Elevating Build-to-Rent Living Experiences with Freya Richard (Vertus)

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Welcome back to the Pillow Talk Sessions podcast. My name is Jessica Gillingham, and I am joined as ever by my co-host Christian Lupinsky. Today, Christian and I are really excited because we've got Freya Richards, the Director of Operations and Beasting at Virtus, which is deep in the heart of Canary Ward and Burrus. We're going to be talking to Freya about how they are combining both bills-to-rent and also hospitality assets with inverters.

SPEAKER_02 0:33

That's right, Jessica. With the hospitality and BTR sectors increasingly intersecting, Freya brings a unique insight into how these industries are learning from each other and how Virtus is evolving to create exceptional living experiences. We can't wait to hear about the strategic moves Virtus is making as they launch their part hotel brand, Virtus edit, and of course the role of sustainability, technology, and community building in that journey.

SPEAKER_01 0:57

Hi, Freya. Thank you for coming onto the podcast and really great welcome to Pillow Talk Session. Really excited to have this conversation with you. And I did a tour of one of the Virtus buildings earlier this year. I guess it was probably in the springtime, and it was gorgeous. You know, it was a gorgeous building, very well thought through, very impressive. So ever since then, I thought, right, I knew this podcast was coming and I wanted to have you on to talk a little bit more about it. So welcome.

SPEAKER_00 1:28

Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.

SPEAKER_02 1:30

Yeah, it's it's great to have you, Frey, and I'm excited to talk about today's topic. However, before we start, I think we should give our audience just a brief background on you and a little bit what you're doing in your current role.

SPEAKER_00 1:40

Okay. Um, so I call myself one of the OGs of Virtus. So I've been here since pretty much day dot. So back in 2019, I think I joined. At the time, there was just uh three others. Uh, and when we joined, there was literally nothing. We had no buildings, we had no systems, we had no processes, we had no teams. Um, so it was an interesting time to join, but also quite an exciting time because we had the opportunity to literally set up everything from scratch. And myself and Alistair, who's a managing director, both coming from residential backgrounds, we had lots of ideas and things that we wanted to take into to Virtus and pull through in Virtus. Um, but my background previously was uh working for quite a well-known estate agency, predominantly working in that space, you know, uh institutional investors, build-to-rent, all that kind of stuff. Um but yeah, came here to join what was a really exciting opportunity to do the first ever residential in Canary Wharf. So I couldn't really turn it down. Um, but yeah, so my day-to-day role, uh I started when I joined as the head of leasing, so my main focus was primarily on sort of getting our first buildings leased and people in them and people loving living there, and then that sort of evolved into a director of leasing and operations role where I pretty much have a holistic view over the whole business, really. So that's that still covers the leasing side and the strategic piece of you know how we lease, how do we market it, how do we keep people all the way down to the operational side. So everything from health and safety to how we uh operate the buildings, you know, I'll be in budget, um, coming up with new and fun solutions that covers technology, my favourite subject. Um, so yeah, I kind of touch on absolutely anything and everything, or I'll do my best to get involved in anything and everything anyway.

SPEAKER_01 3:19

Absolutely, and we will touch on technology in this discussion. But before that, can you give us a little bit? So you're in Canary Wharf, how many buildings is Virtus, and how many, how many units are you managing?

SPEAKER_00 3:33

So, yeah, we're we're predominantly in Canary Wharf at the moment, but I suppose a lot of a reason why we call ourselves Virtus is sort of long term we'd love to take ourselves out of Canary Wharf, but our at the moment our focus is in the Canary Wharf estate because obviously we have the luxury of owning the land that we have here and lots of opportunities here. Um, as it stands, we have three buildings that's that are built-to-rent true builder-rent buildings and sit under the Virtus brand, along with one other building that sits under our communities sort of element, which is a Section 106 requirement. So that's a you know, a meeting affordabilities and a discount market rent product, effectively. Um but in those three products, we've got 1,137 apartments. They range from studios up to three beds, uh, as I say, across three different buildings, all of them pretty similar price points. Um, you know, there's 10 to 20% difference in some of them. One of them is pet friendly, one of them Newfoundland, which I think maybe Jessica, you um came to tour, is our sort of what we call our flagship building, um quite an impressive statement building that you can see from most places in London. Um, but we've we've we've effectively tried to create those buildings and make them all feel and look quite different. At the time when we were launching those buildings, believe it or not, we were delivering them sort of months apart, which you know, 1,137 apartments going to the market all quite close together was a little bit daunting. Um, although COVID had something to do with that and that never ended up happening. But um, yeah, we've tried to make all those three buildings feel look and feel quite different, which I think I can confidently say we've achieved. Um, but yeah, so there's those three, and then we've got a few more in the pipeline as well. So we are growing we are growing. Um, I think we're probably going to talk about it today, but we've got an apart hotel coming, um, and then we've got two more built-to-rent buildings coming, which is another 1,300 units uh in the built-to-rent side. So really exciting time for us.

SPEAKER_02 5:19

Yeah, no, it it sounds really exciting.

SPEAKER_00 5:21

Yeah, very exciting time.

SPEAKER_02 5:23

Going from zero to over a thousand, another 1300. I mean, that must be uh pretty exciting from your side to see uh how how that's evolved. Um today we're we're we're talking a bit uh uh you know about build-to-rent, but also about hospitality uh and how those two kind of have been converging. Um, you know, as as these brands evolve and as these sectors evolve and people's needs and wants evolve. Um, you know, one of the one of the questions that we have for you today is, you know, how has hospitality and build-to-rent, you know, sectors, how have they been influencing each other? And maybe you can provide us with a few examples of that.

