Latest / The Modern Hotelier / #328: How a European Hotel Brand Is Expanding in America | with Phil Andreopoulos, CEO of Yotel
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- The Modern Hotelier #328: How a European Hotel Brand Is Expanding in America | with Phil Andreopoulos, CEO of Yotel === David Millili: Welcome to The Modern Hotelier, the most engaged podcast in hospitality. Don't forget to follow, like, subscribe, and let us know in the comments what you think about today's episode. Steve, who do we have on the program today? Steve Carran: Yeah, David, we got a good one today. We have on Phil Andreopoulos, the CEO of YOTEL. Thanks for joining us, Phil. How we doing today? Phil Andreopoulos: Very well, very well. Nice to see you both. Hi, Steve. Hi, David. Hope you're both well. David Millili: Yeah, great to see you. So we're gonna jump right in. We're gonna go through a lightning round. We're gonna get to know you better, talk about your career a little bit, and then dive into some thought leadership industry topics. Sound good? Phil Andreopoulos: Sounds great. Looking forward to it. David Millili: All right. When you were young, what did you want to be when you grew up? Phil Andreopoulos: Oh, I wanted to be Han Solo out of Star Wars. He was a cool guy. Yeah, that was my dream. I don't know where it went wrong. David Millili: Yeah. All right. What's something that you wish you were better at? Phil Andreopoulos: I'm not a very good sleeper. I'd love to be able to sleep a bit better. Life's so much better if you've had a good night's sleep. David Millili: Yeah, I agree with you. So what's a luxury you can't live without? Phil Andreopoulos: I seem to have a lot of shoes, mostly trainers. Yeah, I do like a good shoe. Today I'm sporting an Adidas Cloudfoam. Very proud of them. They're very comfortable. David Millili: All right. Name a person, dead or alive, you'd like to take to lunch. Phil Andreopoulos: Oh, wow. Anthony Bourdain. I think he would be great company. He would definitely take me somewhere for good food. And I used to be a chef, nowhere near his quality. So yeah, Anthony Bourdain, definitely. David Millili: Right. That's a good answer. What's a superpower you would like to have? Phil Andreopoulos: Teleportation. I love to travel, but I can't get to all the places I'd want to get to 'cause there's just not enough days in the week. So teleportation would help. David Millili: Makes sense. All right, last one here. What's something that's on your bucket list? Phil Andreopoulos: Oh, to my shame, to my absolute shame, I have never visited any country in South America. I don't know how I've been to like 80 something countries in the world, but never once to South America, so I've got to get there. Steve Carran: Those were great answers. A big Star Wars fan as well, so I understand that Han Solo answer. So now we're gonna dive into your personal background, a little bit about you and what makes you tick. So you grew up in North London, is that correct? Phil Andreopoulos: I did. I grew up in the suburbs of North London, so I'm a Londoner. And then we moved a little further out to like a satellite town out in the countryside a bit, just on the end of the tube line. Great place to be. Yeah, London is a fantastic city. Steve Carran: How did growing up in North London shape you into who you are today? Phil Andreopoulos: Yeah. I'm so fortunate, you know, as you would have guessed by my family name, I have some Greek heritage and my mom is actually from New Zealand, so I'm kind of a citizen of the world in many ways. But I was born and brought up in and around London, and it has shaped me because it's such an amazing multicultural city. There is so much to do here and see. We used to play a game when I was a student, pick the most obscure restaurant nationality that you can. And one night, we found an Uzbek restaurant. It was... I don't recall exactly what the meat was, but I think it was unidentified. But yeah, it was an interesting experience. So I love the multiculturalism in London and then being a little bit outside, like the latter part of my childhood, green fields, trees, nature, all within striking distance. So I feel like I've been shaped by a lot of that, the hustle and bustle of London, the multiculturalism, but then the kind of closeness to nature and getting away from it all. David Millili: So what led you to pursue a degree in hospitality administration and management at the University of Brighton? Phil Andreopoulos: I am a lifer in this industry. At the age of about, I think 14, I'm not even sure if that was legal, but at 14 I started work in a restaurant. My friend's dad had a restaurant and they hired me to wash the pots and pans 'cause I needed the money. And gradually I progressed. I got promoted onto plates. And then from there I hit the pinnacle of my pot wash career and I was allowed to wash glasses. But in all seriousness, I worked alongside or across the kitchen from a very inspirational chef, and he taught me to cook. And then when I finished school, I wanted to cook and spend time in the kitchen, and then I figured the best route if I wanted to be serious about the industry, 'cause I'd fallen in love with it, would be to go and do a degree. And so I did a management degree specializing in hospitality, and that was that. And yeah, I've been in the industry my whole life. So since 14 to, we'll call it late 40s, I've