“No matter how small the hotel is, it will have two or three restaurants. So they now need to change. We need to be careful and know exactly what we need to do to meet customer expectations.”
Also on the agenda for the company are two new brands: one lifestyle and one luxury. The former will make its debut in the trendy Shoreditch area of London in early 2016, while the latter remains in its formative stages.
For both, Wan and his team are thinking hard about how they want to position themselves and what that even means.
“We need to define what luxury is. Luxury is a personal thing. Luxury to you might be different to me,” he explains.
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“Some people like wall-to-wall marble, chandeliers hanging down and gold-plated things everywhere. That might not be your personal taste. It can be overbearing to some people. We are now really working through defining what luxury is. We’re trying to work that out.”
He adds that the luxury brand is unlikely to come to the Middle East — and almost certainly not the UAE — anytime soon.
“There are already a lot of top-end luxury hotels in this market. I think the UAE should probably go the other way.
“Maybe Dubai is now ready for some mid-scale and some economy brands.”
If Dubai is indeed ready to diversify its offering, the charge will be led by Staywell’s recently-established Middle East office, headed up by Jose Ventura, formerly vice president business development Asia, Pacific, Middle East and Africa at Preferred Hotel Group.
“We are now back here and we have graduated from learning things and hopefully our second push will be a lot more successful,” Wan concludes.
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