# A decade of hotel catering: tech wins, hidden fees still bite

Canonical-URL: https://hoteltech.news/digest/hotel-catering-conventions-decade-change
Text-Version: https://hoteltech.news/digest/hotel-catering-conventions-decade-change.txt
Markdown-Version: https://hoteltech.news/digest/hotel-catering-conventions-decade-change.md
Language: en
Published: 2026-09-14T08:46:21.379Z
Modified: 2026-09-14T08:46:21.379Z
Author: Joan Sanz
Topics: Hotel Technology
Summary: A new industry review looks back at ten years of change in hotel catering and conventions, from personalized menus and tech gains to hidden fees and contract traps that hit smaller groups hardest.

## Article

A new review published on [Hospitality Net](https://www.hospitalitynet.org/opinion/4134347/hotel-catering-and-conventions-a-decade-of-change-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly) takes a long look at ten years of change in hotel catering and conventions. The good: menus are more personalized, tech has smoothed quoting, BEO management and group communications, and F&B teams now lean on data they simply did not have in 2014.

The bad and the ugly land on the commercial side. Hidden fees, opaque F&B contract clauses and labor shortages keep squeezing smaller groups, the ones without legal muscle to push back at the negotiating table. That is where I would focus. If you run events tech, the real opportunity is not another pretty proposal builder, it is tooling that makes contract terms, surcharges and staffing costs legible before signature, for both sides.

Operators who win the next decade of group business will be the ones who treat catering as a revenue product with the same discipline as rooms. Sharper pricing, cleaner contracts, tech that shows the real cost. The rest is noise.

## Sources

- Hospitality Net: https://www.hospitalitynet.org/opinion/4134347/hotel-catering-and-conventions-a-decade-of-change-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly

## Citation

A decade of hotel catering: tech wins, hidden fees still bite. Hotel Tech News. 2026-09-14. https://hoteltech.news/digest/hotel-catering-conventions-decade-change