MÖVENPICK Hotels & Resorts has opened the first of four hotels in its China pipeline, reportedly the first international five-star hotel in Enshi, Hubei Province.

Located close to the convention centre in the city’s business district, Mövenpick Hotel Enshi is a short drive from the train station and offers quick access to the newly built airport.

The hotel comes with 240 guestrooms, including 27 suites and one presidential suite, all boasting Tujia and Miao ethnic art to reflect the local culture.

Guests can choose from a range of F&B options such as the Lotus Garden Chinese Restaurant, serving local and Cantonese cuisine; the all-day dining The Chef Theatre for European fare; and Dessert House for Mövenpick ice cream and home-made chocolates.

Other facilities include an outdoor swimming pool, a fitness centre, The Flower spa with nine therapy rooms, a hairdressing and beauty salon, a 515m² grand ballroom, a 250-pax banquet hall, eight meeting rooms and a private club lounge.

Jean Gabriel Pérès, president and CEO, Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts, said: “We are proud to become the first five-star hotel in the city of Enshi. By 2020, China is poised to become the world’s most visited tourism destination and the largest outbound travel market, and we are excited to be growing our presence here. Establishing a new five-star hotel in Enshi is a significant step forward for showcasing the Mövenpick brand to a new generation of Chinese travellers.”

Three more Mövenpick properties are slated to come online by 2015 – a 380-room resort on Phoenix Island, Sanya; a 350-key hotel in Chifeng City, Inner Mongolia; and a 300-room hotel in Jiading, Shanghai.

TUNE Hotels’ fifth Indonesia hotel, Tune Hotel Solo, began welcoming guests last week.

The 159-room property is located on Jalan Sopomo in the heart of Solo, within minutes of the city’s historical and cultural attractions and shopping options.

Mark Lankester, CEO, Tune Hotels Group, said: “Tune Hotel Solo represents the first hotel in Central Java, a city steeped in history with a fast-growing tourism industry as well as a booming middle class offering a huge potential for rapid growth.

“With four hotels currently operating in Indonesia, there will be an aggressive expansion of six more Tune Hotels in development, which are scheduled to open over the next 18 months (in destinations such as) Makassar, Bekasi, Surabaya, Bandung, Jakarta and Palembang.”

With the group’s latest opening, Tune Hotels has a total of five properties in Indonesia, 11 in Malaysia, five in the UK, four in Thailand, five in the Philippines, and one each in India and Japan.

Tune Hotels will also open another property in Australia this year, while projects for the Middle East, Europe and Africa are currently under development.

EUROPE’S economic crisis does not mean an end to longhaul travel from the region as the UK is still a viable market provided travel consultants know whom to market to, said speakers at the Luxperience Thought Leaders forum yesterday.

Sandra Leach, founder of the London-based Sandra Leach Company, a travel marketing consultancy promoting Australia and the South Pacific to Europe, pointed out that the UK is no longer in recession, with its economy expected to expand one per cent in 2013.

She advised travel consultants to focus on the UK’s 50-69 age group that represents a quarter of the UK’s longhaul holiday market.

Furthermore, luxury travel and the VFR market are recession-proof, she added.

Likewise, Helen Logas, CEO of Luxperience, noted that the luxury sector has been a “saviour” in the UK.

Leach explained that Britons have turned to all-inclusive packages as they know how much the total holiday spend will be, with 50 per cent of the market now choosing to purchase package holidays as compared to 37 per cent in 2010.

As holidays booked with travel consultants afford consumer protection in case a company collapses, UK travellers have also rediscovered the value of agencies.

To tap this sector, Leach urged companies to aim for a clear section of the market, be visible to tour operators, invest in partners to create long-term working relationships, utilise B2C marketing and throw in as much additional value to holiday packages as possible, such as Wi-Fi and onsite tours.

INDIAN travellers are flocking Down Under for a taste of Australia’s F&B offerings and local sellers have responded with wine tours and food safaris catered to this segment.

Brigid Kennedy, executive officer, Ultimate Winery Experiences of Australia, said: “We have seen the emergence of Indian tourists curious about wine and are designing special itineraries to cater visits to Hunter Valley, Margaret River, Jacob’s Creek and De Bortoli, and wineries in Mornington Peninsula and Yarra Valley, combining wine tourism and gastronomy with leisure activities we believe Indians will love.”

Penny Rafferty, executive officer, Luxury Lodges of Australia, shared: “Across our lodges in Ayers Rock, Great Barrier Reef, Barossa Valley, Kangaroo Island and Margaret River, we are offering food safaris geared towards the Indian guest. Coupled with unique luxury residences, we foresee excellent growth from this market.”

Other eno-gastronomic tours available in Australia include truffle picking, grape plucking, wine blending and barbecue competitions.

Andrew McEvoy, managing director, Tourism Australia: “The world travels on its stomach. That need must be satisfied in the most complete way.”

Tourism Australia will conduct roadshows in Mumbai, New Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad between September and October to showcase Australia’s tourism offerings and boost inbound arrivals.

Nishant Kashikar, manger India, Tourism Australia, commented: “Our Tourism 2020 Strategy states that India’s overnight visitor spend has the potential to reach between A$1.8-$2.2 billion (US$1.6-$2 billion), and that visitor numbers could go up to 300,000 annually.”

