HOTEL CASE STUDY

THE GLEN BOUTIQUE HOTEL | A LUXURY EXPERIENCE IN THE HEART OF CAPE TOWN

The Glen Boutique Hotel saw an impressive boost in their RevPAR of 22% with the help of RoomRaccoon’s innovative platform, as well as saving 4 hours a day and capitalising on upselling ancillary services. This case study will explore how they achieved these great results.

About The Glen Boutique Hotel

Sea Point, Cape Town
24 rooms
Boutique hotel

In 2006, The Glen Boutique Hotel & Spa opened its doors to the public and has since grown from 8 rooms to a collection of 24 beautiful suites with terraces, luxury linens, and lounge areas. Guests can take advantage of the G Spa, offering a range of treatments, or they can relax poolside with a cocktail. For food lovers, G Kitchen serves up delectable dishes.

The luxury boutique hotel is located near the main attractions in the Mother City and provides its guests with some truly special discounts in collaboration with Kloof Street House restaurant, BUC Fitness Club, Cape Kayak Adventures, Sport Helicopters scenic flights, Sport Motor Yachts & Helicopters & Wiggle Car Hire. 

Creating an unforgettable stay is the highest priority at the Glen Boutique Hotel, and their success in doing so is evident by the many guests that return time and time again.

Unleashing the Potential of Dynamic Rates

Challenge

Changing their rates across their various booking channels was a manual, time-intensive process for the Glen Boutique Hotel. Consequently, they only updated rates for the low and high seasons. This meant they lost out on maximising revenue when the demand for hotel rooms grew, thanks to major events in the city and surrounds, like concerts and marathons. On top of this, business travellers usually book on short notice and somewhere central, regardless of seasonality.

Solution

With RoomRaccoon’s Dynamic Pricing, the team at the Glen Boutique Hotel has access to dynamic pricing rules that make it simple for them to enhance their revenue management strategy. They can easily create custom rules with choice parameters or activate pre-programmed rules. Driven by their goal to maximize revenue, they utilize dynamic pricing rules to get the most value from last-minute bookings and high-demand periods, all while saving valuable time with an automated system of rate adjustments. 

Result

The Glen Boutique Hotel enjoyed a notable boost in RevPAR of 22% in just 12 months after implementing RoomRaccoon.

Our dynamic pricing rules work exceptionally well when we are approaching peak season. They also help us regulate the traffic to our bookings by adjusting our pricing based on our occupancy. We can offer a 10% discount for first-time guests and a 20% for VIP guests who have been coming to stay with us for more than 5 years. We can also easily offer seasonal discounts based on occupancy and availability.
TAKUNDA, GENERAL MANAGER AT THE GLEN BOUTIQUE HOTEL

Shedding Light on Ancillary Services

Challenge

The Glen Boutique Hotel found that during busy check-in times, the front desk receptionists would forget to promote ancillary services like spa treatments or restaurant specials. Furthermore, new staff lacked knowledge of the various add-on options and specials available. Also, seasonal offers for activities, meals and luxurious massages needed frequent updates.

Solution

The Glen Boutique Hotel implemented the upgrade feature – RaccoonUpsell, to address these issues. The automated guest service menu informs guests of all offerings before arrival. Guests can browse an online menu at their leisure and select from a list of add-ons to enhance their stay, including room upgrades. The results are greater visibility and more sales! What’s more, the hotel included add-ons in their booking engine, allowing potential guests to pre-book activities and services through their website.

Result

Huge profits can be made with RaccoonUpsell, as evidenced by an incredible ROI of 273%.

Guests have us at the top of their list because they are prompted by the extra services we offer as they make their booking. RaccoonUpsell helps us generate additional sales and increase our ancillary revenue in the services that we do offer. We have seen a major increase in the sales of our spa packages in the past month. With RaccoonUpsell, we have a higher chance of making the sale of these items and packages because they are informed of all our services upon the time of making their initial booking.
TAKUNDA, GENERAL MANAGER AT THE GLEN BOUTIQUE HOTEL

Harnessing Technology to Create Time-Saving Magic

Challenge

During the peak season, Maggie and Takunda, the chief general managers at The Glen Boutique Hotel, were bogged down by administrative tasks like guest correspondence, payment reminders and keeping track of bookings from various channels.

Solution

Maggie and Takunda have found many features that make their job easier with RoomRaccoon’s intuitive Property Management System (PMS), our core product module. Bookings from various channels are automatically populated in the easy-view calendar dashboard, giving them an instant view of the booking and payment statuses: checked-in, checked-in online, partially paid, etc. The customisable email automation templates are particularly useful for keeping their guests informed throughout the booking, pre-stay, and post-stay stages. Additionally, the online payment request links allow them to process payments without being at the front desk. 

Maggie and Tekunda are able to be less operational and more strategic with creating packages, establishing and maintaining relationships with guests and developing staff.

Result

The robust RoomRaccoon PMS helps the Glen save 4 hours daily in peak season. Additionally, thanks to more than 45% of bookings coming through the booking engine, guests at Zwahili Lodge are now more aware of the hotel's offerings, resulting in increased revenue.

Because Peach Payments is integrated with RoomRaccoon, we can just send a secure payment link or guests can pay in the booking engine when they first make their booking. There is no third party, there is no access to credit cards - it’s between the guest and the system, which is wonderful for our team not to have to deal with any payment risks
TAKUNDA, GENERAL MANAGER AT THE GLEN BOUTIQUE HOTEL

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