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What Hoteliers Need to Know About the “Beard Effect”

What Hoteliers Need to Know About the “Beard Effect”

If you're a guy in the hospitality business, you may want to rethink your ambition to win the next World Beard and Mustache Championship.

In a move that proves there is in fact a study of just about everything, an article in the Cornell School of Hotel Administration’s fall Hospitality Quarterly explores some research into how hotel staffers look affects guests’ perception of how good they are at their jobs. And, you guessed it, one thing that makes male hotel employees—at least, Caucasian ones—seem less effective is facial hair.

Perhaps the Red Sox’s scruffy World Series winners will lessen the “beard effect” in the future, but for now at least, men on the hospitality side may want to give the old Norelco a whirl.

Not surprisingly, guests felt the best about smiling, attractive staffers—but only when the smiles are genuine. Fake smiles don’t do much for anyone.

Yes, you can always count on me to come up with the science you really need to know!

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