-By Shantanu Jain MORE than a million Indian tourists will arrive in Sentosa Island, Singapore this year, predicts Steven Chung, Senior Assistant Director, Sales at Sentosa Leisure Management Pvt Ltd, a subsidiary of the Sentosa Leisure Group. In an exclusive conversation with BW Hotelier, Chung, who was in India recently, told us that Sentosa -- with a hybrid of attractions and features and world-class family-oriented facilities, had an edge over other destinations in the world, especially when it came to the Indian tourist. ’The attractions in particular are always designed keeping in mind the needs of the Indian traveler. Often we create packages that cater to the Indian arrivals, meaning we factor in flight arrival times, dietary requirements and meal times ’ as we are aware dinner time for Indians is quite different from the rest of the world,’ he added. Because of the connection between Sentosa and the Indian traveler, the new Madame Tussauds in Sentosa has brought Indian personalities, including Sachin Tendulkar, Amitabh Bachchan and Mahatma Gandhi. ’This is an example of the level of attention we dedicate to our number one international market,’ he told us. Chung who in a previous interview in February last year; said that he was expecting more than a million guests from India; did not have an accurate picture of the collective figure of revenue generated from India and the number of tourists since Sentosa is made up of independent tenants in hospitality, entertainment and retail. He said that despite a drop in last year's peak due to the Indian elections and the continued weakening of the rupee against Singapore dollars, a healthy influx of Indian tourists all year round was witnessed. In an earlier interview with the Financial Express in New Delhi, Chung had been quoted saying 2013 saw 900,000 Indian tourists visiting Sentosa. 2014 also saw a rebranding and revamping of the Sentosa Merlion, with new family centric entertainment like Kidzania, Chung said. Shantanu Jain is a Junior Correspondent with BW Hotelier.
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-By Zia Shiekh OVER the last decade we have seen various industries merge together, with a classic example being the smart phone that has been the result of the coming together of telecom, IT and entertainment sectors, with these devices serving as much more than phones and having capabilities for Internet browsing, social media, camera, playing movies, gaming and increasingly ability to transact with 3G and 4G. We are now seeing the merger of a fresh set of industries with art, music, fashion, movies, food & beverage and hospitality coming together to form a new breed of chic and stylish lifestyle hotels that stand for much more than simply places to stay at or dine at. Much like an Armani watch that is a status symbol, though it’s utility or technology might not be any better than a Titan watch available at a small fraction of the price; these lifestyle hotels are increasingly about the power of positioning and branding rather than their actual utility. The trend actually started in global cities like New York, London, Paris, San Francisco, Rome and Los Angeles, which saw the mushrooming of such lifestyle hotels that made a statement, typically through their architectural or interior design elements; small sizes that enable highly personalised services; and celebrity restaurants with exotic cuisines. While these unique concepts initially primarily appealed to the creative folks (artists, designers, musicians, etc.), it soon became fashionable with top professionals, bankers, consultants, movie stars, fashion models, socialites and other celebrities. Suddenly, it was cool to stay and hang out at these boutique/ design hotels rather than the typical large-format 5-star deluxe properties that till then used to be the accommodation, dining and entertainment location for the cr-me-de-la-cr-me of society. While the boutique hotels might not have the huge spaces or plethora of facilities like huge lobbies, pools, spas, shopping plazas, etc. that larger 5-star hotels have as their standard offering, but these smaller hotels definitely offer experiences that the larger hotels can’t. Let’s start with design. Any frequent traveler knows that though there are various 5-star hotel brands, but there is little to distinguish one from another as far as their public areas or rooms are concerned. Most of them almost look the same. However, these new breeds of design hotels actually take pride in creating unique and distinctive design elements. Sometimes they can be over-the-top with extravagant designs while at other times, they can be bare and minimalist in their approach. Whatever the look might be, it is very difficult to ignore or overlook their designs. This obviously helps boutique hotels deliver experiences that are distinctive and memorable as no two hotels are the same. And then of course, there is the opportunity to create a level of personalisation that simply cannot be achieved in larger hotels. Whether it is private butler services or every staff member knowing the guests by their names (and often having intricate knowledge about their tastes and preferences), these tailored experiences win over the toughest of guests as they feel