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Each episode of GAIN Momentum focuses on timeless lessons to help grow and scale a business in hospitality, travel, and technology. Whether you’re a veteran industry leader looking for some inspiration to guide the next phase of growth or an aspiring executive looking to fast-track the learning process, this podcast is here with key lessons centered around four questions we ask each guest.
GAIN Momentum episode #88: The Hotel Applications for the book "The Explorer's Gene" | with Neil Foster
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Adam Mogelonsky: Welcome to the GAIN Momentum Podcast, focusing on timeless lessons from senior leaders in hospitality, travel, food service, and technology. I'm here with my special co-host, Neil Foster, and we're doing another book review. This time we are doing The Explorer's Gene. Why we seek big challenges, new flavors, and the blank spots on the map by Alex Hutchinson, and that is the title of the book in Full.
We're gonna be talking a little bit about the book in terms of the new research that's been done to explain. Why we, uh, why we explore in the first place, why we as humans are like adventure. And then we wanted to drive into the applications for hotels and what it pretends related to this craze around personalization.
So, Neil, first question for you. Can you give us the elevator pitch for the book, describing it in a paragraph or so?
Neil Foster: Well first it's good to see Adam and wonderful to be doing another book review with you. Uh, maybe I'm gonna start big here by saying that this is probably the most interesting book that we've explored so far in my view, and probably one of the most interesting. Books that I've ever read that explains very clearly that there are some interesting opportunities ahead for some of us that are here in hospitality.
Maybe it explains why we're here in the first place. Hospitality is experiential at its roots, and there are some areas of trailblazing that, uh, uh, that hospitality, if it, if it doesn't fully encompass that it serves as a springboard for, uh, for the Antarctic missions and all the other, uh, incredible achievements that have been done over the years.
Uh. These explorers stayed in hotels either before or after their achievements. And so at as a, at the very least as a supporting role, hospitality is very much part of the, uh, the explorer's perspective.
Adam Mogelonsky: So the Explorer's Gene, uh, basically it covers off roughly, let's say about a million years of genetic history, talking about the evidence behind why we explore why as, why we as humans, uh, bothered to break out of the East R Valley and cover the globe. And then why? We decided some of us to go through the, the treacherous waters of the, to try and find the northwest passage, some of us dying along the way, and then all the way down to why we bother to try new restaurants instead of ordering the same thing over and over again that we know is gonna be that thing that we like. And there's a lot of technical knowledge in the book. As it relates to principles and mathematics, physics, economics, and biology. The one word that I want to throw into this that is technical is the word dopamine. We've heard that word dopamine before. It is a neurotransmitter, which means that it is a chemical that is in our brain that influences, our mind and what we think about and what we feel rewarded by.
And what they found is that the explorer's gene. In a nutshell is certain people have this gene in more, um, in higher, uh, higher percentage than others. That produces more dopamine in certain circuits of the brain, and then that propels them to seek risk to varying degrees and. That is a big part of the book.
And then the latter half It explores other aspects of how that emerges into behavior in modern society as well as historical records. So the first thing that I wanna remark upon about this book in terms of dopamine as it relates to the hotel industry, is this whole idea of.
Dopamine rewarding us for novelty, new experiences, as you said, uh, or novelty seeking behavior. And what, in a nutshell, in a nutshell, Neil, does this imply for the hotel industry overall in terms of growth and knowing that novelty is baked into, uh, what we, what is our core drive as humans?
Neil Foster: Well, first of all, I, I think you did a much better job summarizing some of the key points, so great description on, on that, Adam. And I think, uh, and great question. I feel that we are for the first time equipped with some of the best tools that we've ever had to really understand where some of the opportunities are.
And I think for far too long we've been sort of guessing what novelty might be. We've been taking a risk averse view of, of providing novel experiences and trying to delight our clients without really understanding enough about who they are, what makes them tick, and what may be, uh, a novel experience for them.
As you would know, novelty is highly subjective. And when you consider that novelty is the difference between, the information that you have and, uh, I guess it, it, it has to do with uncertainty. Where, where there, there's a bit of uncertainty. Novelty is, sort of, plays on this. If you have a predictable experience, if you know that you're gonna go into the room and there's a, a chocolate on the pillow and uh, a bottle of wine on the desk.
That's no longer a novelty if it becomes an expectation. And I think that we really need to try and understand that, uh, that there are some opportunities within our industry to sort of move away from those norms to try and find new opportunities where there are, uh, advantages with local supply chain, where there are opportunities to get to know our guests better through, perhaps through AI enabled tools, uh, that we can really find meaningful opportunities to delight and find novelty.
What are your thoughts? I mean, this, this is sort of an overview, uh, realizing that there are a lot of very specific, uh, requirements in order to to, to meet those, uh, those targets.
Adam Mogelonsky: So novelty seeking behavior is the pursuit of the new. And what this book is basically saying is that to a certain degree, all of our efforts as hoteliers to deliver on expectations, to create brand standards, to deliver automated. Personalization at scale is the antithesis of what actually excites us Because we seek novelty because we overtly or secretly crave the unknown, the more we try to standardize everything and personalize, which is to say deliver recommended results that are BA based on past behavior, the more these hotel brands.
