U. Delaware Launches X-Room to Test Guest Satisfaction with Next-Gen Technologies
When one enters any of the various "Visions of Tomorrow" exhibits (car, kitchen, city) at public exhibitions and trade shows, the experience is typically taken with a grain of salt. Few, if any, attendees actually expect to experience the technological advancements during the course of their daily lives any time soon. So while the experience is fun, it often does not come across as practical•until now.
Enter X-Room, the Experimental Guestroom of the Future project launched in September 2007 by the University of Delaware's school of Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Management in conjunction with hotel management company, Shaner Hotels. Located in room 114 of the Courtyard by Marriott Newark--University of Delaware, X-Room features much of the hospitality industry's "technology of tomorrow," but in a fully operational guest room. For the same average daily rate as other rooms at the property ($150), guests will experience the tomorrow's hotel technology in an actual working environment.
Some of these technologies include:
- A robotic vacuum cleaner that automatically cleans the carpet;
- Energy efficient appliances including an air-powered showerhead and an ionic hair dryer;
- A digital video camera connected to an LCD screen that serves as a wide-view peep hole;
- Flameless electronic candles;
- "Clocky" - a computerized alarm clock on wheels that hides after one push of the snooze button, requiring guests to get out of bed to turn it off;
- A bedside digital assistant that allows for control of the heating and lighting systems and serves as an electronic guest directory;
- A universal battery charger that accomodates any electronic device;
- A Microsoft media center that can serve guest needs from computing and Internet usage to live television and the playing of music and movies.
"X-Room is based on the idea of Guestroom 2010 which is produced by Hospitality Financial and Technology Professionals, " explains Cihan Cobanoglu, associate professor of hospitality information technology at the University of Delaware. "We are so pleased that HFTP initiated a project like this and we would like to take this project into the next level."
While X-Room bases itself off of the Guestroom 2010 model, it differentiates itself through its goal of testing consumer acceptance of the technology through interaction.
"The key difference is that in our X-Room, actual guests and staff members get to use these new systems," says Cobanoglu. "Our goal is to determine the acceptance levels of these technologies, and the impact they make on guest satisfaction and staff efficiency."
Determing a guest's level of satisfaction is also done through novel technology. Guests of X-Room are presented an electronic survey with their folio, the data of which is available immediately upon completion. This allows management to remediate any problems prior to departure of the unhappy guest.
This point is crucial. While the X-Room allows guests to have a truly unique hotel experience, it also provides valuable feedback on room technology and guest satisfaction for the industry as a whole.
"We invite everybody to contribute to our X-Room either by staying in it or by giving us feedback or suggesting a technology to test," Cobanoglu comments. "With our X-Room, we want to benefit the industry and vendors by showing what actually works and does not work in a real hotel environment."