What to expect?
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[00:00:00] Inge Decuypere: We never want to grow just for the sake of growth. If we have an opportunity for a new hotel, we always ask the question, is this the right hotel for us? Does it fit with our mindset?
[00:00:23] Matt Welle: Hi, everyone. Welcome back to another Matt Talks Hospitality. And today, we are in Belgium, and I'm joined by Inge Decuypere, who is one of the owners of C-Hotels. Over the last decade, she's been successfully scaling the Belgian hotel group. We'll talk about their growth journey, about the changes that happen when a single hotel becomes a group of hotels, and how operations and technology shape that shift. C-Hotels were also one of the very, very earliest customers of Mews, and I always wanna explore how that journey has been as Mews develops and deploys more features, and as the group develops and how they adopt some of those features. Inge, welcome.
[00:00:56] Inge Decuypere: Thank you. Thank you for having me, Matt.
[00:00:58] Matt Welle: It is so lovely to have you here because we've had such long relationship and you were one of the very first hotels in Belgium. And I remember we did our first Belgian hotel at Andromeda, I think. We did the events, right?
[00:01:10] Inge Decuypere: Yes. That's correct.
[00:01:11] Matt Welle: Yeah. The first thing I remember when I walked into that hotel was Pepper, the robot that welcomed us at the door. Does Pepper still roam around the lobby?
[00:01:18] Inge Decuypere: No. He isn't.
[00:01:20] Matt Welle: He died?
[00:01:21] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. The problem was that it was practical. He was no longer supported, and, technically, it became too much work to keep it running. So, 4 years ago, we said goodbye to him. Yeah.
[00:01:35] Matt Welle: Poor Pepper. Yeah. Yeah. If someone hasn't heard of C-Hotels, because I think in Belgium, people know who you are, but in other countries, they don't. How would you describe the brand?
[00:01:45] Inge Decuypere: So C-Hotels is a Belgian hotel group. Most of our hotels are located at the Belgian coast site, but since last year, we took our first step inland with the C-Hotels West Wing.
[00:01:58] Matt Welle: Congrats on that one.
[00:01:59] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Thank you. So, each of our hotels, they have their own identity. So, no two hotels have the same interior design or the same vibe. Each one offers a completely different experience. But what ties us together is that while every hotel feels unique, guests can always rely on the same level of quality and service.
[00:02:23] Matt Welle: Yeah. That's the line that, like, kind of the thread across the company.
[00:02:28] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Yes. Yes. That's the thing that you will find in every hotel, and that's the same everywhere, but you always will have a completely different experience when you enter the hotel.
[00:02:38] Matt Welle: So, do guests know when they check into Andromeda that they are part of the C-Hotel group? Are they aware of that?
[00:02:43] Inge Decuypere: I think so. Yes. Because when you book the hotel, we mention always C-Hotels Andromeda, C-Hotels Burlington, so it's always in the name. Yeah.
[00:02:54] Matt Welle: So, how was it good to go from, you know, a small group of hotels or an independent hotel to slowly, actually, fast growing, as I was really impressed with the growth that you've experienced? Was it hard as a business leader to adapt from the mindset of an individual hotel to a group of hotels?
[00:03:10] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. But, of course, that group came step by step. So, we had the time to adapt, of course. The first time that we had to change our management was when we started the Andromeda Hotel. That was the third hotel because the first two had 50 rooms, and the Andromeda Hotel had 100 rooms. So, that was a complete change for us. We actually had to work with departments, another approach to management. We had a lot more employees. So, that was the first time that we had to change our point of view on managing a hotel. And then I think around our sixth or seventh hotel, we realized that we couldn't make all those decisions ourselves. So, we had to put some layers between everything and centralize also certain functions and have a good back office, rethink our processes, workflows, and, of course, at that time, we had to invest in good technology so we could have a good reporting system because that's the key factor at that point. If you want to make the right decisions, you need good data.
[00:04:31] Matt Welle: And what do you use for reporting?
[00:04:32] Inge Decuypere: Oh, we have a few things. So, first of all, we have Mews, where I use a lot of…
[00:04:39] Matt Welle: That wasn’t me asking about Mews, but, like, I like that you went there.
[00:04:42] Inge Decuypere: But they're very important to me. Then Flyer, that's our, it's a new management system has also very good, gives us very good insights and everything. Besides that, we use Revinate for our customer experience. It sends the surveys, and it gives us a very nice overview of the satisfaction of our customers. And then, we also use the Bryte Analytics, and that's for the finance part, of course, to have insights into all our financial numbers.
