Nestled in the Appalachian Valley is the Crystal Springs Resort featuring two hotels – Minerals Hotel and Grand Cascades Lodge – 10 dining outlets, eight wedding venues, six golf courses, 30 meeting venues, and two luxury spas. In addition to these guest-experience venues are indoor and outdoor pools, a state-of-the-art sports club, unique culinary experiences, and signature events. Keeping track of these elements proved challenging until management decided to abandon its existing property-management system and return to its former solution, Maestro PMS.
“The most important part of a property-management system is its ability to share information, communicate between departments, and provide reliable reporting,” said Sherif Ayoub, General Manager of the Minerals Hotel. “In years past, I have used different PMS tools, but what is great about Maestro is the internal logic behind the technology. The entire diversity of our business is completely covered by Maestro’s capabilities, which would require endless integrations with other partners. Our entire staff is celebrating the return of the all-in-one Maestro PMS ecosystem.”
Daniella Testino-Lesina, Reflections Spa director, Grand Cascades Lodge, said the hotel’s previous PMS was not communicating well with other departments. “Our previous system introduced challenges because the flow of information wasn’t accurate between properties within our resort,” she said. “This caused issues with billing, postal code errors, and more, and led to dissatisfied guests.”
With Maestro PMS once again supporting operations, both Crystal Springs Resort hotels are sharing consistent information and communications has never flowed smoother.
“Maestro helps us address challenges on our property in many different ways,” said Blake Dolak, front office manager, Minerals Hotel. “We use Maestro PMS to pull all the data we get from different groups, from wedding to conference services, leisure, and even corporate guests, and see anything related to our spa services. This allows us to plan for guests in advance and anticipate their expectations.”
Today, Maestro’s integrated software suite is managing data and event spaces across one deployment and through one interface. Property modules adopted through the integration include:
- Front Desk and Reservations
- Spa Operations
- Event Management
- Sales and Catering
- Billing and Point of Sale
- Training and Online eLearning
- Online Booking Engine
- Business Intelligence Analytics
Industry Leading Training and eLearning Tools
In addition to benefiting from improved data management on property, the Crystal Springs Resort was also able to bolster its training and onboarding tools to reduce downtime spent preparing new workers and improve the overall guest experience. Maestro achieves this through intuitive design, 24/7 support, purposeful information delivery, and robust eLearning resources for beginners, refreshers, or learning new features.
“New employees quickly become proficient in managing all front desk functions, from check-in and check-out to billing, but Maestro is a great tool for continuous learning due to its powerful feature set,” said Nicole Sisco, director of the front desk at Grand Cascades Lodge. “I’ve been at Grand Cascades for seven years, and I’m still discovering new features thanks to this technology.”
Testino-Lesina concurred with Sisco, saying she has been working with Maestro PMS for many years, and the training and support from the system is amazing. “Maestro’s support team is always available, just a phone call, video call, or message away,” she said. “When new users join, we find the spa training module to be very beneficial, and eLearning tools are provided to help existing users as well.”
Robust Reporting and Property Awareness
Maestro’s reporting features allow hoteliers to log important observations about every aspect of a property, even across a multi-property resort like the Crystal Springs.
“Reporting is a very important function within Maestro,” said Caroline Little, owner relations for both the Grand Cascades Lodge and Minerals Hotel. “I often use the owner module to provide monthly or annual statements to ownership. This allows us to dial into any metric owners may be interested in. Maestro also makes it very easy to manage our two properties. With just a click of a button, you can change properties within the system, and anyone can quickly run reports at both hotels.”
Sisco said she uses a variety of reports within Maestro, including occupancy reports to understand how many guests are arriving and departing at certain times, and how many children are arriving compared to adults. “This information helps our hotel plan for the morning breakfast buffet or adjust staffing for group events we know about in advance,” Sisco said. “Then, we can quickly distribute the reports and their relevant information to every department so everyone on property is aware in advance.”
Simplicity by Design
Maestro’s tools are designed to be easy to use and intuitive at a glance. By embracing simplicity while providing options for deep property controls, Maestro is helping operators stay one step ahead of guests with the information and capabilities they need.
“Ultimately, we strive to provide a ‘wow’ factor to all our guests, and Maestro supports that goal from the moment guests book a spa appointment, all the way to arrival and up until they leave,” Testina-Lesina said. “Being such a user-friendly program enhances the overall guest experience. We aim to make the process as easy and relaxing for guests as possible, and Maestro’s simplicity aids operators.”
“Most importantly, Maestro simplifies operations and makes things quick,” Ayoub said. “Guests don’t enjoy standing for a long time at the front desk, they want that interaction to be quick. The better the PMS, the better the guest experience, and we believe Maestro is helping us achieve just that.”
Maestro PMS President Warren Dehan said he is delighted that Crystal Springs Resort returned to Maestro and feels it had been the right PMS for their resort all along.
“Crystal Springs Resort is one of the most striking and beautiful properties in New Jersey, and we are delighted to welcome this property back into the Maestro PMS family,” Dehan said. “The ability to communicate between departments and share cross-property activity data is critical to operations and the guest experience as this award-winning culinary, golf and spa resort attests. We look forward to working with the teams at Minerals Hotel and Grand Cascades Lodge for many years to come.”
