Developing a Boutique Hotel: A case study in New Bern, North Carolina

Developing a Boutique Hotel: A case study in New Bern, North Carolina

Introduction

A local entrepreneur has a goal of developing a boutique hotel in New Bern, North Carolina. His Colonial Place Inn and Spa plans call for seventy-four unique rooms with distinctive color schemes, sixty-six thousand six hundred sixty-eight total square feet of meeting space, a full service spa and a restaurant in downtown New Bern within walking distance from the Convention Center and the waterfront. The five story hotel project includes a two building conversion and renovation. The hotel will have two entrances, one on each major street in downtown New Bern and will have a connecting hallway in the middle of the hotel. The boutique hotel will have a colonial American theme. The primary building is currently a furniture store and the second, connecting building, has a dance studio which would serve as ballroom and meeting space for the hotel. The question is: can all these facilities be assembled into a successful hotel?

Boutique Concept

Boutique hotels are hotels that appeal to their guests because of their unusual amenity and room configurations. There are nearly seven hundred boutique hotels in the United States. They are traditionally independent, smaller than two hundred rooms, have a high average rate and offer high levels of service. Boutique hotels often provide authentic cultural or historic experiences and interesting services to guests. There are select chains that have "Boutique" brands as noted in the Smith Travel Research database, for example, the Autograph Collection, Dream Hotel, Exclusive Hotels, Joie De Vivre, Kimpton Hotels, Melia Boutique, Rosewood, and W Hotel, Hotel Indigo, and Aloft. Additional chain and independent hotels are separately identified as "Boutique hotels" in the Smith Travel Research data base.