Talking about his strategy for F&B, he says: “I want to make it one of those places where you have to be at least once a week. It is about repositioning a hotel in pricing as well as product, preparing a possible uplift and renovation of the hotel.”
In an exclusive to Hotelier, Woltering says he is working on “full-fledged renovation” of the property, which will include the rooms and suites, along with a few restaurants, including Pronto, Café Sushi and The Exchange Grill. The lobby, which recently completed a multi-million dollar renovation, will stay as it is; however, the executive conference centre which is spread across a total area of 1,234m2 on the 33rd floor will get a second look.
Woltering is adamant throughout that he’s not trying to compete with hotels in different areas. He explains: “There’s no need for me as a hotel to compete with hotels in Deira or JBR. What I do believe and what I would like to discuss with DTCM and the authorities is, can we [local] hotels associate ourselves a little bit stronger, and position ourselves as Sheikh Zayed Road and do joint marketing initiatives to promote that area? I think that will be interesting and innovative and further develop this area as a city within a city.”
Returning to the UAE after more than 15 years, Woltering claims life and business hasn’t changed that much. “The only thing that’s changed is the online distribution through third party operators, Booking.com, Expedia, and our own websites. And that is starting to impact our business in a good way.
“I believe that it’s only the ones who play hard ball and are on top of their game who will survive. If you’re not visible online, and fully involved in the online distribution war game — if I can call it that — you are not only losing business but in the long-term you will lose the war.”
He is philosophical about OTAs, and says that “nobody can promote a city as well as Booking.com and Expedia because they have marketing budgets that we as an individual hotel do not have”. However, he adds: “But we can offer security of the booking, and a best price guarantee, and these are things these [OTAs] cannot offer. They don’t offer loyalty points which we do, so there is a huge advantage of booking directly on the dot-com sites. Those are advantages nobody can take away.”
Woltering concludes: “I’ve got my roadmap laid out for me, and I know where I want to take the different properties.”
| Advertisement |
Article continues on next page...
Search our database of more than 2,700 industry companies