SPEAKER_00 5:58

Yeah, I think I think for us from from when we set up the business initially, uh the the buildings that we've built are particularly high-end. You know, the finishes um are you know of really high quality. Um, we believe, you know, the the the place in which the the buildings are, being on a private estate, have got you know got really big USP. So we kind of knew from from the get-go that these buildings needed to be quite elevated in the overall service delivery. And the obvious place to look is then is you know the hospitality world and the hotel world because that is all about service. And looking at what the other builds rent operators are doing in the industry, we knew we really had to elevate that that element of it to be achieving the price points effectively that we were going after. Um, so we took a lot of learnings from that. You know, we've we've looked at hiring people from the hospitality background. Um, you know, a lot we have 24-hour concierge in the building, which to be honest, they are the heartbeat of that hospitality piece in the built-to-rent space. Um, I think without them, those buildings would be a very different place. If you go onto Google or you go on to HomeViews and read our reviews, nine times out of ten, concierge are the ones that have been called out for their incredible service and their attention to detail and their personal touch and approach to our residents. And I think that's probably our biggest thing. But then, sort of the next step down from that is then around, we've always said from the beginning, we're we're not we're not renting apartments, we're sort of we're trying to sell a lifestyle, we're renting a lifestyle, we want to make your lives easier. And you know, typically the renting world has had a bit of a stigma around, you know, if you're renting, you can't afford to buy. But actually, renting is predominantly people's first choice now. Um, yes, it's you know, it is trickier to buy these days, but actually people are a lot more transient, they like the choice, they like the flexibility. And what we're trying to do is not just, you know, one make that that part of their life easier, because historically renting hasn't necessarily been an easy, easy process, and there's been lots of stories of road landlords and all those kind of things, but we're also just trying to add elevate that another, you know, another step further and taking all those learnings from the the sort of hotel industry where nothing's too much to ask, you know, anything you need, we can we can help you out. So we took things like we looked at all the kind of things that landlords might historically have been a problem, things that landlords did that were problematic for tenants and then try to sort of take those and do them differently. So, for example, most landlords will say, you know, don't paint your walls, don't hang pictures, do this, do that. Whereas we're saying, well, we'll help you hang your pictures, we'll help you paint a wall, we'll we'll do those things for you so that you can have them and you can make these pla this place feel like home. You know, we'll take your parcels, um, we'll remember when it's your birthday or your dog's birthday, or um, you know, we'll watch your kid, you know, for five seconds while you while you knit to park your car, and all those kind of small light touches I think make such a difference, and that's what we tried to take over into into into that space ultimately, and that will that will carry through into the rest of our buildings.

SPEAKER_01 8:49

And that's when I toured around, that's the sort of the feeling that I got that it it did feel it almost felt like a hotel lobby, you know, sort of walking in, and and certainly that kind of attention to detail, and you know, not only was it beautiful, like it's obviously that elevated level, but there was definitely that feeling that thought had been put into the little touches. And I think also in in the one that um that that I was in, there was a a bit of a co-working space as well, sort of that kind of um different spaces as obviously the gym, but also a co-working space, an outdoor shared space, that kind of thing as well, that was that felt much more like a serviced offering.

SPEAKER_00 9:32

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, interestingly, when we when we built these buildings, it was all pre-COVID. So we didn't have co-working spaces, you know, they were they were ultimately sort of lounge spaces. And then as as we came out of COVID, those those spaces sort of naturally transitioned into places that people wanted to work rather than than relax. And and and actually subsequently from then we've ended up um converting some of our amenity spaces into true proper co-working spaces. We recognise it's what people want. Um, and again, a part part of that sort of that service offering and making life easier. We recognise, you know, to to get the tenants that we're after and the type of people that are going to stay, we need to make those you know changes and be adaptable to what people are wanting. So um, yeah, I think that's a good probably a good example of where we're we're trying to be flexible about the service that we offer.

SPEAKER_01 10:18

So I think the thing with the service offering is that it's challenging. You know, the expectations can be very challenging to make sure you deliver on that. So, how do you approach that, the challenges there might be, sort of having that more service offering?

