Hotels trying for Airbnb market...

[Pete28]

https://www.ft.com/content/bc60e022-22c9-11e8-add1-0e8958b189ea?desktop=true

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https://www.joandjoe.com/en/

Number of hotels (IHG, Mariott) are experimenting with hostel concepts with rolling beds etc.

- desks less important, the young sit on beds

- large lobby hang out space, smaller bedroom

- more communal activity yoga etc

They look radically different from Accor’s other brands such as Sofitel and Novotel: rooms are fitted with sleek bunk beds, there are huge colourful lobbies and guests are encouraged to cook together in communal kitchens. The company aims to open 50 Jo&Joe venues by 2020.

IHG’s Avid Hotels, also launched in the US last year, is another business offering smaller, cheaper rooms.

Keith Barr, IHG chief executive, explains that modern consumers do not want the staples of more established hotels, such as large writing desks.

“Customers are spending half their time working in their bed now, sitting with their laptop on their bed in the guest room, because they are not travelling with as many papers and documents as they used to as everything’s digitised,” he says. “It’s just making smarter use of the overall space.”

[Pete28]

https://www.avidhotels.com

Didnt get the memo about the desks, or indeed about creating something that looks hideous inside and out.

i was thinking of adding a desk, but now maybe a giant bean bag and a few surfboards ? i I do find tha the younger traveller gives better reviews (and is more used to 5* based on uber), so maybe creating a setting which screams millenial is the way to go ? 

[Willow3]

If I were 18 and traveling with a group of friends (which I believe to be more common in Europe, lucky ducks with trains and an EU!) I would be more drawn to one of these type places... provided the price was right.  I've stayed at hostels, even as an adult, but because we brought our family, it was more of a private room where we all had our own bunk.  I'm a Gen Xer and I've NEVER sat at desk in any hotel I've ever stayed in.  I provide a small secretary in my guest space, because it holds stuff... not because I think a lot of people will use it.  Though I know one business traveler who did.