The Revenue Experiment
While serving as Front Office Manager at a large hotel catering predominantly to leisure groups, I became fascinated by distribution.
At the time, revenue management – both in terms of systems and culture – was still emerging.
Convincing management and ownership to invest in dedicated systems and specialised staff often required as much selling as the rooms themselves.
Most business was negotiated with wholesalers and tour operators at fixed prices.
Something about the methodology fascinated me.
I wanted to understand how it actually worked.
Not the theory. The mechanism. The chain.
How did guests find us? Why did some channels perform better than others? Why did some market segments behave differently from others?
I became absorbed by questions such as:
- GDS and OTAs
- Distribution costs, commissions, mark-ups, kick-backs
- Market segments and sources of business
- Pricing, net or inclusive of VAT and city tax
- Demand, pickup, washdown, pace, and double-occupancy density
- Room categories and benefits, addressing leisure, MICE and business needs
- Yield management
- Reputation management
I experimented relentlessly.
Without specialised software. Without automated tools.
This was long before today’s user-friendly PMS systems and apps.
All I had were spreadsheets, observation, curiosity, and adjustment.
I changed one thing. Observed the result. Changed another.
Observed again. Slowly, patterns started to emerge. The result was not merely better occupancy.
The result was a different business model. New market segments emerged. Dependence on low-yield wholesale business decreased.
The hotel began attracting guests who had previously never considered it.
What had been considered an out-of-town wholesale hotel gradually became one of the city’s strongest online performers.
Looking back, the lesson was not revenue management.
The lesson was curiosity.
Understanding the mechanism often creates opportunities that remain invisible to others.
Thank you for reading my article.
This article is about how curiosity taught me to look beyond the obvious.
This is the seventh of a series of articles – “What hospitality taught me about myself” – in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey, and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.
I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.
Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.
About the Author
Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 25 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.
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