An Interview with Caryl Helsel
The BLLA Events Team sits down with Caryl Helsel, Founder & CEO of Dragonfly Strategists and one of our facilitators from the 2023 Boutique Hotel Owners Conference on October 10-11, 2023.
BLLA: How did you come to enter the hospitality industry?
CH: While in college, I worked at The Read House in Chattanooga TN as a front desk agent and then reservations supervisor. Though I majored in communications, I fell in love with hospitality at a historical boutique hotel. When I graduated from college, my internship at CBS Chattanooga offered me 30% less to work seven days per week and the hotel offered me more money to work Monday through Friday. The hotel promoted me to reservations manager and I was thrilled. Even back then, I did pricing, reservations, forecasting…all kinds of things that were so intriguing to me. I’ve been in hospitality ever since (I won’t tell you the year – you can guess!), rotating back and forth from hotel companies to technology companies in hospitality. As a result, I have started two successful hospitality businesses and am the proud woman founder of Dragonfly Strategists.
BLLA: What is the mission statement of your company?
CH: Our mission since 2016 has been to transform strategy to revenue and to be a holistic and trusted advisory and services firm primarily serving the boutique and independent hotel space or corporate offices of brands.
To expand upon our mission, Dragonfly represents global luxury hotel brands and independent and lifestyle hotels, creating actionable strategies that transform into higher revenue-generating opportunities and streamlined processes across commercial strategy (revenue management, sales, and marketing), distribution, operations, eCommerce, and technology. Our team is comprised of senior level experts with a wide range of hospitality experience.
At Dragonfly, we believe in a true partnership with our clients, acting as trusted representatives of their business. We are system agnostic, meaning that we recommend the best solution for our clients, and never take any referral fees. Instead, we ask that the vendors pass those referral fees back as a discount directly to the client.
BLLA: What does boutique mean to you?
CH: Boutique means curated experiences customized with the guest in mind, authentic community, customized moments, and reflective of the destination, a purpose, and/or a theme.
BLLA: What are the top three trends that you see in the boutique hotel technology space?
CH: The ability for guests to customize their experience and have it their way, including attribute-based selling being facilitated effectively in the PMS, CRS, and RMS systems with the guest able to self-manage their itinerary planning or have a personal guide to help them plan.
Selecting technology stack based upon documenting current and aspirational guest, member, and employee journey vs. what may be sexy or leading edge.
Guests have a choice between a completely contactless guest journey or interaction with the hotel team. In today’s market, it’s still rare to find a contactless experience that actually works. But boutique should give guests the choice of doing business their way.