LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
Building a hotel brand:
How a business class hotel
discovered its brand DNA
Grupo Posadas and the Fiesta Inn brand reinvent
the business traveler experience
Zachary Conen
INTRODUCTION
This paper describes the process by which Grupo
Posadas discovered a disconnect between its seemingly
high-performing Fiesta Inn brand and that brand’s core
customer, the business traveler.
In a market with a growing number of look-alike competitors, Fiesta Inn was confronted with data that indicated it was not creating a true bond with its clientele.
Convinced that reversing this trend and constructing
a unique “Fiesta Inn” experience was the only way to
differentiate from the competition and grow market share
in the long term, Fiesta Inn used a variety of research
methodologies to strip the business traveler experience
down to the essentials....and re-build the Fiesta Inn
experience around a “Brand DNA” to meet each and
every need of its business traveler guest. This paper
will help address a number of issues – how a brand
can differentiate itself in the marketplace using research
as the driver; how research can help design a distinct,
unique guest experience; how a “satisfied” guest might
not necessarily be a truly “loyal” guest; and, finally,
how research can help drive action, as insights without implementation are unnoticeable and of no benefit
to the end user – the guest.
COMPANY PROFILE
Grupo Posadas is the premier hotel company in
Latin American, operating upwards of 90 hotels in
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
Mexico, South America and the United States. There
are seven brands within the Posadas family – Aqua,
Fiesta Americana, Fiesta Inn, One Hotels, Caesar Park,
Caesar Business and The Explorean – covering the
spectrum of price, location and luxury for business
and leisure travelers alike. The company has grown
rapidly of late via development of these new brand
concepts and new construction.
The most prolific growth within the Posadas’ portfolio
has been that experienced by the Fiesta Inn brand. Since
its inception in 1992, Fiesta Inn has become Mexico’s
fastest growing hotel chain; currently, there are more
than 50 properties located in Mexico’s most active
business zones and industrial centers. The Fiesta Inn
brand concept was developed around business travel,
with both the brand promise and delivery focusing
on the functionality and comfort required by business
travelers while on the road. Words like reliable, functional,
consistent, and efficient are viewed as the lifeblood of
any business travel brand, and Fiesta Inn traditionally has
been no different, connecting its brand identity to these
pillars of the business travel environment.
For the first ten years of Fiesta Inn’s existence, its
brand managers kept a sharp focus on penetrating the
business travel market within Mexico. Within the past
several years its disciplined brand message and execution had begun to reap some rewards, leading to the
present day period of apparent growth and prosperity.
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
TOOLS TO MEASURE PERFORMANCE – FIESTA
INN GROWS?
For much of the first ten years of the chain’s existence,
Fiesta Inn embarked upon a very fundamentally solid
strategy for building the brand – target a customer
segment, develop a brand promise and delivery of particular salience to that segment, and move to achieve “top
of mind” status as the provider of choice to that segment.
For Fiesta Inn, the target segment was the business
traveler, and by most traditional measures, the strategy
was quite successful.
Hilton and Marriott. By 2004, Fiesta Inn had again moved
the needle, narrowing the gap significantly between its
“top of mind” scores and those of the two top performers – again, Fiesta Americana and Holiday Inn.
In similar fashion, the ATP study tracked perceptions
of the Fiesta Inn brand on six attributes deemed critical
to business travelers.1 Not only was there a markedly
positive perception in the marketplace of Fiesta Inn’s
ability to deliver on all six attributes, but in all six categories Fiesta Inn’s scores equalled or exceeded those of
Fiesta Americana and Holiday Inn (see figure 2). Fiesta
Inn’s robust sales and growth numbers2 seemed to
In 1999, Posadas began conducting its Advanced Tracking
support the notion of a brand on the rise.
Program (ATP) research for the Fiesta Inn brand, polling
220 business travelers every week on their awareness Likewise, the advanced analysis conducted on Fiesta
of the business hotel landscape. Conducted by Millward Inn’s guest satisfaction and loyalty survey data also
Brown, the research indicated that by 2002, Fiesta Inn painted the picture of a brand truly connecting with its
had surpassed all but two brands (Fiesta Americana, intended audience and market segment. This analysis,
conducted by a second research partner, LRA WorldHoliday Inn) in Mexico for “top of mind” awareness
wide, Inc., indicated that 84% of the Fiesta Inn guest pool
among business travellers (see figure 1); Fiesta Inn had
could be classified as either “Customer Advocates” or
outdistanced iconic brands such as Sheraton, Hyatt,
Figure 1
TOP OF MIND
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LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
Figure 2
MAIN ATTRIBUTES FOR BRANDS BUSINESS TRAVELLERS
“Devoted Customers.” LRA arrived at its classifications
by creating an index from the aggregated answers to
questions concerning guest satisfaction, intent to return
(loyalty) and intent to recommend (advocacy); only
by rating Fiesta Inn highly in each of these “outcome”
questions could a guest be included in the “advocate”
or “devoted” segments.