Will come off as meh, mediocre, right? And uh, if you look at a lot of the best experiences, not just hotels, but the best experiences, a lot of them are things that people were marked, that they exceeded their expectations or delivered some form of surprise or unknown, or something that was really tough to work at and then rewarding in the end.
Climbing a mountain is a life-changing experience, but it's tough. When you're climbing that mountain, you're going up four hours on an uphill climb. That's tough through it, but then you get the reward at the end. The dopamine hit, and, but, and that's very different as this book, this book illustrates, it's very different than playing a video game where you climb a mountain, right?
It's, it's not the same. Impact on your brain. And that is, uh, an example that relates to hospitality because, um, you, you have resorts all over the world that cater to people that want to go on hiking adventures. So hotels have to lean into this novelty in certain ways. They have to create some form of.
Expectation, some form of standards insofar as having comfortable beds, extra towels, clean, clean guestroom spaces, uh, uh, a front desk that's that's actually operated, um, and et cetera, et cetera. But they still have to offer something to guests that excites them, surprises them, makes them work hard to get that reward.
And that's really what the book describes as the explore exploit, um, principle where we as humans like to explore. We like to see new things and test new things and get rewards, get a dopamine hit from that. But then at a certain point we also like to exploit, which is to say, stick with what we know and.
Trust that it's known and, uh, and be safe in that known commodity. So some hotels, the ones that are the, you know, Alpine Hiking, hiking retreats, they can be exploitative in their expectations and their standards, but then they have to allow for exploration. And that exploration isn't just saying, Hey, we're gonna give you equipment so you can hype up the mountain.
Okay, that's great. But they also need to think about exploration of the mind. Of, you know, making people challenge themselves. Maybe present something on the menu that, on the food menu that's a little different. Or instead of using AI driven personalization to say, oh, I saw that you purchased this bottle of, uh, Chateau Margot the past three times you were here.
do you want that same bottle? You'll instead say, oh, you purchased the Chateau Margot. The last three times you were here. Now let's try the, uh, re or something similar or maybe, you know, how about this one that's completely different. It's an orange wine. We just got it in. Do you wanna give it a try?
So something within this bounded exploration range that I feel is being lost in the noise of personalization, what's soon to be over personalization. What, what do you think about the thoughts about over personalization in hotels?
Neil Foster: I would agree, but I, I think also if we could take a step back and really understand the, uh, propensity of our guests, uh. within our industry to to be novelty seeking. that's probably, probably the best way to match novelty with those that are seeking it. Uh, what I found really interesting in the book, and this is something certainly that we should understand, uh, within our industry, is that explore, exploit, uh, also has a time sensitivity.
So it, the best explorers are children. The best explores are children because they're learning all kinds of uncertainty. If you think about potential and kinetic energy, right? Potential energy is where you have, uh, no, no energy has been exploited at all. Uh, kinetic is where something has actually happened.
So the spring coiled up, it's all potential energy. The spring, uh, de coiled it fully is, is kinetic, uh, fully, and there are degrees of it. So if I have a half coil, uh, spring, then uh. Some of the kinetic energy has been deployed, but there's still some potential left. Think about that. In terms of a human lifespan, you start in the world with all potential and no experience, and so your uncertainty is a hundred percent.
And so in order to resolve that uncertainty, what, what the book talks about is that plays the best way to resolve uncertainty, to find ways of taking managed risks. Uh uh, really sort of, um. not having any clear expectations, but just experiment being in a, in, in an experimenter's mindset. The best experimenters are children.
And in fact, when you give them a specific objective as the book says, that they're going to, uh, go to that objective without sort of thinking outside of the box so much. But if you give them sort of, if you gamify, uh, the objective a little bit, the, the results may surprise you. So, for example, uh, uh, I think that the book talked about, uh, reaching for a pencil or something along those lines and a pencil at, uh.
On, on the table wasn't as interesting to a kid as a pencil that they had to jump up for. And so as long as the incentives were, uh, were such that, that, that, that it allowed them to explore, they would do all kinds of interesting and creative things. So kids explore, young people explore as you get.
There's a tendency to exploit more. So you've built this repository of information, your cognitive maps of the world, how the world works to you, all of your different social connections and everything else. The last half of your life is mostly exploitation. What I found interesting though is that, uh, and I wanna sort of draw back on on another book that we did, which was Generations, which talked about the slow life. And now life is being sort of protracted. So if you consider now that, that wellness, that, that the aging population can think that they can live longer, they're not constrained by time anymore, at least not mentally, that group is more likely to experiment, uh, to explore than they were previously. Those that were of a fixed mindset that, you know, were, were.
You know, we've already done everything. Uh, there are more risks to manage. You know, we're content with the way that life is. And, and that's it. I feel that, the paradigm has sort of shifted in the way that we sort of look at, look at ourselves. Uh, the young people draw things out a little bit longer, uh, which means maybe there's a bit more opportunity to, uh, to explore. Without, without all of the commitments that are, that, that were taken on at an early age, uh, in previous generations. But then at the other end of the scale, you have, uh, folks that are not ready yet to, uh, that, that they, they feel that they have more time to fill up, so they're more interested in doing creative and interesting things.