comfortable (like a home away from home) at these boutique hotels that treat them as individuals and respect each guests’ unique requirements. It was only a matter of time before boutique/ design hotels expanded beyond their initial design and personalisation USPs. They started becoming places where the rich and famous like to hang out at. Beginning with swanky lounge bars and celebrity restaurants with eclectic cuisines, they then also started evolving into art galleries, private member clubs, fashion destinations with ramp walks and much more, limited only by the imagination of their owners/ operators. So while the chain hotels stuck to their routine and spent their time perfecting their SOPs, these new breed of hotels used innovation and experimentation has their main tools to differentiate and win over customers. And the market lapped them up, excited about new hospitality experiences that were increasingly becoming lifestyle statements. Thus were born ’lifestyle hotels’; if you stayed in one, you have truly ’arrived’. India is now finally catching on the concept of lifestyle hotels with the launch of chains such as Svenska Design Hotels from Sweden based on straight-line minimalist Scandinavian design concepts (currently two properties are operational in Mumbai and Bangalore, with another eight in various stages of development) and Soho House (highly exclusive private member clubs with various properties across the world and now launching in Mumbai in 2015). Surely, the future of hospitality is here and the big boys beware because once you have stayed at a lifestyle hotel, you are going to be pampered so much and spoilt silly that it will become difficult, if not impossible, to accept anything less elsewhere. Zia Shiekh, Chief Executive Officer, Svenska Design Hotels
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[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="130"] Nitesh Gandhi, General Manager, Trident Gurgaon[/caption] By Sourish Bhattacharyya THE food and beverage revenue of the Trident Gurgaon had been growing at Rs 1.5 crore to Rs 2 crore year on year. This fiscal, it’s a steeper line out there on the growth graph ’ the jump has been of Rs 3 crore, and there are still three months left of FY2014-15. The reason? A smart move by the 11-year-old hotel’s general manager, Nitesh Gandhi, who has worked his way up since his green years at Cilantro, the 24-hour restaurant, when the luxury hotel had just opened its doors in 2004. It all started with an inquiry from a major international client a year ago for an al fresco upper crust party for 700 people. Till then, the hotel, which celebrated its tenth anniversary with a big bash last year, wasn’t able to entertain such inquiries because it had limited banqueting space to offer. But the client was too important for the Trident to be asked to look for another venue. Gandhi therefore undertook a recce of the property and discovered that it had a vast under-utilised parking lot that could, on occasions, be turned into an al fresco banqueting venue. The parking lot, in fact, has two little tree-shaded green islands ’ one ideal for a bar and the other, for a marriage mandap. Significantly, the approach to this parking lot is past the water body at the hotel’s main square, which presents a spectacular sight in the evening when it is lit up by flaming torches. The corporate party was a huge success and it paved the way for the hotel to sell the space for what Gandhi calls ’uber luxury weddings’. Typically, a wedding reception in this league is for 500 to 700 people and the hotel charges Rs 7,000 per guest. Unsurprisingly, F&B revenues today contribute 55-60 per cent of the hotel’s earnings. The hotel’s two restaurants ’ Cilantro and the Indian fine-dining destination, Saffron ’ have also given Gandhi an additional reason to look happier. Their earnings, year to date, are up by 20 per cent, which means they have bucked what is known locally as the Cyber Hub effect. In other words, unlike other Gurgaon and South-West Delhi restaurants, they’ve shown a revenue growth despite the phenomenal success of the Cyber City ’restaurant mall’. ’Food is one of the top three reasons why corporate travelers choose to stay at a particular hotel,’ says Gandhi, offering a rationale for his F&B focus. The hotel, he says, has earned Rs 850 crore in the past 11 years and earned a gross operating profit of Rs 450 crore. ’Each room at the Trident has been sold 3,300 times in these 11 years,’ Gandhi adds with an air of self-satisfaction. Food therefore is the new goal post for the Trident. Few people understand food as well as Gandhi, who’s been primarily an F&B ops person, and his target, set by The Oberoi Group’s President, Kapil Chopra, is to ’bring luxury back to Indian cuisine’. As a first move, Gandhi got Izzat Hussain, a brilliant chef, unani doctor and descendant of Awadh’s last royal family, to showcase his cuisine at Saffron. Throughout 2015, Hussain will be coming back to the Trident to share his secrets with Saffron’s chefs. With such inputs, Saffron will definitely find a place at the top of the must-visit restaurants of Delhi-NCR. For Gandhi, it means the cash registers ringing a bit louder than usual. Sourish Bhattacharyya is the Consulting Editor of BW.