ASKING THE RIGHT QUESTION RAISES THE
RED FLAG - “THEY LIKE US...BUT DO THEY
LOVE US?”
Despite all of these positive trends, the Fiesta Inn team
– with the help of its research partners – identified
some potential cracks in the brand armour. For one,
a deeper analysis of the LRA guest insights report
indicated that though 84% of the guest population
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
could be considered a “devoted” guest or better, only
36% had reached the highest classification of “advocate,” meaning the guest had given Top Box scores for
satisfaction, intent to return and intent to recommend.
Far from showering Fiesta Inn with distinction, this
Loyalty Index metric placed Fiesta Inn firmly in the
middle of the pack, as LRA’s Loyalty Index Benchmark
for the hospitality industry was at 35%.3 For Fiesta
Inn, the underlying message was that its guests liked
them ... but didn’t necessarily love them and would
potentially migrate to another offering if tempted. With
this in mind, Fiesta Inn began to examine what it could
do to upgrade the quality of its guest relationships from
“like” to “love.”
To explore this dynamic further, Fiesta Inn expanded
its partnership with Millward Brown. Fiesta Inn re-
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
engaged Millward Brown for a type of study that would
be able to delve deeper into the company-customer
relationship; Fiesta Inn had first completed this type
of study in 1999, and in 2003 Fiesta Inn launched its
first “Brand Dynamics” study in five years. In Millward
Brown’s words, the Brand Dynamics methodology:
• Allows the client to identify the relationship that
customers have with the brand and identifies the
efforts that can potentially strengthen that relationship;
• Explains why some customers are more loyal to
a brand than others;
• Measures the preferences for a brand and diagnoses the drivers of that preference.4
The metrics associated with the Brand Dynamics study
were related directly to Millward Brown’s graphical
construct of the Brand Pyramid (see figure 3).
Each level of the Brand Pyramid represents a facet of
the brand-customer relationship; moving up the pyramid from level to level indicates increased customer
loyalty. The base of the Brand Pyramid is “Presence”
(Is the Brand known?), followed in order by “Relevance”
(Does the brand meet your needs at a fair price?);
“Performance” (Does the product performance exceed
expectations?); “Advantage” (Is the brand different
from the competition, offering a rational or emotional
advantage?); and, finally, “Bonding” (Does the brand
offer a compelling advantage to make the customer feel
‘nothing beats this’?). The Brand Dynamics study was
conducted via interview with 600 business travelers
in the three most prominent Mexican business hubs –
Mexico City, Guadalajara and Monterrey. The findings
were to be presented as percentages of the respondents who fit into each level of the pyramid, with the
natural expectation being that those percentages would
decrease, as the threshold for inclusion would become
more exclusive as one moved up the pyramid levels.
Lastly, the percentage at each level was to be presented
in comparison to an expected benchmark level for a
company/brand of similar profile as Fiesta Inn. Improved
performance in the upper reaches of the Brand Dynamics pyramid represented the transition from “like” to
“love” that Fiesta Inn was seeking.
Figure 3
WHAT IS A BRAND PYRAMID?
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
Not surprisingly, Fiesta Inn’s performance in the study
exactly mirrored Posadas’ strategy for building and
positioning the brand in its first ten years of existence.
As outlined previously, Posadas’ goals for Fiesta Inn
had been to raise the awareness around the brand
and build its reputation and capabilities around a very
specific set of attributes with particular meaning to the
functional needs of the business traveler. To that end,
the cited research indicated tremendous progress
towards those goals. In the Brand Dynamics pyramid,
however, these more tangible, functional elements of
the brand represented only the first three steps of the
pyramid.
Predictably, Fiesta Inn fared quite well within these
foundational steps, particularly when comparing the
results from the original study in 1999 to those in 2003.
As one might have expected, Fiesta Inn’s rating for the
initial step of the pyramid, “Presence” (i.e., the “Top
of Mind” that they had been rigorously tracking in the
ATP study), increased from 58% to 84%, a significant
leap and a fairly impressive level of market awareness.
