Reservations Manager
Opening in early 2025, The Standard, Brussels marks the hotel brand's third outpost in Europe. Set in the city's Northern Quarter, The Standard, Brussels brings the brand's design, culture and activation-driven philosophy to Belgium.
With 180 guestrooms (plus 20 residences), the modern, new-build project features many stages for The Standard's renowned day- and nightlife. A ground-floor greenhouse welcomes guests and locals into the lobby lounge, restaurant, and terrace. Upstairs, The Rooftop features its own restaurant, bar and garden—set to become a neighbourhood destination. Throughout the building, additional public and private event spaces are platforms for happenings.
The Standard, Brussels will welcome a new set of creative, dynamic guests into the brand ethos. In Brussels, The Standard's signature mix of playful, sophisticated, unexpected hospitality finds roots and resonances in local culture. The simple premise behind The Standard is that it is anything but. Founded in 1999, the goals of every Standard are to up the aesthetic stakes and defy convention while attending to every detail, embracing our local communities, providing a welcoming and inclusive environment for our teams and, of course, delivering a smashing good time for our guests.
We are defined by our richness of personality, diversity of background and lifestyle and are now looking for a Reservations Manager who will embody our 'Anything but Standard' ethos as we commence our pre-opening period.
Your role
As the Reservations Manager at The Standard, Brussels, you will work in partnership with our Revenue Manager and lead a small inhouse team of agents will manage all hotel and restaurant reservation enquires for our new property in Brussels. As part of our pre-opening team, you will oversee a number of important revenue and booking system projects on our critical path during pre-opening period, to ensure that our pre-opening revenue strategy is implemented within the property in the lead up to our opening.
Our Reservations team are our guests’ very first point of contact, responsible for handling a range of individual booking enquiries over the telephone, over email or via one of our corporate travel partners. The Training & Coaching of our team will be an important focus of your role to foster an environment where your team will flourish in order to ensure enquiries are converted and upselling opportunities are maximised; through in-depth knowledge of our room categories and our restaurants to a genuine understanding of individual guest needs. The Reservations team will also oversee PBX.
You will of course undertake a number of daily reservation checks, oversee arrivals, VIPs and ensure any specific room allocations are communicated to our Front Desk operations team. In addition to your overall operational responsibility for the Reservations function you will work closely with our Revenue Manager to ensure our revenue and rate strategies are implemented to effectively yield our room inventory. You will also support the production revenue reports and participate in the production of our weekly forecast. Over the longer term you will support the development of our Revenue and pricing strategy across the hotel and the management of our inventory across all our distribution channels, making sure that these are optimised and managed accordingly.
The Standard, Brussels will be our third property in Europe and you will help develop our wider sales and revenue development strategy within the region to target key markets travelling inbound to Brussels along with future pan-European business leads for all Standard properties.
This is not a 'Standard' Reservations Manager position, our Reservations team ensure we continually engage with our guests to deliver a truly bespoke service experience, that is anything but Standard! so in addition to an analytical brain, you will need to have miles and miles of personality and stamina, be highly social, upbeat and friendly; confident and can handle pressure well; thrive in a high-volume, high-energy environment and able to work equally well both independently and as part of a team.
Do you have what it takes to be our Reservations Manager at The Standard, Brussels?
A minimum of 3+ years as a Reservations Manager or Assistant Reservations Manager (looking to progress) with experience ideally gained within a similar Lifestyle Hotel or large 4- or 5-star Hotel in Brussels or the Benelux region.
In addition to this, the ideal candidate will also...
- Have a solid understanding and detailed knowledge of Hotel & Restaurant Reservations booking procedures
- Candidates should have a good understanding of yield and room inventory management principles and management of OTAs
- Be a confident and proactive self-starter ideally with strong project management skills (including PMS system implementation and setting up of third-party booking sites)
- Pre-opening hotel experience is an advantage
- Previous experience of managing and training a team of reservations agents
- Solid commercial acumen with previous experience of preparing the rooms forecast and a range of daily, weekly and monthly revenue reports for both Corporate Office & Private Ownership.
- Experience working with the following systems is beneficial: Opera Cloud, Duetto RMS, Lighthouse (Formerly OTA Insight), TravelClick, STR, CRS systems & distribution channels
- Exceptional attention to detail with strong Administration and IT and Excel skills
- Fluency in French and/or Dutch in addition to English is preferred for this role
- During our preopening period, you may need to have a flexible approach to working hours
We are defined by our richness of personality and diversity of background and lifestyle so if you think you have what it takes to be a Reservations Manager at The Standard, Brussels we'd love to hear from you.
All applicants must be eligible to live and work in the European Union. Documented evidence of eligibility will be required from candidates prior to commencing employment.
Benefits Include
- CDI - Contrat à Durée Indéterminée
- 20 Days Holiday + Public Holidays
- Meals on Duty (once hotel is open)
- Worldwide Travel Discounts via The Standard Advantage platform
- Employee & Family Rates across all Standard and Bunkhouse properties
- In-house Experience Programme
- F&B Discounts ranging from 25-50%
- Recruitment Referral scheme
- Local Transport benefit
- Eco-vouchers
- Social Committee with regular monthly social activities