In a groundbreaking initiative, Mews partnered with our customer Hey Lou HOTELS to host our very first joint hackathon. Sparked by the shared vision of leaders from both companies—Ryan Tomlinson and Conor Winders, VPs of Product and Engineering at Mews, and Martin Kemmer from Hey Lou HOTELS—the event was designed to bring teams together, foster creativity, and develop innovative ideas to elevate the guest experience in hospitality. This unique collaboration marked an exciting step toward deeper co-creation with our partners.
Experiencing the Guest Journey
From the moment we stepped into the hotel, we had the chance to experience the Mews system firsthand through the self-service kiosk check-in. Hotel staff encouraged us to go through the process just like regular guests so they could gather our feedback afterward.
For some Mewsers, it was their first time using the kiosk, as they’d worked on other parts of the Mews platform. Experiencing it from the guest perspective was eye-opening and incredibly valuable. It not only deepened our understanding of the user journey but also inspired new ideas that fed directly into our hackathon projects.
Our next step in exploring the guest journey led us to the hotel restaurant’s digital ordering system. It quickly became clear that there were opportunities to improve the process for both guests and restaurant staff. The Hey Lou HOTELS team openly shared their experience, noting that the current workflow felt inefficient and could be streamlined to make their day-to-day tasks more effective. Their insights provided valuable direction for potential improvements and hackathon ideas. This feedback laid the foundation for the first hackathon team, allowing them to quickly kick off their initiative and begin development right away.
From Ideas to Action
Out of the many ideas generated during the hackathon kickoff, we selected three that stood out for their high feasibility and potential impact.
Digital Ordering
One of the top priorities was improving the digital ordering experience—an issue strongly emphasized by Hey Lou HOTELS employees during our visit to the hotel restaurant.
A cross-functional team quickly formed around this idea, led by designer Rachel Wu Zi Chin. Engineers Jan Marek, Honza Hrubý, Jakub Saksa, and Danijel Beslic from Mews joined forces with Timo Jahn from Hey Lou HOTELS to bring the concept to life. On day one, the team dove straight into prototyping and mapping out a redesigned ordering flow aimed at streamlining the experience for both guests and staff.
Company Credentials Search
Sean Newell and Jan Brestan from Mews teamed up with Oliver Goecking and Lukas Weitzel from Hey Lou HOTELS to tackle a feature aimed at improving the guest check-in experience, specifically when guests enter their company details. This enhancement streamlines the process for guests. It also supports the Hey Lou HOTELS team by improving data accuracy and making it easier to maintain a clean, reliable database.
Guest Transfers
One of the standout ideas came from Adam Britton and Sean Newell from Mews, and it quickly won over the Hey Lou HOTELS team: a seamless integration for ordering transportation for guests. The concept was simple: enable hotel staff to easily book rides for guests, such as airport transfers, directly from the system. Even better, guests could schedule their rides during the online check-in process, giving hotels real-time visibility into their estimated arrival times and improving overall planning.
Looking ahead, the idea holds potential for AI-powered automation, making the entire process even more effortless. On day one, a team consisting of Adam Britton and Marco Righetto from Mews, alongside Gerdi Kemmer from Hey Lou HOTELS, collaborated to design the initial workflow and user experience.
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Hacking Day
The second day was fully dedicated to hands-on development. The team working on the search functionality made significant progress early on, completing a large portion of the work. However, they soon discovered that implementing the full solution would require a more substantial infrastructure change on the Mews side. While this prevented full delivery during the hackathon, the findings provided valuable insights for future sprints and revealed opportunities to enhance functionality across other areas of the Mews platform.
The digital ordering team faced one of the biggest challenges of the hackathon. With a tight deadline and an ambitious scope, both backend and frontend engineers rolled up their sleeves and pushed forward, working in parallel to make as much progress as possible.
Despite the pressure, the team managed to hit a major milestone. For hours on end, you could walk past their table and see every face locked onto a screen, fully immersed. The room pulsed with focus and determination. Occasionally, a sigh of frustration would break the silence, followed moments later by a triumphant “Eureka!” as another hurdle was cleared.
It was intense, fast-paced, and demanding. But it was also exactly what a hackathon is all about.
The Guest Transfer team made impressive progress, delivering a functional prototype by the end of day two. Sean Newell from Mews joined midway to help accelerate development and support the technical implementation.
The concept was simple but impactful: allow hotel staff to order a taxi for guests directly within the Mews system. Guests then receive their ride details by email. By the end of the day, the team had a working prototype up and running—just a few final touches away from being ready for real-world use.
Development continued late into the night as teams pushed to finalize their prototypes in time for the final day.
Wrapping Things Up
At the start of the hackathon, expectations weren’t entirely clear on either side. During our time together, the Hey Lou HOTELS team shared that they sometimes find it challenging to feel disconnected from the real people, engineers, and designers behind the product. For them, having the chance to speak directly with the Mews team, share their day-to-day obstacles, and put faces to the product was a meaningful experience.
Equally, for the Mews team, engaging with actual users brought invaluable insight. Hearing firsthand about their daily workflows and pain points helped us gain a much deeper understanding of their needs—something that’s difficult to achieve through tickets and feedback forms alone.
“It’s always valuable to bring together the developers and the end users. When they share the same energy and topics, they can uncover issues and solutions that neither side had seen before,” shared Lukas (Head of BI, Hey Lou HOTELS).
While the Mews team successfully delivered working prototypes of both the revamped digital ordering experience and the new taxi integration, the true value of the hackathon went beyond the code.
It was an opportunity to listen closely to the needs of a forward-thinking partner like Hey Lou HOTELS and to build stronger, more personal connections. This foundation of mutual understanding sets the stage for even better collaboration in the future.