So the exploit explorer, um, paradox, I guess is that, if you could call it that, is. that have sort of built up so much information, uh, maybe mentally they're, they're not interested in doing anything. It's not because they can't explore, it's that they've resigned themselves to the fact that, that that's it.
They're finished and it's time to start harvesting. Uh, some of the knowledge, the new knowledge that they've built up. Maybe that's a, a lot to chew on here. Uh, but I guess, uh, for some segments of, of, uh, guests, that they are at the stage where they're not interested in novelty, they're just interested in.
Predictability as much as they possibly can, but there are gonna be some others that desire, uh, some, some novelty and some new experiences. And if we can't give absolute predictability to this group and if we can't give absolute novelty to this group, we're trying to please everybody. And in fact, we're not pleasing, uh, any of these groups at all.
Adam Mogelonsky: So I want to give one example here and then I'll follow up with a question.
Neil Foster: Okay.
Adam Mogelonsky: So an example of exploration. It's a hotel in Stockholm, Sweden called The Bank Hotel, and what they did was on their interactive TV screen. They set it all up with all their different, um, uh, services that they'd offer, uh, as you would a typical interactive tv.
But then in the corner they put a one click for champagne button, and it's a little bit of novelty because you just have a one click and it's just like, boom, champagne. And, you know, they had a service optimization, so it's delivered to your room with a nice setup and this big, uh, you know, display all within.
10 to 15 minutes and that one button, because the novelty of it was doing, uh, many, many hundreds of thousands of, uh, I guess, well I wanna say euros, but I guess this would be kronner's in Sweden, uh, many hundreds of thousands of the equivalent of Euros per year. Just one button. I bring this up because when we think of exploration, naturally our minds gravitate towards the Alpine hotels or the the adventure tourism locations.
But one thing that I hope everyone can take away is that exploration and allowing people to seek a novelty is something that can apply to urban hotels as well, and to the hotels that. Largely cater to groups, corporate and mice. The three, three major segments that are not necessarily coming to a hotel specifically for novelty in any sort.
So therein, Neil, the question is, I mentioned one example, the bank hotel. What other examples of novelty or exploration have you encountered at urban hotels around the world?
Neil Foster: Well, lemme come back to your example. 'cause I really like that the, the example that you've shared. There's only one caveat that I think is, is a bit tricky to overcome and that is that as a guest, I may see this, this one push button. And I may be thinking that the hotel is only looking to fulfill its own commercial interests.
So sure there's a button, I press it, a bottle of champagne appears cha ching, they found, uh, another revenue generating opportunity
Adam Mogelonsky: It's, it's, it's. Colorful button. If you saw the screen, I'll show. I'll share a screenshot, but it's a very colorful button.
Neil Foster: but let, lemme come back to, let, lemme come back to this. So imagine you have a really good relationship with your technology provider that does your mini bars and the guest, a guest goes into the minibar and they see this colorful button inside the minibar that says, push me. You push the button.
Within five minutes, somebody comes with a bottle of cold champagne and it's free. It's free. You imagine you walk away from that experience. This is, I, I think, called the frizen of surprise in our book, the Frizen of Surprise encapsulates uncertainty, where you don't know what's gonna happen in the book.
Uh, they talk about this, uh, sushi roulette, which is sort of a, I guess, a play on Russian roulette. I really liked it. I thought, you know, if, if I
Adam Mogelonsky: What, What, is sushi roulette?
Neil Foster: Sushi roulette is they had, um, traditional, uh, salmon maki rolls, but one of the maki rolls is full of wasabi. So imagine you were with a bunch of friends, right?
Maybe they're. It's a college outing. Right? And you order this 'cause it'll be fun. You see one of, you know, one, one of your mates pop a a roll full of wasabi. You don't know this until you start to see tears streaming. Uh, it's not unsafe. I mean, it's not something that'll cause any, any medical issue, but it's something with, with it, with an element of surprise.
No, I'm like. I guess being at a theme park and you're in what you think is a merry-go-round and the merry-go-round turns into something that shakes you up and, and then at the end you're like, wow, I didn't expect any of this, and you're willing to pay money for this. The caveat, I think, is where you keep people surprised.
And I think that the book also talked about how the frizen of surprise doesn't work perpetually. That if there's a gap in information and you're able to resolve that gap in information. And I think it, it talks about music as an example. So when you're a kid, you listen to, you know, kid songs that are simple and structure, you outgrow it.
It's no longer interesting to you, and maybe you don't realize why you're outgrowing it, it's because there are patterns that you, you wanna be able to decipher, uh, some of the patterns, that are maybe not so familiar. So more complicated music actually becomes interesting because your, uh, you, your expectations relative to what you're getting, that there's a little bit of a gap.