been enjoying this industry all the way. Absolutely. Steve Carran: That's great. And I understand that while you're attending university, you actually spent your summers working backstage at music festivals, largely hauling crates of alcohol for artists before and after they performed. Phil Andreopoulos: How on earth did you find that out? Steve Carran: Hey, we gotta do the research about you, Phil. So I heard you actually thought about making that your career and touring with the bands. What made you stick with hospitality? And I have to ask if there is a favorite story that you have from that time in your life. Phil Andreopoulos: Well, yeah, look, it was fantastic. Through some connections I had with the university student union and some other people I knew, I managed to somehow blag myself a summer job working on music festivals, making sure that the artists had their riders stocked up. And as you can imagine, a backstage rider for most of these bands was just copious amounts of alcohol and a couple of bags of popcorn. And it was just a great gig. I got paid well for a student and it was fantastic. And of course I thought, "Oh, well, this is great. I'm gonna be in this industry forever." I was having a great time. I was meeting some of the big artists of the era and, you know, got to hang out with the likes of David Bowie and De La Soul and Metallica. Yeah, it was good fun. But I was young and a bit of an idiot, and what I didn't realize was that the summer comes to an end. And then at the end of the summer, there's no more music festivals. And I had wondered why all my colleagues were kinda chasing around the tour managers trying to get gigs to go on tour over the winter, but I hadn't made the connection. So at the end of the summer, I was out of a job. But that helped me because I'd been working on these big events and doing big event management at these festivals, so I was able to walk into work in hotels kind of doing event management. But yeah, it was a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun. Hard work, not much sleep, but you know, really good fun. Steve Carran: Oh, that's great. Great story. So now we're gonna dive into your career, how you became the CEO of Yotel. So you were at Marriott for 24 years, and in the beginning part of your career, you had sales and marketing roles at property, country, and regional levels, including London, Jordan, and eventually all of Europe. What did those early days in the sales and marketing roles teach you that you still take with you today? Phil Andreopoulos: Oh, I mean commercial acumen, Steve, is so important in our business. Understanding what it is that the customer wants, how a hotel can deliver it, and what it is that the owner wants in terms of business profitability. And to cut your teeth at, like, right at the coalface, working in a hotel, getting an understanding about what makes business profitable and what makes it less profitable, and how to then upsell to drive those profits and margins is really important. But also customer service, because people buy from people, and as you're trying to sell the products that a hotel's offering, you've got to be able to build relationships. And so this kind of combination of relationship building and business acumen, it's vital all the way up and has been throughout my entire career. David Millili: So you spent nearly a decade working closely with Marriott owners and franchise partners before returning to the commercial side as CCO for EMEA. How did seeing the business through the owner's lens change the way you approached commercial strategy? Phil Andreopoulos: Yeah, that's a great question. There are really three parts to our business, three legs to the stool. We have our customers, we have our crew, our staff, and we have our owners. And if you take one of those legs away, the stool falls over and it just can't stand up. We need our owners and their investment partners, otherwise we'd have no hotels. And finding this right balance between understanding what the owners need and what the customer wants, how to deliver it through the staff, through the employees, the crew, is the important factor here. So understanding that owners need to service their debt, they need to drive a return, and at the same time, they have to be reminded that you've gotta look after your customers and you've gotta look after your staff, otherwise two legs on the stool go away. But I was fortunate enough to work with some truly inspirational entrepreneurial characters, many of whom, as we see in our industry, had started out with very little and managed to build themselves a huge estate of hotel real estate and done very, very well for themselves. And understanding how those people tick and what makes them get up in the morning and do what they do, for me, that's such an exciting and inspirational part of what we do. I mean, I love our owners. Some of them can be pretty forceful, and you gotta learn to live with that. And that's all good. That's all good. Steve Carran: That's great. So about a year ago, you're coming up on your one-year anniversary, you came to Yotel as CEO. What made you come to Yotel? Phil Andreopoulos: I had spent nearly 25 fantastic years at Marriott. We were very good to each other, Marriott and me. We had a lot of success together and I enjoyed every minute of it there. But there gets to a time when you've spent a long time in a big