia and the Pacific region (Australia & New Zealand), governments have initially endeavoured towards a zero-Covid policy. This resulted in an unpredictable and highly disruptive start/stop cycle dependent on the case count of positive Covid infections in the community. Sadly, many F&B establishments decided that this was not sustainable and threw in the towel until a stable environment would allow their re-entry. Concurrently, many F&B businesses pivoted towards food delivery platforms as a means to keep their heads above water, accepting lower profitability arising from commissions paid to such platforms.
Is there a right or wrong strategy? Only time will tell. Manpower may be a huge headache, but financial survival was above everything else!
As the narrative gradually turns towards an “Endemic Policy”, ie, living with Covid as a norm, governments are still nervous about a completely re-opened economy fearing out-of-control infection rates that may result in higher mortality among the infected, while acknowledging the detrimental impact of Covid restrictions on society, families, and the financial well being of the population derived from an economy on hold. In short, there is no precedent that allows an accurate forecast, hence a tentative plan moving forward that is still subject to tweaks along the way, albeit on a much smaller and less disruptive scale.
Still not quite a stable environment upon which to develop clear & confident business plans and budgets as 2022 creeps up on us all.
Still, it points to some light at the end of a very long and gloomy tunnel, however faint and flickering it may be.