(kôn-syârzh') noun

A person employed at a hotel or apartment building to help the guests or residents, as by handling luggage, making travel arrangements, delivering messages and making reservations for tours.

-The American Heritage^® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition.  2000.

Keeper of the Keys
Concierge services date from the middle ages when, as a trusted member of the royal staff,  the concierge was an authority charged with keeping and protecting the keys to the palace. In the 1800s, burgeoning ship and rail travel created a growing need for upscale hotels and travel assistance. The concierge subsequently became an accepted, permanent component of hotel guest services. With a reputation for having exceptional wisdom when making travel arrangements, with information on how to obtain tickets to sold out performances, and the ability to secure last-minute reservations to the best restaurants in town, the concierge became a much-in-demand expert at better hotels. 

Expanding Roles
In the latter part of the Twentieth Century, specialty roles emerged to fulfill needs in corporate, residential, entertainment and other arenas, including academic and private concierge services. While many concierges use their extensive knowledge or ability to cross lines and perform many across-the-board functions, some professionals concentrate on a singular specialty or service. It is impossible to list all the jobs completed by concierges; however, it is worth highlighting some of the services the profession-specific concierge performs: 

Corporate
Offering relocation services, errand services for busy employees, special event and meeting planning, corporate concierges also make travel arrangements, arrange for interpreters or translators and fill a need for temporary office employees. 

Residential
The residential concierge can arrange for gift or personalized shopping, pick-up and delivery of items or run errands, arrange for floral services, romantic dinners, or weekend get-aways and fill unusual requests, including searching for hard-to-find items. 

Entertainment
An entertainment concierge arranges for obtaining tickets to sold-out performances, celebrity bookings, party arrangements, event planning, musician booking, and many exotic services such as hot air balloon rides or greeting services. 

Hotels
A vital member of the staff of large hotels, the hotel concierge can make travel arrangements, has knowledge about the city’s best shopping, dining, arts, nightlife, sights, entertainment and recreation destinations. Hotel concierges offer personal services, including tour package bookings. They make reservations of all kinds and can arrange to replace items that were perhaps lost when an airline misplaces a guest’s luggage.
 

Concierges began to be more prevalent in US Hotels in the mid to late 1970’s. As a matter of fact, I was one of the first two at my hotel in 1978, although the Hotel had been open for 50 years. In 1977, a committee of concierges from San Francisco, which was headed by Tom Wolfe, a native New Yorker, had petitioned the International Les Clefs d’Or for membership and had gained it. Tom Wolfe later became President of NYCAHC in the early nineties. Back home though, there were several groups also vying for recognition. Consequently, Les Clefs d’Or National was organized into regions. These regions were: the Western region, comprised mostly of San Francisco; the Central region comprised mostly Chicago and Texas; and the Eastern region, comprised of Boston, Philadelphia, Washington and New York. The regions acted rather autonomously and consequently New York acted as a local association considering our size. However, that changed around 1982 when Les Clefs officially incorporated under NY State Law. The law requires certain procedures and officers; thus, the regions were eliminated, except for membership committees.

There was also an organization formed in the late 70’s early 80’s by some concierges that was formed as a business venture (publishing etc.). It failed rather quickly and people went on their own. There were also some outside organizations that attempted to represent Hotel concierges which was rejected by the concierge community.

Then in the mid 80’s, Les Clefs d’Or USA committed to do an International meeting in Washington, DC in 1987; thus, a need was created for local areas to organize. During the New Orleans congress in 1985, Manny Mulero, Herb Tepper and myself volunteered to host a national meeting in New York in early 1986. With the help of Bruno Brunelli and others, we were able to pull off a successful meeting with a Broadway show and a gala at Windows on the World. Subsequently, we began having meetings discussing organizing a local association.

Of course, there were discussions as to how we should organize. Some felt that it should be a very exclusive association, while I felt that it should be democratic and broad based. I felt this was important both to be able to represent a great many of the concierges and also to spread our ideas of professionalism. It would also afford an opportunity to introduce Les Clefs d’Or.

In early 1987, with the help of Daria Dooling, we held a meeting at the Essex House to set up an organizing committee of five volunteers. Rather than getting too political, it was decided that the head of the committee would be picked by drawing straws. As it happened, I drew the short straw.

We went to the National Congress in Houston that spring as a very cohesive group. It was there I worked on the By Laws for NYCAHC. We incorporated that fall and I became the first President. We have continued growing ever since.

On February 22, 1988, we published our first newsletter. Here is an editorial I wrote , which I would like to share with you:

“It has been a year since about twenty of us met at the Essex House and decided to form a local concierge association. Our growth since then, though not rapid, has been steady. We have had several successful meetings, had a raffle , been incorporated and, with this issue, mark the debut of our Newsletter. We have accomplished quite a few things; however, there is always room for more. Our association is a professional membership organization. Like Les Clefs d'Or, it is a non profit association dedicated to the needs of the membership and also run by the membership. And like all professional associations, we hope membership is something one can take pride in. There are also many things we can do as a group that we cannot do individually. We have already received a presentation from Pan Am. At this next meeting we will receive one from Hertz and in the future hope to have many more. We also hope to expand this newsletter. We talked about advertising but have not yet explored that area. Also we hope to have it appear regularly and welcome all comments and articles. But most important, we hope the association provides a forum for discussion and exchange among friends and peers. I have always felt that a concierge's greatest ally is another concierge and as many of us noticed at the International Les Clefs d'Or convention this past autumn in Washington, among the members of the European locals there existed a bond that is the basis for professional society, true friendship. This is our ultimate goal.”
 

On April 25, 1952, delegates from nine European nations traveled to Cannes to hold the first ever "Congress" and create the Union Europeene des Portiers des Grands Hotels (UEPGH). Ferdinand Gillet (then concierge at the Hotel Scribe, Paris) masterminded this effort and is considered the "father of Les Clefs d'Or."
 

In 1970, UEPGH became UIPGH (Union Internationale des Portiers des Grands Hotels) signifying that not just Europe, but countries from around the globe, were joining forces. In 1994, UIPGH changed its name yet again to become what it is today: UICO, or Union Internationale Les Clefs d'Or.
 

The creation of Les Clefs d'Or U.S.A., Ltd., followed a similar path in its development and, on November 21, 1978, at the international Congress in Vienna, the U.S.A. was accepted as the 19th member country of UICO.