January 25th, 2012 by TRT Blog

As we announced on Tuesday, this week we released our findings to an ongoing survey that we had been conducting about Product Improvement Plans (PIPs) in the hospitality industry. All of the findings were very interesting and we have been receiving great feedback about the survey from members of the hospitality industry, as well as journalists that have been reporting the results.

One bit of coverage that we really enjoyed, came from Hotel News Now. Today Stephanie Wharton compiled the regular section, ‘5 things to know’, and included some of the key findings from our survey. She included findings such as, 57% of respondents admitted they had experienced leniency from corporate franchisors regarding PIP implementation and 61.5% of managers believe travelers are unsympathetic to lapses in hotel renovation.

To see the entire article, go the HotelNewsNow.com.

coverage, Hotel News Now, HotelNewsNow.com, PIPs, Product Improvement Plans, Stephanie Wharton, survey, survey results

January 24th, 2012 by TRT Blog

The hospitality sector has faced new and challenging pressures in this slow economic recovery period. In particular, Product Improvement Plans (PIPs) have proved to be great source of concern for hotels owners across the US. To try to understand exactly how hotel owners feel about these franchisor-enforced PIPs, The Refinishing Touch recently conducted a survey which asked the largest hotel chains in the US about the financial and operational pressure PIPs, customers, and the economy places on them.

PIPs are used by corporate hotel franchisors to ensure that all locations are maintained and up to date. While many chains suspended PIPs in 2009 and 2010 to alleviate hotel owners from some economic pressures, PIPs were again a common occurrence in 2011.

The Refinishing Touch found that although many hotel owners found leniency from corporate owners, the majority were still concerned over cost commitment for the plans. The survey also found that many hotel owners feel that guests and hotel patrons are unforgiving of lapses in renovation and most owners feel that brand competition has greatly increased since the recession. 

To read the full release and learn more about the survey findings, please visit our website at http://www.therefinishingtouch.com/news.php.

hospitality, Hotels, PIPs, Product Improvement Plans

October 26th, 2011 by TRT Blog

As most of us know, the recovery from the recession hasn’t been easy. Individuals and consumer industries alike are still struggling. Our customers, particularly in the hospitality industry, are debating whether it’s the right time to make necessary improvements or if they should wait until the economy improves.

This notion sparked our curiosity. Based on a recent hotel interactive survey, focused on the increase of renovations being done in hotels after the recession, we pushed out our own survey to find whether or not this is true. We wanted to see if there was a consensus among hotel owners and managers whether renovations in the current economy are beneficial to the bottom line.

Our goal is to gather current information on hotels’ upcoming renovations, or Product Improvement Plans (PIP), as well as uncover any corporate, economic or customer pressures that may have influenced these plans.

Although our research is ongoing, the results we’ve already begun to gather are both interesting and telling. For example, we asked, “Are renovations being pushed back up the agenda now that a ‘recovery’ is underway?”

This is what we’ve found so far: 57.7 percent of participants said no, while 42.3 percent said yes.

In a continuing blog campaign, we will be revealing all of the survey questions and findings over the next few weeks. Check back for updates.

If you would like to be part of our survey, go to https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/piphotelsurvey. In order to avoid any conflict of interest, the surveys are completely anonymous. Participation requires no personal or professional information.

We look forward to hearing your opinion!

Hotel Interactive, Product Improvement Plans, renovations, sruvey, The Refinishing Touch