And many more retail offerings have come through partnerships rather than from a hotel’s parent company. Blackberry Farm, for instance, is among a large handful of U.S. hotels to partner with a luxury car brand—guests can drive a Lexus through the Great Smoky Mountains on a particularly scenic test drive (or “driving tour”). Those who follow up with a purchase or lease earn $1,000 toward their coupe or sedan, plus a $100 resort credit for a future vacation. “It yields results for both brands,” says the property’s director of marketing, Sarah Chabot. Among the automaker’s hotel partners are New York’s Beekman Hotel, the St. Regis in Aspen, and the Allison Inn and Spa in Oregon.
It was at a previous job at the Ritz-Carlton in Cancun, Mexico, that Elger saw the power of retail partnerships first-hand. There, his cooking school was outfitted by Viking Range LLC, and he watched as guests were driven to recreate aspects of their experiencing by, say, buying a blender that they had used to make their first molé.
To Elger and his higher-ups at Baccarat, the midtown property was always intended to drive crystal sales. People may not plan to buy glassware on their trip to New York, but they can be seduced to make an impulse buy under the context of a celebratory night out. This, he says, is how you solve a perennial branding dilemma: appealing to guests’ emotions.
Already, it’s proved to be a powerful formula. “We’ve done some of our largest sales at 10:30 at night on a Sunday,” adds Elger. “The chance that a guest is still going to be in the mindset to make that kind of a purchase [at our flagship store] the next morning? It’s not so likely.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.