How to make more money in your hotel lobby?

With the festive season behind us, hopefully you would have started to pack off the Christmas decoration and the lobby is back to the original state. Now is the time to ask the question how to make more money in your hotel lobby.

The hotel lobby is by far the most interesting public space in a lobby that you wish was not there, because it just sits there as a functional utility which is almost free to your guest but cost you money to maintain.

You would have much rather create a space that would give you some money in the short term while providing guest with the same functional space that they need.

In a traditional sense, the hotel lobby is a place where the guest first interact with the hotel and the team, gets to socialize and generally have a space bigger than the guest room.

Monetizing the lobby space with Food and Beverage

Monetizing the lobby should be done while keeping the functionality of the space in mind. In case you are planning a redesign, consider the following:

Plan for a Food and Beverage outlet in the lobby:

We know that guest want to relax and socialize. With more free standing restaurants and bars opening in your vicinity, your food and beverage outlets may not be getting used as much as you wish.

The reason is that most of them may be at a different level and the guest may not explore the options.

With an lobby lounge or a coffee shop at the lobby, you will provide guest an option to use your service at the same time, the space can act as a marketing front where you can advertise other services in the hotel

If you are worried on the labour cost aspect of operating another food outlet, consider if you can outsource them to good brands for a rental revenue.

Plan year round activities

Since you have just wound up the festive season, use the space you made to plan for year round activities.

A spa popup to market you spa, a culinary demonstration to highlight the culinary offering, a 3 rd party tie up to display products from other retailers are simple example to generate revenue.

If you are a resort, adding a photo booth to capture memories and experiences can also be an additional way of generating revenue from the space,

Carve out a Business center

Make space for a Business center right in the lobby where people may be more inclined to meet and work. With WiFi becoming free in almost all regions around the world, bundle it with some additional services like free coffee or sandwiches to create value to the guest and encourage them to use it. Plan a hotel lobby design with some space for working and put in some ergonomic chairs etc

In conclusion starting this year think of how you can make additional revenue from you hotel lobby so that you increase your Total Hotel RevPAR