As soon as you know that that expectation is gonna be met a hundred percent, it's no longer interesting. Certainly not to the person seeking novelty. So the only way the the, the reason I push back gently on, uh, the champagne button, if it's marked as such, and if it's something that everybody knows and they've marketed it and it's a word of mouth, that there's a very short lifespan to that because it doesn't really,
unless it's for expediency. If I knew I pushed that button and that was the quickest way for me to get a bottle of champagne that I didn't have to consider any cognitive activities when I've already had a little bit to drink that, that could be a really great idea just to keep things flowing. But from a novelty perspective, I think it has a short shelf life.
Adam Mogelonsky: So, another, uh, example I wanna throw at you is a brand called Penta Hotels. And what they do is they've merged the lobby with the bar. So that way instead of checking in at a front desk, you're checking in with the bartender at the bar, uh, and you're surrounded by a games room. So, you know, you talk about this goldilock zone of.
Of surprise and of uncertainty where you cannot have endless uncertainty. 'cause that's too much for the mind to handle. But then zero uncertainty is boredom and that goldilock zone. In, in, in between. And here you have a hip European brand of hotels where they have the, they still have a check-in.
You still are greeted by somebody, but instead of it being a front desk, it's. It's a bar and you just go right up to the bar and then it's the, in the middle of a, of a games theme bar to create that, that specific atmosphere that they want. And that's sort of the, I, I believe a good example of the goldilock zone that we're talking about here, where they've changed things just enough to be, to be different, to be a strange attractor without it being.
You know, oh, we don't, we don't even, we, we, you just walk into a games room and you know, you, you sort of have to find the, uh, find the host. You have to ask for them, and then you have to go down a secret alleyway and, and you know, it's, uh, and the, the front desk is actually, you have to have a password to get in behind a speakeasy type bar.
So it's, they've crafted that experience where it's, it's approachable but different. And, uh, therein, you know, I'm wondering if you could give some more examples because realistically, this book is very heady, uh, when, especially when it gets into the part about the free energy principle and Carl Furton, who is ostensibly the Einstein of our generation, talking about, um, how energy is structured, uh, within life.
How that determines behavior. Very heady stuff, but not a lot of applicability on the surface for hotels. So therein, I'm wondering, could you give some more examples of hotels you've experienced where they meet this sort of Goldilocks zone, uh, or a strange attractor of being similar but different at the same time?
Neil Foster: Yeah. Uh, well, I before I answer that question, I just wanna backtrack a tiny bit. And I wanna say that for the Swedish Hotel company that has the champagne button, that is an excellent idea and this is an amazing starting point. And I think there are other ways to take that. So if it's a button that gives you some sort of an uncertain, uh, outcome, something that you're not expecting, that's amazing.
And, uh, something certainly to explore further and perhaps for other brands to take note of.
Adam Mogelonsky: I mean, uh, there, there's, there's plenty of other examples like that. I mean, the, Virgin Hotels does a fantastic job of echoing the core virgin ethos of being cheeky, having, you know, a British style and, uh, really upscale, really vibey places. Um, their property in New York City, one of the cool things they did is they don't just have a library by there.
By their lobby and, uh, their lobby on the third floor in their, their cafe area. What they've done is they've purchased a whole lot of books and organized them by the color of the spine, so that way when you organize them by the color of the spine, you can actually make a color coded rainbow around a doorframe, uh, by molding bookcases around that are all done by, done by the color of the book, of the book cover itself.
And it's like a little touch, but it's like, wow. I've never seen that before. That's so colorful. And then they, then they augment that with just this incredible third floor space that's overlooking the, uh, overlooking the Empire State Building. And then altogether you're like, wow, this is such a cool place.
Uh, there's something interesting in every corner. I wanna hang out here. I wanna have a drink here. I wanna have a cafe here. I wanna have a meal here. And then that translates, uh, up to their room experience, which has a very distinct style as well. So. I think that there's, from this book, in terms of the Goldilock sign, Goldilock zone of expectations and exploration, the overall message is hotels have to explore.
They have to, in order to be different, they can't just be McDonald's of the hotels and, but they can't over explore. They can't be too wild. They have to still fit it within, um, a certain set of predefined conditions so it doesn't overwhelm the brain.
So I mean, yeah, there, there's, there's plenty of other examples.
Um, I mean to, I've talked about one in North America, Virgin, uh, one in predominantly France, Penta one in Sweden. Um, maybe to throw another one that you're familiar with, there is, uh, QT Hotels. Out of Australia and they just, uh, they just have, um, have, they just launched a hotel in Singapore and that one actually won a lot of awards for its service, its design, its overall feel.
And, uh, I, I toured it when I was down there. It's a fantastic property just. Utterly amazing in every single way. But it has that QT style, which is that, that Aussie cheekiness of, um, the, the, the property in Sydney, uh, the, the staff uniforms are like, uh, something out of, uh, Alice in Wonderland. Uh, and you know, some of the, some of the hosts are wearing wigs, and then you go up to Gooing, the main restaurant, and it's stylized like a, like a steampunk, uh, and it, and the hotel itself is, is converting an old theater.