Indeed, the Brand Dynamics study benchmark verified
Fiesta Inn’s superiority in this regard, indicating that the
chain was 24 percentage points higher in the category of
“Presence” than would be expected of a brand of its size.
The next level of the pyramid – “Relevance” – matched
the image and attributes portions of the ATP study. Once
again, the findings confirmed that Fiesta Inn had done
an excellent job making its brand and the related offering
relevant for the target business traveler market segment,
as scores rose from 50% to 71%, placing Fiesta Inn five
percentage points higher than the expectation benchmark. “Performance,” the third-level of the pyramid,
jumped from 49% to 67%, reinforcing Fiesta Inn’s
successful focus on delivering on the functional elements
of the brand. Unlike the previous two steps, however,
where Fiesta Inn exceeded the expected scores for a
brand of its size, Fiesta Inn only matched the benchmark
for “Performance.”
It was Fiesta Inn’s scores for the final two levels of
the pyramid – “Advantage” and “Bonding” – which
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
gave Posadas’ leadership real concern about a potential fissure in its relationship with guests. As a quick
refresher, the final two steps of the Brand Dynamics
pyramid represent the less tangible, more emotional
elements of the customer relationship, with “Advantage”
representing the question “is the brand different from
the competition” and “Bonding” answering the question
“yes it is – nothing beats it.” As with the previous stages
of the pyramid, Fiesta Inn’s scores increased significantly
in the final two as well5 on the strength of the brand’s
overall development. Where a weakness began to reveal
itself, however, was in Fiesta Inn’s expected performance
against like brands; for both “Advantage” and “Bonding,”
Fiesta Inn lagged behind the benchmark, by two and
three percentage points, respectively.
The most recent data from the Fiesta Inn Brand Dynamics study (and the related pyramid) was gathered and
analyzed in May of 2005 and showed that the trends
first identified in 2003 had only intensified. In this most
recent iteration, Fiesta Inn showed its continued strength
in advertising and operations (though the “Performance”
ranking had slipped 2% beneath the expected target),
but the levels of the pyramid representing the emotional
connection with the guest had weakened in the ensuing
two years. For the “Advantage” level, Fiesta Inn scored
63%, which now placed it 3% below the benchmark
expectation; the “Bonding” measure dropped in real
numbers to only 12% (from 15% in 2003), sliding to six
percentage points beneath the standard for a brand of
Fiesta Inn’s profile (see figure 4). What first arose as a
statistical curiosity two years before had now grown
into a disturbing trend – what did it mean to have
“devoted” customers…if there was no real connection
to the brand. Without commitment, was the relationship about “love” … or familiarity, the delivery of some
basic needs and convenience?
Further analysis of the data gathered via the LRA
Worldwide guest satisfaction and loyalty tracking
survey provided additional insight into this dynamic.
As part of the strategic report, LRA conducted a
“Segment Migration Analysis” in order to determine
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
Figure 4
which elements of the Fiesta Inn guest experience would
have the most impact on “migrating” guests from “On the
Fence” to “Devoted,” “Devoted” to “Advocate,” and so on
(see figure 5). Two key drivers, representing attributes
of the Fiesta Inn guest experience, recur throughout the
analysis. These drivers, which related more to Fiesta
Inn’s ability to emotionally – not functionally - meet the
guest’s needs, were:
• [Fiesta Inn’s] ability to effectively deal with your
requests or solve your problems;
• [Fiesta Inn’s] friendliness and courtesy to you.
By the time the migration analysis focused on migrating
the most loyal customer segments, these two drivers
were isolated as the most important in Fiesta Inn’s
ability to convert the “devoted” into “advocates.” This
analysis served as a powerful complement to the
Brand Dynamics study findings. Not only did Fiesta
Inn have an issue in creating a true bond with its
seemingly “devoted” guests, but the elements that
would create that bond were less about the business
traveler functionality that currently personified the
brand and more about the interpersonal elements of
the experience.
CREATING THE FIESTA INN ARCHETYPE
At first, these findings seemed counterintuitive to
Posadas leadership; they had spent ten years building
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
a brand around all of the elements of a hotel stay that
business travelers hold dear, and they had done it quite
well. Now the research was indicating that their efforts
had fallen short in creating a true connection with their
guests, and that they needed to concentrate on building
and strengthening that bond based on … emotions, guest
interactions and service. At first glance, this strategy
seemed more akin to that of a resort property. What
Fiesta Inn quickly realized, however, was that there was
more than one way to connect to a guest emotionally.
