European hoteliers: Here are your 2026 hospitality trends

In this episode of Hotel Moment, Dylan Cole, Managing Director EMEA at Revinate debuts as podcast co-host with over 13 years at the company across New York, San Francisco, Singapore, and Amsterdam offices — bringing essential regional context to the five major hospitality trends shaping 2026. While the previous trends episode covered hyperpersonalization, unified tech stacks, real-time decisioning, cybersecurity and privacy, and guest engagement platform evolution from a global perspective, Dylan demonstrates that hoteliers in London, Munich, Stockholm, and the Amalfi Coast face fundamentally different pressure points requiring regional strategy.

What you'll learn:

Regional personalization motivations: In UK and Ireland, personalization defends margins against OTA dominance with high labor costs and price-sensitive guests, making it about driving direct bookings and valuable loyalty rather than being fancy. DACH guests demand clear consent and value-driven communication without creepiness, requiring prominent opt-in buttons and data privacy lines. Northern Europe expects zero tolerance for generic communication tied to brand credibility where guests who trusted brands with data expect right messages. Southern Europe uses personalization as powerful in-stay revenue lever for driving experiences, increasing on-property spend, and maximizing peak demand without discounting.
Operations-driven tech unification: Unified tech stacks are pushed by operations teams rather than IT departments, particularly in UK and Ireland where really lean teams have no appetite to juggle five different systems that don't talk to each other, making unified stacks mean less manual work, faster execution, and fewer things breaking at worst moments. DACH portfolios find disconnected systems create risk beyond slowdowns, Northern Europe needs flexibility to evolve without locking into yesterday's decisions, and Southern Europe requires unification for managing seasonality and rapidly changing staffing models.
Real-time data regional priorities: UK and Ireland need real-time data for survival where expensive labor and quickly changing guest behavior mean inability to react causes absorbed unnecessary costs. DACH uses real-time data for precision forecasting holding up under scrutiny from multiple stakeholders. Northern Europe finds static reports feel outdated with real-time visibility becoming baseline expectation. Southern Europe captures on-property value while guests are present, especially when demand shifts with weather or events, with bottom line being that looking only at last month's performance means you're already behind.
Privacy as brand promise: Privacy functions as a brand promise rather than compliance, with DACH and Northern Europe guests actively assessing data handling where transparency, consent, and restraint all matter. UK and Ireland see rising guest awareness influencing repeat bookings and loyalty. Southern Europe with international travelers finds strong data protection is simple expectation. What's different in 2026 is privacy can't be treated separately from personalization, making trust a brand promise rather than legal checkbox.
Unified engagement platforms: Guest communication platforms evolve because guests think in experiences not systems, while many hotels communicate in fragments with separate systems for email, messaging, and feedback creating friction. Unified platforms bring pre-arrival, in-stay, post-stay together, helping UK and Ireland drive direct revenue, supporting DACH structured compliant communication, meeting Northern Europe high digital expectations, and enhancing Southern Europe experiential differentiation with different reasons producing same smoother journey outcome.

Throughout the episode, Dylan emphasizes that 2026 hospitality trends solve very real regional problems, where simplification creates value, and where activation of existing capabilities rather than new technology purchases can drive results.

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If you want to go deeper into these trends, we have a full guide to the latest hospitality trends of 2026 with practical insights designed to help you move from strategy to execution.

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Episode Highlights

[03:00] UK and Ireland margin defense - Dylan explains the regional driver: "In the UK and Ireland, personalization is really about defending margins. The market is dominated by OTAs, high labor costs, and price-sensitive guests. So personalization isn't about being fancy, it's about driving more direct bookings, making loyalty actually feel valuable, and selling the right upsell to the right guest at the right time. If you're not activating guest data here, you're going to feel it straight in your P&L."

[03:50] DACH consent requirements - Dylan describes the different conversation: "Guests still want relevance, but they want it done with clear consent, and they want to make sure that values are driven with the communications. They don't want any creepiness. So you got to make sure that you're dropping in that line about data privacy in your conversations, your communications, and that you're leaving that opt-in button pretty prominent for those guests."

[04:37] Southern Europe revenue leverage - Dylan contrasts drivers: "In Southern Europe, hoteliers, especially in resort destinations, can use personalization as a powerful in-stay revenue lever. Basically, it's how you drive experiences, it's how you increase on-property spend, it's how you maximize peak demand without discounting. It's all the same trend, it's just completely different drivers."

[05:20] Operations-driven tech unification - Dylan reveals the unexpected insight: "Unified tech stacks sound like a trend that should be driven by the IT department, but in Europe they're actually being pushed by the operations team. In the UK and Ireland, we're seeing that teams are quite lean, in fact really lean, and there's no appetite from our customers to juggle five different systems that don't talk to each other."

[06:32] Real-time data regional priorities - Dylan breaks down survival versus precision: "In the UK and Ireland, real-time data is about survival. Labor is expensive, guest behavior changes quickly, and if you can't react in the moment, you are going to absorb unnecessary costs. In DACH, real-time data supports precision, better forecasting, and fewer surprises."

[09:07] Fragmented communication challenges - Dylan identifies the core problem: "Guest communication platforms are evolving because guests don't think in terms of systems. They're thinking in terms of experiences. And right now many hotels are still communicating in fragments. They have one system for email, another for messaging, another for feedback. Across EMEA, that fragmentation creates friction for guests and staff."

Chapters:

00:00 - Intro
02:14 - Five trends with regional context for Europe
03:00 - Hyperpersonalization across UK, DACH, Northern, Southern Europe
05:20 - Tech stack unification driven by operations teams
06:32 - Real-time data and decisioning regional priorities
07:30 - Privacy as brand promise across European regions
09:07 - Guest engagement platform evolution and fragmentation
09:58 - Strategic prioritization framework for European hoteliers