The Modern Hotelier #231: Streamlining Hotel Security & Operations with Smart Access Control | with Gabriella Forss
====
Steve Carran: Welcome to another episode of The Modern Hotelier. We are coming to you from the Trade show floor at the Hospitality Show in Denver, Colorado. We are joined by Gabriella Forss. The Hospitality engagement leader of North America. Thanks for joining us Gabriella. How you doing? 
Gabriella Forss: Doing great. Loving the show so far. Loving the energy. It's a great turnout. 
Steve Carran: Good, good, good. So Gabriella, can you give us a little bit about your background and for those that might not be familiar with SALTO, what you all do? 
Gabriella Forss: Sure, absolutely. So, I'm a hospitality gal through and through started back in college I went to Cornell, the hotel school there for hospitality. It's only grown from there, working for price, line and saver. Now I've been at Salto Systems for a little over eight years now. Always focusing on the hospitality vertical explicitly. So hospitality through and through a little bit about Salto systems now, the Salto ecosystem we're one of the leading providers of electronic access control.
So anything from your guestroom door locks to the back house in many of these spaces to essentially anything that you need secured, Salto can do. And so we've really expanded over the last few years, but like I said, we're one of the leading electronic access control providers. But it goes so much further beyond that, whether it's your locker as well, or connected ecosystem, Salto can excel.
David M.: How is Salto helping hotels modernize their access control systems while keeping the guest experience seamless? 
Gabriella Forss: And that's a great question. It's hard to find that balance between the levels of authentication and the security side of it. And the different construction pieces that are involved in a retrofit or new construction, finding that balance with guests and they want a seamless experience. So finding that's difficult. Salto does a really great job at providing many different modes to do so, whether that's our different levels, or different types of locks and our solutions. A door lock to a locker to a padlock on your roof hatch, self-compute it all, and it's all done in a scalable solution that's on one platform. So the guest doesn't know, and it's seamless that any of these access points, just their one key card or their mobile app all in one place. 
Steve Carran: So one thing that we're seeing more and more of is mobile keys. How is SALTO making sure that not only the convenience factor is there, but also the security aspect as well?
Gabriella Forss: Fabulous question. That's such a pain point here in the industry now is to balance those two, 'cause you have to have the balance for success for both the guest side, the staff side for the brand, everything. So SALTO uses industry standard encryption levels. And it goes beyond the hospitality industry, you know, the same type of encryption, insecurity that are going into government buildings, into hospitals, into college campuses, et cetera. And so that expands across any of our platforms and any of our mobile app or key and wallet or your typical key card credential like here, right?
Gabriella Forss: That expands across all.
David M.: Tell us more about how SALTO works with mobile key and how these keys help increase the guest experience compared to traditional keys. 
Gabriella Forss: So guest experience these days, they want something seamless, they want something quick, low friction points, touch bases, et cetera. So checking into hotel, they can now skip the front desk if the hotel allows, you can use your mobile app, which many brands and some of the independent partners that we work with allow for that.
We're also launching key and wallet later this year. So that's a really exciting thing that SALTO has coming up in the future. But you can also use keycard credentials as well. So there's a multitude of credential ability. But the beauty is you can use one or all of them, right? So if someone on the room wants mobile key or someone wants a credential, you can do everything.
David M.: So also how is SALTO integrating with other technologies like P-M-S-P-O-S or guest apps to keep, keep, keep that created ecosystem. 
Gabriella Forss: Absolutely. And recently, SALTO you rebranded a couple years ago to be SALTO ecosystem 'cause we understand the importance of that. Hotels and our customers, they want something that's full encompassing.
So yes, we have the door locks for the guestroom doors, back house amenities, but we go beyond that now. Now we have parking gate integrations. We have facial recognition to get in some more secure doors. We have all that, but beyond that, we rely on our partners. We like to think we're best in breed, and we also like to do the same with our PMS providers, our POS.
Any of the other technologies out there that, guess what, for comprehensive, and scalable ecosystem. 
Steve Carran: One thing we talk about on the podcast so much is sustainability. How does SALTO not only approach sustainability, but also energy efficiency in their hardware and also their operations as well? 
Gabriella Forss: SALTO is really proud to say that our headquarters, um, in fact we're over 100% carbon neutral already, and by 2030 we're on track to be net zero across the brand, and that extends beyond the operations. That's the hardware side as well using sustainable sources, everything down to the key cards, for example, even bamboo credentials that, uh, for recyclability, um, and good for the environment as well. 
David M.: So what is next for SALTO? 
Gabriella Forss: So, I alluded to it a little bit earlier. But we're really excited to launch Key and Wallet later this year. We have a couple properties live already, and we're excited to roll it out across the globe later this year. Additionally, especially speaking of the sustainability piece, we have excess 4 cents launching next month. And that's now going to be to bring energy efficiency and community sensing into the room itself for the individual walks.
David M.: Well, that does it for another episode of The Modern Hotelier, the most engaged podcast in hospitality. Whether you're watching or listening, we appreciate you and hope to be with you again soon. Thank you.
Gabriella Forss: Thanks.