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By Bikramjit Ray ONE of the country’s iconic hotel brands, The Leela Palaces, Hotels and Resorts, and the company that controls it (Hotel Leelaventure Limited, henceforth mentioned as The Leela Group), have been struggling with debt for quite some time, but the industry grapevine is abuzz with whispers that the luxury chain is selling two significant assets to turn around its fortunes. The Leela Group, which sold its Kovalam property in 2011 for Rs 500 crore, is in the process of selling two other hotels in its portfolio. If rumours are to be believed, the two hotels are the Leela Palace Chennai and The Leela Goa. No one within the group was willing to speak when contacted by BW Hotelier, citing a non-disclosure clause, but we have heard that negotiations are on and due diligence is being done for both properties. The company’s objective is to wipe out a considerable amount of the debt which the Leela group is struggling under, even with rising revenues. According to an ICICI Securities Ltd report dated June 5, 2014, the group’s total debt stood at Rs 4,976 crore in FY14. The Leela Group’s annual interest commitment is said to be over Rs 500 crore, while its estimated turnover is Rs 822 crore, so the going it still very tough. A significant reduction of debt is desperately needed, the report states. The Leela Group got into a high debt situation after opening its luxury hotels first in Chanakyapuri, New Delhi, and then on the Adyar Seaface in Chennai. The two hotels set the group back by Rs 2,900 crore. The high capex in these two properties ’ averaging Rs 5 crore per room ’ coupled with moderate market growth has led to heavy losses over the last two years. The group’s combined net loss, according to ICICI Securities, now stands at Rs 875 crore. To pare its debt, the company first sold its Kovalam property, but it did not help much. In 2013, the group executed an agreement for sale with Reliance Industries for the Chennai IT Park. The deal was pegged at Rs 170.17 crore. If the sale of the Chennai and Goa hotels go through as planned, there is hope that The Leela Group will eventually get back into the black. Bikramjit Ray is the Executive Editor of BW Hotelier.
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By Archit Gupta In the hurly burly high stress world of business travel a good night’s sleep is of paramount importance. Hotels and hotel chains are always striving to make the slumber experience of the guest as comfortable as possible. The most important thing when it comes to sleep is what you sleep on and in this field; the hospitality industry has made giant strides. When you enter a modern hotel room, there are a number of trends in the bed and bedding segment of the hotel industry in the international market. These include, electric beds which can be adjusted to increase comfort’ which is very popular with high-end suites in luxury properties. Mattresses with Eurotop or PillowTop construction are another growing trend in the bedding segment. These add more comfort cushioning layers and end the hassle of flipping and turning the mattress every few months as they are one side usable. This reduces the load on the housekeeping department as well. Finally, the pillow menu is an offering which has spread in the industry across the subcontinent as well and is just another customization hotel’s offer for a restful stay. As far as lifespan of a hotel bed and mattress is concerned, it should easily last 8 to 10 years, though internationally due to hygiene issues, the trend is to replace mattresses every five years. The choice of mattresses in India has also seen a massive increase in recent years, with the entry of big international brands entering even the retail market. This has led to not only better product specifications, but better construction and international quality beds and mattresses which we at King Koil, also happen to follow. ’We are the only brand in the world which is spread over 85 countries, making us the world’s most popular premium mattress. The core strength of our brand is the penetration of the hospitality market in most countries we are present in. If we talk of the Asia Pacific region, we have the most premium and extensive client list containing almost all of the top hotel chains. ’In recent past, we have supplied King Koil bedding products to hotel properties operated by Starwood, IHG, ITC Hotels, Carlson Rezidor, Golden Tulip, Accor, Taj and Best Western. Archit Gupta is Managing Director of King Koil.
