Some people think booking accommodation is easy. You just get a good rate and book it! I suppose in the same way, cooking is easy. Everyone can cook. And everyone can drive, too. I've been driven by plenty of poor drivers, eaten too much bad food and have stayed in some truly awful accommodation. So maybe it isn't that easy after all?
I've had some clients wax lyrical about one lodge, and then others, just a few weeks apart, tell me why it wasn't any good. I've had some clients tell me why their hosts are the best people in the world, and others tell me they were terrible. So, not everyone see the same thing.
For a number of years we have been asking our clients, agents, and personal assistants to tell us as much as possible about the people travelling so we can match them up with the correct accommodation. On our side, we keep tabs on the accommodation, understanding how changes of management can totally alter the feel of a place (for better or for worse), and in the best cases working with those places to shore up any weak points. (with our own hosts and chefs for example).
Our favourite accommodation providers are open to this process and we work together well and in 99% of cases have extremely happy clients. Some other accommodation providers operate a 'closed shop' where our influence is stopped at the front door. Sometimes they do very well. Sometimes they don't.
Others price themselves too high. Occasionally some price too low (see Silver Pine for one of the best bargains in the country at the moment).
We had a wonderful moment two weeks ago with a VIP group when we trialled a new estate - Glen Aros in Hawke's Bay. Our clients, who had tried some of the best established places in the country loved this newcomer. We were the first clients ever (I had visited the place a couple of months earlier for an inspection) and are already booking it again.
Operated in conjunction with top lodge Greenhill, and presented to the market with all the sophistication those professionals are famous for - I re-print below my feedback to the owner.
"A quick word of personal thanks from me for being allowed to use your gracious home for our clients. They absolutely loved the place. I think a combination of the tranquillity, elegance, attention to detail, original features, and excellent understated service worked very well. It is a special home with its own aura which offers travellers a haven within which to restore their energies. I am certainly keen on placing more clients there as I have seen how it worked on these ones, and these ones were very hard to please. The adults who stayed there (one couple had to leave early) rated Glen Aros as the top place they had been to on their trip. The hosting was excellent, the finishing touches were spot-on, and the support from Greenhill was first class
Welcome, Glen Aros, to the world of luxury tourism.
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