The Yeatman wine themed hotel
4-12-2013
The Yeatman is a luxe hotel in the heart of the wine cellar district of Porto with view on the city and the Douro river. The 5-star hotel is specialized in wine and gastronomy. All rooms have a Portugese ‘wine partner’ that hosts the room decorations, from pictures of the vineyard to branded artifacts. The wine partners hold weekly wine dinners at the hotel with meals that are cooked by Michelin star chef Ricardo Costa*.
Taylor’s Port sponsors the Master Suite 008, one of the most luxurious suites in the hotel. The bed in this suite is placed in a gigantic 28.000 liter wine barrel. According to the legend, the barrel is over a hundred years old. Check here the photos of this phenomenal hotel.
Nightswap exchange nights
3-12-2013
Through the Nightswap website people can lend out their house or room and get a night in someone else’s house in return without any financial transaction taken place. It’s possible to collect nights and spend them all in once, home swap at the same moment or to buy extra nights. The website offers insurances as well and is an alternative for peer-to-peer websites like Couchsurfing.org and Airbnb.com with a slightly different business model.
Game cafe in New York
3-12-2013
A crowdfunding game café initiative in Manhattan was funded by 188 people this October. For $8.700,- the game café ‘The Uncommons’ was created in the Big Apple. In the café-toy shop- coffee house guests can play a wide range of board games for $5,- a day. The shop sells a range of (warm) alcohol free drinks, pastries and sandwiches. A six months membership ($150,-) will provide you with privileges like a 10% discount for all in-store items, possibility to reserve a table and includes the rental fee.
Christmas gestures
2-12-2013
Recently the Dutch paper ‘NRC Handelsblad’ published an article about what makes people happy. The writer, psychologist Sonja Lyumbomirsky gives as point number 1 that money can make happy sometimes, but focus on buying experiences (vacations, food and courses) rather than things. Things will get old quicker and are easier to compare to things of others or newer versions that come out later, this leads to more disappointments. This gives precisely the importance of hospitality, a good experience in a restaurant, bar or hotel contributes to the happiness of guests. As restaurant owner, you and your team contribute to creating a memory, especially with the holidays! The season makes it simples to create lasting experiences because your guests will already be in a merry mood and this can only be strengthened by dishes, decorations and hospitable gestures. This booklet will contain more photos than you are used to, but the images speak for themselves. Beautiful, simple examples of easily usable Christmas gestures. Download ‘Christmas gestures’ here.
Hotel offers Bike Butler service
2-12-2013
The Fairmont Pacific Rim hotel in Vancouver offers their members of the Fairmont Presindent’s Bluc an exclusive Bike Butler service. With this service, hotel guests can explore the environment in an ecofriendly way. The hotel rents out 20 bikes, for free, and the bike concierge Marc Henley prepares the bikes and fixes accessories such as helmets, locks, water bottles and maps. Marc Henley has 20 years experience of cycling in Canada and can provide the best cycling routes and tips.
Pinterest connects businesses to an interactive map
29-11-2013
Pinterest has launched the new tool ‘Place Pins’ which makes the social media platform more interesting for small businesses. With Place Pins, users can add addresses and maps when they Pin an image. These are displayed on an interactive map. Make a Pinterest board with your favorite hotels and restaurants, for instance Paris and you can share this interactive map of Paris with other users. By clicking on ‘more information’ you will be directed to the Foursquare page or the hotel / restaurant website.
Nhow recruits staff in an accessible way
29-11-2013
Nhow Rotterdam hotel will open its doors on January 10, 2014. This is the third nhow hotel in the world after Milan and Berlin. The hotel has 278 rooms, conference- and meeting facilities, a skyline bar, food lounge and a rooftop terrace. To recruit staff for the hotel, nhow has organized a Pioneer Fest on November 18. The hotel sent three local scouts on the road to search for candidates and to invite them for the Pioneer Fest. While enjoying a drink and a snack, the hotel met the candidates. An accessible way to get to know the potential staff outside of a professional environment.
Instagram marshmallows
28-11-2013
Now it is possible to print your favorite Instagram photos on marshmallows. Very simple, you choose nine of your favorite Instagram photos and Boomf delivers the pictures on 4cmx4cm vanilla marshmallows. The site advises to use relative simple pictures with a good contrast. At this moment, the marshmallows are only available in the United Kingdom for £ 12, but there are plans to introduce the marshmallows internationally next year. A nice gift for the holidays: a marshmallow with your favorite photo into a hot chocolate during the cold winter days.
Five-star hotel educates local youth
27-11-2013
The Ritz-Carlton is the first five-star hotel at Aruba. Next to the 320 rooms and 450 local jobs the hotel brings education to the island as well. Together with maritime biologist Dr. Richard Murphy from the Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ocean Futures Society, the hotel developed an innovative environmental curriculum for primary school students. The education modules will be available on the Green Aruba website to learn about the island’s unique environmental assets and how to protect them. The youth is introduced to the ‘Ritz-Calton Succeed Through Service Program’ to enhance their leadership qualities. Though these and other collaborations Prime Minister Mike Eman and Bill Marriott agreed to a long-standing commitment to enriching education on the island and a Green Aruba.
Google Streetview from airports
27-11-2013
Traveling often brings along a fair amount of stress. Google relieves this a bit with the introduction of Google Streetview inside airports and other travel hubs. KLM already used Streetview technology to explore destinations and it is possible to feature 360 degrees photographs from restaurant interiors. In the near future it’s possible to ‘test-walk’ through your trip in Streetview.
