Managing and Scaling the Web Infrastructure for a Multi-Billion Dollar Hospitality and Entertainment Group Managing and Scaling

About The Ryman Hospitality Group

The Ryman Hospitality Group is a premier lodging and hospitality real estate investment trust specializing in upscale convention center resorts managed by Marriott International and entertainment experiences. With an estimated revenue of $2.2 billion and a team of around 1,000 employees, they are notable for their unique combination of hospitality and entertainment offerings.

Goal

• Migrate 11 existing WordPress websites from Pantheon to WordPress VIP hosting and integrate them into a unified multisite architecture.
• Complete the migration and multisite restructuring within the strict six-week timeframe to meet project deadlines.
• Preserve existing SEO scores and rankings throughout the migration and consolidation process to ensure no negative impact on search visibility.

Solution

• Utilized the WordPress VIP Code-Scanner tool to identify thousands of issues, prioritizing and fixing hundreds of critical code and database problems.
• Conducted thorough manual code audits to address and resolve all critical issues promptly.
• Cleaned up and optimized themes for ADA compatibility within the VIP infrastructure.
• Performed comprehensive plugin audits, removing unnecessary plugins and replacing slower or non-compatible ones to enhance performance.
• Employed CLI scripts to efficiently migrate content, assets, and the multisite architecture to WordPress VIP.
• Optimized all codes and plugins, resulting in improved stability and speed of the websites.

Result

• Within six weeks, all 11 websites were successfully migrated to the WordPress VIP platform, seamlessly integrated into a multisite architecture. The meticulous optimization of codes and plugins led to significant improvements in website stability and speed. 
• By addressing critical issues and ensuring ADA compatibility, the overall user experience was enhanced. The streamlined migration process ensured no negative impact on SEO scores and rankings, enabling Ryman Hospitality Group to maintain its online presence while benefiting from a more robust and efficient digital infrastructure.

About Syufy

Syufy Enterprises is a fast-growing Marin County-based entertainment and leisure company with over 1000 employees. They operate various businesses, including high-end athletic clubs, spas, restaurants, golf venues, shopping centers, public markets, and drive-in theaters. Syufy Enterprises is renowned for its rapid expansion and robust financial performance. The company is poised for continued growth, aiming to expand its existing brands and invest in new ventures in the coming years.

Goal

• Improve marketing agility across diverse business units by transitioning from the sluggish legacy Sitecore CMS to a more responsive solution.
• Develop a more cost-effective, flexible, performant, and user-friendly platform to enhance their online presence and integrate more closely with marketing strategies

Solution

In a strategic partnership with Multidots, Syufy Enterprises transitioned eight websites from an outdated Sitecore CMS to a streamlined WordPress multisite network on the WordPress VIP platform in just six months. 

This transformative project significantly cut Syufy’s annual operating costs while boosting performance and usability for site managers and customers. With a modern front and back-end digital experience unifying its diverse brands, Syufy’s custom WordPress solution has dramatically impacted its operational efficiency and customer interaction. 

Syufy’s partnership with Multidots has positioned Syufy for growth and helped drive greater customer engagement and increased revenue.

Result

By adopting the open-source WordPress platform, Syufy immediately realized significant annual savings in licensing fees and technical maintenance, boosting both cost efficiency and operational effectiveness. Multidots further enhanced these benefits by reducing — and in some cases eliminating — the need for legacy middleware, enabling WordPress to communicate directly with third-party platform APIs.

The new WordPress multisite architecture brought numerous efficiencies, streamlining and accelerating the Syufy web team’s control over promotional content and sales across multiple brands and sub-brands, encompassing 27 business locations

• VillaSport Athletic and Health Clubs: Eight locations across four states.
• Tomatina Restaurants: Eight locations in the Bay Area.
• Peacock Gap Golf Club: Including the Range Cafe and event venue in San Rafael.
• Santa Cruz Cinema and West Wind Drive-In Theaters and Public Markets: Seven locations in three states.

During the rollout of the new sites, standard front-end web performance benchmarks improved by 20% to 60%, with an average improvement of 25% across all eight properties.

Est. 8 hours saved weekly

Est. 20 hours saved weekly

Est. 5 hours saved weekly

Est. 5+ hours saved weekly