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发表于 2009-11-4 11:28:00
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Stephen Joyce: Making the mid-range a pleasant place to be
Travel, in the words of Stephen Joyce, chief executive of Choice Hotels, has become spectacularly inhospitable.
“For a significant number of travellers, it is so bad that going to the front desk and seeing a friendly face who says something nice to you is so odd an experience that the hotel business – when it does it right – is actually providing therapy to the travelling public,” he says.
Mr Joyce is making a semi-serious point about the vogue for self-service check-in desks and other changes to hospitality that fit the needs of travellers looking to save time and money, but which might not necessarily make the experience terribly pleasant.
Still, Mr Joyce is not one to complain. Choice, with 5,800 hotels and 470,000 rooms, is about the only hotel group sounding remotely upbeat as the recession engulfs the sector.
Choice will not escape the downturn lightly. The company predicts that in 2009, revenues per available room – the industry benchmark – will decline by 10 per cent.
However, as many hoteliers cut rates and worry about their survival, Mr Joyce has reason for short-term optimism and confidence in the group's long-term prospects.
Its brands, such as Comfort Inn, Quality, Cambria Suites and Sleep Inn – easily recognisable in the US – are in that economy to mid-price range that have become such a tempting alternative to the full-service upper-end hotels for the cost-conscious business and leisure traveller.
“It is very well placed for a downturn,” says the 49 year-old who was poached last year from Marriott.
These brands are ripe for international expansion. Hotel developments may be stemmed by the lack of available finance, but in the long run, says Mr Joyce, Choice's brands should be well suited for the new travelling armies of emerging middle class professionals in markets such as India and China.
“These markets have very high-end hotels and very low ones, and nothing appropriate in the middle. That is exactly where we will play,” he says.
Hotel costs in India, says Mr Joyce, are out of control. “I stayed in a Trident Hilton for $550 a night. It was not worth $550.”
China, he adds, is similar to the US in the 1950s, when the development of highways gave rise to the Holiday Inn chain. InterContinental Hotels Group has made inroads into the China market, as has Marriott.
Mr Joyce should know. He was 26 years at Marriott, his last job there was as vice-president of global development.
He joined Marriott when it had 75 hotels and 40,000 rooms. By the time he left last year, Marriott had some of the world's most recognisable hotel brands and a room total of 600,000. In 2007, Mr Joyce oversaw the development of 55,000 extra rooms.
He would still be with Marriott but for the persistence of Choice, whose overtures he rebuffed several times. But he fancied the challenge of taking Choice – a group that deals only in franchised hotels – on the same path as his previous employer.
“The big thing for me was I felt I could have a much bigger impact with Choice than with Marriott.
“Choice is not as big in some of the other markets as it should be, and in the long run I saw an opportunity to add brands.
“Choice is more of a mid-sized entity today, but could be a large-sized entity in the not too distant future if we do a couple of things right and have a bit of luck.” The first task is to see Choice through the downturn.
“My belief is that when we stop barraging people with bad news, they will take a deep breath and go back to work,” he says.
As that happens, he expects the trends of business travel to change, and Choice to be the beneficiary.
Smaller hotels will be more in demand than the mega-properties outside the big urban areas, as business travellers choose to eat out.
“What is big in the US and moving to Europe is that a lot of business travellers prefer the smaller in-and-out [hotels] with a more refined set of services.
“They are utilising the bed and the lobby area, and the Wi Fi piece is important. Being able to conduct business throughout the hotel is important.
“But the relatively older style of stiff formality, of lots of employees standing around, is going to wane.
“If you're a full service brand with lots of meeting spaces but you're not a real convention space, you're going to struggle.”
Such a full service offering was one of the reasons for hotels to drive up prices in recent years, as hoteliers sought to recover from the mistake of deep discounting in the post-9/11 period.
In a climate in which guests will be acutely conscious of what they are getting for their money, Mr Joyce doubts that the current bout of discounting will be followed by a similar rise in rates.
“At the upper end, you are going to see some discounting, but for most of the hotel business, people are going to hold rates and live with lower occupancy,” he says. “The business traveller is going to perceive value – some decline and not rapid increases.
“The business traveller for the next several years is going to be relatively happy.” |
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发表于 2009-11-4 11:28:00