Luxury Travel checking in
Designs on Monaco Karl Lagerfeld is to redesign the outside public spaces of the Hotel Metropole in Monte Carlo and design a new restaurant at the hotel, which will run under the guidance of chef Joel Robuchon.
Laura Ashley plans hotel The British interiors and fashion firm is to open a hotel in Hertfordshire as a showcase for the brand. All 49 rooms of the hotel will have beds, sofa, wallpaper and curtains in matching Laura Ashley fabrics.
Edinburgh in style A new property opening in Edinburgh this May will have just four suites and charge from £1,000 per night. There will be no restaurant at The Atholl, but in-suite cuisine will be overseen by Albert Roux.
Aussie opening Orpheus Island has reopened on the Great Barrier Reef. The resort has a restaurant, infinity pool and takes up to 34 guests.
Turkish delight Le Meridien has opened a hotel in one of Istanbul’s most exclusive neighbourhoods, Etiler. The 259-room hotel features an eight-room spa, two pools, rooftop bar and an art programme.
Hertz gets into top gear Drivers now have the chance to rent the McLaren MP4-12C supercar for the first time, with Hertz/Premiere Velocity offering the car from £1,134 for a single day mid-week.
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Hotels such as The Setai in New York could soon be adopting a more aggressive Leaders Club model
LHW looks for new business model
Leading Hotels of the World trials ditching the transaction model, and is calling on members to grow its Leaders Club instead. By April Hutchinson
up more guests to the Leaders Club loyalty programme – instead of them being charged transaction fees for reservations made at their hotel. The bold revenue replacement model will run as a pilot through 2012 with 50 hotels implementing the new approach. For the model to work and revenue
L
from transactions to be replaced overall, Ted Teng, LHW president and chief executive officer, said every hotel will eventually need to be signing up and maintaining three members per guestroom a year. He added that the move should also lead to a more collaborative approach among member hotels, helping them compete more effectively with global luxury chains. “We needed to rethink the model,” Teng said. “This way, instead of charging hotels a transaction fee each time someone books, the hotels
22 05.04.2012
eading Hotels of the World is trialing a new revenue model that will see its hotels encouraged to sign
a Priority Pass giving access to 600 airport lounges and a Leaders Club concierge service. There are 60,000 rooms across
Teng: LHW will be more competitive
contribute to revenue and to loyalty for Leading as an entity by collectively encouraging more guests to sign up to Leaders Club. Both guests and hotels will get the benefits of increased loyalty.”
Leading by loyalty It is one of few loyalty programmes with a fee attached; at entry level, Leaders Club members pay $150 a year for membership which gives them inclusive breakfast, complimentary Wi-Fi and one free night stay in five. The next tier, “Unlimited”, costs
$1,200 and also includes room upgrade at the time of booking,
the Leading network and with each hotel signing three guests per room, Leaders Club has the potential to generate $27 million a year. There are already 100,000 members. However, Teng added: “It will never be a mass programme, but we would like it to grow to 400,000 members. That is still only 5% of all guests, so we see it as a reachable target.” Teng said the move was good news for agents as it provided them the chance to communicate even more value per stay for their clients. “Agents can tell their clients that if they are Leaders members, they don’t have to pay for breakfast or Wi-Fi and can access all the other benefits too – the agent is still going to get their commission from the guest stay,” Teng explained. The Leading Hotels of the World website is also being redesigned, and will relaunch in November.
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