company that things do get a bit frustrating trying to make things change in a huge supertanker like Marriott, which is such a great organization and a great machine. But if you want to be entrepreneurial and you want to really drive change in a business, then there's no better place to do that than in a small business where you have a bit more control and you can be a little bit more nimble. You don't have to be the big supertanker. You can be the speedboat. So it had got to that point in my career where I just wanted to do something a little bit different in a different environment, and Yotel had been a brand that I had been admiring for a long, long time. When I was at Marriott, I was part of the team that launched our Moxy brand all those years ago, and we had looked at Yotel for inspiration at that time, and I remember thinking, "Wow, what a great brand." And then a few years later, I was talking with the main shareholder, and they were looking for a new CEO. I spoke to the outgoing CEO, who's a great guy, and I just felt like my skill set and my experience fitted perfectly with what Yotel needed, and it gave me the opportunity to have a fantastic brand with great people and a wonderful group of guests to try and take it forwards to the next phase in its evolution. So yeah, it's a bit of a project and one that I am enjoying immensely even after one year. David Millili: Looking back on the first year, what have been some of your biggest learnings, proudest moments, and the opportunities that you have the most excitement about for the future of the brand? Phil Andreopoulos: Oh, David, where do I start? Well, look, some of the proudest moments—we have some fantastic people in our hotels and in our head office at Yotel. And coming in and working with those people to set out our vision for the first year and the first five years, and getting everybody around the table to draw out all of the wonderful ideas and feelings and love that people have for the brand, and then planning out what that's gonna do for the next five years, that was an amazing thing to do. We tried to do that early on so we could set out our vision. And the vision has four pillars that we're gonna work through over the next five years. One of those pillars was about distribution. We're a growing company. We're a growth company. We're in 16 different countries now. We have 24 open hotels, and we're growing fast. We want to grow faster. And one of the things we need to grow is to improve our distribution, and it felt like the right time to get into a partnership with one of the big brands to help with the distribution of our product. And so in week one, when I started in September, I set up some meetings with all the people you'd expect, all the big brands you'd expect, to talk about what an affiliation might look like between Yotel and those brands. We were able to negotiate a fantastic deal, fantastic for us and fantastic for them, with Hilton to be part of their system of wonderful brands so that we can take their distribution. They have not bought us. It is a straight-up affiliation deal and one that they and I are really, really proud of because it allows us to keep our independence. It allows the great people here at Yotel to continue to do what we do to look after our crew, look after our guests, to make sure that our brand is growing in the right direction. And it also allows us to appear to the 250 million Hilton Honors members and appear on the Hilton website and all the great stuff that comes with being affiliated with the best distribution system in the world. And so we are very, very proud of that. We have spent a lot of time this last year working on our culture 'cause whilst we're affiliated with Hilton, it's very important to us that we maintain that special sauce, the DNA that makes Yotel what it is. So our culture is hugely important to us and yeah, there's a lot to be proud of in the first year. And then there are some kinda back-of-house stuff. We needed a new accounting system and it's a bit boring for the non-finance people, but we needed to get better data and better access to data, and we needed better business intelligence. So we rolled out a new system and it's revolutionized our lives here. It's made us a much more effective team. And being quite a tech-forward brand, we're always interested to see what we can do with the latest innovations, and so we've been working a lot with AI and how that can support us in what we do. So yeah, there's a lot that's happened actually. It's been really good. We're just in the midst of—at the time of recording this, we're just in the midst of integrating all of our systems with the Hilton machine, which is going really well. Early indications are we're seeing a lot of production through their channels, which is brilliant. David Millili: Great. Steve Carran: It's a busy year. Busy first year for you. Phil Andreopoulos: Yeah. Yeah. Steve Carran: So, I was lucky to spend some time at the Yotel property in Washington, DC when I lived there. But for those that aren't familiar with Yotel, can you tell us a little bit about the brand? Phil Andreopoulos: Yeah, of course. So Yotel was born out of aviation. We were founded, our first hotel opened, nearly 20 years ago. There was a British guy called Simon Woodruff, who was the founder of the company. He sold it some time ago, but we're still in touch. He's a really good guy. And