The art of unscripted hospitality with Dina Belon

What happens when you hire for personality? That’s how Staypineapple built a culture where staff aren’t afraid to be themselves at the front desk, where genuine interactions win over guests and where hospitality feels authentic, not scripted. The hotel group’s president Dina Belon explains how that same culture kept the staff resilient when Staypineapple overhauled most of its tech stack – PMS, POS, CRM, housekeeping and guest communication tools.

What to expect?

Hospitality is at its best when everything just works. That’s the idea behind the very first Mews Summer Release, aptly named Smooth Operations. It's a bundle of new Mews features intended to make hotel operations (and stays) smoother. Think guest ID & selfie collection, wallet-based room keys, guest lifetime value insights and automatic payment routing, among others. Adam Britton, Product Director at Mews, joins Matt to talk it all through.

Speaker

Matthijs Welle

CEO, Mews

After years in the trenches of hospitality, Matt joined the Mews journey during its early days in 2013. Since then, he’s been our fearless CEO, leading the company and the industry forward.

Adam Britton

Product Director, Mews

Adam Britton blends hotel experience with a sharp eye for product marketing. At Mews, he’s helped shape tech that drives real impact for hoteliers.

Episode chapters

0:00

Introduction to Dina Belon

2:30

What's at the core of Staypineapple Hotels

4:36

Creating an inclusive culture

Transcript

Introduction to Dina Belon

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to another Matt Talks hospitality. And this week in talking about hospitality, I thought I'd have Dina join me from Seattle. She is the president at Staypineapple. I immediately thought like, I know there's many fruit hotel brands, but I'd love to get to the story of Staypineapple specifically. But maybe do you wanna give us a short introduction to your background because you've been in hospitality for a while?

You can tell by the gray hair. Yes.
So thirty years almost.