The FINANCIAL — Sheraton Metekhi Palace Hotel, the international brand with a long history in Georgia, has announced it plans to reconstruct and invest 13-15 million USD in renovation of the building.
“The initial settlement is 13.6 million USD however this expenditure might be increased up to 15 million USD based on the targeting facilities planed to upgrade at the hotel,” said Toni Toshev, General Manager of Sheraton Metekhi Palace Hotel.
“The hotel will undergo certain processes. The redesign of the hotel was a challenging in terms our wish to stay close to the historical building and simultaneously, implement the latest Sheraton standards by putting more emphasis on existing hospitality trends,” declared Toshev.
“It took a lot of time to develop the concept considering the market changes. Currently, we are preparing 2 mock-up rooms to test how the rooms’ design will be accepted by the customers. Than we will be seaking to obtain our customers and associates feed back whether they like the new product and would it be suitable for everyone. After our plans are set, renovations will start presumably in the second quarter of 2011. We will try to speed up the process and reduce the initial projected time of 2 years to 1-1.5 years. The hotel will be operating fully during this period, however, certain areas will be under the renovation simultaneously at the same times,” Toshev added.
Q. What will the year 2011 mean for the Sheraton? What is your forecast of tourism development in Georgia?
A. The year 2011 will be challenging for our hotel as a new competitor is entering the market, aend respectively, we do expect an increase in supply versus demand. That is required a new approach and exploring of new niches on the market in effort to secure a sufficient customers’ inflow.
If there are not changes in the adopted governmental program for the tourism development and determined political and economical climate in the country shows stability, the level of tourists will continue growing. There are plenty of opportunities in the hospitality sector and many business activities are being carried out. I think that the second quarter and summer period is when the inflow of leisure tourists will increase the most and boost additionally travellers’ demand.
Q. What are the major strategies and directions of the Sheraton Tbilisi? How have the strategies and marketing directions changed over the years?
A. We have been living in a very dynamic time which requires certain flexibility. When we talk about long term strategy we have always been very much dedicated to promoting the hospitality industry in Georgia and for a very long time we have been the flagman of this hospitality.
During different periods of time, due to market requirements, the hotel had to change strategy from being the only hotel in the city, even in the country where everybody came to. As soon as competition arrived, we had to change our strategy and tried to explore and step into new unexplored territories. We have been looking for different customer layers, for different opportunities in the sport, business, and leisure fields and tried to get a different market share or different customers' levels in a way to keep occupancy level at the necessary level and secure a good income for the stakeholders.
We have been using different marketing strategies and tools to achieve our goals, creating special packeges and promotions, using different sources to introduce the product from a direct mailing, newspapers and magazines ads, to media and TV advertizment. This very much depends of how you like to present your product, yourself, how you penetrate the existing capability on the market and explore new opportunities and customer’s levels that will be fitting into our portfolio and satisfied by the offered facilities.
Q. What was the influence of the Sheraton’s operations after other international hotel brands entered the Georgian market?
A. We monitor the market very carefully. We getting to know our competitors and have certain expectations of how they will influence the market. Sheraton puts a lot of emphasis on securing a certain business segments which are actually dedicated to our brand. Besides, we are always looking to new different customers’ layers which could also be attracted by our product.
When Radisson entered the market its influence was quite heavily affecting the existing international hotels as the market supply rose up to 27% while the demand was only reached 12%, so you can imagine the challenges we had. In this period, we have experience a slight tendency of hotel’s price war, that was very much benefiting the customers and it is not a sicrect, the prices in the Tbilisi’s lodging industry were a bit higher.
Q. How many guests did you host in 2010? Who are the majority of your guests, are they business travellers or tourists? From which country have you hosted the majority of guests?
A. The Sheraton hosts more than 20,000 customers per year when we talk for accommodation. If we talk about guests visiting our banqueting facilities in terms of functions, seminars, conferences, our restaurants and bar we have almost 70,000 visitors per year. So in total, we host 100,000 visitors per year.
Sheraton Tbilisi is oriented predominantly at the business customer segment however, recently we have experienced different segmentations due to the changes in the demand. Historically in the past up to 90% of our customer were business visitors and 10% leisure. Currently, we are notifying an increased arrival of more leisure travellers to Georgia. Of course these figures much depending on the period of the year, as in the summer the percentage of leisure travellers reaches 40%, while in the off-season for leisure tourism the ratio stays 80% to 20%.
