Smart Label Host Innovation Award has now become the reference award in the innovation of products and services related to HoReCa. This year, in anticipation of the great return of world hospitality, it will be even more awaited. We addressed the theme with Professor Matteo Ingaramo, scientific manager of the Smart Label Host Innovation Award.

What does the commission expect from the nominations this year?

On the part of the products and services presented we expect to see a reconfiguration of value. The theme of sustainability will be fundamental, which will not only mean attention to consumption, but takes up themes that are not entirely new but more contemporary than ever, such as the durability of objects, circularity, low consumption of territories. There is no more time for green washing.

That is?

We enjoyed it for thirty years on a dying planet, now we don't enjoy it anymore. Our style of consumption has come to an end. And I say this not as a militant but from a scientific point of view. Sustainability is a necessary quality but has not been considered as a priority: this must change. Especially now that the money is there: 11 billion euros in funding just for the New European Bauhaus, a European project that involves entities thinking about cities, places to live and dwell.

What does it mean to be smart today?

It means accepting the challenge. The Smart Label is an independent space that enhances initiatives that take a step forward. This year we expect sustainability that is not just technology but lifestyle sustainability. It will be necessary to understand if that product or service will change the conception of the overall work and energy cycle. Italian companies must return to being courageous.

We will evaluate elements of principle, it is necessary to give a signal of quality, the challenge has increased, the skills and motivations are there, the stimulus is lacking.

We want the Smart Label to be this stimulus, the trigger that allows us to actually change the behaviors mentioned by BJ Fogg, the founder of Stanford University's Behavior Design Lab.

How has Smart Label grown over the years?

I find it significant that companies have accepted to be evaluated by putting themselves on the line, even at the risk of being excluded. The award itself is just a label, but it is highly coveted. The aim is precisely to encourage the quality and value of the proposal present at the fair.

What do you expect from the return of the out-of-home?

We expect schizophrenic reactions with choices dictated by security and personal beliefs. The concept of sustainability could lead to higher quality, true value in the face of a customer who will tend to penalize unethical and untransparent systems. We will look for open places, with a terrace, eating outdoors will be a choice and we will take this into the future: the quality of the single event will be more important than the quantity of events. The outdoors will dominate in the second half, but virtuality will not disappear.

And the hotel reception?

In the end, the concept of hospitality that we all have to look at is to make the customer live an experience, which may not be physical or environmental but integrated into other models. We are looking for solutions that go in this direction. Let me give you the example of a hotel in Shanghai that, even before the pandemic, certified its air, free of pollutants and micro-dust: in the future a feature of this type could take on greater value than the interior design or the Spa. Some things will become current and relevant in the post-pandemic. Whoever is able to remodel the offer will win.

How do you see the future?

As a strategic designer, I believe that there are elements to rediscover value, get back into the game. These could be  positive things for the hospitality system. The commission will try to explore the areas that can change the system for the better by making people's lives enjoyable, in terms of value, not just from an economic point of view. Real sustainability is what makes you live well.