What makes a 5 Star Hotel?
If you ever wanted to know what makes a 5 star hotel, then E4 may have the answer.. or not? Over the past few weeks it has been airing it’s ‘Five Star Hotel’ reality series where a Greek Hotel is ‘taken over’ by 5 celebrity reality ‘stars’. These 5 celebrities have to run the hotel and are rated on their performance by their guests. Now TV shows like this I cringe at – as they do not always show the hospitality industry in the best light. With it being set on a Greek Island, there is ‘adult content’ that is also aired for the viewer’s to get the TV ratings up and needless to say the hotel is run very much like a brothel rather than a 5 Star establishment.
With the 5 celebrities from very different walks of life, the obvious personality clashes come through together with the sense of competition to get the best rating – however it is the average rating from all of them that will get them their 5 stars for the hotel, which means they have to work as a team…
In the interest of research I have been watching this series and underneath it all, it does give some insight as to how hard it is to work in a hotel, and that it is not just about organising boozy parties. Under the watchful eye of Hotel Consultant Mario Armani the celebrities are put through their paces, given words of advice and being called in for a serious talking to. The hotel loses some of its ‘stars’ as they get fired for inappropriate behaviour and then they hire another ‘star’ to take their place to keep the 5 celebrity stars.
What do they do to ensure the hotel gets a 5 star rating?
Throughout the series whilst at the hotel they organise the following:
- Welcome Dinner
- Pirate themed Booze Cruise
- Birthday Party
- Hen Do
- Vineyard Tour and Wine Tasting
- A marriage proposal
- Speed Dating event
- Greek themed night
- Tour of the island
- Site visit for a Hotel Reviewer
- Wedding Blessing
- A BBQ
- Site visit for from some Hotel Inspectors
- A White Party
- A Gold Party
At the end of each week the ratings come in and the individual with the best score is Employee of the Week. In order to get their ratings up, what is becoming abundantly clear to the celebrities, is the way they do this is reflected in how they service their guests. From all the shenanigans that go on two things show up very clearly – the management style and teamwork that is needed to make the hotel a success.
From having to fire the poor performers, motivating each other when the going gets tough, and working professionally the celebrities are given pep talks to keep the hotel operating and to ensure they give their guests a 5 star service.
From this the most memorable episode had to be with the hotel inspectors. Serving made up cocktails in a cracked glass, showing a dirty room and polishing the hotel inspector’s bald head! In answering how do you handle guests who may have food allergies? By having antihistamines on hand really was not the answer the inspectors wanted to hear. This was classic ‘Fawlty Towers’ material.
So did the hotel ever manage to get it’s 5 stars? What do you think – the guests are staying for free, the celebs seem to forget they are meant to be working in a hotel as they lounge around with the guests by the pool and it is a TV show….