Sanitizer Over Room Service: Luxury Hotels Pivot to Healthcare During Coronavirus
Skift Take
Empty hotels are getting put to use for medical staff during the coronavirus pandemic, but it will be just as tough restoring these properties as it was to prepare them for emergency service providers.
Hoteliers are transforming their properties into temporary healthcare facilities and self-isolation wards during the coronavirus pandemic. But it isn’t easy dropping five-star service for a new normal.
As coronavirus exploded over the first quarter of 2020, global hotel room occupancies plummeted. Operators temporarily closed properties due to the dwindling revenue, and companies like Hilton and Marriott have both indicated more closures are likely until the crisis stabilizes. But some hotel owners are keeping the lights on by handing over properties for emergency uses like housing frontline healthcare staff. It is an arduous but increasingly necessary transformation going from the business of thousand-dollar suites to health aid.
“We worked out every product and procedure we had to turn this into a utilitarian operation,” said Four Seasons Hotel New York General Manager Rudy Tauscher. “We’re a very service-oriented hotel, and we needed to move away from that and all guest interaction.”
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The Four Seasons Hotel New York’s owner, Ty Warner, responded in late March to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s call to action. Cuomo turned to the private sector to help reduce the supply constraint the state, a coronavirus hotspot, had in safely housing frontline medical staff. Warner volunteered his hotel to house doctors and nurses working shifts at nearby hospitals. The hotel team worked with Dr. Robert Quigley, senior vice president and regional medical director at medical and travel security services firm International SOS, to transform the luxury property into temporary quarters for healthcare providers. “We spent a lot of our first day having town halls and educating staff,” Quigley said. “We stripped down th