While resort properties had been doing so for years,
there might be a completely separate dynamic at play
to connect with the business traveler on a higher level
based on his/her unmet emotional needs.
This revelation led Fiesta Inn to yet another partner,
Mindcode Research, whose “…ethnographic and social
anthropological research is designed to dig deeper
than traditional research methods.”6 In August of 2005,
Fiesta Inn engaged Mindcode to conduct a study based
less in quantitative data and more in the ethnographic
and anthropologic relationship between the brand
and its users. To elicit this qualitative data, Mindcode
conducted in depth interviews with both male and
female business travelers between the ages of 28
and 65 years in Mexico City, Guadalajara and Tijuana.
In addition, Mindcode spent some time observing
guest activities and interactions at several Fiesta Inn
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
Figure 5
SEGMENT MIGRATION ANALYSIS
properties, fulfilling one of the key components of ethnographic research – observing the “subjects” in their
“habitat.” The goal of this effort was suitably ambitious –
to “understand” business travelers by developing a
universal profile that would capture their needs, fears
and preoccupations and how to respond to them
appropriately.
What Mindcode found was that it was incomplete to
think of the business traveler exclusively in his/her role
of “executive.” More accurately, the business traveler
played two roles while on the road and staying at a
Fiesta Inn. The first role, of course, was that of an
“executive;” the second role was that of a “person”.
While the latter role seems self-evident, Fiesta Inn
quickly realized that the brand had been neglecting
the “person” within the business traveler. Mindcode
expanded further on this concept, building out the
profile of the business traveler who was both executive
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
and person, using a universal male pronoun as the
personification of the business traveler in question.
He has an objective; his responsibilities continue even
if he’s out of the office. The emotional implications of
this reality are that his primary concern is a sense of
continuity in his travels that will allow him to accomplish
his business goals. Because he is on the road, his “safety
net” has been altered and needs to be rebuilt under new
conditions, making him vulnerable, dependent and tense.
What does he value? Efficiency, attention and a sense
that “they understand.”7
For Fiesta Inn, the mandate from this portion of the
profile was clear – how do you replicate that “safety
net” within the hotel environment? And on a more
functional level, how do you shift your traditional
thinking from “meeting the needs” of your guest to
that of “contributing to his/her success?”
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
For the “person” role within the business traveler, the
dynamic that Mindcode identified was perfectly intuitive...but had typically been removed from the equation where business travel was concerned. For the
“person,” the emotions identified came to bear generally
upon completion of the activities associated with the
“executive” role:
At the end of the day, they miss the contact they have
with their loved ones at home. They long for the fragments of their lives that are comfortable, familiar and
soothing – food, bed, a warm reception. They also feel
anonymous.8
Ironically (or perhaps intentionally), for this summary
of the more interpersonal emotional needs of the
business traveler, Mindcode abandoned the masculine
pronoun and went with the gender-neutral “they.” The
picture that accompanies the summary, of course, is
of a woman. In any case, the direction provided by this
portion of the profile was equally instructive – Fiesta
Inn needed to convey that not only are “we here to
serve you...but we care about you,” fulfilling the need
to be known, recognized and ensconced in a “familiar
place.”
With this information in hand, Mindcode had created a
vivid picture of the type of experience Fiesta Inn guests
(and business travelers in general) were craving. The
challenge at this point became less one of discovery and
more of communication and implementation. Having
isolated the different “feelings” that business travelers
were seeking from Fiesta Inn and incorporating them
into an overall profile, how could Mindcode help Fiesta
Inn evolve into a brand that could deliver those “feelings”
consistently? Fiesta Inn had always been a brand focused
on raising awareness and the delivery on a very functional set of needs. The crucial next step for elevating
the brand and creating customer loyalty was to weave
something far more ephemeral into the brand DNA –
the ability to deliver a “feeling.”
To that end, Mindcode began assembling a collection
of figures within the life of a hypothetical business
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
traveler (Mr. X) who may have fulfilled the expressed
needs at some point within other aspects of Mr. X’s life.
From Mr. X’s business dealings, Mindcode posited that
an executive assistant would fill the needs articulated
in the profile; at home, the identification was with
more of a mother figure; in healthcare, a nurse, and
so on. With these figures bringing to life the types of
people who provide these “feelings” in one’s everyday
existence, Mindcode was able to identify the common
thread throughout and designate a persona – or, more
accurately, an archetype9 - for the evolution of the
Fiesta Inn guest experience. In other words, if Fiesta
Inn were a person, what type of person might it be?
