Robot Mario, the new employee and mascot of the Marriott Hotel Ghent

18-8-2015

The Marriott Hotel Ghent has a new employee since late June. The humanoid robot Mario. Now almost two months later, Mario is a local celebrity and he has his own ‘Mario Monday’. On these days he examines issues surrounding the hotel, he is trying out rooms and visited the football club Gent which is sponsored by the Marriott Ghent.

The success of Robot Mario

We read all the press coverage late June and planned an article in a later stage about the effect of the humanoid robot for the hotel. According to Annabelle Stevens (Marketing Marriott Ghent) Mario has stolen many hearts. School classes have come to meet Mario and his dedicated ‘dad Thomas’ can’t watch Mario’s performances alone any longer. Nowadays a number of front office staff accompany Mario occasionally in the things he says and does.

Mario is deployed in the MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions, Exhibitions) market for a welcome or farewell speech, he gives classic PowerPoint presentations or talks about the menu during diner. Another big advantage, Mario speaks a couple of different languages! He is regularly present at the front office, which is especially great for children.

Mario Monday

Mario does not replace staff, it is an extra level of experience. Mario even performs a mascot role every Monday through Facebook under the name ‘Mario Monday’. He investigates all issues surrounding the hotel. He already tested a room and checked whether the area around the hotel was well cleared after the Ghent Festivities for example. Thus, the mascot is part of the storytelling by the Marriott Ghent.

QBMT; the company that has designed Mario

Humanoid robots are already used for a while in the healthcare sector. In the hotel sector, this is one of the first times we hear about deploying a robot. The robot is a product of the Belgian company QBMT from Ostend, which has produced more than 100 Zora humanoid robots for the healthcare sector in Belgium, the Netherlands, France and Switzerland.

Flying robotic waiters

2-12-2014

By end-2015 autonomous flying robotic waiters will be deployed at 5 outlets of the Timbre Group in Singapore. Infinium Robotics Pte Ltd chief executive officer Woon Junyang signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Edward Chia, managing director of Timbre Group, on 31 October this year.

Prototype

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong observed an autonomous flying robotic waiter serving food during a demonstration at Singapore’s National Productivity Month 2014 Launch Event at Suntec Singapore Convention & Exhibition Centre.

Seeking productivity-related government grants

The costs are high but the flying robotic waiters could be a solution for the labour-crunch in Singapore and the robotic waiters do allow human waiters to focus on higher-value tasks such as explaining the menu, upselling and getting feedback from customers. At this moment both Infinium Robotics and the Timbre Group are seeking productivity-related government grants to help offset deployment costs.

The flying robotic waiters at work

Do you want to know more about these robots? CNBC did an interview with the owner of Infinium-Serve and had a demonstration in the studio.

Fun packaging for kids

1-10-2014

After drinking milk or juice, kids can play with this packaging. Designed by Bora Yildirim, the main function of the packaging is that it can be reused after the drink is consumed. The Pinar Sut bottles have two designs which can be transformed into fun toys. The lids and empty bottles can be attached to each other and transformed into shapes such as flowers and robots. This way children are encouraged to finish their drinks so they can play. Great way to serve drinks to children! The patent for this packaging is still pending but we think it’s ideal for healthy drinks for kids.

Of course we did spot a lot of inspiration focused on children before: in 2013 we saw a Happy Meal diorama. ‘Horeca Vlaanderen’ (Hospitality Flanders) and ‘Vlaanderen Lekker Land’ (Flanders Tasty Land) published a guide for a child-friendly hospitality industry full of hospitable ideas and menu tips for kids. You can also search yourself for inspiration focused on kids: Note ‘children‘ or ‘kids’ in the search field of our website and find pages full of inspiration.

Robot mixes and serves drinks

23-5-2013

We see more and more robots behind the bar preparing drinks. This robot Makr Shakr mixes and serves drinks and is controlled by an app. The robot can make drinks with about two dozen spirits and liqueurs, more than a hundred non-alcoholic mixers and can add ingredients such as mint, lemon slices, salt and pepper. Earlier we saw the robot Bartendro making cocktails within ten seconds.

Robot entertaining in a restaurant

9-4-2013

‘Robot Restaurant’ in Tokyo gives you a real entertaining during a dinner. The restaurant has four, 11.8-foot tall robots who are ‘fighting’ with each other. The robots are controlled by scantily clad women dancers and accompanied by loud electronic music. Building the robots and the interior of the restaurant did cost 125.8 million dollar. The entrance of the restaurant is $ 51 and even though there is nobody eating in this video, it does include dinner and drinks. The restaurant opened in august 2012.

Colorful carboard coffee boxes

5-3-2013

Inside the colorful carboard boxes by Martins Café, a coffeebrand from the vicinity of Sao Paulo, you don’t expect to find coffee. The boxes are colorful, retro and with their robot logo printed on the cardboard. Martins Café is a Brazilian brand of specialty coffee which comes in the variants cardamom, anise, cinnamon, nutmeg and 100% Arabica. With the package Martins Café wanted to create something colorful, retro and Brazilian that would catch your eye. Read the article on www.coolhunting.com to know why the use robots as their logo…. 

Cocktail Robot

30-1-2012

During the Barbot event new robots will be presented, including the RoboBartenders that serve cocktails. Barbot takes place in March 2012 at San Francisco

Robot-waiters

14-12-2010

The Chinese Restaurant “Dalu Rebot” uses six robots to serve food and drinks to the tables. The robots follow a fixed route laid down in the restaurant. The idea behind these “restaurants robots” comes from the Shandong Dalu Science and Technology Company.