he was on a flight, and of course back then business class was just a big seat. But first class was a flat bed. And Simon was traveling, and he got upgraded from business to first, and he was like, "Wow, this is great. I've got a pretty luxurious, by plane standards, place to sleep. It's a seat that turns into a flat bed," which at that time was kinda cutting edge, "and I have everything I need around me here in this space." And during the course of the flight, he thought, "You know, this would make a great concept for a hotel. Something which is quite compact but super efficient, comfortable, luxurious, everything I need and nothing I don't need." And so when he landed, he contacted the person who had designed that first class cabin and said, "Let's do a hotel." And so that's how the brand was born. So we like to think about it as first class travel on the ground. It's a super efficient model where check-in is easy. It's automated generally through our self check-in kiosks. And then the F&B varies by hotel, but it's interesting. Think of first class travel on the ground. Think of a lounge in an airport. And then the rooms are compact, but you've got everything you need, and it's super comfortable. I mean, the quality of our beds, I'm not a great sleeper, but when I'm in a Yotel bed, I have to say they are some of the best beds I've ever slept in, and I've spent a lot of time in hotels. So we really do focus on sleep being a fundamental of good travel, and we try and do everything we can to make sure our guests have a good night's sleep in a comfortable space. Steve Carran: Yeah, you always seem to be a little bit ahead of the curve. I remember, do you... I don't know if you still have them, but you had, like, robots delivering room service, like, before 2020, and that was, like, before anybody was talking or doing anything like that. Do you still have those robots? Phil Andreopoulos: We do, we do. Steve Carran: Awesome. I loved it. I ordered room service just to see the robot. Phil Andreopoulos: Some of them will even sing you a song, which is quite nice. But, yeah, some of them have a real sense of humor. But yeah, those robots are great and our guests love them. They're not in every hotel, but they're in as many as we can get them into. And yeah, it's a lot of fun, but they also serve a practical purpose. Being tech forward these days, I think people have to be wary of gimmicks. We don't want to be gimmicky. We want to have tech that actually works and makes the stay a bit more efficient. They can be fun too, like our robots, but they serve a purpose and that's the important thing. Steve Carran: Absolutely. Absolutely. So now we're gonna dive into the industry thoughts, more of the thought leadership section of the podcast. So you mentioned the Hilton integration, which was a huge milestone for you. Can you take us back to how this collaboration came together, and why it was the right moment for Yotel right now to join the Hilton ecosystem? Phil Andreopoulos: Yeah. Yeah, that's a good question. I believe that we should have Yotels all over the world. I think it's such a great brand. We can develop it in so many different ways, in so many different places. We have our Yotel Air product that's in airports. We have our Yotel Pad product, which is more extended stay, and we have a couple of others that are in the pipeline, and obviously we have our core brand Yotels. And they genuinely can be everywhere. Customers love them, our crew love working there, owners love the high margins and the huge number of keys we can fit on a small footprint. But I think to be noticed in the environment we have in our industry these days, as a small brand, it is difficult to be noticed because the big brands have so much power, and then the OTAs have so much control and so much power. So I wanted to find a way that we could get to scale whilst retaining our own DNA and all of the things that make us special as a brand. So yeah, we had to start having those conversations. I wanted to get the exposure that a big brand could bring us, and it just felt to me... I mean, we did speak to a number of different global hotel chains, but I always knew from the start that Hilton was the one for us. And so we had... And I think for Hilton, I don't want to speak for them, but they hadn't really done anything like this before. I suppose SLH was kind of similar, but the structure of the deal I think is very different. So we had a long period of negotiation with them, but in the end, we managed to crunch through the deal quite effectively. It was all very good-natured and we only fell out two or three times as you do in these negotiations, but it was all in good spirit. And then we signed the deal. We started negotiating first week of September, and then we signed the deal in early March. So I suppose in that regard, it moved quite quickly. We both had our red lines, and so it was a fun negotiation. You know, we all enjoyed it. We all got what we wanted, kind of. But yeah, it just felt like in order to get to that scale, we were at that time in Yotel's evolution where we needed something to help us get noticed. And I really want to see Yotels in many, many more locations in the US. We have a presence there already, but we needed an engine that was gonna be attractive to the US owners and the US franchise community, and Hilton definitely gives us that. David Millili: So that is a