MIAMI — At the recent Hotec North America conference, held in late June at the JW Marriott Turnberry Miami, 152 suppliers and 109 designers and operators gathered to network and discuss upcoming projects, finding mutual support as the industry emerges from the downturn.
The event brought two conferences together for the first time. Hotec Design and Hotec Operations are traditionally separate events hosted by Questex Hospitality, the parent company of Hotel Management, for professionals in different segments of the industry. The consolidation allowed a greater variety of buyers and suppliers to network and connect.
Several of the suppliers shared stories of how they adapted to the new normals of the downturn. Robert Wright, director of commercial and hospitality sales for Séura, said his company has been focused on improving the performance of its domestic products during the downturn. “At the same time, we've learned to build to spec, using five manufacturers in China to build to spec offshore for more exotic designs,” he said. Many of the company’s projects went on hold, he added, but some projects that were already financed and already under construction continued on to completion. “That kept us going,” he said.
Studio Twist founder Michelle Wildenhaus said her company had to downsize during the worst of the downturn and also “tightened up the process” a little bit. “We're in position to move ahead with a small, very tight, well-run little team, and we're going to run with that as long as possible and then see what happens in the future,” she said.
Projects that started in 2019 are now in full production, Wildenhaus added. “We have been, up till now, relatively unaffected by the supply chain,” she said. “We see on the horizon [that] there's going to be some changes we need to make but we expected them, and we have options available that we're vetting completely so as one source runs out another one's going to be able to pick up.”
Carlos Gaultier, director of Interiors from Spain, said that many of the company’s members thought they would not be able to sell anything for the bulk of 2020, and that all projects would be canceled. But while some projects were, indeed, canceled or postponed, other opportunities emerged. “If a hotel [or a bar] is going to be closed for months ... and they have the financial ability to actually do it, that was the perfect time to do renovations and renewals," he said. "So many projects that were not planned actually happened, and that actually created a lot of new opportunities for many of our brands.”
Pivoting
Projects going on hold created new opportunities for suppliers to find work in different sectors.
When Séura’s hospitality business declined, Wright said the team pivoted its resources and its focus more on the commercial end of the business, primarily multifamily residential units. A growing demand for lighted mirrors in higher-end apartments and condos has driven a “tremendous growth spurt” for the company. “Our commercial business has really made a difference in our ability to maintain [our business] while we refill the pipeline,” he said. 2020 wound up being a record year for the company’s pipeline, and while the numbers ultimately declined again, April and May of this year were the biggest months in the company’s history.
Keyless Company, which manufactures mechanical combination locks for lockers, had primarily focused on supplying locks to fitness centers, but since the downturn has moved more into workspaces and retail areas, especially in hospitals. “While hospitality and fitness kind of shrunk during COVID, now they're starting to pick back up,” said Christyl Tabbert, global sales representative.
Gaultier said the Interiors from Spain consortium has seen a “boom” in residential demand. “Some of the loss on the hospitality segment actually went into the residential, which saw incredible growth,” he said. Ultimately, Gaultier estimated that over the past year and a half, the company’s brands have lost about 20 percent of their average sales—“which is actually not a lot, when a year ago they were expecting that it was going to be a total crash. They were expecting an 80 percent loss, and it was only 20 percent, so it wasn't so bad.”
Residential vs. Hospitality
After a year of many people staying home, Wildenhaus expects to see increased demand for residential style in hospitality decor. “The pandemic has taught [these travelers] to expect these kinds of things,” she said. People want the comfortable blankets they have on their sofas at home to wrap up in on their hotel beds, she said. “I think that's going to help from our product standpoint, to help carry us into areas where we maybe haven't been before.”
Gaultier, on the other hand, does not expect to see the two segments overlap much more than they already do. “An important factor is volume,” he said. “For a company making beds for a house—where you're going to basically sell two beds here or five beds there—it’s different than actually manufacturing beds for a 500-room hotel,” he said. “Smaller companies cannot manufacture lamps by the hundreds or by the thousands if they only have maybe a small factory ... They don't have the ability to produce the volume.”
Furthermore, while the designs for residences may be catered to an individual’s taste, designs for hotels have to appeal to a wider base. “But it's true that more and more hotels are trying to create a feeling of being at home,” Gaultier acknowledged.