Juyo, the hospitality intelligence platform used by more than 1,600 hotels, has published an essay arguing that hotels have repeatedly been the place where new technology first reaches a mass audience, and that each of those waves has added new roles and departments to the hotel organisation chart.

A nineteenth-century head start

The piece starts with the Tremont House in Boston, opened in 1829 and widely described as the first modern hotel, which combined indoor plumbing, private lockable rooms and a full-time service staff at a time when most homes had none of these. It then follows a run of firsts: the passenger elevator at New York's Fifth Avenue Hotel in 1859, electric lighting at the Sagamore and the Edison-lit Prospect House in the early 1880s, the Savoy's integration of electricity, lifts and en-suite bathrooms in 1889, in-room telephones at the Netherland Hotel and a private bathroom in every room at the Statler in Buffalo in 1908.

Juyo links each step to a new job: elevator operators, resident electricians who became engineering departments, switchboard operators, standardised room attendants and early fire and life-safety teams.

Three patterns

• Hotels showcased technologies such as electric light, hot water, telephones and air conditioning before private homes did.
• Innovation clustered around fast-growing cities, from New York and London to Paris, Buffalo and Chicago.
• Hotels acted as integrators: the Savoy's breakthrough was combining existing technologies into one seamless guest experience.

From minibars to mobile keys

The twentieth century brought in-room televisions, the Hong Kong Hilton's 1974 minibar rollout (which Juyo says lifted in-room beverage sales fivefold), universal air conditioning, electronic locks and in-room safes, and later Wi-Fi, which turned IT into a hotel department in its own right. Since the 2010s, mobile check-in, smart room controls and contactless services have shifted front-desk teams from transactions towards guest relationships.

Why it matters

Juyo's conclusion is that AI is the next general-purpose technology to "check in" to hotels and will reshape roles again, but faster than previous waves, which played out over decades. The company says it will explore what those new roles might look like in a series of follow-up pieces.

Originally published by Juyo: Hotels have always been where the future checks in