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Our Latest – We’ve Been Busy!
May 28, 2022
Lakshmee Lachhman-Persad (left), Peter Slatin (right) and Peter's guide dog Inga at the Summit One Vanderbilt.
Last August in partnership with Lakshmee Lachhman-Persad of Accessible Travel NYC, we introduced the Accessibility Blueprint. This unique program is dedicated to helping Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs) and also other types of organizations learn how to build a path to accessible travel throughout their location while also building disability inclusion and accessibility from within.
We launched the concept in a presentation at ESTO, the annual education convention of the US Travel Association, held at LA Live! in mid-May
We completed delivery of the Blueprint to two significant clients: NYC & Company, the leading destination marketer in the country, and the Greater Boston Convention & Visitors Bureau.
Lakshmee Lachhman-Persad (left) and Peter Slatin with his guide dog Inga (right) in the lobby of the Fairmont Copley Plaza hotel in Boston.
- The Greater Boston Convention & Visitors Bureau includes Visit Boston and Boston USA. For each organization, we designed a learning schedule that blended smoothly with their operations. We spread our seminars over six weeks in New York City to reach the nearly 100-person team at NYC & Company – and we shared the Blueprint over just two days of intense discussion in Boston at the fabulous 110-year-old Fairmont Copley Plaza. Going forward we will be helping both DMOs implement the practices and initiatives laid out in the Blueprint. We also expect to announce two exciting new clients shortly.
- After our ESTO presentations – which included a keynote and workshop – we were invited to be a featured speaker at Explore Minnesota’s annual statewide convention in early March outside Minneapolis, and that was followed by a workshop at the North Dakota Tourism Industry Conference in Grand Forks in late April.
- We certainly haven’t neglected our Elements of Service program. We broke through the pandemic fog last August with two days of pre-opening staff training at the Virgin Hotel New Orleans, located just steps from the French Quarter in the hot warehouse District. It was wonderful to be back in a hotel preparing to open – which it did just days after our work there – and to feel the excitement of a new team of associates learning the ropes at a new property.
- Our final pre-Covid lockdown Element of Service sessions were held with the staff of One World Observatory in February 2020.
Lakshmee Lachhman-Persad (left), Peter Slatin (right) and Peter's guide dog Inga at the Elements of Service training at the Summit Observatory, One Vanderbilt.
So it was areal treat to bring Elements of Service back to NYC at the dynamic new Summit Observatory at One Vanderbilt. We are super proud to be part of their wholehearted embrace of accessibility throughout this attraction, and we continue to work with them as they continue to improve the accessible experience for all visitors.
In April we brought Elements of Service back to the New York City hotel world during three days with team members from all three Arlo Hotels in Manhattan- the Arlo Midtown, Arlo NoMad and Arlo SoHo. Thanks to the keen interest from ownership and management at Arlo Hotels, in promoting accessibility throughout this rising independent brand, we’ll be in Miami in late August to train the staff at the Arlo Nautilus in South beach and the soon-to-open Arlo Wynwood.