Majority of guests at the Sheraton are from the USA, UK, Turkey, Germany, France, Italy, and we also have a lot of customers from the CIS countries.
Q. How did the number of tourists change in the year 2008, as well as during the global crisis period?
A. The Georgian market and customer inflow was affected very much by the events happing in 2008. Our hotel mostly because of its location has the privilege to host a lot of visitors who were coming to the country to monitor and evaluate the post-war situation. However at this time, in general, the travellers were almost shut down for a couple of months. The good thing for Georgia was that everything was very quickly restored due to the emerging economy and international support received.
In 2009 we saw slight improvement. However, it was a very difficult year for all Georgians due to unstable political situation with the opposition rallies in the city centre, which definitely affected customer’s inflow. The tourism sector is very sensitive to any circumstances happening in the country and is very much affected by any positive and negative events. Anyway, if we are looking into the statistics, the tourists’ inflow in Georgia is definitely increasing from year to year.
Q. In your opinion, in the short-run what activities should be conducted to increase the number of tourists in Georgia?
A. I think that the Government has adopted the right strategy and is trying to promote Georgia in all possible markets, advertising in the global medias as CNN, BBC and Euronews by creating and showing an image of a stabile country and developing tourism market. This definitely will impact and encourage more people to think about Georgia when planning their future travelling routes.
From our perspective, the authority should be focusing more on the publicity and presentation during the biggest trade shows, work/approach aggressively several global travellers’ operators to attract and promote further the county tourism. It is very nice to notice that the Department of tourism is working in this direction. Also, more emphasise is required over the country’s infrastructure and some of the current available facilities that needs to be further developed in way to create a memorable experience for these travellers who visit Georgia. To facilitate international tourists these areas should be developed considering the international standards, without any deviations.
Internet and website are the magic engines in our life and these recourses should be further explored.
Q. What is the menu at the Sheraton like? What cuisine and dishes are available? What is the business lunch at the Sheraton comprised of?
A. We have a much diversified kitchen and an innovative chef who has a good international experience and knowledge of different cuisines. We are using a lot of recipes from many parts of the world cuisine like Mediterranean, Europe, Asia and South America. We try to be diversified in terms of which dishes we offer as we have permanent and loyal customers who expect a variety of dishes. Of course, we should not forget that we are in Georgia, and we should be providing Georgian food for our international guest as well. So our Georgian menu is very carefully selected and we have selected some of the famous and tasty Georgian dishes at the hotel.
Currently, we provide a business lunch opportunity in our Slammer Bar where we have a “special’s menu” which changes on a daily basis. The business lunch starts from 8 GEL, and goes up to 30 GEL depending on the selection of dishes.
Q. What kind of facilities do you offer guests? Which facilities are the most attractive for Sheraton guests?
A. As a 5 star establishment we provide a full range of all required for a 5 star establishment services and facilities starting from different room type categories. Our Club floor provides a special VIP treatment in the Club launch where customers have accessibility almost for 18 hours a day. We offer breakfast, tea and coffee service, refreshment, wine and beer during the entire day as well as a special so called “happy hour” at lunchtime and light supper at the evening. There are a basic business facilities as a free internet access, computers, printers, international and local newspapers, magazines, games and entertainments.
Our Health club with out-in door swimming polls and large Fitness Centre is very attractive not only for the hotel customers but for many locals.
Additionally, we do have our on transportation service that our customer could take an advantage in any time.
And nevertheless, our Starwood Prefer Guest (SPG) program, rewarded as the best loyalty program in the world for a several consecutive years. This is a unique opportunity for any of our guest that could be enrolled and star getting benefits by earning points for each dollar spent during their visits. The program applies not only for any of the Sheraton properties around the globe, but is relevant for any hotel of the entire Starwood chain.
Q. Does Sheraton Tbilisi plan to add some new facilities in 2011?
A. Sheraton, within the framework of renovation plans will upgrade some of its facilities. We are providing an additional opportunity for our customers to experience the Sheraton brand and the services provided.
The Sheraton brand will provide two very dynamic programmes, one is called Sheraton LINK. It is a meeting point for all customers ready to experience a high speed internet access in the specially designated area in the main lobby area where additionally our customers can access free business facilities and request refreshments. This service will be available 24 hours. Secondly, we are looking very much to introduce a new SPA concept that will be benefiting not only the hotel customers but the local society. Both program are currently launched and working in our sister hotel Sheraton Batumi.
Also, we are targeting to fully replace our audio/video equipment and TVs, and secure all rooms with Tea and Coffee service faculties.