[00:05:19] Matt Welle: Nice. And has that technology stack developed over time? So, you've obviously been with Mews for almost, I think, 10 years. Am I correct?
[00:05:26] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:05:27] Matt Welle: Yeah. Has it changed over time?
[00:05:29] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Sometimes it changed, but also all those
integrations, they grew step by step. You start with one thing, and then you add another one, and so on, so.
[00:05:40] Matt Welle: Because when you decided to go with Mews, you were one of the very first innovators that took a risk on us, right? Ten years ago, we were just 2, 3 years old, so hoteliers that took the bets on us took some risk, I guess. Did you see that? Did you feel that at the moment? And what was the reason why you chose us?
[00:05:59] Inge Decuypere: Well, why did we choose you? Because we felt that you were very ambitious and that you had a completely other point of view on how the PMS system should work. All the other programs, they worked in the same manner, and that didn't fit how we felt that a PMS system should work. And I remember our first talk. It was also an online meeting. I think you were in Prague at that time.
[00:06:31] Matt Welle: I lived in Prague still. Yeah.
[00:06:33] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. The way you were thinking, that was the way we also were thinking, and that's why we believed in it. And, of course, you made huge progresses through that ten years.
[00:06:44] Matt Welle: Yeah. It feels like a very different company than you know ten years ago; we were just a PMS, and suddenly, we've got this whole ecosystem. But also, the way that the PMS has morphed into this, like, monster of a system, it can do a lot more. Was it hard? Because I often find that when we deploy Mews today in hotels, they adopt the entire stack. But I often see hoteliers that joined us years ago, they don't adopt new features because they have a way of working. Is it hard to constantly get new features that we're releasing and to then update that culturally across your hotels?
[00:07:17] Inge Decuypere: Well, we have one person in our hotel group who tracks all the updates. And I think that's important. He also tests new features and translates them into practical workflows. And if we think something could work for us, we roll things out. It's always step by step. We pilot it in one hotel, we gather some feedback, and if we see that it works, then we scale it to the others. And I think it's very important that you don't want to add everything at once, that you always have to have a look at what is the right thing for us, and what has the biggest impact for the team and the guests.
[00:08:04] Matt Welle: And culturally, because I get often asked the question because we've grown so much. I think when we started working together, we were probably 50 people in the company. Today, we're 1,300 people. And people ask me, how do you keep the culture, like, alive? But you've also gone through this incredible growth from, you know, a small group of independent hotels to a much larger group. And I think you have more ambitions. I don't think you're done yet. How do you keep the culture, you know, where people represent what your vision is behind hospitality?
[00:08:33] Inge Decuypere: We always stay focused on what we believe a hotel should be. I think to protect our mindset, that's very simple because I think the mindset should always be that the guest experience comes first, no matter what, because the guests are the most important for us, and that's where we can make a difference. So, we can simplify processes, so we give room to those personal touches, and scale should never make us distant because that's what you often see with the big brands. And that's something that we protect a lot.
[00:09:13] Matt Welle: Yeah. Because the latest edition that has joined the family has come from a big global brand, and the owners decided to actually go with a local brand. What was the rationale behind that?
[00:09:23] Inge Decuypere: Well, now we are also a part of the owners of the hotel, so we could make a decision ourselves. Yeah. And at the time that we started with Mercure Roeselare. So, we managed that hotel for one year under the Mercure brand. So for us, it was very interesting to see how things work in such a big brand. It gave us great insights, but it also gave a lot of friction because you can't use your own software programs; they have so many lists, and the main thing is that they slow you down. And after about a year managing the Mercure Roeselare, we had the opportunity to stop that collaboration and switch to our own C-Hotels brand.
[00:10:13] Matt Welle: Yeah.
[00:10:14] Inge Decuypere: But honestly, it wasn't that easy a decision because big change, they promise you a lot of distribution, and at that point, you worry about losing occupancy, of course, because you don't know what the impact will be. But on the other hand, they have so many strict rules and high fees that you don't feel like you have full control over your own hotel. So, eventually, we decided to stop the collaboration. And I must say that we are very happy we did because in the end, I must say that we didn't lose almost any occupancy at all.
[00:10:54] Matt Welle: Wow.
[00:10:55] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. And now we have the freedom to run the hotel our own way.
[00:10:59] Matt Welle: The way you think it should be done.
[00:11:00] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:11:01] Matt Welle: So that sounds like you wouldn't have a global brand take over the whole chain or start to operate as a franchise for the rest of the chain? Like, you're really committed to running everything yourself?
