Guangzhou taps into luxury hotels
The city prepares to enter the big league of world-class five-star accommodation
Guangzhou hoteliers are looking forward to welcoming more luxury hotels to the city after the municipal government decided to open up the market, saying increased competition will raise service standards and help put the city on the international map.
The city has not had any new five-star hotels for years, but will enter the big league when world-class luxury hotels such as the Shangri-La, next to the Guangzhou International Exhibition and Convention Centre in Pazhou, open over the next two years.
Other hotels being built include the Ritz-Carlton, Crowne Plaza and Grand Hyatt, while the Sheraton and Westin groups are also looking at Guangzhou.
The Guangzhou government says the city needs 14 new five-star hotels with a total of 7,500 rooms to meet demand during the Asian Games in 2010.
Hoteliers say the city government is on the right track because Guangzhou needs top-flight branded hotels if it is to be recognised as an international city.
'The message is Guangzhou is ready to have an international lifestyle,' said Rauf Malik, general manager of China Hotel by Marriot. 'We are becoming the LA of China.'
Tony Colella, deputy general manager of the Guangdong International Hotel, said: 'Everybody wants to go to Shanghai and Beijing. It's time for Guangzhou. Competition will be fierce and everybody will improve themselves.'
Mr Malik said he was not worried that the new hotels would eat into his incentive travel business because the market was mature enough to welcome more participants.
'Five years ago if someone told me they wanted to open a five-star hotel in Guangzhou I would have laughed, but Guangzhou is now ready, with business growing and more offices migrating to the city.'
Mr Colella said new infrastructure - an international airport and the exhibition centre - also supported development of the hospitality industry. 'The exhibition centre is the key factor because people come to Guangzhou for trade fairs,' he said.
The five grandes dames of Guangzhou's hotel industry - the Garden Hotel, White Swan Hotel, China Hotel, Dongfang Hotel and Guangdong International Hotel - have enjoyed a captive market for years, enjoying sky-high occupancy rates during the biannual China Export Commodities Fair when daily room rates are as high as US$1,000. They boast a total of 4,500 rooms and most are undergoing long-overdue renovations to gear up for the competition.
'I can't stop them from coming, but I will be ready to face them,' said Mr Malik, showing off his new roof-top restaurant.
The faded Guangdong International Hotel, whose ownership in the aftermath of the collapse of its once-time owner Guangdong International Trust and Investment Corporation is still unclear, is reducing the number of rooms from 1,025 to 702.
Mr Colella said the days of 1,000-room hotels were numbered and hoteliers would have to convert their rooms to apartments or offices in order to raise occupancy rates during the low season.
'Four-hundred to 450 rooms are ideal.'
Guangzhou is not the only city in Guangdong attracting international hotel chains.
They are also going to Shenzhen, Dongguan and other Pearl River Delta cities.
But the delta still has a long way to go to catch Shanghai, which has 24 five-star hotels - including the world's highest hotel, the Grand Hyatt Shanghai, which starts on the 53rd floor of the Jin Mao Tower.
Many international hotel groups already have more than one property in Shanghai and more plan to increase their presence in the city in the lead-up to the World Expo in 2010.
Shanghai had 457 hotels at the end of last year, of which 359 had star ratings.
The city plans to open seven star-rated hotels this year alone, with even grander plans before the expo.
Additional reporting by Bill Savadove
