Tuesday 28 August 2012

Do we need hotel brands for ethnic travelers?


“East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,” Rudyard Kipling wrote more than a hundred and twenty years ago and it seems that, despite all globalization efforts, he may be right. At least if you look at the recent moves by international hotel groups such as Intercontinental to introduce China-centric hotel brands.

IHG's Hualuxe... designed to offer a traditional experience
to Chinese travelers
At the recent ANZPHIC conference in Sydney this point was hotly discussed and it seems to me that both sides have a point. On the pro side, the arguments include that Chinese travelers crave cultural familiarity in everything from food to design and service. Given that China is expected to overtake Japan by 2013 as Asia's largest travel market and is set to become the world’s largest business travel market, after the US, by 2015, it seems a wise move to tap into this coming wave of travelers with a brand tailored exactly to their needs. And these needs, apparently, include anything from daily tai chi sessions, complimentary head and shoulder massages, a 24-hour congee menu, to specifically grand entrances and tea rooms rather than boozy sports bars. 

But does this craving for familiarity really warrant a completely different brand? KP Ho, Executive Chairman of Banyan Tree Holdings begged to differ during an interview session at ANZPHIC. He warned of the compartmentalisation of travel if hotels are specifically targeted at certain nationalities and I think he may have a valid point. The craving for familiarity is certainly not a Chinese monopoly but something that is woven deeply into our social fabric, no matter what nationality you are. And so the question is: do we really want to have hotel brands that only cater for Chinese, only for Russians, only for Germans, etc?

But this is of course a numbers game, and at least for now, China is the country with the most of everything: people, growth and travelers. This poses a natural attraction for anyone keen to grow their business and as a growing travel segment the temptation is to pander to them and them alone.

If we talk about ethnic segments with economies of scale however, what about religious groups? A new study shows that Muslim tourists globally represent a major niche market worth US$126.1 billion in 2011 which is set to grow to US$192 billion by 2020. The travel industry is already responding to this trend by providing Halal foods, prayer rooms and spas adapted to religious requirements. But would it also be worth considering building hotels that are built to strict Muslim standards? Incidentally, China has a sizeable Muslim population of around 20 million, or 1.5% of the total population, which just highlights how complex the whole issue of exclusively catering for individual groups’ demands can get.

But there are already examples out there where providing a familiar experience is handled in a very subtle way. Accor has been a champion of taking the French way of life to the world for a long time. Whether you check into a Pullman Hotel in Bangkok or a Sofitel in New York, you will be greeted with a warm “Bonjour” and can enjoy a croissant for breakfast that would do any boulanger back in Paris proud. That’s why Accor hotels tend to attract a lot of travelers from France, which in turn validates the whole French experience, but without alienating non-French guests.

But let’s get back to Banyan Tree’s KP Ho: his response to his peers’ push to open China-centric brands was that cultural preferences are much better served through electronic means such as CRM and PMS, and I have to say that I wholeheartedly agree.

The personalisation tools offered through intelligently integrating with the hotel’s PMS system which holds the vital customer data offer many more opportunities to provide an atmosphere that is not only tailored to collective ethnic preferences, but to a guest’s individual tastes, without sacrificing or alienating others’.

The way the China-centric brands tailor their hotels to make them more familiar to the Chinese traveler seems to me not very dramatic: grand entrance ways, the above mentioned tai chi and wooden floors instead of carpet, as one panelist at the Sydney conference mentioned doesn’t sound particularly Chinese to me. Plus, decent congee has been on the menu in all better hotels in the region for years.  

But a capable PMS and CRM system that is intelligently linked to in-room facilities can achieve a much more familiar atmosphere. Being greeted on the in-room TV in your preferred language upon entering the room, saving TV channel preferences in the system to have your personalised line-up ready whenever you check-in, or even tailoring the in-room dining menu to reflect your favourite choices are all means by which a hotel can make their guests feel more welcome and at home.

Just make sure you get it right: there’s nothing more annoying than being greeted in the wrong language or by the wrong name, something that happens to me depressingly often. Being addressed as “Mr” Anke Gill, instead of “Ms” smacks of laziness (I guess you’ll have a 50% chance of getting it right). But being addressed as “Gill” instead of “Anke” by the in-room entertainment system is pretty irritating when Google can give you a hint in less than 30 seconds. I guess the lesson here is that the technology is only as good as the people operating it and their respective understanding of target demographics.