SPEAKER_00 10:35

Yeah, it's an interesting question because I think sometimes it's about managing expectations with the residents as well. You know, we we can we try and create a much more elevated level of service, but there's uh there's also only so much that you can do within reason, within budgets and resource and time and time constraints. And what was actually interesting is that we found quite a lot of the time our concierge were going so above and beyond, you know, probably more so than we would necessarily have like sort of directed, but then it's sort of set a bit of a precedent, and we're sort of saying, Oh, well, well, you know, we need to be careful because actually, if we start doing doing these things for one person, it you know, we get all these lovely reviews, but then it becomes the expectation. So that there is definitely that challenge with finding the right balance between what what we do for the residents and what and what we don't do, and I think it's about working out what adds the most value for everybody for both for both parties, really. Um, because also, you know, every resident's different as well. Not not every resident wants you to be that hands-on and that um, you know, they're quite happy to keep themselves to themselves. So it is also about understanding your customer and making sure that we're we're getting that service level right um for everybody. You know, uh, we interestingly did a uh piece of work called a tone of voice workshop where we had a consultant come in and they assessed our entire use of language, everything from sort of how we display the language on the websites, what language we use, um, and they looked at our communications, our emails, our you know, help desk tickets, and he did this whole workshop and analyse all of our language and then looks at look at how we can improve it, and about how it then changes your the the overall experience. And the findings were fascinating, and it was all about that a big part of it was about learning when to call someone sir and madam and when to call someone Jane or what or Mr. whatever, and it's about because it creates such a different feeling to that to that individual, but actually, some people don't feel comfortable being called by their first name, and other people want to be called sir and madam, and you do have to kind of do some learnings, but the outputs of that exercise were were quite phenomenal, and part of it was going away. And uh Rob, who who did it for us, he actually immersed himself in the buildings for two weeks. We attended the events, he spoke to other residents, and the feedback that he got from the residents was quite touching because actually they talked about Virtus and about us as the landlord as their family. Um, you know, so they said that you know, a lot of the a lot of our tenants are international. They said, you know, most of my family are outside of London. Um, and when I come home, the concierge are like my family because they remember my birthday and they know my name and I walk in the door and they say hi to me and they ask how my day was. Um, so that kind of all that insight that we got from those residents, we he then sort of produces into this tone of voice about what how our tone of voice should make our residents feel. Um, and that goes one step further into the point I touched on earlier about the you know the historic problems between relationships, um, with the relationships between landlords and tenants, is that we need to have the total opposite of that. It's it cannot can no longer be a landlord and tenant relationship, it should be a close friend relationship where we're not using lots of jargon, you know, we're we're using really friendly but informative language. Um, so all these outputs were really quite fascinating, and we ended ended up um training all the teams and all our concierge on that. And you know, to me that that is a that's a an offshoot of service, right? It's how do we speak to our customers, how do we write the emails, how do we sign off the emails, creating consistency in those sign-offs, all those kind of things. So, you know, I think that's that's one part of the service piece that I think we've looked at and and um and tried to really tweak to get right.

SPEAKER_01 14:18

It's so interesting that because tone of voice and language is such a fundamental part of brand, and people often think, oh, brand is you know the visuals or it's the things in that you do, but actually the tone of voice, communication style words are as important for a brand as the colour scheme or whatever. Um, it's so it's such an interesting kind of area to really think about because it is that relationship that you have with your customer. It's the most important thing that you have, is that relationship.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

Yeah, and it becomes quite fascinating when you know you end up pulling up a piece of correspondence that maybe we had sent out, and then the tweaks that you make, and you know, for example, if you're sending out an email about I don't know, heating outage or something, seeing what we've sent out and then seeing what this this um the guy from the tone of voice workshop sort of then tweet, just it the the difference is remarkable and it's ultimately getting the same result, but the they it doesn't feel like a them and us relationship anymore. It doesn't feel like a landlord versus tenant, it's like a we're all in this together and we're gonna get it fixed for you, and it's a much more warmer approach, and it was it was quite a fascinating process.

SPEAKER_02 15:28

Yeah, for sure. You know, uh I I I did have one question, you know, when you're talking about you know tone of voice and things like this. You know, is there a specific, you know, resident that you have? Is there you know specific demographic? You know, you you mentioned a lot of international. Um, you know, how do you work that out on you know how to communicate based on you know who your residents are?

SPEAKER_00 15:48

Yeah, it's it's a funny one. And I I always say this whenever anyone asks me the question about demographic, is um I think our demographic is very different to what we probably would have got had we not had COVID. Because when we when we launch, you know, uh 150,000 people came to the estate every day to you know work, visit, play, whatever, whatever it may be. And um, and at the time we were launching, you know, just short of 1100 units, and we sort of thought, well, we've only got to convert 1% of that, and you know, job done, easy peasy. Um, thinking that the majority of our customers would be people that were working here. Um, COVID then hit, everybody then left London, you know, budgets got cut, all these kind of things, and actually the demographic of what we've got now, only 25% of people that live with us actually work on the private estate, um, which I always say is actually a evidence of our success because it means we're converting people from outside of Canary Wharf to come and live with us, which um, you know, we're we're not we're not shy in talking about our perception issue. You know, historically, people have thought we're our financial estate, um, and and it's just full of bankers, and it's it's totally not that anymore. And I think those figures show how we've sort of really transformed that perception. Um, but but to your to your question, we've got, like I said, 25% people sort of already work here, about 35% are international, um, they're a they're a big, big chunk. Um, we're about 50-50 male to female ratios. Um, and in terms of the sort of the general demographic, they are typically you know professionals, single or professionals or couples. We have the odd family here and there, which is nice, probably more than we had initially anticipated. Um, but yeah, I think probably a very different demographic than than one we thought we were we were going to get. But I think a nice demographic, like you know, a good a good mix. Um, age-wise, sorry, is our average age is about 32, I think. 32.

SPEAKER_02 17:44

Uh I I think we should uh shift to brand evolution because you brought it up uh in how you guys have changed, you know, you know, going from COVID thinking one thing to where you guys have come now. Recently, uh you guys are uh introducing a subbrand called Virtus Edit uh for your apart hotels. I'm curious about you know what was the rationale behind this you know branding decision and you know how do you see it fitting in uh in the overall Virtus portfolio?

