Hotel Management student Sam Schoemaker participated digitally in the Young Hotelier Summit in Lausanne last week and, together with some international students, developed a sustainable concept where gardens are placed on hotel roofs. It ultimately proved to be the winning idea, earning her a very valuable prize. "It was also nice to see how many reactions I had afterwards from the students and staff at Saxion."
Hi Sam, what exactly is the Young Hotelier Summit?
"The Online Young Hotelier Summit is a digital gathering for students and professionals within hospitality. Spread over four days, it featured a few speakers, a chance to network and you could participate in an assignment. I was asked by a teacher to sign up and of the four students nominated by Saxion, I was eventually allowed to represent our university together with fellow student Thom Sauerbier."
What exactly did you have to do?
"We were divided into groups - mine consisted of a guy from Australia, two girls from America and a girl from Vietnam - and together we had to work on a sustainable concept for client IHG Hotels & Resorts. They wanted to do more with the sustainability trend, because millennials are also very much looking at that when they travel these days."
Sam’s international group
What did you come up with?
"Our concept was called The Green on Height Project. It means that all the hotels they are building now - there are about 1815 of them - will have gardens on the roof. This reduces CO2 and contributes to the physical and mental health of the guest, as it has been proven that 20 minutes in nature reduces stress by 20%. We won because it was a unique idea and we did a lot of research on visibility and return on investment, which made it easy for the jury to assess whether our idea would be profitable."
What was it like to participate in this?
"It was very special, especially at this time, to have the opportunity to work with people who are not from the Netherlands or studying at Saxion. It was all very professionally organized, with a particular platform on which you could participate in meetings, play games, share updates, and socialize. The livestream was presented by two presenters in front of a green screen. It was nice to see how much effort was put into it"
And then you guys won, too.
"In the end, we had to be the first to present our concept on the last day, and that was exciting, because in addition to everyone present at the conference, other interested parties could also watch. Then we watched the announcement via the livestream, while we were in a Zoom conversation with our group, and heard that we had won. Everyone started screaming, yelling, and was all over the place. We were very happy, of course, and it was also nice to see how many reactions I had afterwards from students and staff at Saxion."
How do you look back on those days?
"I have to say that I did not know what to expect beforehand and my intention was not necessarily to win, but if you're still working on an idea like that, it's a lot of fun and in the end I'm really glad I participated. I learned a lot and met some very nice people, with whom I have already agreed that, if the corona measures are ever lifted, they will come to Amsterdam. On top of that, there was also a nice prize in the end."
What exactly did you win?
"We now receive one-on-one mentoring from IHG's management team, which really becomes a customized program based on our qualities. For example, I was allowed to nominate one of the speakers of the conference to spar with once. All of it is very cool. And who knows, maybe they'll be impressed and I'll find a job this way. That remains to be seen, of course."
Is that also your ambition?
"I am now in the third year of the Hotel Management course and my motto so far is actually: everything happens as it should. I want to remain active in hospitality anyway, that's really where my ambitions lie. And in the end I'll see where I end up."
Everyone started screaming, yelling and was all over the place.
