Moments of levity are rare during panel sessions at a hospitality industry conference. That’s just the way it is when discussion bends toward cap rates, multiples, basis points and other terms that have come to define the hotel industry’s workings. Imagine my surprise, then, when one panel I attended, at January’s Americas Lodging Investment Summit, in Los Angeles, turned downright snarky.

It came during a rather subdued panel concerning the topic of hotels of the future and what they might look like. At one point, the moderator, Bob Alter of Seaview Investors, posed this question to Lauren Chewning, VP of customer insight and growth at Marriott International: “What will a hotel look like 15 years from now?”

Alter’s seemingly innocuous question wasn’t intended to lay a trap, but Chewning took the bait with her response: “15 years,” she said, “is a little bit too far from now.” That’s when Alter, a hotel investor, took the opportunity to throw some shade back: “But you ask me to sign a 30-year franchise agreement!” he said.