Uh, so the room, the room layouts are interesting and it creates an interesting sense of place and, and, and how you move around the space. And that's all on the design front. Design is important. You can also do exploration on the food front. You can do it on the wellness front in terms of giving people new types of spa treatments or, uh, wellness based activities or allowing for group classes beyond just the expected, which is yoga and Pilates, and saying, okay, well we don't just have Pilates, we have Lagree.
What's Lagree? Well, it's a guy who studied under Pilates and tried to do it even better, give it a try, and then they go, yeah, let's do that. And Uh huh The technology underneath enables guests to find these, um, exploratory experiences. So again, any other examples are ideas to build on that?
Neil Foster: Oh yeah, so just coming back to hotels, a shout out to Brendon Granger who gave me a tour of that hotel in Sydney about a
year ago. Fantastic.
Adam Mogelonsky: Right?
Neil Foster: Uh, Brendan's enthusiasm. Uh, I, I, I love Brendon. He's one of the most hospitality oriented guys that I know that understands technology.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah, just, just for everyone here. Brendon is a fellow GAIN advisor. Um, so feel free to look 'em up.
Neil Foster: so Brendon, uh, uh, as he was showing me the, uh, the hotel, he was using the same adjectives that it's, uh, it's cheeky and it's interesting when hotels are able to. Sort of instill a, uh, that, that they're able to, to sort of find a, a cognitive map in other people's minds, right? So there are some hotels where, where you just sort of think about this, and I'm not sure what external inputs they have, but Brendon was just on a podcast, I think it was yesterday or two days ago, and he was saying that in the elevator, if you're a single occupant of the
elevator. And if there are more that that, that there's something that changes in the elevator based on the number of people that are in there. And as soon as you're able to figure out, figure this out. And I think that this really plays on, on this uncertainty, uh, gap, is that if you realize, wait a sec, something is different in this space.
When there's more than one person that something changes, two things happen. First you think to yourself, huh? I noticed something different. Pat on the back, uh, I've noticed a nuance that maybe other people might not have noticed, and I think people feel good that this is, we talked a little earlier about dopamine, when people are able to solve crossword puzzles, when they're able to do things that they figure, uh, you know, other people aren't able to do so well, they think that there are, you know, in, in a different level, in a good way, that it gives them positive re reinforcement, uh, to continue to be open-minded.
Maybe these people are going to look with a little more scrutiny for, for some interesting clues. So this is the first experience. They're in the elevator, headed up to the lobby. The very first experience tells them that something's different. So now the right kind of guests are detectives looking all over the place for little clues about how this is a different kind of a hotel from others.
So, um, one example, so you asked me for an example of, of a another brand that's doing things. Differently in a really interesting way. Uh, I'll offer to you the TWA hotel at JFK New York. The TWA hotel is a story unto itself. It's just incredible how they were able to, uh. MCR hotels was under Tyler Morris was able to secure the lease of the Howard Hughes, the legendary Howard Hughes terminal at uh, JFK, which out undoubtedly involved a ton of paperwork, bureaucracy, everything else.
Uh, that was the first piece. And then being able to turn it into, uh, a, a rehash of a wonderful brand. So consider this on most people's minds. We're living in a travel health. Getting onto a plane for most of us is the start of a terrible anxiety. Even before that, you go to the airport, you're going through security and customs and everything else, and you're thinking, oh my gosh.
I just have to answer the questions the way they want to hear them. Otherwise, I'm gonna be strip searched, bear, uh, my experience is gonna be miserable. And enter TWA. They bring back the glory days of travel from the fifties and sixties. The meals were good. The service was wonderful. The security wasn't something that was o overbearing or, or a dominant part of the whole experience.
And so you have this story in your mind of a time when travel was different, when it was enjoyable, when everything was wonderful. And this is an airport hotel. This is the master stroke. So you're in an airport hotel thinking about how travel was somehow different. When I realized that T-W-A, that the concept was genius, was when I saw flight attendants in the masses from Delta, from American, I think American flies through, uh, through JFK, but all, all of these flight attendants that were on in masses with their phones taking selfies of themselves and with other flight crew, I thought to myself, this is absolutely a genius idea.
If it resonates with those that are in the industry and they feel that it's a special place, then that message is an authentic message, one that can Revinate with others. And so as somebody that was looking to see that flight crews during the, the layover time or the time that they had a JFK between flights sacrificing their time to go to this amazing hotel and to check it out and to see that they were having fun and having a, a great experience of it.
Told me that, you know, this is the kind of experience that, is ripe for for others, uh, to sort of experiment and come up with ideas. Maybe as a starting point, there's probably a lot of fodder that we can consider in terms of areas where we're anxious, right? What are the pain points? What do most people struggle with?
How can a hotel be an interesting, safe haven or to provide a counter narrative of something that might be on all of our minds that causes us distress, that gives us a brief glimpse of the sun in a cloudy sky.
Adam Mogelonsky: Well, um, you raise a very interesting point, is what this book pretends is that themed hotels will grow. Because themed hotels give a guest an opportunity to explore a different story, something they're unfamiliar with. Um, and that can be an urban setting or, or a rural setting. So, you know, you, you're, you see, uh, you may see a Lego themed hotel in Legoland, Disney hotels, uh, that are on the parks are great at this.
