Crown Jewel of Palm Beach Elevates Tech to Drive Luxury Business

The Story

Since 1896, The Breakers Palm Beach has been one of America’s legendary resort destinations. This idyllic and breathtaking property located on the shores of South Florida’s Atlantic Coast welcomes visitors from across the world. A family-owned (heirs of founder Henry Flagler) property, this 140-acre, 538-room resort is a rateleader in the Palm Beach market with an enviable client base that returns year after year.

To sustain such luxury appeal, with the support of its devoted, 122-year family ownership, The Breakers invests over $30 million each year in property enhancements to ensure a balance of modernization and preservation. Guest room interiors are continuously updated, and tremendous attention to detail keeps this iconic destination immaculate.

This year, The Breakers included several enterprise systems in their annual investment, including the property management system and revenue management system. Managers noticed a growing need for better data and insights on guests, room demand and pricing. With better data, they surmised, the hotel could provide a more customized guest experience and create optimal pricing scenarios based on more extensive information.

Our rich guest history and corresponding data is one of our greatest assets However, we needed to make a wholesale upgrade in our entire back-end tech infrastructure to manage revenue for the hotel in a way that would benefit us for years to come.

“Our rich guest history and corresponding data is one of our greatest assets,” said Jessica Fleisher, director of business intelligence for The Breakers. “However, we needed to make a wholesale upgrade in our entire back-end tech infrastructure to manage revenue for the hotel in a way that would benefit us for years to come.”

A major part of that technology overhaul included the implementation of the IDeaS G3 Revenue Management System (RMS).

“A key part of our technology upgrade was certainly in the systems, but our evolution was just as much about our philosophy and our approach to pricing,” said Fleisher. “We had only two best available rate (BAR) levels and a very conservative approach to pricing. IDeaS helped us change that.”

With IDeaS’ continuous pricing model, IDeaS G3 RMS empowers The Breakers team to create more flexibility in their rate structure to analytically optimize prices across 29 room types. “We didn’t have visibility across our 29 room types previously,” Fleisher continued. “The visibility we have with IDeaS G3 RMS lets us identify opportunities to sell upgraded suites rather than oversell our lead-in rooms. It provides clarity instantly, and the results are amazing.”

Immediate results, strong future

As The Breakers continues to evolve its back-end technology systems, Fleisher and The Breakers team are confident they have the right tools in place to successfully deploy an analytically driven revenue strategy. IDeaS’ compatibility with leading property management systems made it easy for The Breakers to create the ideal technology architecture for their property.

Now, the hotel can manage rates across a large variety of room types and offer more flexibility in pricing than its traditional BARs previously allowed. The results provide better revenue at every room level and better integration of critical technology to operate this one-of-a-kind estate hotel. By integrating multiple systems, hotel managers can ensure that the guest experience not only looks beautiful on the exterior but is supported by rich insights and information from within.

“We saw an immediate return on investment from our new technology implementation, and a big part of that is because of IDeaS,” said Fleisher. “It’s a breath of fresh air and one of the best pieces of software I’ve worked with.”

A key part of our technology upgrade was certainly in the systems, but our evolution was just as much about our philosophy and our approach to pricing. We had only two best available rate levels and a very conservative approach to pricing. IDeaS helped us change that.