SPEAKER_00 18:10

I love talking about the our brand because I think it's one of the most exciting parts of what we've done. Um it's definitely been on journey um since 2019. But um to give you the short version, I guess, um obviously when we started, our our one sort of MO, I guess, was that we never wanted to be like your typical property advertising. Um, without selecting, you know, property advertising. It there was just such a stereotype and it was just such a standard way of doing property advertising, and we just didn't want to be that, we wanted to be different. And to my point earlier, we wanted to really showcase the lifestyle part of living with Virtus, not just like, don't get me wrong, the apartments are credible and they sort of sell themselves, but we wanted to be able to showcase so much more than that. So Virtus in itself has been on a journey over the last sort of four years in terms of how we do that and how we demonstrate the lifestyle, as well as still you know demonstrating product because product is important. Um, but then we sort of faced a new challenge, I suppose, um, in the last year, where we're we're at the stage where we're going from three buildings to five, um, and then we're adding in a an apart hotel to the mix and you know promoting or uh sort of explaining what vertices and the three buildings that you have on the website when it's just three buildings is is not too difficult. You know, you can have a burger menu and you've got the three options, but when you get to five, that entire customer journey and the navigation of the website and understanding things totally changed because you've got, you know, trying to how does one person know whether which of the five buildings they want? How do we communicate that? How do we communicate the benefits of Virtus Plus? Um, which is our sort of events and perks and spaces package, how do we communicate that? Um, so it really gave us a lot to think about in terms of the overall brand, and then obviously bringing in an apart hotel into the mix. We really wanted to protect what the what what Virtus was, because Virtus was ultimately a premium product in the market, which was all about service and incredible apartments. And whilst uh Virtus Edit still has all the the sort of principles of Virtus and you know and lovely products, they are ultimately a very different product. They are, you know, 378 studio apartments. Um, they are sort of a trimmed back uh version, I guess, of what we have at Virtus, but the equity and and and the principles and everything that we've spent the last five years developing still exists. So you're still going to get that excellent customer service. Um, you're still gonna get the the perks and the benefits of our Virtus Plus service, which I'll I'll probably touch on. But so what we wanted to do was try and create another brand that didn't blur the lines of what Virtus is and what Virtus delivers or confuse it, but for anybody that understands what Virtus is, be able to appreciate that if they're going to Virtus Edit, they're gonna get the benefits of Virtus, but just a slightly different product and a slightly different need. It's a totally different um you know audience type of demographic that are gonna, in theory, gonna be staying in the apart hotel. Um, and we would like to think that the people that sort of go into that that space will already know about Virtus, or at least in time will get to know about Virtus. And also the other part of keeping those two brands connected, um, but but having a sub brand is about allowing the space for the for people to grow through Virtus. So, in theory, you might have somebody that comes to Virtus Edit who is in a change in situation in their life, shall we say, maybe a divorce or you know, moving house and it's not quite ready or whatever it might be, they can temporarily stay in there in the short term while they'll work out what they're going to do, and then they can come into um, they might then rent more longer term with us in Virtus, or they might go on to buy for our for sale products within the the wider canary wharf group. So in the forefront of our mind has always been about how can we create a brand that allows Allows for people to evolve within our brand and within our portfolio. So, and and I suppose edit is exactly that. It's an edited version of Virtus. But with all the equity and the great stuff that you get from Virtus.

SPEAKER_01 22:15

But doing both products, so so both Christian and I know hospitality really well. And hospitality's hard. Like it's it's it's a really hard business to do operationally, particularly. So how and I I think I believe you've do you already have some short stay product within the the BTR brand as well. So you're already doing a little bit of that, I think. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_00 22:43

Like you have Yeah, a little bit. So we um sort of made a decision a few years ago to take a handful of our apartments, and we don't actually do it ourselves, we we sub that out to a third party, um, but we took sort of 10 apartments within our buildings that that were available on a short-term net because we have always had a demand for shorter term, but ultimately our our main principle of what we do at Virtus is about building communities, and you can't build communities if people are moving out every you know two weeks, three months, or whatever it might be. So um, you know, our focus remains on the longer term stuff, but we also recognise that there was a market of people out there, predominantly in the corporate world, that um, because typically what happens if they are relocating, their company will put them somewhere for two weeks or three weeks or two months whilst they're sourcing their longer-term accommodation. So we thought, well, why not try and tap into that market? And whilst they're there, we then try and upsell them into Virtus to stay longer term. Um, but yeah, it just we just felt like it was a good, a good sort of uh opportunity just to do a just offer another service effectively to to another market that might give us insight into um you know the corporate world initially. Um, but we're not managing it ourselves, and and we're not because we know how operationally challenging that is. And again, we don't want to move the team away from doing the job in hand, which is longer term, you know, building communities and all that kind of stuff. So we have dipped our toes in, but only very slightly. So this will be our first step into the real world of hospitality, and it has already been an eye-opener for me and for the team, um, just in how different it is. It really is very different. So, what have what have been the learnings? I think just it's more of those sort of logistical things that you just don't necessarily think of, um, you know, just the sheer volume of people moving in and moving out. Um, so that the our apart hotel, uh, 3 and 15 West Lane um is its name, and it's got 378 studio apartments. But if you think about, you know, at the point that you get to full occupancy, that could be 100, 200 people moving out a day.

SPEAKER_01 24:42

It's a sizable hotel. Very big. That is a sizable hotel.