Um. A Ferrari hotel, I believe there's now, uh, or maybe it's still opening an Atari hotel, which is themed after, uh, after the old video console company. Um. You, you could see a Nintendo hotel, uh, there. The, the luxury, uh, the luxury house of brands, uh, Louis Vuitton, Mo Hennessy already has Bulgar Hotels and Armani.
So those are sort of themed in, in a lot of ways. But do you see, do you foresee a future where themed hotels really take off a and all these major brands try to have a hotel in some way to. To tell a story, to allow guests to explore, like for instance, a a Nike hotel,
right?
Neil Foster: Absolutely. And, and I just wanna go back and, and shout out to Chris Ben. Especially to Jacob Messina for lining up the tour for, uh, for the TWA hotel when I was there in June of 2023. Uh, they were both super passionate about something that, that understandably they should be proud of having built something that's interesting, something that's great for the community of, of flight attendants.
For those that are in the airline industries as well as those in hospitality, there is a, a redemptive. Uh, aspect to what they've offered. so if, if the theme hotels are able to bring back nostalgia in a way that it reflects some positive attributes, I'm a Gen X. The first, uh, video game console that I ever played was Atari, and I remember.
I mean, now it's laughable in today's standards, but there was a game called kaboom, and there was a bad guy that was dropping, uh, dropping explosives and you had to move quickly and catch the things, and the, the, the plate became narrower and you had, and the guy dropped it faster. That actually felt like hospitality, now that I'm thinking about it.
That game was all about hospitality. Uh, the stressors, the, the speed picks up. The, uh, the expectations change. They increase in, you're left with less in order to meet those expectations. So with all, all joking aside, I think the challenge in our industry is that hospitality is risk averse by design.
As an owner, you're spending millions of dollars in capital. You're trying to figure out how to make money without, uh, taking a really crazy, foolish risk that that's gonna thrust you into the throes of bankruptcy.
Adam Mogelonsky: Uh, but what, what this book is saying is that you have to take risks in order to truly succeed.
Neil Foster: Sure. Absolutely. And I, I think there are those that are born to take risks. Uh, earlier today I read you, you might've read this also, that there was a, an Alaskan, a young Alaskan climber, uh, that fell off El Capitano, uh, the, uh. Alex Honnold made a movie called Free, uh, free Climb, I think a, a few years ago, all about, uh, climbing thi this was the holy grail of, of free climbing. It had been done before, right? So he'd done it, he'd filmed it, it, it, it was something out there. Unfortunately, somebody passed away doing the same thing, uh, only yesterday. The reason I bring this up is it speaks to a quality that some have, that they do it because it's there. It isn't necessarily important that somebody else has done it, but for them to do it, for them to be able to validate that they have something in them and that they're able to fulfill whatever potential that they have, I think is one of the greatest, um, unwritten, uh, unwritten rules of humanity.
I think that, that to be human is to figure out what you got inside of you. and To take that as far as you possibly can, and a measure of success is that you leave this world full of scars and everything else that you have been used up. Maybe this goes against the grain of some of the wellness narratives that we talk about today, that you know, you're looking for perfect skin and, uh, that, that everything is perfect as you leave.
But Another view of that is, you know, hey, if you have it in you to do stuff, wear yourself out. Leave yourself with no regrets. At the end of at, the end of the journey, the book talks also about goals versus the journeys, and so that journey is, really, I, I guess it speaks to the fact that the journey for some is more important than getting to the destination.
But I think with passive, the passive response to life and entertainment, I think that the way that we've looked at life is to figure out what are our goals? Let's, let's set goals and achieve them, then move on to the next goal and achieve the next goal. Do you think that that that encourages a lot of exploration?
Tendency or that that encourages any tolerance for ambiguity? What are your thoughts?
Adam Mogelonsky: first off is, as for what this pretends for hotels, I wanna pull out one little thing to what you said, and that is that. The whole point of life is to leave it scarred, uh, and kicking or, you know, the Hunter s Thompson way of, of, uh, of measuring a good life. Um, at worse as wellness is all about, you know, um, preserving and, uh, and keeping things smooth, let's say.
But as that relates to the journey, uh, versus the destination, I wanna describe one other hotel brand. And this is one that I experienced recently, and that is the Lancer Hoff. Uh, brand in Germany and Austria, three hotels sent, uh, centering around supervised detoxing, and it's a luxury health clinic, but they do a, they can do a fasting protocol while you're there and not just talking about an eight 16 where people go 16 hours without eating and eating within an eight hour window.
I'm talking about they'll, they will supervise you through a seven day water fast. With some pills and some and some treatments around that, and you have to think what percent of people have gone seven days without eating. That is a journey that ultimately will be very good for your health. It has been shown that going through a, an assisted fast and not eating without, not eating for seven days afterwards, after you're done, the refeeding will be very good for your health, but the journey through it is hell.