great segue to the next question. So as Yotel looks to grow beyond the six properties in the US, where do you see the greatest opportunity in North America? Phil Andreopoulos: Oh, we should have Yotels in the center of every major city in the country, as a start. And one of the things that's important to us is to have our hotels in locations pretty central to where the action's taking place, 'cause that's where our customers want to be. And many of our owners want to have those assets, but sometimes the economics just don't stack up. But when you can fit so many keys on a relatively small footprint with good design that really works and it's efficient and customers love it and people like working there, then you have a good proposition with high margins. And so I'd love to see us in those downtown locations all over the US. We also think the brand or the brands lend themselves to other more suburban locations. You know, whenever I'm in the States and I'm driving down the freeway and I can see the different brands all lined up, I think, "Well, we should have a Yotel in one of them." So we are a good conversion brand too, so I hope to see some conversions in those kind of locations as well. We are a very franchise-friendly brand. We are a genuine business in a box that an entrepreneur can pick up and turn into a functioning, profitable business relatively quickly. We are quite prototypical. We have easy-to-replicate design standards, but they are standards that pop. They really stand out, but it's a relatively simple business to manage. We have lean staffing models because of all the tech. And so for the right entrepreneurial franchisee, they can convert an existing hotel into a Yotel, see their margins improve, and do it, I think, in a relatively straightforward kind of way. So I think the answer to your question is I see the potential everywhere. We're also in the process of looking at Yotel resorts. About 60%, just under 60% of our travelers globally are traveling on leisure. They love our brand. They love Yotel, but they keep asking me why we don't have any Yotels in resort locations. And of course, that would follow the same ethos. We would not necessarily be on the front row on the beach in Barbados, but we might be one block back and our customers would love that. They're near the action. They'll have a lovely product that they can use. We would have to adapt our product. And so we're looking at a few opportunities now for Yotel resorts, and I would see them as being part of our growth in the US as well. David Millili: So you started to touch on it, but what must a hotel brand get right when using franchising to scale without diluting the guest experience or the brand itself as you grow? Phil Andreopoulos: Yeah. Look, I think the first thing is you've got to pick the right partners. You've got to have a strong brand identity that you are confident with and you're able to articulate clearly to owners and franchisees. And then you need to pick the right partners who can go and execute. I think for us, the fortunate thing about Yotel is that we do have a brand that's relatively straightforward to execute. The operating model is what the customers want, but it is relatively easy to deploy. So yeah, finding the right partners is important, but I think standing out is really, really important. I'll tell you just a real quick story, and I've got to do it without naming names because I will upset my previous employer and my current partner. But I was at the NYU conference earlier this year, and I was walking from our Yotel to the venue, and I walked down a block and it was like mid-scale, upscale hotel block. There were five hotels next to each other of kind of mid-scale, upscale brands, and I won't name them for the reasons I just said 'cause I'll upset people. But I thought to myself, "I wonder if I walk into these five hotels, will I be able to tell the difference between them if I hadn't seen the sign on the outside?" And so I did this exercise. I walked into each of the five hotels and I tried to ignore the signage. I wouldn't have been able to tell the difference, and I'm a hotel guy. Imagine if a guest is walking in there. It is a sea of sameness. Now, if one of those hotels had been a Yotel, you would've known it because the design is very clearly defined as Yotel. There would be these attractive self-check-in areas with our kiosks that no one else I don't believe can do as well as us. And you would've seen our wonderful staff, and you would've known you were in a Yotel 100%. And so that's the other important thing as you try and get to scale, you want something that an owner or franchisee can implement relatively easily, but at the same time, it is very unique and distinctive so that you stand out and you want to stand out from the crowd for sure. David Millili: I was gonna say real quick, just having lived in New York and been at your property in Times Square, I know exactly what street you were walking down, so. Phil Andreopoulos: Right. Steve Carran: Owners and investors are placing a lot of emphasis on operational efficiency, adaptability, and long-term performance. How are those expectations changing the relationship between hotel brands and owners, and what part of that traditional hotel operating model needs to be? Phil Andreopoulos: Well, I think in terms of the physical asset, owners have always got an eye on exit value. And we as