Meet the Team: Jennifer Bechtold, Partner Account Manager
When she’s not out conquering Colorado’s tallest mountains or making soaps from scratch, Jen Bechtold plays an integral role in building and maintaining Hotel Engine’s relationships with our hotel partners. Acting as an advocate for the industry in which she spent most of her career, Jen is passionate about making mutually beneficial connections between the hotel accounts she oversees and Hotel Engine’s business travel customers.
Read on to get to know more about our partner account manager extraordinaire and how she uses her 30-year history in the hotel business to drive great results for our partners.
Can you tell us about your role? What is your day-to-day like?
I handle the larger partner agreements with property management groups. They might have 100 hotels under their umbrella, or even up to 1,400 hotels. My primary goal is to report to those folks on how their hotels are doing with their Hotel Engine accounts and help them strategize, keeping the end goal in mind that their hotels need to make money and fill beds.
What do you love about your job?
I really love the relationship piece of it. Just getting to know these folks, getting to know how their business works, what they need from us, and educating them about who we are. Ultimately, what Hotel Engine wants is a helpful and beneficial partnership with the hotels. Hotel Engine is coming into this brand-new space that’s not really been defined yet. I love being the voice and the face of Hotel Engine to these larger property management groups to help educate them on who we are and how we can best work together.
What special skills do you bring to your team?
I’ve been in the hotel business for 30 years. I’ve done all the jobs at a hotel. We are a tech company operating in the hotel space, so I think that’s my edge: understanding the hotel business inside and out and being able to speak their language.
Do you have a favorite memory so far of your time with Hotel Engine?
I have a couple! I love the fact that this organization reaches out to women in the workforce. They give the women at Hotel Engine a community and they bring us together. One of my first in-person events was a happy hour for the women of Hotel Engine, and it was just amazing to be with all these incredibly talented and beautiful women in the industry.
Soon after that, my small but mighty team of three attended the Global Business Travel Association conference together this year. Not only was it great to be with some of our clients, but it was fun to get together in person, joke around and share meals together.
What’s the number one thing that you want hotels and property management groups to know about Hotel Engine?
Hotel Engine has been very thoughtful about how we do business. It’s a closed, private portal. Our customers are qualified accounts that are partnering with us so we can help fill a need for them in their hotel travel. We’re not interested in selling information or having frivolous charges and commissions. We really want to streamline and connect our customers with our hotel partners in an effective and economical way.
Tell us about you personally! What are some of your interests and hobbies?
I’ve been in Colorado now for almost 20 years, originally from the Midwest. Colorado just has amazing outdoor opportunities and activities. My favorite thing to do is get outside! I love to get into the forest, I love to camp, I love to hike. I’ve bagged five 14ers, which is a thing here in Colorado — we have 58 mountains that are over 14,000 feet and I’ve made it to the top of five of them.
What’s one fun fact about you?
I make my own soap! It’s pretty cool, it’s chemistry! I make coffee soap, green tea soap and oatmeal soap. I like to give it away as gifts, but I haven’t tried to open an Etsy store or anything. That just feels like it would take the joy out of it.
What is your favorite travel destination?
I love, love, love a little island off the coast of Cancun called Isla Mujeres. I’ve been there four or five times in my life and from this point forward, my goal is to try to get there at least once a year. It’s just the most beautiful beach, most laid-back atmosphere, the most fabulous food. I love it there.
