About Invite
Hafstadvegen 23 | 6800 Førde
Knutholmen is an idyllic place in Kalvåg at the West Coast of Norway. On Knutholmen there are 130 rooms where 60 of the rooms are apartments/seahouses while the rest are hotel rooms. Knutholmen is part of the hotel chain the Historic Hotels and can offer a variety of experiences such as costal cruises, kayaking and fishing to name a few.
The rooms at Sjøholt are of the high-end room type. When offering such rooms, the guest experience should also be high-end. Knutholmen had mechanical locks on the doors in the hotel, which meant that they struggled with a lot of physical key handling, while the solution did not fit the image. In addition, they often experienced that the guests left the rooms, while the stoves were on with high temperature. To address these challenges, Knutholmen wanted to use smart and sustainable technology. By offering guests self-service, such as keyless entry, they could let guests skip the line at the reception and rather go directly to the room. In addition, they needed a future-oriented solution to reduce energy consumption for two reasons. One of the reasons was to cut costs, at the same time as they needed to meet the requirements as an Eco-Lighthouse.
Knutholmen wanted a simpler everyday life and at the same time exceed the guests’ expectations. Equally important was it to reduce the energy consumption. With these needs, Invite automation for access and temperature integrated with the booking system became the solution.
“Those who receive digital keys have a positive experience and we get a lot of praise for having this in place”
— Jan Fredrik Fosse
Invite is a solution that integrates with various booking systems. Knutholmen uses Visbook and with a complete integration, Knutholmen gets the opportunity to take advantage of all the benefits that the solution facilitates;
Time savings
Knutholmen saves a lot of time on key logistics. Automated guest access is much easier for both operations and guests.
“I save a lot of time by being able to share keys remote from my phone and the guest experience has become much smoother”
– Jan Fredrik Fosse
Flexibility
Guests receive digital keys automatically and in addition, the receptionist can now give temporary access to anyone from Invite, without having to meet the person. In addition, Knutholmen have the opportunity to set their own rules for when a key is to be sent and check the status of whether the digital key has been sent.
“Invite has definitely solved many of our challenges. There is nothing that beats exceeding customer expectations ”
— Jan Fredrik Fosse
Cost savings
With the possibilities for temperature management that Invite provides, where they avoid unnecessary heating of a vacant unit, Knutholmen has dramatically reduced its electricity consumption. In January 2022, the consumption of 16 rooms was 3,000 kWh, while in February it was reduced to 1350 kWh. This means a saving of as much as 1650 kWh, more than halving the energy consumption. It can also be mentioned that February was on average 1°C colder than January. If you take a cautious estimate of the electricity costs recently and say that a kWh incl. Mains rent costs NOK 2, Knutholmen has saved a formidable NOK 3,300. For Knutholmen, it is a focus area to be able to use such sustainable solutions.
“With Invite, I save more on energy than the solution costs, especially in the low season”
— Jan Fredrik Fosse
Do you want to get started with Invite?
Contact Terje Skog Jenssen at: terje@visitinvite.com
/ 8. juni 2022