The archetype that Mindcode identified as the new
representation of the Fiesta Inn brand: “Caregiver.”
THE DEVELOPMENT AND COMMUNICATION OF
THE “CAREGIVER” ARCHETYPE
In order to fully develop the Caregiver archetype, Mindcode created a wealth of materials to illustrate the
attributes within the archetype and tie them to examples
of real life behaviors and actions. This step was crucial,
as it enabled Fiesta Inn to bridge the gap between
the research findings, the actual implementation of an
enhanced guest experience, and the needed changes
on the property level. While the process itself that Fiesta
Inn had undergone was somewhat revelatory, the
information that it yielded would not have been actionable without a meaningful way to translate it into actual
behaviors to model and experiences to deliver.
To assist Fiesta Inn in the further development and
communication of the caregiver archetype, Mindcode
created a diagram titled “A Caregiver Anatomy” (see
figure 6). The anatomy outlined the path from the needs
(emotional, functional and symbolic) that the caregiver
fills; to the interpersonal qualities and actions of the
typical caregiver (empathy, compassion, willingness to go
the extra mile); to the meaning of a caregiver’s actions
(“giving to others”); to examples of caregivers in society
(teacher, doctor, fireman); to the ultimate “feeling” that a
caregiver provides – “you are taken care of when you’re
with me.”
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
Figure 6
UNDERSTANDING THE ARCHETYPE: A CAREGIVER ANATOMY
As an illustrative follow-up to the anatomy diagram,
Mindcode prepared a presentation to introduce the
caregiver archetype to all Fiesta Inn personnel. The
presentation, which would ultimately be delivered to
each and every Fiesta Inn employee, actually showed
examples of those who embodied the caregiver role
and why, both inside and outside the context of a hotel
environment. For example, one slide pictured a fireman
on a rescue, indicating the presence of the caregiver
archetype when one takes risks for others; a second
slide showed a parent helping a child with homework,
noting that the caregiver archetype is present when
one is patiently and selflessly interested in helping
another achieve positive results … knowing full well
there will be no gratuity at the end of the interaction.
Finally, the presentation connects each and every
role (front desk, food and beverage, housekeeping,
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
etc.) within the hotel to the practical execution of what
“caregiver” actually means in the hotel environment.
While there was no expectation that employees would
begin modeling the new archetype immediately, these
efforts were crucial to introduce the new concept and
make an initial connection to the workforce – those
who would be charged with embodying the archetype
on a daily basis.
TAKING ACTION – IMPLEMENTING THE
ARCHETYPE
As a transition between the archetype development/
communication stage of the process and the implementation stage, Fiesta Inn began the process of shifting both
its internal and external branding messages. Internally,
Fiesta Inn immediately began reinforcing the concept
of “caring,” adopting the Spanish phrase “Pensamos
LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
en la Gente que Trabaja,” which translates to “We Care
for Working People.” For the external message, Fiesta
Inn shifted slightly, anticipating that some potential
customers, no matter how much they might actually
crave it subconsciously, probably didn’t view themselves
as needing “care.” With this in mind, the Fiesta Inn team
crafted an external message that married both the
“executive” and “person” roles they had identified within
the business traveler: “Donde Descansa la Gente que
Trabaja,” or “Where People that Work can Relax.”
areas. New furniture, bath amenities, bed, magazines,
etc., all selected to elicit the feeling of being cared for...
in a home environment and fulfilling the caregiver
archetype for the senses of touch and sight. Once the
facilities have been refreshed in this manner, Fiesta Inn
plans to address the other senses via a more subconscious evocation of the caregiver, with music and
scents (vanilla, mint, camomile) carefully selected and
tested to put the business traveler in the desired state
of mind for success...and relaxation.