You feel cranky, you feel, uh, disoriented. You feel hangry. And then once you get to about the day three mark, once you get past your hunger pings, you have this moment of clarity, like you're actually thinking clearer and sharper than what you were before you entered the fast. And so a lot of times the, the journey, just like a mountain hike, can be rigorous.
But the destination is worth it in multiple ways. And then in hindsight, you realize that it was all worth it. The, the, the pains and suffering of the journey, and tie this back to hospitality, is that you have brands like Lancer Hoff that are allowing people to explore in a slightly safe and controlled environment in a, in a, in a safe and controlled environment, but allowing them to, to explore what a fast is like and.
That is exploration in a nutshell. That's where hospitality, true hospitality is, is it allows people to experience new things. Sometimes those things are tough getting through, but then in the end they're worth it. And another wellness experience that's like that is a cryo chamber. You're not expressly having fun while you're in minus 170 degree, degree, uh, frozen air.
You're not having fun. You're in there for three to four minutes. The last minute is very painful, uh, or uncomfortable, I should say. And then you get out of there, and then you go back into the sauna and you solely heat up and you have this moment of bliss. So there are ways that hotels can take risks by making their guests feel uncomfortable in a, in a, in a controlled manner, and then come out on top by engendering those guests end.
Making them customers for life because the guests really feel something for that brand. And part of that feeling is the fact that they had to work for that dopamine hit, and then by working for that dopamine hit it en endeared them to that brand.
Neil Foster: I think I saw some of the, uh, did, did you very. Recently visit the Lancer Hof Hotel. Was it in, uh, in Munich or not Munich? In in Hamburg.
Adam Mogelonsky: It was in, uh, te Te Sea, which is an hour south of Munich.
Neil Foster: Okay. Uh, what I, what I really liked, so the, the photos that you posted were incredible, and I love how you share your experiences, Adam, this is a good part of, uh, bringing some of this joy to others that are in armchairs that should be out there exploring, uh, that you're giving them little morsels that they can follow.
One thing that I really, really liked and I recalled about that, was that there was a big room that was designed in a way that. People could sort of sit and converse with each other. So it's more likely than not that those that stay at a Lanoroff hotel have similar mindsets and probably have, uh, interesting experiences and perspectives to share with each other.
So, as an added dimension that you're basically using the stratification of your clientele as a feature. So you're not trying to appeal to everybody where there's so much variability in your type of guests that they can't all sit in the same room and find a common thread. But, uh, perhaps there's a more selective nature.
Those that are willing to go through a fasting exercise is a very small, uh, segment of, of even even the wellness crowd that that might be, uh, willing to undergo something like this. Added to that is the forfeiture of lucrative f and b revenue. So the idea of doing something like this also means that your f and b revenue.
Adam Mogelonsky: Oh, the, the, they all, they also have incredible food like that. You, you, you can choose to go on a fasting protocol or you can have their food and they bake all their bread in house and their breads are absolutely fantastic. Some of the best bread you'll ever have. Uh, they're, they're buckwheat toast rivals any bakery in the world, and it's worth, it's worth the time just to go there to see that.
But I mean, I'm, I'm detracting from your overall point. They, they do have exceptional cuisine. It's, it's incredibly healthy cuisine, but overall hotels are places for finding community. And
that can be the reward as well. You, you, you know, to get to ancy to this property, for me, I have to fly from Toronto to Munich, eight hours, then train from Munich Airport into halal the central station, another hour, then switch trains in a very crowded train station.
Uh, and then get on a, a local commuter train to go south to this beautiful part of the Bavarian Alps. And then when I was there, uh, just chilling out in the sauna, started talking with some other guys, and one of the guys who was there was also from Toronto. And we were both, we, we were both raised and living two blocks from one another as we were kids, like in the same neighborhood in Toronto.
know, in the, in the middle of a, of a resort in Germany. But. I bring that up that because those experience, so that that fri of uncertainty, you don't know what you're gonna encounter and then you're so surprised and delighted and then, you know, I'll remember that hotel for the rest of my life.
Because, because of the, the interactions I had with the team, that's lovely. The doctors that are lovely, the breads, the food, uh, and the the sauna experience. Um, the rooms, which are absolutely fantastic. The setting, uh, all of it together and from there, now you have the makings of something that's so fantastic.
You'll remember for lifetime and you wanna revisit it. You know, to, to close out our, our, our talk about this book and the applications for hotels is that you can see there the, the journey destination where the journey of getting to this place from Toronto is, is grueling. Uh, planes, trains, automobiles, and then when you get there you have this, this magic of the destination.
And as well, it is quite risky to do what they do in terms of saying, we're gonna be a luxury health clinic. We're gonna do things very differently. Like, you know, it isn't necessarily good for your digestion to have a lot of water at dinner, so we're not going to normally present a bottle of water at your table when you sit down.
You can ask for it for sure, but we don't recommend it. So risky. But they built, they, they understand it. they understand customers for life. And this is, this is where I think our industry. Maybe he needs to focus more. There's always places for safe hotels, for expectations, for brand standards, but the hotels that are really excelling and realizing above market value are ones that are do, that are, that are doing a little bit of risk.
