Below is an Autogenerated Transcript

Ron: When you look at your career, literally the invention of a brand new brand- LUX*. You look at the way the industry itself has evolved and you look ahead into the future, what do you foresee? 

Dominik : I’m a bit worried that there’s so much focus on technology that everything can be more efficient, it can be quicker, it can be better, it can be more advanced, which in many aspects of our lives can be helpful, but in hospitality it comes down to to a personal experience that technology cannot give you.

I don’t want to check in, like when I go to an airline. I’m happy  to go to a computer, scan my passport, get my boarding pass. Would I ever want to see that in the hotel? Not in a million years. Because you travel to a place like Mauritius to experience the island. But a big part and I think more so going forward, you want to experience the culture, the people, the feeling of a destination. I’m a bit worried that the many, even in luxury hotels, that is going to disappear. I think in a meaningful resort experience, especially when it’s leisure, that has to be a focus that could easily be forgotten because it could be so much easier with technology.

Ron: You’d think it would be easier or more efficient or more productive. Yet that really heartfelt experience, you know, hospitality and hospital both share the Latin root of “hospes”, which means care for in the home space, like literally welcoming you home. And when you talk about a resort experience as never really being something that’s been so digitized and automated that’s highly efficient. But where’s the human? Where’s the heart space? 

Dominik: It reminds me that my colleague Nitesh said when he was managing Tamassa, people come to, and Tamassa is an all inclusive resort. 

So the conventional thinking is “I’m going to check into my resort. I’m going to stay there because I paid for an all inclusive experience.” But he said, “Well, let’s take the guest out of the resort and put it in the dining room, in the living room of one of the team members’ families.” And a lot of people would have said, well, that’s not going to work because that’s not included. People have to pay extra and they don’t want to go outside of the luxury bubble of an all inclusive hotel. But surprisingly enough, it was so popular that people said, “Finally, I have experienced Mauritius.” 

Ron: What I was hoping, beyond hope, was that I might actually be welcomed home.

Dominik: Obviously, it’s not the five star meal that you get in the hotel. 

Ron: Mama’s meal.

Dominik: Exactly. It’s that one dish that was passed down from generation to generation, and now they can show it off To guests coming from Europe or from wherever in the world. It’s been a great success, and that was also a lot of the thinking that then went into the creation of the SALT brand. And

Ron: Like you said, the really, an early kernel, if you will, of SALT, a crystal of salt that became caring about what matters. That’s allowed it now to flourish. Much, much more.