TravTalk India Online Magazine
AccorHotels organised its Showcase for 2017 in Mumbai and Delhi, which saw the hospitality giant’s properties from around the world come under one roof to meet the travel trade partners in India.
Arif Patel, Vice President – Sales, Marketing, Distribution & Loyalty – AccorHotels India, revealed that 50 properties from 27 countries presented their products in the Delhi Showcase. “This is one of the largest showcases done by any brand in the country. We are very excited and the response is overwhelming. In Mumbai, we had more than 800 customers, and in Delhi we had around 700 people. I spoke to participants and all of them had some active leads to close.” He further informed that they are looking at offering a panoply of brands under AccorHotels to customers in India, and taking necessary steps for the same. “We have a larger distribution strategy in place. Firstly, we are opening global sales offices in nine cities with 42 sales people,” he informed. In future AccorHotels will showcase products from selected destinations as well in India.
“We are the largest player in Singapore with 14,000 rooms, and we are going to invite all our hotels from Singapore to come to India to meet customers who have business for Singapore. However, the Showcase will remain the face of our B2B events, and we might take it to Bengaluru next year or year after that,” added Patel. Patel said that with the acquisition of FRHI Hotels by AccorHotels, they have more opportunities for development. “In India, we have 46 operating hotels. We are going to open nine more hotels by the end of this year, which will make it 55. We will cross the 10,000 mark in rooms. These three brands give us more opportunities to work with potential developers. Our strategy now will be to grow our luxury portfolio, while not losing sight on upscale and midscale brands. We are going to be in 26 cities by the end of this year. The new cities are Lucknow, Vadodara, Guwahati, Nagpur, Coimbatore and we just opened a hotel in Cochin,” he claimed.
The travel trade remains a focus for Patel, and he claimed that they are going to work with tour operators, wedding planners, entertainment industry, corporate customers, and travel management companies. For them, it’s a 360 degree approach on both B2B and B2C. He also talked about their new tool, Leisure Online (LOL). “We are the first chain to launch Leisure Online, which is a platform where without any human intervention, one can book up to 30 rooms at a participating hotel. This could be done at a rate, which is different from what one sees on a B2C site. You can generate your own invoice and pay online,” he added. He further said that they are looking at densifying in the cities where they already have hotels like Hyderabad, Chennai and Goa. Also Patel informed that they will open another Ibis in Pune. “We will continue to densify existing network, and would also grow in Tier-II, III cities,” he said.
The number game:
– In India, AccorHotels has 46 operating hotels and it is going to open nine more hotels by the end of this year
– The hotel group is going to be in 26 cities by the end of 2017, including new ones such as Lucknow, Vadodara, Guwahati, Nagpur, Coimbatore, Cochin
“We will cross the 10,000 mark in rooms. Our strategy now will be to grow our luxury portfolio, while not losing sight on upscale and midscale brands.”
– Arif Patel Vice President – Sales, Marketing, Distribution & Loyalty – AccorHotels India