SPEAKER_00 24:45

Yeah, and I mean I'm yet to find another apart hotel that's this big, so I feel like I should get some kind of award for that. I don't know. But um so it's gonna be it's gonna that that in itself, you know. I I I being so used to um, you know, uh built a rent, where if you're at 100% occupancy, like wicked, you're you know, you're you're pleased, but you're not having loads of people moving in and out every single day. You know, we might on a on a in a busy period in summer, you might have 10 people moving in in a day, and that's kind of it, and and that's stressful. Um, but then sort of getting your head around the fact, oh well, actually, yeah, if you if you're doing nightly stays or if you're in a season where you're doing lots of nightly stays, you could have two, three hundred people coming in and coming out. That is a lot of stuff to coordinate, that's a lot of questions. That's a lot of people. That's a lot of suitcases, it's a lot of questions, you know, it's so many things. And even that I hadn't quite considered. And then you're sort of like, well, hang on, how big is the lobby? Is the lobby big enough? And um, you know, even more recently, we've we've added in a bathroom to the downstairs lobby because there wasn't one. Because again, like we hadn't necessarily thought of that in terms of the volume of people coming in out that might be sitting and waiting, waiting for taxis, whatever it might be. So that was definitely one. Um, and as you said, the volume of you know, cleaning, working out, do you outsource your cleaning? Do you in-source your cleaning? We do a bit of a blend of of both uh in our built-in assets. So we have a couple of in-house cleaners and a couple of um agency. Um, but that's you know an interesting one because you want to get you want to somehow manage the quality and the standards, but do you do you want you know, but that's a lot of people to hire? That's you know, 15 plus people that you've got to hire. So you've got to consider the time to to hire all those people and the problems that come with hiring. And so actually, maybe agency is a better route because you don't have to worry so much about that. You you know, it's somebody else's is somebody else's problem. So, yeah, lots of things like that I think have been really interesting. Um, and I think I've sort of just learned the hard way of thinking of things that we do in build to rent that would work over there, and then quite quickly realizing, well, actually, no, that that doesn't work. We shouldn't do it like that. Um, so yeah, it's been fascinating.

SPEAKER_02 26:52

You know, I I think we should talk uh uh a bit about you know, one of the most important aspects of your business, your residence. As as our society changes, as we evolve as people, as these new generations come through, uh the sense of community, sense of belonging has become more and more important instead of just a sense of a place to stay. So I I'm curious between you know the build-to-rent uh units in the Virtus Edit, you know, what are the different ways are you building these communities? Is there a crossover between those learnings? Um and I'd be curious to see, you know, uh how you guys approach it, you know, whether it is personal, through social media, is through you know, messaging, what what it may be.

SPEAKER_00 27:30

So at the moment, uh just looking at our build-to-rent stuff, we have um something that we could something that's called Virtus Plus. It used to be called Club Virtus. Um, and being quite honest with you, it just wasn't, it hadn't quite got to where we wanted it to get to. We couldn't quite get the engagement in the events um or the attend, you know, the attendance that we were after, or just the engagement between residents. So we kind of went straight back to the drawing board and sort of re-branded or or rethought the the entire sort of Virtus Plus or Club Virtus offering and came up with Virtus Plus and sort of just redefined it to one make it a bit more uh forward, sort of future-proofing it. So we're we're planning events sort of now two, three, four, five, six months in advance, but we also then broke it down into pillars, so we now have pillars of types of events, so more so that residents know what's coming, they know what to expect. So those pillars are things like social, taste, um, educate, uh, sustainability. And then, so, for example, within taste, you know that's going to be a cooking class of some kind or or whatever it might be. So, trying to create some structure behind that events program so people are a bit more committed to coming because they know what they know what's happening in the future. Um, and it's been wildly successful since we've launched it. We now um roll out our events a month in advance and they sell out, you know, and that we're in waiting lists within days, if not weeks, um, of launching it. So that the events themselves have been really successful. Um, and then the second part of that is the perks piece. So we're obviously very lucky being on this private estate and having all the relationships with our retailers that it enables us to get some sort of perks and offers for our residents. But we did that previously, but we took it a step further and went to the retailers and said, Well, hang on a minute, we don't want the same perks that you're giving to you know the average Joe on the street. We want really good perks because these guys are people that are living here, what you know, working here, shopping here, they're doing everything here. We want something a little bit better, and we're only going to allow a handful of you to advertise a perk at any one time. So trying to make it a bit more exclusive. So, you know, they're now getting even better discounts on the private estate than what you would get if you weren't a resident. So, again, it's all about like kind of really enhancing those USPs. I think then taking that into the apart hotel world, you know, we quite we we knew quite quickly that they that those two programs can't be the exact same because the demographic is different, but we do still strongly believe that that Virtus Plus has to go into Virtus Edit because you know, I always I still say, you know, London, London is full of a lot of lonely people. Um, you know, it's one of the busiest uh cities, but everybody is very lonely, and I think that that still applies to the the travel community. Um, and you know, even if you are just here on business for a couple of nights, you might still just want to be sitting around some other like-minded people, or you might want to go grab a glass of wine or or do some yoga in the morning before you have to go to your meeting. So we are effectively just going to kind of take that curated events program and just tweak it for the audience that we have in the apart hotel. But equally, we're then trying to be a you know a little bit more clever about it and host some of those events for the apart hotel in our Virtus buildings. So we're moving people physically into those buildings so they're getting a taste of what that Virtus lifestyle is like if they would then want to move into it. Um I mean, we already do that now between the three buildings. So, you know, if you live in 10 George Street, we might invite you to an event on new in Newfoundland because we see a lot of people moving within the portfolio, so that's great for us because we just want to keep them. We don't care if they move between, we just want to make sure we keep them in the portfolio. Um, so yeah, so there's some there's some tactics to the events piece and and and and the sort of versus plus stuff to to encourage them into the other buildings, and then on top of that, uh touching back on the build-or-rent side, when we first started doing Virtus Plus, we were really obsessed with keeping people in the building, you know, use the lounge and use the dining room and use the gym. And then we realised, well, hang on a minute, why are we why are we forcing them to stay within our buildings? Like our spaces and our our USP is the in the estate. Um, and actually, well, through lots of research, we actually worked out that a lot of people that already work here are the hardest people to convince about the changes in Canary Wharf because they're they're stuck in their routines, you know, they get out the tube, they get their coffee from the same place every morning, they walk to their office and they're in a bit of a routine. And actually, the people that are already here are actually the least informed about all the changes and all the amazing things that are going on. Um, so part of what we're doing with Versus Plus is now trying to get them out into the estate. So if we've got a new opening, we'll host like a private supper club in the new restaurant with our residents to get them to that restaurant, or you know, we'll take them on a walk around the estate to show them the public art spaces and all those kind of things. So it's it we we've really changed our view on what those events look like and and how we commute how we engage with our community. Um, but and then I suppose the last piece is that we also now encourage residents to host the events themselves. So they come up with the idea. So we have a book club now, which three years ago we tried running a book club and it was abysmal. Nobody came, it was terrible.

