Turn hotel rooms into digital stores...

📰 In This Issue

✔️ Ever seen a beautiful piece of furniture in a hotel room and wanted to buy it? That is exactly the thought Carlos Ferraz had when he founded Furbsh…
✔️ SpaGuru was acquired by Omegro, a big win for SA Founders.
✔️ Meme of the week.
✔️ GuestChat - If you ever wanted to adjust your chatbot's personality, now you can.
✔️ Next time we look at staffing in hospitality.

🌟 Spotlight: Furbsh, a digital storefront for hotels.

🔍 Furbsh – Pronounced Furbish, yes, took me a moment.

💡 It happened to Carlos, it’s happened to me and I’m convinced it happens to every person who travels, we check into a hotel, settle in and our partner points out a unique piece of furniture or art, and WOW! Influenced by local culture, and crafted by artists in the community, it stands out and we know we’ll never be able to purchase that piece anywhere else in the world, until now…

Furbsh allows hotels to turn their rooms, lobby, and restaurant into a boutique buyers fantasy. Furbsh gives hotels a digital storefront, where hotels can list available art, furniture pieces, anything really, and allow guests to become boutique buyers. Furbsh handles the rest, from purchase to delivery, partnering with international shipping to ensure guest satisfaction.

You can watch a 13min video of Carlos deep diving into Furbsh here:
https://www.loom.com/share/eacaeb6fa50b4465abb67a4f9142fabc

🚀 Currently focused on hotels and lodges in SADC, Furbsh is a great tool for any property to showcase local artists, designers, and creatives to visitors. This will contribute to the local economy, generate additional revenue, and give guests unique memorabilia to remember their stay. 

📢 Industry Insights: Tourism & Tech News

📰 SpaGuru joins the Omegro group. A big win for SA Founders who have been at it for 16+ years.
🔗 The official media release: over here
📌 Personal views: This is great news for SpaGuru, and it's great to see Micros SA grow and expand its offerings. However, I have a concern, and something to think about is how Micros SA and HRS will support mutual clients going forward. 

😂 Meme of the Week

🎯 Sponsored Ad

I have been talking to a few hotels about AI chatbots over the last 2 weeks and a recurring concern is the impact a chatbot makes on the brand and guest engagement. One of my favorite features on GuestChat is the ability to tell the chatbot in which tone to chat to guests. Longwinded answers, short answers, warm and friendly, polite, always recommend hotels in the same brand, group, etc.

I am a bit biased because Nima and the team at GuestChat sponsored this piece, but I do believe they are busy creating the best chat option for your hotel, including internal chat, social chat, and much more to come.

📌 Final Thoughts & What’s Coming Next

✨ Check out Furbsh! Include local community into your hotel guest experience, it matters and gives visitors a real story to tell.
🔮 Next time we check out Dalton, a hospitality-focused talent management solution.
📩 Did you enjoy this newsletter, reply and tell us what you liked and what you don’t like.
Share your thoughts on the topics we discussed.