A&O opens its first hostel in Bremen

A&O’s new hotel, A&O Bremen Main Station, opened its doors to visitors on 1 October and is the first of the chain’s hostels to feature its brand new look: a completely revamped and very smart lobby with a dynamic structure that seamlessly merges with the breakfast area.

Thomas Echelmeyer joins A&O as CFO

On 1 October, Thomas Echelmeyer will assume the function Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and accordingly Commercial Director of A&O Hotels and Hostels, Europe's largest privately run hostel chain with headquarters in Berlin.

A&O is introducing the new GROUPPay payment tool by mamooble to allow group travellers to book without one of them paying the bill in advance

This makes A&O the first hostel group to roll out the GROUPPay payment tool: The trip organiser books group travel on the A&O website. But there's no need for any kind of pre-payment, as the embedded tool automatically opens a virtual piggy bank into which the participants deposit their shares. The booking is confirmed, but payment is made incrementally. 

A&O will be the first hotel chain to offer Bitcoin as a payment option

A&O will now be the first-ever hotel chain to offer its guests the option of paying for their booked 
hotel rooms online by Bitcoin at aohostels.com.  
"The digital currency Bitcoin is one of the most important payment innovations of recent years. We 
are therefore very proud of being the first hotel provider to offer this payment option to our 
customers" says a delighted Oliver Winter, CEO of the A&O Group. "Bitcoin as a payment method 
is an important step in making the booking and payment process even more convenient. True to 
our motto: There are no complications here with us at A&O - from booking to check-out", adds 
Winter.  

A&O opens A&O Venice Mestre, its first hotel in Italy.

On 26 July, A&O opened its first A&O hotel in Italy, the A&O Venice Mestre. The hotel located at the gateway to the city on the Venetian lagoon is truly and stylishly Italian.

A&O creates new positions and recruits a head of construction and a head of revenue

A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS adds two new positions to its management team: A&O has appointed proven experts to its management team. Alexander Schober will strengthen the A&O management team as Head of Construction, while Hubertus Hessel has been appointed Head of Revenue at Europe's largest hostel provider. 

A&O organises a family weekend in Amsterdam from 25 to 27 August 2017

The fifth instalment of the A&O Family Weekend is just round the corner, and it will be held outside of Germany for the first time: The hotel chain is inviting its guests to whisk their families off on an inexpensive mini-break from 25–27 August 2017 at the A&O Amsterdam Zuidoost.

A&O is holding a three-day blogger's weekend at the newly opened A&O Copenhagen Nørrebro from 19 to 21 May 2017. The hotel expects 20 influencers from the areas of travel, lifestyle, family and art.

Katharina Wallmann moves from a catering start-up to the A&O hotel group. The 26-year-old Austrian will now be responsible for the chain's overall brand presence and heads a team of seven.

A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS now in Denmark: The new, four-storey property with 6,144 m² of floor space at Tagensvej 135–137 is budget, design accommodation for the next generation of A&O. Shared rooms start from twelve euros; a double room starts from 39 euros.

'We are proud of the prospect of offering affordable accommodation in one of Europe's top destinations! A&O stands for affordable accommodation, even in cities with a high cost of living. We make expensive cities accessible to everybody,' enthuses Oliver Winter, CEO of A&O.
Construction of the A&O Copenhagen Nørrebro was completed within eight months and there is a long-term lease in place with AP Pension that will last 30 years. The construction investments including furnishings and fittings has so far amounted to 5.5 million euros.

The budget hotel chain A&O recognises the training services offered by the specialist instructor for personnel development. Her unconventional knowledge transfer of leadership competence and progressive methodology were the deciding factors in her receiving this award.

"We have found an exceptionally skilled trainer for our youth travel segment in the form of Jana Pieper! Her humorous methods and structured presentation techniques quickly convinced our regional and hotel managers", emphasises Phillip Winter, Chief Marketing Officer of A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS.

As part of the realignment of the brand, A&O is planning to allocate some of its budget for video clips and opinion-makers on YouTube, Instagram and with niche blogging for the very first time.