SPEAKER_01 32:39

Um, and then again, since we've sort of I think that might be book clubs in general, they're quite hard to get to.

SPEAKER_00 32:45

Not now, but today the Virtus Plus Book Club is is uh one of the most popular clubs we seem to have in the in the buildings, and it and that's being run by the residents. So we started it off, you know, we might chuck it a bucket of beer uh in the amenity space or something to entice them down there, but they run it themselves and and it's really well attended. So, you know, I think it's just it's about being really agile with and listening to the feedback from the residents as to what do they want, what you know, what do they want to get out of living in the building, and then you know, trying to roll that out. Um, and to your point, um Christian, on sort of how we communicate that, we also we have a residence app, which you know most people do, um, but that resident app is there to obviously communicate those events, advertise the events, um, and it also has those sort of social spaces within it to encourage residents to chat to each other. The sort of marketplace section of that app is wild, everyone loves to sell stuff. Uh that's and we should probably start taking some kind of commission because it's great. They're all selling furniture and PlayStations and um so yeah. Have you got dating? Is there like a dating element to the garbage?

unknown 33:51

Verdict dating.

SPEAKER_01 33:52

We probably should sing lonely V4.

SPEAKER_02 33:55

We probably should.

SPEAKER_00 33:56

I think I actually have joked about that before that we should do some kind of speed dating or something on those lines, but we have had lots of um successful relationships, so we say we had a we had a we hosted a wedding in um the building from a couple that got engaged in the building, um, which was really sweet. And we've done birthday parties, uh engagement parties, and stuff like that. So, yeah, lots of really nice stories have come out of um the communities that that we've built, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 34:19

I just want to talk about Canary Wharf Estate for a bit. I live somewhere completely different. I live in Bath. You know, we're a historic old town, city, you know, very, very different. I absolutely love when I visit Canary Wharf. I would love to have a period of time living there. Like I really like it. As soon as you get off the tube and you go, you know, it's I really like the vibe of it and the way it is, it's completely different from where I where I live. But I can, you know, I can really see over the years how it's developed into a real kind of go-to destination, you know, not just uh the place for the bankers that you know years ago we might have thought. But I just want to get back to what you were saying about the experiences for the hospitality customer, for the part hotel customer, and it's kind of a little bit if you think about it, you know, other hospitality brands like even the likes of Airbnb, if you know they've just launched today, they are definitely doing experiences. You know, you're adding that value add to those customers, which then makes them more loyal to you. It really enhances the brand, it builds that relationship with them. If they're looking for a choice of different kind of hotels to stay in, they're more likely to choose one that's really thinking about those experiences. It's not just having a room in a in a building, it's much more than that. So, not just the fact that it's a smart kind of shoe-in for what it's like to be part of the vert the wider Virtus community, the wider Virtus brand, but actually for those hospitality customers, you're really giving them extra value there.

SPEAKER_00 35:54

Yeah, definitely. And I think you know, as a as a destination, Canary Wolf has everything you need. You know, it's it's a it's a no-brainer, you know, especially for corporates. You know, you've got access to City Airport, you can jump on the Lizzie Line and go to Heathrow, you can get into Bond Street on the Lizzie Line, you've got all the all the shops and restaurants for your client meetings, you know, that there's everything you could possibly want here. Uh, and I think the the big difference is you've also got, you know, there is a genuine element of care that comes from Virtus and from Canary Wharf Group about the customer. Um, you know, we are we are in a very luxurious position where we we are able to control everything that goes on the in the estate, and trying to get that across to a customer is not the easiest thing, right? It's very hard to kind of explain that to somebody, but you know, we are a really involved landlord, if you know, if you want to categorize us as that, we are such an involved landlord and we genuinely care about all those steps and we're constantly looking at how do we improve um you know those relationships between somebody that might rent but then go to the shops and somebody that might buy a flat and then work in the offices, so or just or just visit the estate, we genuinely think about those things all the time, and I think and I I would like to think that really comes through in what we're doing. Um, and I think certainly once they get here, they get it. And I you know, when we when we launched um in 2020, I remember saying to my leasing team, you you are gonna have a bit of a battle to convince people to come and live in Canary Wharf. Nobody's ever lived in Canary Wharf before. You're gonna have to convince them, but just get them here because I think once they're here, it will sell itself, but you've got to get them here, and that's still our motto today is just get people down here. Because as you said, you know, you've seen it change over the years. You know, I still hear people say it today, oh, you know, Canary Wharf is this, that, and the other. And I I always challenge them and say, Well, hang on, when did you last come? Because I guarantee you you'll be very surprised if you come back.