Q. What is special about Sheraton beds?
A. It’s called the Sheraton Sweet Sleeper! It’s a concept that was developed many years ago. In the hospitality field the quality of bed is one of the most importance dimension of how the customer with have a rest and good sleep. Sheraton has put a lot of emphasis on developing this concept and it is a good combination of the latest know-how technology. It is not only the bed, the entire program consist of all materials selectively including in the complete package as mattress, duvet, pillows and bed sheets. Moreover, as we have very positive feed back and the customers were very exciting, they start asking to purchase it at home, Sheraton Sweet Sleeper is a trade mark product available for retail sales and anyone can order it.
Q. What are the room prices? Do you offer any special discounts?
A. Sheraton official prices vary from 250 USD, going up to 750 USD depending on the room type category as well the period of the year. In the hospitality industry customers can experience different prices for different periods. Of course, we differentiate and do have special corporate contracts based on the loyalty and fruitful relationship built up with the customers over the years. Occasionally, we are proposing special packages and promotional prices as well as very attractive price stricture for long-stay guests as we do have several serviced apartments.
Q. How many people are currently employed at the hotel? How do you manage to motivate staff?
A. Currently we have 162 permanent associates. Moreover, we have so called buyouts, or casuals who work at the Sheraton during certain periods of the year when we are most busy, apart from the part-timers. We try to keep all them involved as much as possible and therefore we are flexible in terms of employment as we can reach a capacity of 220 employed people when necessary.
Managing people requires a lot of effort and dedication from the management to keep them tuned and motivated. One of the strengths of the Sheraton team is its long-term commitment and engagement. We treat our associates equally as partners in our business. We constantly ask for their feedback on what they think about the business and what can be done to improve it. Majority of the improvements at the hotel come from the very good collaboration of the different associate’s levels where we do not consider their position. We are always ready and open for any associate’s feed back and our communicational channels are quite transparent.
Secondly, we do have an official associate feed back program where our associates are able once a year to take part in a survey and give their opinion about the ongoing processes. This they do on-line on the web, where their responses are collected anonymously and provided by an independence company. The Sheraton pays great attention to this feedback, where we are preparing an action plan and lately truck any further development over the problematic or respectively, the good achievement discovered.
In addition, as the remuneration for associate is one of the most important criteria we managed to create and implement several incentives program for our employees. Besides, we kept all benefits for them even during the times of unstable financial environment.
Q. Please list the activities the company does in terms of CSR?
A. A lot of emphasis is put on CSR. We started with patronage of one of the retirement houses on Nakhalovka, where we have been taking care of people for almost a year and a half, delivering food products to them and making their lives that little bit easier.
Our team is very much dedicated to the environment and is taking part of any preventive environment activities. We actively participating in the trees planning and continue maintaining the job done previously, not any as one time event.
Since more than a year we have adopted the program of garbage separation in effort to enforce the associates’ mentality and boost their environmental awareness and currently we are collecting separately the paper and plastic recycling our waste paper.
Recently we supported Catarzisi house and also still have several areas where we are highly dedicated, including patronage of a school for the disabled children allocated near to our premises.
Nevertheless, is worth to mention Earth Hour initiative, one of the most recognized and rewarded activity that occur each year 28 March. At this time exactly at 20:00 the entire world is shutting down the electricity for an hour! We tried to involved the Georgian society last year, not that much successful but this year we really managed to regain a great support and launched something spectacular with the assistant of Georgia Today, Radio City, Messenger newspaper and Rustavi 2 was broadcasting directly the event. Also, al international hotels were participating that boost the awareness of the society.
Q. The Sheraton hosts VIP guests. What’s more many historical happenings and events are connected with this hotel. Can you list how many country leaders and stars the hotel has hosted?
A. We have good records of VIP celebrities including politicians, presidents and primer ministers, musicians, artists, sportsmen and many official delegation delegations. The long list of famous guests can not be mentioned in a few words, however, I just like to highlight some of them: Roman Herzog, Boris Yeltsin, Geidar Aliev, Hans Dietrich Genscher, Oscar Lafontaine, Gerhard Schroeder, Suleiman Demirell, Colin Powel Donald Rumsfield, John Mac Cane, George Soros, Javier Solana, Butors Gali, Coolio, Jamiroquai, Joe Cocker, Earth, Wind and Fire, Ray Charles, James Brown, Al Jarreau, Charles Aznaur, Vanessa Redgrave, Franco Nero, Nick Nolte, Diego Maradona and many others.
