A photo taken of the front entrance of The Charleston Place hotel including the prominent Quadriga fountain around which its porte-cochère is situated.
Success Story

The Charleston Place

Charleston, SC

How The Charleston Place drove a $1M+ lift in holiday revenue with experiences

Beginning in February 2022, The Charleston Place partnered with Way to deliver a robust offering of experiences and activations both on property and in the Charleston community.

Business Type
Historic hotel
Features
Way Products
Host, Activate
Customer Since
2022

Challenge

After becoming an independent property in 2022, The Charleston Place wanted to redefine itself through unique, memorable programming that would drive guest engagement and brand awareness. However, they lacked a streamlined system to create and manage these guest experiences.

Solution

Way’s platform enabled The Charleston Place to curate, market, and manage brand-defining experiences like their iconic Let It Snow event. By allowing guests to book directly through the website, The Charleston Place could capture valuable guest data and simplify operations.

Impact

With Way, The Charleston Place has successfully launched an experiential program that has contributed it a significant $1M lift in total hotel revenue during the holidays from 2022 to 2023. Guests and locals have booked nearly 60,000 experiences booked, including 50,000+ bookings for the iconic “ Let it Snow” event. The hotel has also received notable press from Forbes, Condé Nast, and more for their memorable experiences. Streamlined operations freed up staff time for even more programming.

58K+

participants

$1M+

lift in total holiday revenue YoY

95%

would book again

Background

The Charleston Place is a luxury hotel and gathering place for locals and visitors alike in Charleston, South Carolina. Prior to partnering with Way, The Charleston Place team did not have processes in place to create, market, and monetize experiential programming and brand activations.

In March 2022, the hotel transitioned from a branded property to an independent. As a part of this transition, Managing Director of The Charleston Place Robert Megargle and his team sought to deliver meaningful, immersive experiences to their guests as a means to drive brand awareness and relevancy as well as increased traffic to the property.

Customer Goals

The Charleston Place team had several mission-critical objectives that needed to be addressed in order for them to reach their goals of becoming a truly unique gathering place for everyone, including:

  • Increase ADR and community awareness
  • Capture guest data to build brand loyalty and deepen customer relationships with both guests and non-guests
  • Develop and market curated experiences with local partners
  • Establish operational efficiencies via technology to allow hotel staff to focus on core tasks
  • Increase non-hotel guest traffic to the property
  • Allow guests to make special memories

‍

The results were clearly quantifiable. Even if there’s not dollars and cents that you can specifically track to a free snowfall experience, there’s absolutely ways you can not only differentiate your brand [through experiences], but really help contribute to the bottom line as well.
Catherine Woods
VP of Marketing at The Charleston Place

Results

Since partnering with Way, nearly 60,000 guests have booked experiences and activations directly on The Charleston Place’s website. The Let It Snow experience alone saw over 50,000 bookings across the 2022 and 2023 holiday seasons, with a YoY revenue increase of $1M+ during the holidays.

What’s more, 95% of guests surveyed indicated that their experience increases the likelihood that they’ll stay at The Charleston Place again.

By hosting bookings end-to-end on their website rather than relying on third-party platforms, the hotel’s marketing and operations teams also have direct access to valuable guest data.

By streamlining the logistics of experience marketing with Way, both the corporate marketing department and Becky's on-site team can now dedicate their energy to crafting even more unforgettable guest programming. We're excited to witness how our partnership will continue to elevate The Charleston Place's enduring legacy through unique and impactful brand experiences.

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