Espresso: Soho House Founder on The Power of Simplicity

0:00Soho House Founder:When I was at Soho House, I did go and redesign a mode control, which had an on and an off and a volume and a channel part, and that was it. What was, because you were saying sort of the old kind of stale ways of doing luxury. It was kind of like hooty fluty, you know what I mean? How are you ripping that up and like taking away those irritants? Well, the other thing I told myself is I stay in hotels and there are certain things which really annoy me when I stay in a hotel. And I'm a pretty impatient sort of character. I hate waiting for an elevator, so it's going to have quick elevators. I hate checking in.

0:47Soho House Founder:I thought, why in this day and age do you have all that kerfuffle? when you arrive at a hotel you have to give a passport a credit card you've got to fill out a form then the person behind reception tells you oh i'm going to ring a certain amount through for your incidentals oh so you think i'm going to run away you think i'm a thief yeah and so even before you get into your room you're irritated and what i wanted to do was well how how can we change that how can we and and and i know why hotels do it because one percent of people who stay in hotels mess around and try not to pay and 99 percent of people are completely upfront and honest and always pay but the 99 percent of people are the people who are having to deal with all the procedures of what the one percent are put in for the one percent to behave themselves so we looked of that and so we want people to walk in and be already checked in well they do that for like an app or how are they checking you're pre-checking i think you most people pre-checking for an airplane flight nowadays uh well you have like because there's a something that rory southern talks about the he calls it the doorman rule the doorman fallacy which is the the reason you have a doorman is not really to open the door that's that kind of one thing but it's actually one it adds to the status of, again, this could be really old school, or this is very old school, adds to the status of the place, it automatically looks like, oh, we can spend on the dormant.

2:25It adds to the grandosity of the place. But also, you know, if they want to ask questions and stuff like that, there is someone there, a point of call. That's his theory. But, like, how would you do that without having a dormant and a bowler hat to make it feel, you know, a bit wanky?

2:42Soho House Founder:We're definitely having a door person. Yes. And they won't be in a bowler hat, but they'll be in a beautifully designed Alex Edle coat and suit and trouser suit. Yeah. So, yes, we're definitely having a door person. Yes. To do exactly that. But do it in the reinvented, relaxed stuff. In a very friendly way. Yeah. to obviously open the taxi door, to hail taxis, to welcome people, and also just keep an eye on who's coming in and who's not coming in. How did you think about doing it differently? I know we've talked about the medicine cabinet, but other things. What else could we add into the room?

3:27Soho House Founder:What could we take out? So we've done a lot about reducing the size of a minibar because I think mini bars just got too... They became little sort of convenience stores in hotels. Yes. And I was beginning to find that a bit of an irritant. And so we've taken tea and coffee machines out of the room and if someone wants tea and a coffee, they just WhatsApp because everything's on WhatsApp. So you just WhatsApp, can I have a cup of tea and coffee? and it will arrive on a silver tray, hopefully in a very reasonable amount of time and it's all part of the price. There's nothing to sign, but you just get that.

4:15Soho House Founder:If you want a tea and a coffee making machine in the room, we have a tea trolley which we can wheel in and plug in and you have your coffee machine and you have your kettle, etc. so it was simplifying the minibar absolutely simplifying how the television worked and how yeah that's that's annoying when that doesn't mean when i was at so i did go and redesign a remote control which is is had an on and off and a volume and a channel part yeah that was it yeah that's what it needs though yeah i couldn't ever remember why most tv remote controls have 50 buttons on crazy and so the tv works very simply and and most people now want to carry on watching what they're watching what they're watching at home so what they're streaming at home so it's very easy connection doesn't matter what what whether it's an apple tv or disney or netflix you can easily put it up on the on the screen in the in the in the room tv's hidden some people don't want to watch TV.

5:23Soho House Founder:We got somewhere where you can store suitcases, which is... Which you showed me, which is, again, so simple. Yeah, because, I mean, you go into these beautiful rooms and then you go into them again and people's suitcases are everywhere and it's suddenly a very different feel. So all of that, on the white piece of paper, the clear piece of paper, I would just sort of jot down and how we could try and make the room work a bit better. After all the things I learned at Sewer House, doing Sewer House and doing the NED, I really wanted to simplify it again.