Oh.
Neil Foster: To draw from the book. So there's a term adaptive flexibility that's brought up in the book, and it sounds to me like this is a hotel with adaptive flexibility. So they're not worried about, uh, worried about the FOMO of, uh, losing f and b covers 'cause they understand that it's all about the full experience, as you pointed out.
They've got great food and beverage. This is something that's available to you as part of the experience, not necessarily something to force down your throat every night. Uh, but something that in fact, the. The moderation of some of the activities might leave you feeling a, a sense of wanting more, that you had such a, a wonder, wonderful experience with, uh, with f and b, the couple of, couple of days or opportunities that you had with f and b, that that's one of the things that you're thinking about.
Uh, so I, I wanna sort of connect with, with, with something that I think is a little bit controversial. There's a, an Antarctic tour that now, um. Is, is flying people across the Drake passage, connecting them with a ship already in the Antarctic to do the tour, uh, before flying them back again across the Drake passage.
And when we talk about sort of active versus passive. I'm not sure if you've ever traveled to the Antarctic or if ever you have a desire to do so. I highly recommend it, and I also highly recommend that you go across the Drake passage. They call it the Drake Shake. It takes two days to cross in both directions, and there's a strong likelihood that you're gonna be extremely sick on the way.
That's not a bug, it's a feature. 'cause by the time you see land for the first time, it's gonna be the most incredible thing that you've ever seen in your whole life. And when it comes to ticking the box to say that I've been in Antarctica, I guess you could tick the box, but you won't feel the same way about it.
Coming back to the point of sacrifice that if you've had to pray to the porcelain gods for a couple of days in order to see this wonderful land in the Aurora Astralis where the sun doesn't truly set at night, uh, over that, that period of time, you're in a magical place, but it's taken you a period through purgatory in order to get there.
Purgatory in order to get there, but once you've been there, it's forever burned in your brain.
the short circuiting, and we talked about this in another book that, that we, uh, uh, that we did together. Um, that I think there are all kinds of hijacks that we need to be aware of, and technology can either help us to the extreme or it can hinder us to the extreme. The hindrance is where it saves us from a healthy struggle that makes us feel great about ourselves and feel great about the experiences that we're about to undergo.
The great part, of course, is that we have limitless opportunities, all kinds of potential, uh, opportunities to explore at our fingertips. And I think that the masters of the new technologies, particularly ai, are going to use it in order to grab little ends that they can explore for. So you have an idea that you can take to another level and you can feel great about, about doing something on your own.
The, the beware of the caution. Is that you don't rely so heavily on technology that you're no longer forming cognitive maps of the world. And this is our existential fight. I think, uh, especially when it comes to our kids and figuring out free play and figuring out how to, uh, continue along the, the, the spirit of exploration.
We have to get rid of the notion that everything is unsafe and that everything is crystalline. We have to figure out more opportunities where we can, uh, demy, deify, all of these, these fears that we have in our minds, and to boldly go out there and experience things.
Adam Mogelonsky: I mean, that is what the book is all about, is exploration and the need for it. And again, what I hope the message overall that listeners can get is that we have to explore, we have to take risks. Because if we're just doing the same, same in, same out, we are not winning customers for life. And that can mean, that can also mean on the hotel tech front in terms of how you talk to your customers, your clients, but also on the hotel front in terms of experiential design, facilities planning, uh, decor in, uh, interior design, uh, activities, wellness, et cetera.
Neil. If you could finish off with one sentence as a lesson for hotels, what would that one sentence be?
Neil Foster: I would say be bolder to consider that the risk in your mind is not the actual risk to consider. The actual risk is doing nothing.
Adam Mogelonsky: Yeah, that's, I would end it the same way Fortune favors the bold. And, um, a lot of times, uh, as, as I've said many times, is that. It's better to do something now than do nothing, even if that action is incorrect. Taking action is very important quickly, and then you can always backtrack. And the problem with inaction is that you just end up deliberating and deciding, then nothing gets done.
Then you don't innovate and you're not, you're not cool, you're not, you're not taking risks. You're not, you're not allowing guests to explore.
Neil Foster: may I add sort of another part to my my one summary, and that is we don't have to do it alone and with the right kinds of people, that we can explore things that are already in us and take them to levels that we never imagined possible. So with the right kinds of advisors and catalysts, ones that are asking more questions that are giving answers, ones that are able to share a wealth of experience where the, the learning is, is not something that, that, that one needs to feel, feel anxious about, that there's a playfulness in finding others.
On, on a journey to greatness, and I would encourage everybody out there to consider more wholly, more thoroughly the teams that you have and catalysts that can make the environment fun and interesting and more like journeys than a series of destinations that may or may not be, uh, real ones to, uh, to arrive.
Adam Mogelonsky: Very true words, Neil, that's a great way to finish it off. Thanks so much for the one hour conversation about this book. Plenty of applications for hotels around the world, not just resorts, but also urban hotels. Let your guests explore. Neil. Thank you.
Neil Foster: A pleasure, Adam. Thanks so much.