SPEAKER_01 37:47

I've actually taken my kids there, sort of shopping for the day and just wandering around. You know, we had uh in COVID actually, we had a week's holiday in London where you couldn't sort of go anywhere else, and we really loved it, just sort of wandering around. I'm just gonna bring us to the topic of technology because you stated first you love that, we know that you love that. And then when you were talking about the challenges of operationally, particularly the hospitality side, you know, all those turnovers, all of that. How, and you obviously have a resident app and a guest app, but how do you use technology inverters to kind of ease all those efficiencies, make your life easier, make that connection with guests and residents kind of work better? What kinds of things do you look at in your tech stack?

SPEAKER_00 38:35

So, yeah, technology is my favourite subject, but it's such a complicated subject. I think there is still so much that can be done in the tech space, in the prop tech space. I don't I don't think we've quite nailed it or anyone's quite nailed it yet. Um, talking to the apart hotel, we had to effectively go out and and source almost a whole new solution. So, as a business, um we we have one centralized PMS system that we use across the whole of the Canary Wharf group business, and that effectively acts as our single source of truth. So that's as a starting point. I always have to try and make something work with that. Um, but we quite quickly realised you know the systems that we have in place for Virtus were not fit for purpose for you know the level of transitions that you're gonna have in a in an apart hotel world. So we went out um and sourced uh a sort of, I suppose, a relatively newer system um in the space that was very much technology-led. And you know, I really wanted to find a bit find a PMS that was you know interested in AI, was agile, could make um lots of changes, all those kind of things. So we picked um a new PMS specifically for that that building and then had to find a way to sort of integrate at the very least the the end financial data into our main PMS system for that single source of truth. Um, but that was quite that was quite an exciting bit you know, bit of discovery and piece of work because um, you know, having been so heavily involved in the in the technology solutions from a build-to-rent and a PRS perspective, it was really interesting seeing what softwares and systems are out there. And uh, you know, I I'd quite comfortably say, God, there's so much stuff in the PMS in the hotel world that I wish we could just drag over and dump into the into the build-to-rent world because it's it's screaming out for it. Um, so it's it's definitely been quite eye-opening to see the capabilities and the automations and things like that that are happening in that space. Um, and then you know, then having to also think about you know uh housekeeping APIs and stuff that that tap into that system, which you know we didn't have to think about in in Built Your End, but looking at how we integrate those things. Um and we and also just being fascinated by the number of APIs. So they they have a marketplace. Um, so Muse is the system that we've we've we've started using for the apart hotel. Uh, and they have this marketplace where you can basically go shopping and sort of connect in with all these different things, which is great, but I think as most people who've been involved in technology know, it does you know, having too many things in your tech stack can also become a little bit problematic. But I was quite fascinated by the number of solutions that they've come up with in the hotel world. And one that we saw um was like a lost and found thing, and it was just literally if a cleaner goes into a room and someone's I don't know, left their laptop behind, they can go onto the system, um, log what's been items been lost, it automatically notifies um the person who was staying in the room. We found this item, it prints out um a postage uh stamp thing or a slip, and then it orders a courier to come and collect the item and deliver it back to the person that booked. So just automating that, which you know, in a apart hotel of 378 rooms, I imagine lost and found is probably going to be quite a big issue for us, and we're gonna have lots of things left behind that it's just a tie on your staff. So making that tiny little thing easier, fascinating. Um, so yeah, so we kind of went down a whole new journey um from that perspective. But I suppose if we were to talk about challenges, it's then about because we are a multifaceted business and we're we're we're trying to keep to as many, to as fewer systems as possible, the piece on sort of compliance and critical compliance and all that kind of stuff, it's then trying to work out well, actually, that does need to sit in our main PMS systems. How do we then connect those things? And it's trying to get everything to link together when you're effectively now running two very different styles of business and making sure that all sits in seamlessly within your sort of main uh tech stack. Um, and then on the build-to-rent side, I mean, we've been on a journey there as well in terms of technology, and as I said, like I just, you know, we have not nailed it. I don't think anybody's nailed it yet in that space. Um, you know, I don't I don't want to slate the the products are out there, and I certainly won't, there's lots of great things about the lot of the products, but there's still so much that I think can be done. Um, and I suppose we technically do have a tech stack, but ultimately we have not one core system with a few sort of integrations within it. Um, but I think there's there's definitely more that could be done. And I and I actually think we should open up that conversation between the hotel world and the BCR world, and looking at the the technology that's been created in that space and get it into build-to-rent because it was screen that you know, there's so much crossover that I think would benefit both.

SPEAKER_01 43:21

I actually think that's across lodging, like service apartments, build-to-rent, short-term rentals, hotels, like there's very little crossover, which always astounds me because there's been so much innovation in some of the sort of, you know, certainly in the hotel space, but also in the short-term rental space as well. There's you know, just cloud, everything, so much kind of going on.

SPEAKER_02 43:44

You know, if there's any developers listening to this conversation, uh, there's your million dollar idea, guys. So make sure you credit us uh when you develop that that software for that crossover. Um, you know, I had a a brief question for you about uh technology. Are there like any Emerging technologies that you know may be exciting or may enhance guests, you know, uh, you know, guest satisfaction, you know, whether it's keyless entry or it's you know those sensors that turn your heat on or turn your heat off when you're not in. Are there any things that you guys are looking at that maybe not right now but in the future uh you know could become part of the Virtus?

