Case Study — Cobbler's Rest Hotels

Module 4, Unit 1 | Hospitality case study

By the end of this case, you will be able to:

• Identify the real business problem beneath competing stakeholder priorities
• Map the current workflow and mark where an AI or automation proposal might responsibly intervene
• Analyse likely human impact, including who may benefit, who may be negatively affected and who needs to be consulted
• Prepare a proposal, workflow diagram and leadership presentation without building a working technical solution

Scenario snapshot. A family-owned hotel group across the Lakes and Dales. Seven properties, 480 staff, a 47% turnover rate, and a generational tension at the top of the business.

Back to the five scenarios

Your Brief

You have been asked to advise leadership on whether and how AI or automation should be used in this organisation. Your recommendation should be specific enough to act on, but restrained enough to be credible.

You are not expected to build a working solution. Use the case to prepare a one-page Opportunity Brief, a workflow diagram or process map, and a 7–10 minute presentation followed by approximately 10 minutes of Q&A.

Organisation Snapshot

Cobbler's Rest is a family-owned hotel group with seven 3–4 star country hotels across the Lake District and Yorkshire Dales, ranging from 32 to 95 bedrooms. The group employs 480 staff: 180 housekeeping, 95 food and beverage, 85 front-of-house, 60 kitchen, 30 maintenance, and 30 management and administrative. Annual revenue is approximately £18m. The business was founded by the current owner's father in 1978; the founder's son has just returned from a hotel management internship in Las Vegas and joined the executive team.

Business Context

The group is profitable but margin is being squeezed. Annual staff turnover is 47%, driven partly by rural location and partly by the brutal post-pandemic labour market. Recruitment is increasingly through visa sponsorship routes, which carry compliance burden. Guest review scores have slipped about 0.4 points on TripAdvisor in 18 months — owners of second homes in the area are particularly vocal. Energy costs have risen 60% since 2022. The owner has agreed to 'look at AI,' but only because his son has spent six weeks lobbying him.

Process A — Guest pre-arrival and in-stay communication

Each guest receives a sequence of communications: booking confirmation, reminder seven days out, reminder two days out, an upsell email (spa, dinner, room upgrades), and a final check-in details email. Staff manually adjust these where there are dietary needs, accessibility requirements, or special occasions. The food and beverage team separately emails about restaurant bookings. Special requests recorded at booking sometimes fail to reach the relevant department.

Pain points

• Guests routinely receive 6+ emails before arrival, several of them duplicative.
• Dietary requirements logged in the PMS (Mews) frequently don't reach the kitchen.
• Around 12% of guests arrive to find their special request (anniversary, dietary, accessibility) hasn't been actioned.
• Reception team estimates one hour per day chasing inter-departmental information.

Process B — Shift scheduling and shift handover

Each property manager builds the weekly rota in Excel, considering staff availability (collected via WhatsApp groups), occupancy forecast, payroll budget, and minimum-hours contracts. Handover notes between shifts (housekeeping → front-of-house → night porter) are written in a paper book in each department, often illegibly.

Pain points

• Rota changes mid-week are frequent and communicated by WhatsApp; some staff miss them.
• Handover gaps mean front-of-house often doesn't know which rooms are ready or which guests have complaints.
• Property managers spend 6–8 hours a week on scheduling.
• Cross-property staff sharing during peak periods is almost impossible because each site's rota is on a local laptop.

Voices Around the Table

These voices are evidence. They do not all agree, and that disagreement is part of the case.

Owner (62, founder's son, runs the group): "We are a hospitality business, not a tech company. I want my staff smiling at guests, not staring at iPads."

Owner's son (29, recently joined as Innovation Director): "Every serious hotel group has an AI concierge by now. We are years behind. I will fund this myself if I have to."

General Manager — flagship Lake District property: "I do not need a chatbot. I need housekeeping to tell me when room 207 is ready before the guest is in reception asking."

Head of Housekeeping (group-wide): "Can someone please digitise the handover book before someone gets hurt? A guest fell in an unmaintained bathroom because no one knew."

Long-serving Restaurant Manager (Yorkshire Dales): "I have seen a hundred new systems come and go. Tell me what problem we are actually solving for the guest."

Visa-sponsored chef de partie: "If the new rota tool gives me less than 38 hours a week, I lose my right to be in this country. Has anyone thought about that?"

Proposals Already on the Table

Before your team was brought in, others in the organisation had already proposed ideas. Some may be useful. Some may be distractions. Evaluate them without getting captured by the loudest pitch.

Practical Realities You Should Know

Mews PMS holds guest data, but special requests are scattered across free-text fields: sometimes in 'internal notes,' sometimes in 'guest preferences,' sometimes in 'comments.' Restaurant data lives in ResDiary, spa data in Book4Time. Housekeeping uses a third app, Optii. None of these systems are currently integrated. There is no group-wide data dictionary; each property has been allowed to evolve its own conventions over the past three years.

Constraints

• Year 1 budget across the group: £30,000
• Rural broadband is patchy at three of the seven sites
• Staff digital literacy varies enormously — some staff have never used a workplace app
• GDPR for guest data, including health-related dietary information
• UK immigration compliance for visa-sponsored staff (Skilled Worker route)
• Founder's son is the budget holder; founder has veto

Your Team Task

• Define the real business problem in measurable terms.
• Map the current workflow and mark where your proposal would intervene.
• Decide whether AI or automation is viable, and whether a lower-tech process change should come first.
• Explain likely human impact: who benefits, who may be negatively affected, and what support or consultation is needed.
• Name the risks, data limits, ethical concerns and governance requirements.
• Prepare your one-page brief, workflow diagram and 7–10 minute presentation.

Remember: This is a proposal exercise. You do not need to build a chatbot, workflow automation, dashboard, wireframe or prototype. A clear workflow diagram is enough if it helps the leadership panel understand your recommendation.

KSB evidence focus

• K22: Collaborative working principles to explore AI and automation solutions and implement prototypes, pilots or proof of concepts.
• S22: Present and communicate information including the translation of technical concepts into accessible materials to support clear dialogue with stakeholders.
• S23: Work with others to achieve agreed outcomes or outputs. Provide evidence-based analysis and insight to leaders on the likely human impacts of automation projects.
• S3: Undertake analysis to identify if automation is viable.
• S4: Engage with non-technical staff to understand their roles, responsibilities, and concerns when automation solutions are proposed and implemented.