hoteliers need to show some flexibility so that owners can maximize the space that they've got. And when I put my owner hat on, I didn't think about RevPAR or RevPAR index. When I've got my owner hat on, I'm thinking about profit per square foot, and how can we as hoteliers help our owners in terms of asset value to maximize that profit per square foot. And that means being smart and efficient in design so that you can fit in as many keys as possible without damaging the customer experience. But also, how do you maximize the profit from the public spaces? Is F&B always the right answer? What kind of F&B is the most profitable? How can we do all of this while staying true to our brand identity? And that's the real secret sauce. I think a good hotel brand, a good operator can find that sweet spot in the middle where the owner, the franchisee, they get what they need in terms of the asset value, but they also get happy customers that are gonna keep coming back. And so I think that's key. And then in terms of ongoing operations, you have to be able to run a profitable business. And yes, lean staffing models, I keep talking about that, but also you have to have a product that people want to pay money for. And getting the right rate and the right occupancy balance is absolutely key. So it's this balancing act that I was talking about earlier. We always have to think like an owner, but at the same time we have to think like a customer, because if we don't have the customers coming through the door spending the right amount of money, then no one's gonna be happy. And at the same time, we have to think about our crew too, because you've gotta have happy staff, otherwise you're not gonna have happy customers. And if you don't have happy customers coming back, then the owner's not happy either. So it really is this creativity and flexibility to find a sweet spot, and that's what we as hoteliers have to get right. And at a time where new builds are really expensive and it's about adaptive reuse and it's about conversions, we have to get really smart about how we can take an asset and help owners to understand how they could maximize the potential. What is the potential of profit per square foot in that building, and how do we achieve it? David Millili: So as the lines between traditional hotels, extended stay resorts, lifestyle hospitality continue to blur, what shifts in traveler behavior are driving that change, and how should hotel brands determine where it makes sense to evolve their offering? Phil Andreopoulos: Yeah. I think, look, the first thing I'd say is, I'm a Gen X. When I started my business travel, I came in, went to the hotel, did my work, maybe had a dinner with some clients or whatever, got on a plane and left. That was me. As I've got a bit older and I've seen the next generations do a way better job of business travel than me, I've realized that if you want to have a good time at work and get your work done, you go in, you do your work, and then you blend that business travel with going and experiencing the wonderful place that your business travel has taken you. And I remember first hearing about this term some years ago and thinking, "Ah, it's never gonna catch on. People want to get back to their families, get back to their lives." But I can tell you it's not what we're seeing. When we talk to our customers, we know that they are coming for business and staying for leisure. And people have networks. People's global networks are so different to what they were before. If you're doing a bit of business travel to Rome, "Oh, I remember so-and-so. They live in Rome. Let's add a day on and go and catch up with an old friend." So I think that is happening, and we have to be very aware of that and make sure that we're catering to that and helping people to get what they want out of that particular trip. So that's one big change. I would say the other thing that I found interesting over the years is as we've seen the rise of the home rental companies, the Airbnbs of the world, I think that there is a demographic of customer there that wants to be a bit more self-sufficient and does want to stay a bit longer. And so I think extended stay in hotels has a really, really big runway, because let's be frank here, sometimes when you go and stay in one of these home rentals, you really don't know what you're gonna get until you get there. And on occasion, it can disappoint. If you're in a hotel which is an extended stay offering, you know you're much more secure in the knowledge of what you're gonna get. There's gonna be somebody there. You're gonna be able to get in your room. You haven't got to go and get a key from a padlock chained to a fence one block away from where you're staying with all your bags. And so I think the extended stay product, like for what we have as YotelPad, it offers that feel which is a bit more residential and a bit more long-term, but it gives you the security of knowing that you're in a safe environment in a hotel where the fire alarms work, and I think you just feel a little bit more comfortable in that environment. So I suppose those are a couple of things that are interlinked, and we as hoteliers just have to be very aware. There is definitely the market there for the traditional hotel, like those big boxes that people come to and it's very formal, and people will always travel like that. But I think that's getting less