Since it began greeting guests with its signature warm chocolate chip cookie more than 20 years ago, the Doubletree family of hotels, suites, resorts, and clubs has served more than 175,000,000 of the treats at its properties worldwide. The cookie is intended to provide a warm reception and symbolize a promise of consistent quality, service, and hospitality at every Doubletree property.

Not long ago, Doubletree F&B executives, chefs, and managers came together to look at brand-wide foodservice offerings and practices. What they saw was a collection of programs that presented no clear identity to represent the company’s standards and service philosophy. They decided to create a uniform F&B program that would bring quality and consistency to food and service—a program reflecting Doubletree ideals. That is, the new F&B program would follow the Way of the Cookie.

While Doubletree has long been a respected full-service brand under the Hilton umbrella, it was never known for foodservice. In 2006, then Director of Brand Standards and now VP of Doubletree Brand Performance Gary Steffen assembled a committee to change that reputation or lack thereof.

Managers from six top-performing hotels representing a cross section of domestic properties varying in size, style of facility (e.g., resort, extended-stay suites, etc), and location addressed F&B needs and discussed ideas to strengthen its stature within the brand. The group also realized that, with more than 200 properties open or in development, creating a top-notch foodservice program would be necessary to better compete for domestic market share and to make a strong entrance into new markets in Doubletree’s ongoing global expansion.

STARTING WITH THE COOKIE
The cookie concept of quality and consistency to drive customer satisfaction was the jumping off point for standardization of F&B elements that could translate into a brand identity. But constructing one distinct F&B program from numerous extant programs at individual properties may have been a more daunting task than starting from scratch.

Doubletree has always encouraged chefs to embrace regional foods and flavors at their individual properties. In standardizing F&B, the committee wanted a unified presentation that could preserve the unique nature of each program. They wanted to be true to the ideals of the cookie, but they didn’t want cookie cutter, so the team decided on a framework of minimum requirements that could be expanded with corporate-approved suggestions or chef-driven creativity.

Priorities had to be set to swing those varied menus and disparate practices into a single, cohesive foodservice regimen. Doubletree’s Satisfaction and Loyalty Tracking survey (SALT) showed the committee where tweaks would be most effective and what measures would give them the greatest return. The team agreed on three areas where programs could be implemented quickly and cost-effectively: breakfast, in-room dining, and coffee service.

GETTING BREAKFAST RIGHT
Breakfast presented itself as the prime vehicle for spotlighting Doubletree’s new F&B image. “Breakfast has the best capture rate of any meal period [typically 40 to 45 percent brand-wide], and it’s often the first look guests have at your food program,” says Steffen. The morning meal also has the lowest food cost ratio of any service period at any location.

Doubletree’s historic property in Roanoke, Virginia, the Hotel Roanoke & Conference Center, was a model in the reformulation process. Assistant GM Phillip Davis places the breakfast capture rate there in the 55 to 60 percent range. “Breakfast was our first major initiative because a hotel sets its reputation with breakfast,” Davis says. “If you want people to come back for other meals, you really have to get breakfast right.”

Getting it right means fresh, healthy food and a sleeker, more modern presentation of the breakfast buffet. Davis says the new F&B protocols stress a preference for local sources for food items and encourage properties to install permanent stations while trying to avoid Sterno, chafing dishes, and skirted banquet tables.

Doubletree requires a 7 to 10 a.m. service period with a minimum of items—five hot dishes, three cubed or sliced fruits, five cold cereals, one hot cereal, nine pastries/breads, three fresh juices, and two yogurts—that the Roanoke buffet fills out with regional specialties like country ham and red-eye gravy, grits, and spoonbread. All items have distinct signage (paid for once annually by corporate) and are prepared in small batches.

The brand also places minimum requirements on equipment, suggesting such items as induction pans and air-void coffee pots. Doubletree provides deep corporate discounts on those supplies while allowing a grace period for such capital expenditures.

Doubletree found a way to innovate and break the mold of ordinary breakfast service by extending the buffet to guests with no time to sit down and enjoy breakfast. “We asked, ‘Why can’t we allow guests to do buffet to go?’” Davis says. To take advantage of the branding opportunity, Doubletree designed compartmentalized, recyclable takeout containers complete with the Doubletree logo. About 4 percent of Davis’ breakfast capture is from to-go meals, and this option has shown up as a very positive change on guest surveys.