As part of the realignment of the brand, A&O is planning to allocate some of its budget for video clips and opinion-makers on YouTube, Instagram and with niche blogging for the very first time. 

A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS will initially be offering guests single and double rooms at selected establishments, which can be reserved from 10 AM - 5 PM for the daily overnight stay rate as of 1 April, 2017.

The rooms can be booked online at aohostels.com or on site at reception. We believe that business travellers and stopover tourists in particular will benefit from the latest booking innovation. This will initially be tested for six months, and then gradually extended to all other A&Os. 

The monthly introductory seminar for each staff member is considered to be the central "kick-off" event for the new working relationship.

In addition to corporate culture, the three-day event in Berlin focuses on how to deal with guests, professional conduct, body language and complaint management. A training team consisting of external communication instructors and internal best practice staff provides the combination of industry and company knowledge.

A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS is redefining its brand and hotel design.

"We are the most successful hostel chain in Germany. We now want to become market leaders throughout Europe. Our cost leadership structure will be supplemented by a reworked interior design and a new brand presence”, emphasizes Phillip Winter, Chief Marketing Officer of the A&O Hotel Group.

The low budget chain recorded a turnover of 114 million Euro in 2016, with around 23,000 beds and 3.7 million overnight stays.

"We can attribute this strong result to our annual themes of quality improvement, product development and employee training, among other things. We are extremely proud of growth of almost 18% in our sixteenth financial year. [...]

Guests can book the A&O Bremen Hauptbahnhof using all A&O channels as of now. The budget hotel opens its doors on 1 November 2017.

'It is important for us to accept guest bookings for at least half a year in advance. We will hereby launch using all booking methods. The A&O Bremen can now be booked using direct sales channels, online travel agencies and, of course, our B2B partners in the wholesale trade,' explains Phillip Winter, Chief Marketing Officer at A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS.
 

From February 2017 onwards, A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS will sell all room categories through China's largest online travel agency Ctrip. The hotel group is expecting an increase of 13 per cent compared to 2016 associated with the interface.

"Both partners are connected with a 2way XML interface via the channel manager Autoupdate PMS. Availabilities are loaded in real time. Through direct online sales, restrictions such as time shifts or service unattainability are minimized.

A&O and iWTX finalise a two-way integration between A&O and iWTX. A&O’s entire hotel product portfolio will be available as a supplier to the global B2B distribution network of iWTX.

"With iWTX, we have found a strategic technology partner, which connects us particularly to our B2B trade partners. In addition, we are simplifying the very successful collaboration with DERTOUR and ITS, who are already integrated with iWTX- and can finally connect real-time with other major tour operators as we have successfully done with our OTA partners. And all this with minimal effort", says Oliver Winter, General Manager of A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS.

In addition to the International Student Identification Card (ISIC) each A&O Hotel and Hostel accepts both Teacher (ITIC) and Youth Travel Card (IYTC) at the reception.

A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS offer every cardholder a 10 per cent discount on the daily accommodation rate in all locations of the chain including a free non-alcoholic refreshment drink upon arrival.

With the opening of the hotel in 2011, the number of overnight stays for the entire city has grown possibly record-breaking.

A&O Dortmund Main Station has a market share of five percent in 2016; Dortmund Tourism registered 595,000 overnight stays throughout the whole year.

A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS won over an experienced sales specialist for Southern Europe with Astur language travel consultant Roger Ruiz.

Ruiz founded the language and youth travel tour operator Astur Sprachreisen in Fulda, which the former CEO successfully sold two years ago. The native Frenchman will lead the markets of France, Italy and Spain for the European A&O hotel group in the future.

A&O invests with system partner Daphi in high-speed internet development in A&O Prag Metro Strizkov.

"Whether for private or business purposes, these days fast, free WLAN is the most important selection criterion after price. Spotify, Netflix, Skype, YouTube, photos uploaded into the cloud and downloaded again: these services all require a good network connection and enormous bandwidth. For every guest, an A&O hosts on average 2 online devices, and that's a challenge for us. That's why we have undertaken significant technical upgrades once again, as the first hostel in Prague to do so", as Oliver Winter, General Manager of A&O HOTELS and HOSTELS, is happy to report.