British celebrity chef Jamie Oliver has already put children's nutrition in the spotlight with his School Dinners documentaries and Feed Me Better campaign. Now, through a partnership with Swedish Scandic Hotels, he's bringing his philosophy right to the table for travellers with children.

The three-year partnership will focus on a different target group each year, beginning with children. Specifically, starting this summer, kids will be able to try out completely new children’s menus at all 150 of Scandic’s hotels. Many traditional meals will be revamped; other, new ones will also be introduced, featuring natural preparations and organic ingredients. Kids will begin by choosing their food from a photo-based menu designed specifically with them in mind, according to Fashtastic. They'll also be able to assemble their own salad. Entrees will include spaghetti and meatballs, while dessert will feature ice cream “Smushins”—something Oliver apparently invented as kid—including vanilla ice cream with healthy toppings like fresh fruit and berries, "smushed" together with a spatula by the kids themselves.

What's the best way to impress a parent? Take good care of their kids. A concept to emulate throughout the hospitality industry! (Related: Happy healthy meals — More meal prep & cooking instruction, this time by Jamie Oliver.)

Website: www.scandichotels.com
Contact: www.scandichotels.com/settings/Side-foot/Customer-service/Contact-us1/

Spotted by: Robert Olzon

Good hotels can be hard to find, but not for lack of candid advice. The sheer number and dispersed nature of reviews on the web are what can make the process difficult, and that's where Raveable comes in. Zeroing in more narrowly than the likes of TripAdvisor, Raveable aims to provide a comprehensive view of hotels across the United States by aggregating and summarizing millions of reviews from sites far and wide.

Drawing from more than 35 million reviews of some 55,000 US hotels, Raveable analyzes and condenses such opinions into rankings for hotels nationwide. The company begins by collecting basic information from the hotels themselves. It then gathers travel reviews from all over the internet, including well-known sites like TripAdvisor, Expedia and Travelocity as well as lesser-known contenders such as individual travel blogs. Taking into account factors including the quality of the originating site, the date of the review and the reputation of the original author, Raveable then creates colour-coded rankings for each hotel using a weighted combination of all the factors it considers. Room quality, service, value and the extent to which patrons would recommend a hotel all get individual rankings, while overall rankings compare the hotel with those in the same price range as well as all others in that city. Finally, going beyond numbers, Raveable's patent-pending technology uses semantic analysis to analyze and distill reviewers' comments about each hotel, summarizing the good and the bad about its rooms, location, service and overall. Free for users, Raveable earns revenue each time a visitor books a hotel through one of its booking partners.

Indeed, it's the smart hotels that are turning transparency tyranny into transparency triumph by welcoming the spotlight when it shines on them and using it to grow, to improve, and to win new customers. Then there are the facilitators like Raveable, which stand to earn a pretty penny making it all happen. (Related: SeatGuru for hotel rooms — Hotel search tool that's all about location — Hotel search? Video completes the picture.)

Website: www.raveable.com
Contact: support@raveable.com

At the baggage claim area of Jože Pučnik Airport in Ljubljana, Slovenia, travellers can pick up more than just their luggage. Using the Bluetooth feature on their mobile phones, they can download tourist information and coupons for their stay in Slovenia.

Through a campaign devised by the Slovenian Tourist Board in cooperation with Aerodrom Ljubljana and Creativ Interaktiv, arriving passengers riding on the airport's buses from plane to terminal are invited to turn on the Bluetooth feature on their mobile phones. That invitation is repeated as they pass through customs to the baggage retrieval area. Within baggage claim is the so-called Bluetooth Zone, where users who have turned on Bluetooth are asked if they want to receive information about Slovenia. Users who say yes receive a free SMS text message with instructions on downloading the information, which is presented in both Slovene and English and includes tips for a hassle-free stay in Slovenia, recommended tourist attractions and events, and mobile coupons from partner organizations. Following the positive response to a test in December and January, the Bluetooth service is in place at least through the end of this month.

While Bluetooth proximity-marketing efforts elsewhere have met with mixed success so far, the fact that travellers are already accustomed to receiving text messages from local phone providers when they land at a foreign airport makes this one seem like more of a natural fit. One to test out in the tourist destination of your choice...? (Related: Tony Player brings online playlists to the dance floor — Brick-and-mortar kiosks sell mobile content — Digital billboards revive empty storefronts.)

Website: www.slovenia.info/en/Tourist-Guide.htm?_ctg_guidebook=0&lng=2
Contact: www.slovenia.info/asp/write_to_us.asp

Spotted by: Matej Golob

Bees seem to be capturing an increasing proportion of the virtual ink on our pages of late, playing center stage as they have in our recent stories about urban beekeeping at Fortnum & Mason's and Toronto's Fairmont Royal York hotel. Adding to the buzz—so to speak—we just came across yet another bee-focused hotel.

In honour of Earth Day a few weeks ago, Paris-based Pullman Hotels & Resorts partnered with Bee My Friend to sponsor a beehive on behalf of each of its French hotels. The "Pullman Is Bee Friendly" campaign, as it's called, aims to help maintain honeybee populations and protect biodiversity in general. It's also created some sweet new opportunities for guests. Specifically, customers at each hotel now have the chance to sample three different honey varieties from Burgundy produced by the sponsored bees: a delicately flavoured acacia honey, a spring flowers honey and an all flowers honey from Morvan, the taste of which is said to reflect the sunny conditions and acidic soil of that region.

Offering eco-credentials along with (still) made here appeal, Pullman's Bee Friendly campaign is sure to win over many a green-minded (and sweet-toothed) consumer. One to emulate locally in your own specialty shop, restaurant or hotel...? (Related: Honey without the mess — Sweet snobmoddity.)

Website: www.pullmanhotels.com
Contact: www.pullmanhotels.com/gb/contact/ask-question-form.shtml

Adidas is no stranger to the street culture scene, and their latest move seems right on target: the Adidas Urban Art Guide to Berlin is an iPhone travel guide listing Berlin’s best graffiti.

Users download the application for free, giving them access to a Google map of Berlin that’s pegged with the locations of its urban art masterpieces. The map can be navigated in several ways: "Find artworks nearby" provides users with a map of art works in their immediate vicinity; "Tour guide" calls up a curated walking tour of local urban art; and "Gallery" gives users the option to browse the city's street art and then seek out their favourite pieces. Users can click on each marked location to call up images as well as information about the piece, the artist and further references.

The app’s interactive elements including rating and commenting functionalities, and letting users upload their own snaps of new art, which keeps the map cutting-edge at no extra cost to Adidas. Berlin is currently the only city on the Urban Art Guide's map, but plans are underway to develop similar guides for other cities.

Although a growing audience appreciates street art, few traditional guide books make any mention of it. So this is a smart move on behalf of Adidas, getting the brand straight into the hands of its target audience, while reaffirming its street credentials. Other brands—what kind of map-related content can you offer your (niche) audiences on the go? (Related: Free coffee for iPhone users at Swedish 7-Eleven — Louis Vuitton’s walking tours of Beijing, Shanghai & Hong Kong — trendwatching.com's take on mapmania.)

Website: www.urbanartguide.de
Contact: info@urbanartguide.com

Spotted by: Susanna Haynie