With the shift in messaging came a focus on implementing the elements of the guest experience that would
bring the archetype to life. In June of 2006, Fiesta Inn
unveiled the first phase of the implementation, which
would address the products or services that Fiesta
Inn could offer to show the guest genuine interest and
support. This phase came in the form of a “10 Step”
program oriented around each of the “touch points” of
the guest experience deemed most important by the
LRA Worldwide guest satisfaction and loyalty tracking
survey. The “10 Steps” addressed bodily/energy needs
such as food and beverage service;10 emotional needs
such as stress reduction;11 and needs that would
contribute to the guest’s success as an executive.12
These measures were rolled out during the summer
of 2006, with compliance with the new archetypical
standards required by late 3rd Quarter 2006. To ensure
compliance, Fiesta Inn integrated the new standards
into its site inspection protocol that is part of the larger
Posadas Prometeo Quality Assurance/Brand Assurance
program conducted by LRA Worldwide. As LRA consultants visit and evaluate the guest experience at each
Fiesta Inn property during the 3rd and 4th Quarter of
2006, the expectation is for the new caregiver “10 Step”
program to be in full effect.
CONCLUSION
The next implementation phase of the caregiver archetype is scheduled for 2007, and is focused less on
the service attributes and more on the full sensory
experience that will animate the caregiver archetype.
The first measures are more tangible, and call for an
overhaul of the Fiesta Inn guest room and common
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
Fiesta Inn’s holistic approach to studying its guest
experience ensured that there were no shortcuts on
this journey to remake the Fiesta Inn brand from the
inside out. By embarking on the journey via a process
of: a) assessment of the “current state” of the guest
experience; b) identification and design of the desired
“future state”; c) implementation of the guest experience
elements; and d) measurement of the experience
delivery, Fiesta Inn is creating the best environment to
truly effect change across its portfolio and impact guest
loyalty. To truly recalibrate the “Brand DNA,” it was
crucial for Fiesta Inn to:
[concentrate on more than just] sheets, pillows and gadgets. Lodging brands that are truly committed to pulling
off this paradigm shift are seeking ways to redesign
the entire guest experience to elicit that homespun feel.
Property design, room layout and service models are all
being reworked to align around the concept of hotel as
home. Without this alignment, the desired experience is
in grave danger of being only duvet cover deep, thereby
alienating guests.13
By proceeding methodically through the process
as described in this paper, Fiesta Inn created the
“alignment” referenced in the citation above. While
the first wave of measurement to indicate the fruits
of their labors will reach Fiesta Inn leadership in the
4th Quarter of 2006, there is some satisfaction on
the part of the company for having recognized the
opportunity and stalked it methodically and logically
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LEISURE 2006
part 2 / BUILDING THE EXPERIENCE
via a variety of research methodologies and activities.
Only time will tell, however, if the typical Fiesta Inn
guest is stuck on “like”....or if the implementation of the
caregiver archetype has created a true love match.
Footnotes
1. Those attributes were: 1) Good Frequent Guest Program;
2) Guest Rooms that Allow Guest to Work Comfortably; 3)
Features Best Promotions for Business Travelers; 4) Casual
and Flexible Ambiance; 5) Good Support for Business (i.e., fax,
meeting rooms, etc.); 6) Recognition as a Business Class Hotel.
2. From 2001 to 2004 Fiesta Inn grew from 29 to 47 properties.
In 2001 the brand experienced a 19% growth in sales from
2000; in 2004, the figure was a 51% growth in sales from 2000.
3. LRA Worldwide’s Loyalty Index benchmark is based on more
than 350,000 guest survey data points.
4. www.millwardbrown.com
5. The “Advantage” scores moved from 34% in 1999 to 56% in
2003; the “Bonding” scores from 4% to 15%.
6. www.mindcode.com
7. Mindcode Brand Research Presentation to Grupo Posadas/
Fiesta Inn, August 2005
8. Ibid.
9. http://www.m-w.com/dictionary
Main Entry: ar·che·type. 1: the original pattern or model of
which all things of the same type are representations or copies:
PROTOTYPE; also : a perfect example
10. Examples: Free coffee and cookies for early-risers who
leave before the kitchen opens; 24-hour room service;
extended menu options and service hours.
11. Example: The check-in process was revised to ensure that
the front desk clerk immediately reassured the guest that his/
her room was available, eliminating the stressful phase of the
check-in where the clerk would peck away at the reservations
computer without any communication and/or validation that the
room was waiting without problem.
12. Examples: Implementation of a mandatory 24-Hour Business
Center; Creation of a corporate resource guide for the Guest
Services Directory; Creation of the “May We Help You” button
option on the phone system across the portfolio.
13. Rush, Rob. “There’s No Place Like Home: The New Paradigm of Hotel as Home,” Hotel Business Review: August 2006.
The Author
Zachary Conen is Director of Marketing, LRA Worldwide, Inc.,
United States.
Copyright © ESOMAR 2006
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