interesting to people. They want something a little bit more authentic to them that allows them to get what they want out of their trip, rather than perhaps conforming to what it is the hotel wants of them. Steve Carran: Agree, 100%. So Phil, you've spent your career in hotels. What advice do you have to the younger generation out there who may be in hotels or thinking about getting hotels who have aspirations to be a CEO? Phil Andreopoulos: I have friends in all different industries. I know lawyers and teachers and doctors and city traders, and I can tell you what, and they'd agree with me, when we sit around and we talk about what we get up to at work, none of them have as varied and as interesting a job as we do in the hospitality industry. We work with great people. We get to meet and greet guests from all over the world. We get to work with people from all different segments, people traveling on business, people traveling on leisure, government officials. It is so rewarding. The camaraderie that you have when you're working in a hotel, a well-functioning hotel where you've got happy guests and happy staff, is just an amazing place to be. It's an absolute machine, and being part of that team that's functioning at its absolute peak, that's an experience. That's a sight to behold. It really is something. And then, from a corporate perspective, it is an extremely rewarding industry. You get to see everything. You get to see the way that the finance fits together, the way the capital stacks come together to buy a massive piece of extremely valuable real estate, all the way through to how many sheets and pillowcases you have to order to make sure that you're gonna be able to serve it to your guests. It's just an amazing, amazing industry. Now how to get into it is also a good thing. I started washing pots and pans. I know other people that got summer jobs working in a bar. I had an old boss who was a lifeguard, and he was a lifeguard at Marriott Hotels when I think they had eight or nine hotels in the world. And he stayed all the way through until they had many thousands, and he progressed his career all the way up. I think the advice I would give is we need to be prepared to work hard. And it is an industry that has a reputation for long hours. And sometimes I think in the era that we live in today, people find that a bit challenging. But I would argue that it is well worth it because the rewards definitely outweigh it. And look, I would say as well, the other thing is if I can get to CEO level in a company as wonderful as Yotel, then anyone can do it. My... I have two boys who have just done exams, their high school exams here. And they both did exceptionally well 'cause they're so much smarter than I am. And they will probably get into very competitive industries where there are loads of people fighting for the top jobs, and it's like that in hospitality too. But if I can do it, then anyone can do it. So if there's people out there listening to this and they want to get in the industry, then just go and give it a go. Steve Carran: There we go. There we go. Phil, we've been asking you questions this whole time. This is where we turn the tables and let you ask David and I a question. Phil Andreopoulos: Oh, thank you very much. That's a great opportunity for me. So, okay. You have a lot of people that you've invited on, and I'm a follower of your podcast and I really enjoy listening to what you guys do. I would ask you two questions. What's the best kind of takeaway you've had from one of your discussions that you feel like is really profound for our industry? And this is a bit mean 'cause I'm gonna make you play favorites, but who was the most interesting person that you've interviewed and why? So what was the most profound thing that you've taken away, and who was really interesting? Steve Carran: David, I'll let you start this one. David Millili: Yeah. We just—the last podcast we did too, I said I have two kids and it's always tough when you have to say your favorite. It always gets you in trouble. I think that we have had a lot of people who've really emphasized the importance of thinking global, but focusing locally on the community. So especially with the brands and a lot of—we have a lot of independent hoteliers that are thinking about global and the guests being global, but how do you really connect that community? I'm trying to think through. I don't have one person. All I can tell you is that probably the most rewarding part of doing this is getting to talk to people like yourself and understanding. And one of the things, you know, I used to run hotels and move to the tech side, but it is great with all the hoteliers that we've interviewed to hear how passionate they are and how much they care about the industry, and there's nobody who's been on who's complained or said it's so difficult. Everyone's been like, "If you work hard and you pay attention, you surround yourself with good people, you can be successful." So with that, I'll dodge the question and hand it over to Steve. Phil Andreopoulos: I think that was well dodged, David. But I mean, yeah, what a great answer. It's so true. And everyone I've listened to on your podcast, they've been so positive about our industry, which kind of goes to prove the point. It's a great place to be. David Millili: Yeah. Steve Carran: I agree. And I think one of my takeaways is we've interviewed over 300 