Indian arrivals grew 4.8 per cent year-on-year in 1Q2013.

Air India also commenced daily flights to Sydney and Melbourne on August 29, connecting New Delhi with Australia after a 16-year hiatus (TTG Asia e-Daily, July 16, 2013).

JETSTAR Group has signed interline agreements with seven carriers to grow its traffic from Asia, Europe and the US.

Boosting Jetstar’s number of interline partnerships to 31 are China Eastern Airlines, China Southern Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Malaysia Airlines, El Al Israel Airlines, Swiss International Air Lines and Turkish Airlines.

The newly sealed deals will allow passengers on said airlines to book interline itineraries containing a sector on a Jetstar Group airline.

Said Jetstar Group COO, David Koczkar: “Our growing shorthaul networks out of Singapore and within Japan and Vietnam provide some very attractive itineraries for global carriers to offer their customers.

“Through these new agreements, we are now able to connect passengers from places like Zurich to destinations like Phuket and Bali and travellers from Shanghai to Darwin and Perth via Singapore.”

The Group also has existing codeshare agreements with Qantas, Japan Airlines, American Airlines and Myanmar Airways International.

Meanwhile, Qantas’ retiming of Australia-Singapore flights has led to a “three-fold increase” in the number of passengers flying to popular holiday spots such as Phuket, Penang and Bangkok through Jetstar Asia, said Koczkar.

IN LIGHT of a budget cut and the weakening rupiah, Indonesia will “work smart” and home in on source markets that are already seeing an increase in arrivals.

Indonesia’s minister of tourism and creative economy, Mari Elka Pangestu, said during a press conference in Jakarta yesterday: “The weakening of rupiah creates a double impact on tourism. While it means travellers can stretch their money further, the marketing budget, which is in foreign currency, will decrease.”

Furthermore, Indonesia will trim the coffers of all its government agencies to fund next year’s general and presidential elections, with almost 50 per cent of the tourism ministry’s budget to be cut (TTG Asia e-Daily, August 30, 2013).

Said Pangestu: “We have to work smarter. We will do more targeted marketing. For example, in China, instead of television advertisements, we will do more online platform marketing, as more and more people there do their research online.”

The ministry is working on a Mandarin website as well as intensive, year-round programmes for China that are expected to launch before the end of 2013.

“The other way is to increase the cooperation with (travel-related) companies, such as airlines, banks, credit card companies, to do joint promotions,” Pangestu added.

TTG Asia e-Daily understands that the strategy, currently still a work in progress, will see Indonesia also focus on markets including Australia, Japan and South Korea.

Despite the budget reduction, Pangestu said the ministry is working with the travel industry to keep Indonesia’s positive momentum in tourism going.

“Data showed that tourist arrivals to Indonesia for January-July 2013 grew 6.4 per cent compared to the same period last year. This is higher than the global tourism growth average, which was five per cent, according to UNWTO data,” she said.

Visitor arrivals to Indonesia between January and July totalled 4.9 million, while 2012 saw 5.6 million inbound travellers.

MALINDO Air is adding another two international destinations to its network following the launch of its maiden flight from Kuala Lumpur to Dhaka on August 28 (TTG Asia e-Daily, August 14, 2013).

Daily Kuala Lumpur-Jakarta flights will begin on September 23 and Kuala Lumpur-Bali services on September 26. Both will be operated with 180-seater Boeing 737-900ER aircraft.

Inbound travel consultants in Malaysia said they would leverage Malindo’s new flights to sell packages including destinations beyond the country’s capital.

Raaj Navaratnaa, general manager of Johor-based New Asia Tours & Travel, said he would promote packages combining a one-night stay in Kuala Lumpur with two nights in Johor, as well as target Indonesian families with packages bundling Legoland and the Puteri Harbour Family Theme Park.

Meanwhile, Andy Muniandy, director of sales and business development at Asian Overland Services Tours & Travel, said: “Indonesians from Bali and Jakarta usually come to Kuala Lumpur for shopping. For those who wish to stay beyond the average two or three nights, we will push East Malaysia, as Malindo offers good airfares from Kuala Lumpur to Sabah and Sarawak.”

With increased seat capacity between both countries, Ally Bhoonee, executive director of World Avenues, said he hopes to see 10 per cent year-on-year growth in the number of Indonesian travellers to Malaysia.

The company set up a marketing office in Jakarta two years ago.

HOTEL 1929 has been sold for S$35 million (US$27.5 million) but will continue to be operated by the same entity, controlled by Loh Lik Peng, under a leaseback agreement.

According to The Business Times, a company owned by Cheong Keng Hooi acquired the hotel on Keong Saik Road in a deal brokered by Historical Land.

Loh, founder of Unlisted Collection to which Hotel 1929 belongs, will continue running the property and its restaurant, Ember.

In an interview with the broadsheet, Loh said there were no intentions to sell the four-storey freehold property, but the “attractive offer” and “optimal timing” sealed the deal.

Unlisted Collection owns three boutique hotels in London and a hotel in Shanghai, as well as restaurants in both cities and Singapore.

It was also reported that the group plans to open a hotel in Sydney within the next two years.