What exactly is a concierge? Depends who you ask ...
A concierge friend of mine researched this extensively and sent me the following definition ...

Although more and more people are becoming familiar with the term "concierge," very few know where this customer-service based profession originated. The word "concierge" evolves from the French comte Des cierges, the "keeper of the candler," a term that referred to the servant who attended to the whims of visiting noblemen at medieval castles. Eventually, the name "concierge" came to stand for keeper of the keys at public buildings, especially hotels. There is even a famous prison in Paris that is called The Concierge, in honor of the warden who kept the keys and assigned cells to the inmates.

Regardless of the origin, hotels from around the world were the first ones to adopt the concierge idea and offer the service to their guests. Today, independent concierge companies have brought this ancient service to the modern world so that now everyone has access to them.
So what exactly is a concierge?? I think the short version here is that it is simply another word for personal assistant.

The concierge industry itself is only about 10-15 years old and started with a few brave pioneers who took the hotel concierge idea and decided to offer it to the corporate world. I have been in the field since 1998 and when I started there were, perhaps, 50 or so concierge around the U.S. Today, I suspect there are thousands. I have nothing to base these numbers on except my personal experience in the field. You can actually see the phenomenal growth by looking at my company's numbers. Triangle Concierge began in 1998 with a dozen clients. Today we have thousands of clients from 30 countries and every US state.
Copyright © 2004 by Katharine Giovanni

About the Author:

Katharine has been a meeting/event planner and concierge for over 20 years and has set up several successful businesses including Triangle Concierge.

She is Triangle Concierge's senior trainer and speaker and is the author of their best-selling book The Concierge Manual. She is Chairman of the Board and Co-Founder of the International Concierge and Errand Association (ICEA) a dynamic public speaker. She can be reached through her websites at www.triangleconcierge.com or www.katharinegiovanni.com