people for this podcast, and the amount of diversity of their backgrounds is pretty impressive. Not everybody comes from the hospitality space. Some people come from Amazon or an outside—a lot of folks come from outside the industry, and it just shows that no matter what your background is, you can work in hospitality. There's so many different positions, so many different jobs out there that anybody can really work in this industry. And it's really cool to—that's why we love to go through people's backgrounds because everybody's is unique. Like you, you've been in the industry your whole life, and then we'll have somebody who, hey, this is their first time they were in hospitality. So it's really cool to see that aspect. As far as my favorite guest, I'm going with you. You've been my favorite guest so far. This is my top—this is my number one conversation, so that was an easy question for me. David Millili: That's a good answer. Phil Andreopoulos: Trying. Steve Carran: So Phil, this honestly has been a really great conversation, and our producer, Jon, he's been listening the whole time. We're gonna kick it over to him for one more question before we get you outta here. Jon Bumhoffer: Your background is so vast. You have a lot in the branded space and then coming to Yotel. And I'm curious, working kind of in that branded space for so long, and I know Yotel was very established when you got there about a year ago, what are things—and Yotel has a very distinctive, you mentioned it, distinctive brand—what are things that in your career working at brands that you've looked at to kind of influence how you approach hospitality, and just what can make things different? Like, are there things outside of the brands that you're looking at that really have influenced, impacted how you approach how you lead a brand? Phil Andreopoulos: I was dreading the Jon question because having listened to quite a lot of your podcast, I always feel that you come up with the tough questions and you've made no exception, but it's a great question. It really is a great question. I think you gotta know your customer. Who is the target customer? And I think one of the mistakes that I often see in hotels and hospitality in general is that not enough thought has been put into what is it that the customer wants. You can't tell the customer what they want. You can present something that you think they're gonna like and hope that they do, and that's a building block of what makes a very successful brand. So that's where I'd start, like understanding the customer. And then as you go along, you've gotta keep checking in with your customers. One of the things we did in the last year is we had a really in-depth study that we undertook to speak to as many of our customers as we possibly could to get a deeper feel of what they thought of our brand and who our customers were. So I think that's a starting point. And then is the important bit. You've gotta take all of that, all the things that you've found out about your target customer and what it is that they want, and your existing customers and what it is that they want, and you've gotta build on that to give them something that they didn't realize they wanted, and yet all along they actually knew. But it wasn't until you presented it that they went, "Oh my goodness, how have I lived my whole life without this thing?" And so for us it's the simple things. I know that it can be a bit stressful when people are traveling and you want to be able to just get into that space where you can relax and sit down for a bit. And I was traveling to Tokyo to our hotel there, and I walked in and it'd been a long journey and, you know, one of our brand proof points is that you should be able to check in through the self check-in kiosk in a minute, literally a minute. And it worked perfectly. And I was, from coming through the door to being in my room, was about two and a half minutes. And I opened the door and they had the lighting on just right. We have this brand standard in Yotel about a specific type of light when you walk into your room and the hotel had it just right. And I walked in and I was so tired and the bed was there and it was so comfortable and I just threw my bag down and I was on the bed and fast asleep. And to me this was a travel experience that I knew I wanted, but it wasn't until the brand did it so well that I realized how important it was. And so that's the thing about brands. You have to understand your customer and promise a lot, but then you've gotta overdeliver and that's what I think makes people very passionate about brands. Jon Bumhoffer: I love that answer. It's kind of like following those breadcrumbs, listening to the guest, and then from that information you're like, "Oh, I know that you're gonna love this even though you haven't asked for it." I love that answer. That's great. Phil Andreopoulos: That's it. That's it. David Millili: That's another episode of "The Modern Hotelier," the most engaged podcast in hospitality. How can people find out more about Yotel and connect with you? Phil Andreopoulos: Thanks guys, absolute pleasure. Come find us at yotel.com and follow our developer link, and to everybody direct. David Millili: That's great. Whether you're watching or listening, we appreciate you and hope to see you again. Thanks for joining us. Phil Andreopoulos: Thank you guys. Absolute pleasure. Steve Carran: Thanks!