[00:11:12] Inge Decuypere: Oh, yes. Of course. I don't think it would fit with our identity because our strength is to have our own style. And when you would go to a big chain, they are too restricted, and no, it wouldn't fit at all with us. No.
[00:11:31] Matt Welle: Great. If you look at the different integration partners that you use, what, if you have a hotelier that's listening to this today, what do you think are some of the critical integrations that you could not live without?
[00:11:44] Inge Decuypere: Oh, of course, I think that's a revenue management system that everybody should have and…
[00:11:53] Matt Welle: Do all of your hotels have a revenue management system?
[00:11:54] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Of course. I couldn't live without it anymore. I work with it every day. It gives me a lot of insights. It helps a lot with the price settings. I think everyone should have it.
[00:12:05] Matt Welle: I like how you say, "Yeah, of course." The majority of hotels don't have a revenue management system today, which is, like, shocking to me always.
[00:12:12] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. I'm shocked about it as well because it helps a lot, and it will give you much more revenue, so.
[00:12:22] Matt Welle: But the arguments from the hotels that don't have it, and I speak to a lot of those hotels, they say, yeah, but I know the market better than this revenue system that doesn't know our market. And I know my competition, so I'm ahead of what they're thinking in pricing. What would you say to those types of arguments?
[00:12:38] Inge Decuypere: Well, in the beginning, I thought that as well. But what you see is that when you have a revenue management system, the system raises the price, and sometimes you think, oh, no, that's too much. I will not ask that price for my room. But then you see that those rooms are sold for that price. And then you say, oh, okay, I wouldn't expect that.
[00:13:03] Matt Welle: Yeah.
[00:13:04] Inge Decuypere: And after a year, you will see that your average rate will rise a lot without doing a lot of effort. And that's the thing.
[00:13:16] Matt Welle: And besides revenue management, any other favorite integrations that you have?
[00:13:19] Inge Decuypere: Well, yes. I have one that I'm very excited about. It's the latest integration that we added at Mews. So, we have it now, I think, for four months. It's also a startup, a Belgian startup. The name of it is AskWhisper. I don't know if you know it.
[00:13:40] Matt Welle: No. I don't know it, but I will find out now.
[00:13:42] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. I'm very excited about it. It's an AI-supported guest communication system, and guests can easily communicate through WhatsApp with the system. So, that saves a lot of time.
[00:13:57] Matt Welle: Like a chatbot through WhatsApp?
[00:13:59] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Yeah. But it works very good, I must say.
[00:14:02] Matt Welle: At which point of the guest journey does it start to engage, at the point of booking, online check-in, or at arrival?
[00:14:08] Inge Decuypere: No. It starts when they make a reservation.
[00:14:11] Matt Welle: Yeah.
[00:14:12] Inge Decuypere: They get a message through WhatsApp, and the system says, hi! You made a reservation at Andromeda Hotels, for example. If you have any questions, you can ask. And, at that point, we see that a lot of guests ask questions about check-in, check out, they want a parking space, for example, at that time, the system has a look in use if there is still availability. If there is availability, the system will answer the guest that there is a possibility to have a parking space, lots of prizes, and if the client says, yes, that's okay for me, he will put the parking space into the reservation list for the guest.
[00:14:55] Matt Welle: That’s so good.
[00:14:56] Inge Decuypere: So, we save a lot of time with that. All those little questions from those guests are all managed automatically right now.
[00:15:05] Matt Welle: And then if the AI doesn't have an answer, does it then escalate it to an employee at the hotel group?
[00:15:11] Inge Decuypere: Yes. From that, if he doesn't know the answer, he asks the guest if he would like to have a personal person who will answer that.
[00:15:21] Matt Welle: Yeah.
[00:15:22] Inge Decuypere: If they say yes, the system sends the message to the dashboard in Mews, and in the messaging system from Mews, you have a new message. And from there on, our front FS can handle the question.
[00:15:34] Matt Welle: I love everything you're saying. AskWhisper, I'm gonna get in touch with their founder. I wanna hear their story.
[00:15:39] Inge Decuypere: You really need to. And one of my favorite features also of that, one is that when a room is ready, the guest receives a message that they can check in earlier, and I must say our guests are really positive about that one.
[00:15:56] Matt Welle: I love that always. Like, I travel every week, and I'm always like, shall I go to the hotel? I'm not sure if they're gonna tell me that to come back at 3, and it's just such a nice little gesture that has quite an impact on people that travel.
[00:16:07] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. That's a really good one for our guest experience.
