Founder, Owner and Chief Executive Officer at Riva Hospitality, Hotels and Resorts, Gérald Lampaert carries an extensive background in various areas of the upscale & luxury service and hospitality industry. Half Belgian-half Swiss and born in 1970 in Brussels, Gérald started his life with an international mindset, first by learning multiple languages, then by living and working in several countries around the world.

Spending most of his professional career in hotels and in the meeting and event industry, he rapidly realised that the key factors for success in his day to day operations, is to be customer centric with an excellence in service, perfection in product craftsmanship and a particular attention to details.

Gérald started his career in 1992 at the Walt Disney company, holding various positions from hotel operations, sales, marketing and the organisation of very large conferences, as well as digital information management. This is where he discovered the value of having a culture, a vision, a structure of quality, operational standards and to focus on extraordinary deliverables. He also worked with Florida based A&L Associates to run Hard Rock Café Europe secret shoppers and service quality management. Seven years later, Gérald pursued his career at the Imperial Palace in Annecy and at the end of 2000 returned to Paris as a regional director continental Europe for Millenium & Copthorne hotels for almost three years.

In 2002, Gérald started his first privately owned Paris based and highly successful company, Luxury Communication and simultaneously held various Vice President positions for international groups in headquartered in New York and Houston including Dolce International and Benchmark Hospitality.

Strategic business advisor, international conference speaker and owner of a sleeping music label while keeping the french operations running, Gérald moved to Zurich in 2015 where he was appointed Managing Director at LUXCOM GmbH prior to deciding the creation and the launch of his fourth very specific hotel brand concept, Riva Hotels and Resorts and Riva Hospitality Services in 2018.