SPEAKER_00 44:21

Yeah, I think um so interestingly, we're actually going through um a retender at the moment for our residence app, and that's been a really um insightful experience because we've been with the same app provider for our for the Residence app since we launched, so you know, five or so years, and we've gone out to sort of six suppliers and seeing how much that's that's evolved you know in that space, um, and you know, all the things that they've they've now developed and thought of and and and and added into these these softwares is is is great and really exciting and solves so many problems and I think will definitely enhance sort of the the customer's overall experience. Um I think alongside that that there's I do think there's lots out there, there's lots of really exciting things out there. So looking at the um apart hotels, you know, we've looked at from a sustainability perspective, we've looked at um some softwares that can you know sense when people are in the rooms based on when they check in. So what you know, if if that room's empty for a couple of days, you know, the heating will sit at a sensible level and then it will kick in once somebody checks in, but it will also sense if they're physically not in that room, it will, you know, power down things. Uh same for you know light switches generally, um again, having sensors so if nobody's present in the room, the lights are turning off. So, you know, saving, especially in an apart hotel setting where ultimately the landlord is taking those costs, we're you know, reducing those costs in our overall consumption. Um, and then also in the built-in side, we just installed Utopia through all of all three of our buildings, which is an ESG sensor. So that's not only gonna give us insights into those apartments for things like humidity and you know and general usage and stuff, and help us also predict problems because you know that that is ultimately what every landlord wants, right, is to predict before these problems uh arise. Um, but also for the for the residents, a gamification of their their usage. You know, sustainability is a hot topic. There's a lot of research out there at the moment around how sustainability is a is a key uh decision-making point for some people when it comes to renting. So, you know, we can't ignore that. Um so those are sort of the first steps we're taking to try and tackle that. And that and that effectively allows for gamification of um, you know, competing between buildings um for your overall consumption or being able to allow allowing us to push forward tips and tricks on how to reduce your consumption and and things like that. So that's something we're we're looking at. Um other than that, you know, we've got all the obvious things like you know, keyless entry and all those kind of things. I think it's a real fine line between overloading. Uh my preference would be let's get the basics absolutely nailed before we go wild on AI, right? I think AI is a fantastic, exciting thing in this space, but I still think there's a lot more that we can do with more of the sort of the basic you know, procedures and tasks and things that we have to do to sort of nail that in the tech world and in the prop tech world and then move into the AI space, but also keeping that balance of, you know, I said it at the beginning, the concierge are the absolute stars of our show, and technology cannot replace that. Um, so it's working out where there is a real need for that technology and where it's a people thing. You know, for me, the ideal world is we bring in technology that allows us to allow our teams to give people more time. That that's the the ideal, I think.

SPEAKER_01 47:43

That feels like a perfect kind of summing up there. You know, there's the technology, but of course, the human interaction is really important as well for that service offering.

SPEAKER_02 47:54

You know, Fred, it's a it's been a really interesting conversation today and a lot of really interesting points and really cool things that you guys are doing. Uh, so the final question for today um anything coming up that our audience should know about? Um, anything exciting uh that you want to share uh before we wrap up today's conversation?

SPEAKER_00 48:12

I think, I mean, for me, that the our most exciting next steps are our next phase, so our next two built-roup buildings and obviously the apart hotel um sort of launching. I think also just from a more wider perspective, the the Canary Wharf Estate is still evolving drastically. Um we are imminently launching um our middle dock transformation, so our partnership with Eden, um which effectively is creating this sort of incredible blue-green spine uh throughout the middle of the estates and connecting people with the water, that in itself is a really exciting time for us and we can't wait for that to launch. But also in Inward Wharf, where our future phases are currently launching, obviously that's still all in construction at the moment, but having looked at our future sort of videos and fly-throughs of those spaces, this is the first time we'll have retail really predominantly on the ground level. So all of our retail in Canary Wharf at the moment is underground. Um so this is gonna create and really sort of add the finishing touches to that neighbourhood feel of Wood Wharf, which I think is gonna be so transformational for that space and is going to be really exciting. We've got lots of lovely red brick, um, you know, having all those shops and lots of greenery and you know, and having people more connected to the water. I think that in itself, and seeing how that's gonna evolve the people that come to the estate, and also the demographic of renders, I still think our demographic is gonna continue to evolve. Um, uh, you know, once we've got this real mixed, um uh mixed use of um, you know, we've we've got student student development potentially coming in the future. So you're gonna have a real mix of all these different people and seeing that come together and that neighborhood really evolve, I think is is really exciting, and I can't wait to see it all kind of come to come to fruition.

SPEAKER_02 49:49

Yeah, I I think you might get a future uh resident uh in myself because everything that you're talking about today just sounded so great. And I haven't been to Canary Wharf, so that's on my my list now uh to do next time I'm through town there. Oh, you're officially invited. That's great.

SPEAKER_01 50:05

Yeah, so Freya, thank you so much. It's been really, really brilliant to hear, you know, what you're doing, more of your about your thoughts on the industry as well and your learnings. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 50:15

No, thanks for having me. It's been fun.

SPEAKER_02 50:18

And that wraps it up for us today. So thank you guys so much for joining us on this episode of Pillow Talk Sessions. A big thank you to Freya Richard for joining us and sharing your insights into the fascinating intersection of hospitality and build to end. To stay connected and catch every new episode, do us a favor and head over to pillowtalksessions.com to subscribe. And be sure to follow us on LinkedIn for more insights and interviews with leaders who are shaping the future of hospitality, multifamily living, and community-driven spaces. Thanks again for tuning in, and we'll see you next time on Pillow Talk Sessions.