[00:16:11] Matt Welle: Nice.
[00:16:12] Inge Decuypere: The whole package of it. So, I'm very excited. We started the pilot project at Andromeda Hotel, and now we will run out AskWhisper in our hotels.
[00:16:24] Matt Welle: Amazing. What else do you have? Like, it sounds like you have an amazing stack.
[00:16:29] Inge Decuypere: Oh, man. That's really my favorite one now. Yeah.
[00:16:33] Matt Welle: And you mentioned you use Revinate for analytics. So, you analyze guest reviews, but you also use it to drive guest reviews because I think in the time of AI, it is really critical that we get people talking online about our hotels so that that data feeds into the large language models so that when people are looking through a large language model where to book next that they actually see, hey, you know, all of these features are being talked about by guests. Do you use Revinate to reach out to guests to leave more reviews?
[00:17:00] Inge Decuypere: Well, no. Not at that point.
[00:17:04] Matt Welle: Okay. So, it's really for analytics that you use it for?
[00:17:06] Inge Decuypere: Yes. Yes. So, we send an email after they check out to ask them if they will fill in the survey, and we mostly use that data to see how our hotels are doing. Yeah.
[00:17:21] Matt Welle: Yeah. Great. You've worked with Mews for quite a while. Where do you think we've had the biggest impact on your business? Hopefully positive, but could also be negative, I guess.
[00:17:33] Inge Decuypere: Well, I think the biggest impact has been in two areas. First of all, in our operations, of course, because we work faster with fewer manual steps, more automation, so less mistakes from our front desk, of course. And that gives less stress to them and a smoother guest flow. And then secondly, on the management side, of course, we have so much better insights and reporting, not only because of Mews, but also because of all those integrations that we have.
[00:18:08] Matt Welle: Yeah.
[00:18:09] Inge Decuypere: Most importantly for me is that when the system runs smoothly, our staff have more space to have those small meaningful chats with our guests. And that's really important for the guest experience. Yeah.
[00:18:27] Matt Welle: I'm so happy to hear that. So, you know, we've both gone through tremendous growth in the last 10 years. But if you look forward for the next 10 years, what would C-Hotels look like in your view, in 10 years' time? It's a long period. I know it's difficult. It's a difficult ask.
[00:18:42] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. It's difficult because, of course, our ambition has always been grow, but we never want to grow just for the sake of growth, you know? So, we don't set their targets based on a certain number of hotels; instead, we focus on the real question. If we have an opportunity for a new hotel, we always ask the question, is this the right hotel for us? Does it fit with our mindset? Is it the right location? Can we maintain our quality in that hotel or culture here? And that's why we never say in ten years, we will have 20 hotels or 25 hotels. No. We see what passes through, and if it fits with us and if we have a good feeling with it, then we go for it. And if not, we leave it at the site.
[00:19:39] Matt Welle: Great.
[00:19:40] Inge Decuypere: And we’d rather grow slowly with the right hotels than rush into growth with wrong decisions.
[00:19:47] Matt Welle: I think that's the right mindset. I've seen so many brands that pushed out way too fast, and then it slowly deteriorated the brand and the experience. And then it just wasn't the experience that you, as our hotelier, were anticipating. So, I'm really happy to hear you say that.
[00:20:01] Inge Decuypere: Yeah. Because in the long term, we want to remain a strong, recognized C-Hotels brand without ever losing our soul. I think that's the most important thing: that you’ll always be aware of what is your identity, and then you get stuck to that.
[00:20:18] Matt Welle: What are some of the projects that you're going to do next year that you're excited about that you can talk about already?
[00:20:22] Inge Decuypere: Well, I must say this is the first year that we don't have new projects.
[00:20:28] Matt Welle: But they will come, probably, right?
[00:20:31] Inge Decuypere: I think so. Of course. Of course, they will come. We always have the ambition to do new things, but I must say the last years went very fast. We had a hotel opening every year. We have also completely renovated the existing hotels. So, it was maybe a bit too much sometimes. And now, we are happy that we have a year with no new hotel openings. And then now we can focus on our operations and our back office, and that's also important.
[00:21:08] Matt Welle: I agree. Thank you for sharing your story so openly, and thank you for the incredible support for the last ten years. I hope we get to repeat this in ten years' time to see which of these predictions have come true. I hope to see you in May at Mews Unfold, our annual event, because you are one of the loyal visitors of that event, always throughout the years, which is just incredible, but thank you.
[00:21:28] Inge Decuypere: No. Thank you for having me, Matt, and for this nice talk.
