The ability to directly book both event space and guest rooms at the same time without the need for a request for proposal long has stymied planners and hotel companies. Some solutions offer one but not both, or can book pre-selected packages but not offer inventory views in real time.
Meeting and event sourcing platform Groups360 now claims it has solved this problem with a new solution dubbed GroupSync Engage, and IHG Hotels & Resorts is the first hotel company to deploy it, the companies told BTN.
GroupSync Engage gives planners the option to directly book event space and guest rooms separately or together, and also provides customization for food and beverage, AV needs and meeting-room configuration, according to Groups360. There is no limit to the number of rooms that can be booked at one time.
"We built the technology not to limit the strategic selling ability of the hotel or brand," said Groups360 president and CEO Kemp Gallineau. "They can open it up to as many rooms as they want. … They can offer 1,500 rooms and 100 spaces if a hotel wants to try to do that. Or on any given day if they want only to [offer] 25 rooms and two meeting spaces, [the property] can do that. They can set it by day, week, month or quarter. It is up to the hotel."
One challenge of developing a complete booking solution was that guest rooms and meeting space inventory often are housed in different systems, or group inventory might not be displayed online at all, Gallineau said. Each hotel company manages their inventories differently. "There is no standardization," he added. The key to getting GroupSync Engage to work was developing technology that could "take multiple endpoints of inputs and aggregate them so the customer can navigate in a seamless process." Data sources will vary by client. For IHG, the tool pulls group rooms inventory from a point in the company's central reservation system.
IHG will launch the pilot of its participation Thursday with three hotels—Hotel Indigo Los Angeles and New York's InterContinental Barclay and InterContinental Times Square—and plans to roll it out in the coming weeks to 27 more U.S. hotels, then further expand it.
"A majority will be in limited-service hotels, with one to two meeting rooms, so it's easier to ramp up [as] there's not an existing sales and catering system," said IHG SVP of global sales Derek DeCross. "We're aiming for 500 hotels in the U.S. and Canada by the end of the year. Then we'll work through the complexity and bigger box hotels and diverse offerings. By the end of 2022, we anticipate having the solution in place for 80 percent of our estate, roughly 4,800 hotels, then focus on the remaining 20 percent in 2023."
IHG currently is offering no cancellation or attrition fees on room bookings through its Meet with Confidence offer for groups with 10 to 50 rooms booked by June 30, 2021 and that meet or stay by Dec. 31, 2021. Otherwise, planners who direct-book will need to accept IHG's listed terms and conditions. Further, the company said a booking would not be denied due to catering yields or ratios, however, requests that fall out of certain parameters, including a particular hotel's limit on group size, would be shifted to an RFP.
DeCross explained that many of the group bookings likely would qualify for the Meet with Confidence offer as events with 50 or fewer attendees comprise about 80 percent of current meetings business industrywide. The new solution also will result in time savings for planners of up to 80 percent, he said, adding that "in 15 to 20 minutes, you can book and get F&B and a confirmation and be done, versus an RFP, which can take hours if not longer. That's a huge benefit for meeting planners."
On the hotel side, the solution frees up staff—which in many cases is reduced due to the pandemic—to focus on those larger, more complex meetings and events, DeCross said. "It allows us to do a better job on the [other 20 percent]," he said. "Owners and teams can be excited about embracing it for opportunities to free up the sellers and [on-site] folks to spend more time with the guests on property."
Groups360, which in August 2019 received a $50 million investment from Accor, Hilton Worldwide, IHG and Marriott International, is partnering with multiple hotel companies—both investors and non-investors—to offer this service, and during the next four months will disclose those partnerships, Gallineau said.
Booking joint guest and meeting room space at participating IHG properties at first only will be available through the GroupSync Engage platform, but IHG also is designing a platform for its website that incorporates a white-label version of the tool, DeCross said. That aspect is scheduled to go live in the second quarter. White-label solutions also are available to other suppliers, Gallineau said.
This is the second meetings enhancement IHG has announced this month. In March, the company will expand its Meet with Confidence program, which will offer two hybrid solutions.