F&B is 'bread and butter' of Fairmont's UAE hotels

The restaurants and bars under development at the upcoming Fairmont Palm Jumeirah will be the “bread and butter” of the hotel’s business when it opens in Q3 2012.

According to general manager Martin Van Kan, the hotel will seek to establish itself as a dining destination for local Dubai residents — in much the same way as its sister hotel Fairmont Dubai has over the past 10 years.

Van Kan said: “Food and beverage at the Palm is going to be where we hopefully are going to be opening the hotel in great style and for the foreseeable future F&B will be our bread and butter — we will be owning that community as best as we possibly can”.

He suggested that the hotel would look to topple Fairmont Dubai’s Spectrum on One restaurant “off its number one brunch spot”.

"Fairmont’s name in the city in very many respects came out of F&B and one of the big things 10 years ago was its position in brunch and that really helped elevate the F&B status here,” said Van Kan.

“There’s no reason why we can’t use that as the platform from which we can all move to greater places. There are some great opportunities and the restaurants that we have are new offerings to the market in that area in which we play,” he said of The Palm.

Henning Fries, regional vice president for Fairmont in the UAE and general manager, Fairmont Bab Al Bahr, said the restaurants at Fairmont Dubai were an “un-missable” part of the community.

“This property really set the tone for us as a brand, the success of this property was really built on the success of its food and beverage,” he said. “Being really part of the local community and being a place where people meet and socialise and so on.

“And that will be a very similar scenario at The Palm project. And that is part of our philosophy and drive — that you really build the success of the hotels first on the relationship and success within the local community,” added Fries.

Van Kan said they “deliberated for a long time” over whether to develop the F&B at Fairmont Palm Jumeirah in-house or to work with brands.

“The marketed/branded restaurants segment in Dubai is obviously very mature, so [there is some space for] coming back to grassroots and creating them yourselves and using the talents that you’re able to resource into creative or concept designs within your outlets,” said Van Kan, who decided to develop the restaurants in-house.

The signature outlet will be a pan Chinese bar restaurant concept, There will also be an informal Brazilian restaurant incorporating the Churrasco method of grilling, an all-day-dining located on the beach level with “a breakfast to die for”, and a cigar and malt lounge.