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BENGALURU ranks 16th among 50 cities across the world where a global agency tested hotels for the quality of their WiFi connectivity and the number of them that offer the service for free. It is also the only Indian city to make it to the list, where the Top 3 are Stockholm, Budapest and Tokyo. Berlin and Munich are just above Bengaluru at Nos. 14 and 15 respectively, and Seattle, Rome and Barcelona follow it in the global rankings just released by www.hotelwifitest.com. The ranking are limited to 50 countries that are in Hotel WiFi Test's most-tested category. Not getting free WiFi connectivity has become a sore point with travellers across categories because it is seen by them as an entitlement because of the high prices they other pay both for their rooms and food and beverages. Keeping the sentiment in mind, a quick look at the Hotel WiFi Test global rankings reveals that Istanbul and Stockholm are the most generous cities in this regard - 91.5 per cent of Istanbul hotels offer complimentary WiFi; the percentage is 89.5 in Stockholm and 87.9 in Barcelona. Among the much-travelled cities, Dubai is the stingiest, with only 40.9 per cent of its hotels extending this courtesy. Tokyo is a distant second from the bottom with 51.2 per cent and Washington, D.C. and Las Vegas follow with 58 per cent and 59.1 per cent of their hotels offering WiFi services for free. The global rankings also throw up interesting regional snapshots. Asia, for instance, is at the top for hotel WiFi quality (49.5 per cent), but at the bottom for the percentage of hotels offering free in-room WiFi (61.2 per cent). South Korea is the leader in hotel WiFi quality (92 per cent) by a healthy margin in 7.1 percentage points to the No. 2, Japan. Even though Sweden is only No. 7 in the country ranking, Stockholm is No. 1 among cities. The definitions following by the study are: A hotel, according to www.hotelwifitest.com, judged as having adequate WiFi must provide an expected download speed of at least 3 Mbps (the Netflix recommendation for SD-quality streaming) and an upload speed of 500 kbps (the Skype recommendation for high-quality, non-HD video calling). "This type of ranking is easy to understand, and it makes perfect sense from a practical standpoint. For most travellers, having super-fast and consistently stable WiFi is a great bonus, but their first priority is ensuring that basic quality expectations for Internet access are met," the study points out. The free WiFi percentage is calculated as a ratio of hotels that offer free in-room WiFi to all hotels for which the WiFi price structure and availability is known. Hotel WiFi is a synonym for in-room WiFi; hotels that offer free WiFi only in public areas are not counted among the ones offering free WiFi. Sourish Bhattacharyya is the Consulting Editor of BW Hotelier.
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LUMINARIES from the tourism and hospitality industries mooted the idea of creating a tourism promotion council assist and advise the Government of Rajasthan's Tourism Department at a BW Hotelier Roundtable at the ITC Rajputana in Jaipur this past weekend. The gathering discussed the present situation of hotel occupancies and tourist arrivals in the state and the problems that needed to be addressed. The idea of forming the council, to act like a "think tank for tourism", was discussed among those present, who were also a part of the newly formed and soon to be registered Federation of Travel and Hospitality, Rajasthan (FTHR). The discussion started with Bhim Singh, who founded Rajasthan Tours in 1959, going down memory lane. "I remember tourism in post-Independence Jaipur really began in the 1950s, when the city had only one hotel, in front of the railway station, called Kesar-e-Hind," he reminisced. The establishment was run by a Muslim gentleman who used to be the manager, cook and waiter, and also operated the pick-up and drop facility for guests to and from the railway station. Much progress has been made since then. "I think there is an imbalance between the glut of rooms and tourist arrivals in Jaipur," said Randhir Vikram Singh, Joint Managing Director of Hotel Castle Mandawa. "A lot of people who are not professional hoteliers but are involved in the real estate or in the alcohol business park their money in hotels, drawing a number of chain hotels from across the world to start operating out of Jaipur," Singh said. This has led to an explosion of hotel room numbers in the city. There is also an imbalance of trained manpower and the number of rooms available in the city. There are more problems as well. Jaipur airport hasn't really developed as an international terminal. You only have four international flights coming in daily from the Middle East. You have no European airline coming into Jaipur. Everyone lands in Delhi and uses travel agents there to come into the state. Rajasthan is actually losing out in the bargain, Randhir Vikram Singh informed us. The hotels too are now betting against each other, trying to fill up rooms. The ARRs compare poorly with South India, for instance. "What sells for $250 a night there, can be got in Rajasthan for $30," Randhir Vikram Singh said. But there is always the brighter side. "When we used to have our meetings a decade ago, we used to talk only about the shortage of rooms, I remember the room requirement in the starred