Renewing themselves

Vietnam’s luxury hotels have been particularly hard hit by sharply lower tourist arrivals to Vietnam. International arrivals dropped 19 percent, year over year, in the first seven months of 2009.  However, managers in the elite hotel sector are looking to the future rather than moaning about the present.

The five-star Movenpick Saigon is spending $25 million on an 18 month upgrade to its rooms and services, focusing in particular on the hotel’s Nishimura, Café Saigon and Lotus Court restaurants and its gymnasium and spa area.

Movenpick executive Dominik Stamm said that the Mulligan Bar will turn into a late night club. This move is in anticipation of guidance from the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) allowing more four and five star hotel services to stay open till 2 am.

Phan Huy Tien of the Berjaya - Hotay joint venture that owns the Sheraton Hanoi told that guests are scarce at most of Hanoi’s five star hotels. Only the Hanoi Hilton and the Melia come near filling their rooms. Though the Sheraton’s occupancy ratio fell to 47 percent in the first half of 2009, it is working hard on plans for the post crisis period.

“We’re planning ahead for the recovery so we can come out of the gate fast, ahead of the competition, said Patricia Neo of Starwood Hotels & Resorts. We also believe that today’s reduced travel budgets, canceled meetings and ‘staycations’ (stay-at-home vacations) are tomorrow’s pent-up demand.”

Starwood plans to open the Sheraton Nha Trang in November. The group has put into operation a telephone number (free of charge) which clients can use to book hotel rooms at 950 hotels run by Starwood worldwide.

And launching marketing campaigns

Travel agencies also say they are ready to receive the international tourists who will surge back to Vietnam as soon as the global economic recession finishes.

Saigontourist Director Vo Anh Tai said that his firm has been expanding Saigontourist’s system in Hanoi and is opening a branch in Can Tho to access the Mekong Delta market. Tai added that while waiting for the opportunities to come, the firm is emphasizing training and pushing up marketing, particularly internet marketing, so that Saigontourist is primed to greet tourists as soon as the crisis ends.

Tai commented that other countries seem to have had a more rapid economic recovery and have better dealt with the flu pandemic than Vietnam. Companies in the travel business need to detect changing tourist preferences so as to draw up reasonable marketing and advertisement policies. Vietnam has been doing this well with domestic travelers, but not so well with international tourists.

Expressing the same viewpoint, a Mexico Tourism Board official noted at a recent workshop that Vietnam tends to be very slow to draw up new tourism policies when conditions change. 

Baron Ah Moo of the Vietnam Business Forum’s tourism consultative group, says he was been told that the initial budget for promoting Vietnam’s tourism in 2009 was $2 million. Meanwhile, Thailand announced it would provide $140 million to revive tourism after the Bangkok airport was shut down for several weeks by political upheavals, additional to its ‘regular budget’ of $80 million designed for 2009.  Malaysia reportedly has reserved $180 million for ‘Truly Asia’ campaign.

National Administration for Tourism General Director Nguyen Van Tuan told the workshop that his agency will focus in five areas to get ready for the recovery of tourism:

1/ continue the ‘Impressive Vietnam’ discounted services campaign;

2/ advertise Vietnam at home and abroad as a tourist destination;

3/ organize professional training;

4/ continue upgrading facilities;