IN-ROOM DINING
The surveys also pointed to opportunities to enhance the in-room dining experience. “We live and die by our SALT scores,” says Don Molinich, executive chef at Doubletree Paradise Valley in Scottsdale.

Molinich runs 24-hour in-room dining to 378 guestrooms out of a central kitchen. He also operates a three-meal restaurant and lounge with a tapas menu, services 40,000 square feet of banquet space for group customers, follows a 10-day breakfast buffet schedule to provide variety for long-stay customers, and competes against nearly 100 restaurants within five miles of his property. He credits the brand’s F&B initiative with “really giving the customer a clear idea of where Doubletree is going.” He also says the improvements have helped Paradise Valley F&B perform above Doubletree benchmarks for customer satisfaction.

The goals for in-room dining were to offer a thoughtful menu and deliver the food hot and in a timely manner. With this initiative, Doubletree was not only working to build its own reputation but also to repudiate the too-familiar perception of in-room dining as food you’re going to eat but that you would probably send back if it were served to you in a restaurant.

The first move was to pull the in-room dining menu out of the hotel directory and place it prominently in a freestanding display. Next—after a four-month trial at various locations—four light entrées and two desserts were named as “Doubletree Classics.” These are required on the menu, along with two more suggested entrées. (These items are also recommended on lunch and dinner menus for casual Doubletree restaurants.)

The list of items includes the Classic Cobb Salad with grilled chicken in a Tuscan marinade, Grilled Chicken Sandwich Caprese, Triple Decker Club Sandwich, and Doubletree Thick & Juicy Burger. Desserts featuring the famed Doubletree cookie include Chocolate Chip Bananas Foster and Cookie Crumb Bread Pudding with Grand Marnier Custard Sauce.

Preparations and presentations for the required dishes, plus the suggested Grilled Chicken Caesar Wrap and Spiced Rub Seared Salmon Salad, are described meticulously, down to portion size, ingredient sources, and exact placement of garnishes. According to Molinich, the aim for the menu was not to offer a huge number of items but to provide a manageable selection of dishes to satisfy most tastes that any location could execute well. Molinich’s staff follows up with a callback within 30 minutes of delivery to make sure guests are pleased with their food and to immediately attend to any problems or requests.

IN-ROOM COFFEE
In-room coffee service was the third area the committee decided was important to a quality F&B program. This area proved to require less effort than the other elements. Doubletree struck a deal with a high-profile celebrity chef as a mutually beneficial opportunity to link two respected brands. Wolfgang Puck came forward with his specialty coffee, and Doubletree had a recognizable and admired name on coffee packets in every guestroom. Puck further assisted in the rollout of the program, making appearances at the 2007 Doubletree Brand Conference.

Large-scale relationships with vendors like Puck have engendered economies of scale for Doubletree. Purchasing through Hilton Supply Management and predetermined vendors, sourcing in large quantities, and standardizing inventory have produced significant savings. Preferred vendors often attend Doubletree strategy meetings to collect feedback and make recommendations that could be advantageous and cost-effective for both parties.

Vitalization of the Doubletree F&B program has become manifest in many ways. Emphasizing the synergetic relationship between rooms and foodservice, Steffen says it is difficult to quantify the actual gains in revenue from the new F&B program. Rooms drive F&B; F&B drives rooms. Increased revenue and widening margins are definitely there. With Doubletree gaining market share against competitors nationwide, however, Steffen cannot say what portion of those gains is attributable to F&B. What he can attest to is that the new confidence in the F&B segment has allowed Doubletree to offer rooms-and-meals packages to increase occupancy this year.

Steffen turns to guest satisfaction—the driving force that precipitated the transformation of Doubletree F&B—to gauge the success of the initiative. Since implementing the new program in 2007, survey numbers are widely positive: restaurant food quality up 5 percent, speed of restaurant service up 10 percent, room service experience up 10 percent, and overall F&B experience up 18 percent.

Those statistics alone have made Steffen happy with the brand’s investment. He hails the “great team effort” that has raised the quality of foodservice and thereby the quality of each individual property. In bringing the brand up to a new standard of excellence in foodservice, F&B managers and staff have set high guest expectations for Doubletree hotels. With that new reputation for reliable, well-executed, and thoughtful foodservice, it looks like Doubletree’s chocolate chip cookie has one more thing to symbolize.

• Five-star coffee at the touch of a button for in-room, catering, meeting rooms, and restaurants.