category then used to be a mere 3,000," Gyan Prakash, ex-director of FICCI, Rajasthan, said. The shortfall doesn't exist anymore. "The present government is very proactive on tourism, so the situation is looking good," he said. One of the great contributors to tourism revenue in Rajasthan is the domestic traffic, he added, saying that this really helps shorten the off-season, which confronts you if you are dependent entirely on the international market. "The biggest challenge today is to push marketing initiatives in Europe and the US to help bring in more international tourists into the state," said Kuldeep Singh Chandela, Managing Director, Spice Court Restaurant. When we speak to tourists from those countries, we discover that there is hardly any marketing effort for Rajasthan as a destination in those markets, he said. "We should have more extensive campaigns and the official delegations should include more tour and travel operators as well as hoteliers, not just government officials," he said. There is no longer a dearth of rooms in Jaipur, Chandela emphasised. What was needed, though, was a regular flow of tourists "so that we can fill up the rooms". Mohan Singh, Managing Director, Rajasthan Tours, raised the issue of air connectivity, saying Rajasthan was better off in this regard between 1984 and 2004. "We are missing the connectivity among tourist centres within the state. Jaipur, Udaipur and Jodhpur are not connected, which hampers the way we can package Rajasthan," Singh said. "Rajasthan is the most mature tourism market in India, yet growth has been lopsided. Moreover, a mere 20 per cent of the industry is organised," Sunil Gupta, General Manager, ITC Rajputana, and President, Hotel and Restaurant Association of Rajasthan. What the sector needs, he said, is a structured approach, structured marketing, structured selling and structured functioning. The widespread concern over saturation of the rooms market came across in the discussion. It may take a couple of years for the market to stabilise and even as it heads in that direction, the industry is getting focused on bringing in many more tourists from all over the world and, more importantly, within India. Bikramjit Ray is the Executive Editor of BW Hotelier.
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New consumers are looking beyond just the hotel, but is the industry prepared to wake to this new reality? The perceived differences between the Indian and international travelers are now blurring. Don't forget that a lot more Indians travel abroad, so they are getting used to the service abroad. A lot of mid-level operators coming into the country are now giving the kind of service they offer in their hotels abroad. There are no bell boys in many of the new three-star hotels. You have to come down to get a newspaper, which is an add on. I believe that the over-expectation of Indian customers is getting tempered today. They have more realistic expectations. What has changed today is that customers no longer expect just a good hotel. They want good food and a good experience overall. Whether they are there for leisure, business or a conference, it's the overall experience that they get in a hotel that counts. What do we do differently, being an international brand, in India? We are bringing in an entirely new culture. Many Indian hotel companies are trying to do new and different things. A number of international companies are already doing them. We have the experience and expertise globally, which makes it easier for us to bring it into India. For the Indian companies, the challenge and the opportunity is to quickly understand this fact and do it better. I don't for a moment believe that Starwood can come here and operate hotels better than Indian companies can, but I certainly believe we bring in more efficiencies to the use of technology and to the use of our global processes, which Indian companies will certainly start adopting as well. The transition in the attitude to service we see in the hospitality industry isn't just limited to it. Indians are changing the way they live. Look at social media platforms. Indians use them more than anywhere else in the world. We have Gen Y travellers, millennial travellers who are more adaptable to global trends. When we have a 60-year-old customer, they would probably say, "I don't want to do laundry", while someone who is from the younger generation, a techie who travels abroad, may not mind. He has done it abroad, after all. The altering demographics of the customers are making changes like those happening in mature markets easier to adapt to India. When we speak about service in hotels, we have to also look at whether India has enough people to staff the industry. The industry is growing so fast that questions being raised on the quality and availability of talent to meet its demand for skilled hands. Rooms will remain in short supply, but what about the shortage of talent? The talent crunch is a reality that the industry must face up to. Nonetheless, we are heading towards another golden era of the hospitality industry. The surge in business that it saw between 2003 and 2008, when demand grew faster than supply, is poised to come back in 2015. It's back to the days of growth. As spoken to Bikramjit Ray. Dilip Puri is the Managing Director-Indian and Regional Vice President, Starwood Hotels & Resorts.
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