Sébastien de Courtivron, Executive Vice President Hotels, Covivio was joined by Damien Perrot, global chief design, technical services & innovation officer, PEM at Accor, Bittor Sanchez-Monasterio, VP design Eco&midscale Accor, Ramy Fischler founder of RF Studio and Petra de Meyere, general manager of the establishment to discuss the extensive renovation of the Novotel Bruges centrum.

Sébastien de Courtivron: ‘This hotel was part of the Accor portfolio that we acquired in 2005. The transaction we initiated with AccorInvest in 2022 enabled us to recover the hotel's goodwill. The question of renovating it arose and we decided to make it a pilot establishment. We went to see our partner Accor and suggested that they take advantage of this opportunity to develop the Novotel product.
Our aim was to move the establishment upmarket and make use of the underused m2. For example, there were 1,000m2 of seminar space, which makes little sense in a destination like Bruges, where the majority of customers are leisure travellers. So we transformed this area into 12 family rooms.

The hotel is integrated into our WiZiU platform and average daily rates have risen since the renovation. In 2019 the ADR reached €94, we expect €137 for this new year and are aiming for €150.

We have also paid a great deal of attention to issues relating to the establishment's energy consumption. We have rationalised the energy network by switching everything over to electricity and installing heat pumps. During the renovation, we also kept waste production to a minimum. This enabled us to reduce our carbon emissions by 52%.

Ramy Fischler adds: ‘We've been working on this project for several years. We rethought the way a hotel is used. What will a lobby be used for tomorrow? What are people going to do when they're not in the room? How can we get different customers to live together? How can we put the resources in the right place to maximise the impact for the customer? How can we encourage the reproducibility of the room?

Part of the answer has been to keep the infrastructure to a minimum and to work on developing quality furniture that justifies the move upmarket. The room is designed to highlight the elements that are visible once you are in bed.

Several areas have been created in the lobby. Depending on the establishment, it is possible to install a different number of stages. These spaces are modular and we need this agility today.

Petra de Meyere: ‘This space used to be two hotels. Now we have pooled the teams. The renovation has enabled us to deliver a customer satisfaction score of over 88 points, which puts us ahead of other Novotel establishments. We are reaching standards similar to those in the Middle East.

Bittor Sanchez-Monasterio: ‘These issues of quality and customer satisfaction are also what motivated our thinking. Covivio's commitment is also in line with that of Novotel, which is illustrated in particular by the partnership with WWF.

We have mobilised the synergies of the Accor group by calling on Paris Society consulting for the map’.