Service of Silence in hospitality industry

Sometimes rather than to satisfy guest needs, we realized a better choice is to create guest demand. We prepared a poster with a slogan "Escape from the digital world. Embrace the inner peace." We also created some activities, like surfing summer camp and watching open-air films, to help guests experience disconnection from the noisy world. These activities not only brought high guest satisfaction, but also increased our revenue.

This experience reminds me of a new concept called "digital detox", which is focused on silence in hospitality industry. Dr. Franz Linser, founder of Linser Hospitality, said in 2016 Global Wellness Summit: "wellness programming at hotels/retreats today can sometimes feel like nothing more than an "operational line-item", while future destinations will need to put a deeper, more comprehensive focus on the true "art of living" and that will include a much more powerful focus on silence and nature."

There are many industry pioneers that have already applied service of silence to their resorts, restaurants, gyms, salons and even airports. A wellness monastery named Eremito in Italy, without Wi-Fi or phone signal, offers services of meditation, yoga, hiking, reading, etc. Its brand is "peace, contemplation and re-finding oneself". Other examples of applying service of silence can be found in airports like London City, Bristol, Barcelona, Warsaw and Helsinki, where the announcements are only made at boarding gates (except in true emergencies).

The service of silence is not anti-technology, but will embrace new technologies to create a silent experience for customers. We can identify the future trend of this unique service in hospitality industry. As the world will become noisier and more digitally connected, the service of silence in hospitality industry will have the opportunity to became a popular project for guests to escape from noise temporarily.

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