Silent travel is emerging as one of the key hospitality trends of 2024. This type of holiday offers a chance to recharge and reset, without feeling like you need a holiday to recover from your holiday. Mews-powered Cabiner is a unique Dutch brand at the forefront of silent travel, aiming to connect guests with nature again.

It’s not glamping, though – these are properly constructed small buildings offering comforts like a hot shower and a kitchen. Their cabins, dotted throughout National Parks and only accessible by foot, have no Wi-Fi or wall plugs. The goal is to encourage guests to disconnect and truly relax in their new surroundings.

Cabiner was looking for an open API to connect with bespoke software solutions. They also wanted to connect to leading hotel tech while powering unique and secluded guest experiences through automation. In Mews, they found a solution that could help them automate, integrate and scale.

Direct connections through Mews Open API

Because of their unique proposition and processes, Cabiner has developed many of their own software solutions. For example, their booking engine allows guests to choose a cabin based on factors like how far they want to walk. They also built a custom integration that connects a food package order to their supplier.

Sander Ejlenberg, Co-Founder at Cabiner, was looking to connect any software straight into a PMS and needed the flexibility to customize to any existing tech infrastructure. Since Mews has a truly open API, the Cabiner team was able to directly connect their bespoke solutions. The API documentation is open to everyone and provides unrivaled flexibility for integrations and customization. This empowers properties with very specific needs to work effectively.

Because the API is open, we can build a whole custom front end that exactly fits our needs, but still runs on Mews, said Ejlenberg. Mews is the glue in the middle that connects everything – it fits our open mindset where everything is a network.

100% automated payments and integrated upselling

Cabiner has no reception or front office, which means that reservation payments and other transactions need to be simply and securely completed online. Mews enabled them to take payment at the moment of booking. Upon arrival or departure, no bill needs to be settled – guests can happily move on with their day.

Cabiner also built an add-on functionality that lets guests add extra people or meal packages up to 24 hours ahead of the visit. Payment is taken at once for any add-ons, meaning financial data is always up to date. Since moving to Mews, 100% of Cabiner payments are automated, ensuring zero payment discrepancies or mistakes due to manual errors.

We use humans to do human tasks because it's good to talk to people and to help them, but the repetitive stuff we get out of the way through automation, continues Ejlenberg.

Admin-free guest experience

As their cabins are in difficult-to-reach places, Cabiner had no choice but to go fully digital. Automation is at the heart of their uniquely hands-off guest experience. Shortly before their stay, guests receive an automated email with their walking routes and find out where to pick up their food supplies.

The door code is also automated and changes at check-out time after every stay. Because of this, no staff need to be present to facilitate handover and guests don’t have to perform any admin for the duration of their stay. The self-service approach aligns with the Cabiner concept of reconnecting with nature. With Mews, they can offer a fully admin-free guest experience, with 100% automated check-ins and check-outs.

Embrace the digital way. Focus on what really matters for the guest and try to automate the rest. I never found the check-out process at a hotel to be a nice thing, it's just something you want to get out of the way, said Ejlenberg. If you can automate all these things, Mews is the right system to do it with.

Discover more about modern hotel space management

Cabiner is a hospitality brand that has fully embraced digital technology to power every element of the guest experience. Without an innovative platform like Mews, the brand would struggle to deliver the kind of experiences that modern guests expect. The team will continue adding integrations and efficiencies to prevent their team from wasting time on repetitive tasks.

Do you also want to offer unique experiences and see impressive gains from a more engaged, higher-spending guest? Mews can help you future-proof your property's success by diversifying revenue. Hear from successful hoteliers and see how much they earned – all within their PMS and without creating extra work for their teams. Our guide, How to Diversify Hotel Revenue, will teach you everything you need to know about optimizing space and maximizing profit.

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