Amanresorts is one of a number of big name operators with a presence in Siem Reap W
elcome to Siem Reap, home to one of the world’s most spiritual sites and Cambodia’s
most visited tourist attraction – the Angkor Wat temple complex. This charm- ing and cosy city in the north-west is simple to navigate and visitors can easily fi t in a trip to the temples, some market shopping plus a spa treatment in a day and still have time for a relaxing dinner. Surely this makes it an ideal spa destination?
Change of image According to Cambodia’s Ministry of Tour- ism, international tourist arrivals were up nearly 25 per cent in 2012 and Siem Reap is its most popular destination. Visitors from Vietnam, China and Korea make up the largest percentage of travellers, with people from France, Russia, the USA, Australia and the UK dominating western arrivals. Siem Reap has also just been named one of the top 10 fastest growing cities in a 2014 Euromonitor tourism report. Like Thailand, which is fi ghting to
shrug off its travellers-on-a-budget image, Cambodia is opening itself up to a diff er- ent kind of visitor: one who has more than dreadlocks and a few coins for spending money. Five star resorts are a large feature in Siem Reap’s accommodation off erings and one look at the upmarket cafés and restaurants in the city’s entertainment district confi rm hospitality operators are not after the gap-year tourism market. The Prime Minister, Hun Sen, says that tourism is a priority for the sustainable
Spa Business 2 2014 ©Cybertrek 2014
The tourism ministry recently declared that it was looking to encourage high-end hotel development to attract more affl uent visitors
growth of the country’s cultural and natu- ral heritage sites. The tourism ministry recently declared that it was looking to encourage high-end hotel development to attract more affl uent visitors. Despite this positive news, Cambodia
still has a way to go to shake off its tag as a backpacker’s destination and, more pressingly, rid itself of its damaging reputation for underage prostitution before the serious money-spending spa-goers will come. While the Ministry of Tourism’s offi cial website lists hundreds of ‘spas’ under its activities section, fi rst up is a listing for a 7 Girls Massage at a parlour in the centre of Siem Reap.
Big name operators Encouragingly, hotel occupancy was at a healthy 68.49 per cent in 2012 according to the tourism ministry. Bookings were slightly lower, however, in fi ve star resorts which reported an annual occupancy of 40-60 per cent. But this hasn’t stopped some of the big name international spa resort operators from staking their claim in this growing market. Despite Siem Reap already being
fl ooded with day spas, the city is home to a number of branded hotel operators including Raffl es, Sofi tel and Le Méridien. The luxury Navutu Dreams Resort and
Spa opened in 2012 and last year The Park Hyatt Siem Reap opened for business. It’s going to take a few years for Siem
Reap to follow in the footsteps of other south-east Asian countries such Bali, which has shrugged off its budget image and reincarnated itself as a serious destination for spa retreats. Operators talk of the challenges of having to compete with almost criminally cheap massages in local day ‘spas’. And the government needs to do much more to help promote tourism in the region and reposition Siem Reap as a destination, rather than part of a journey on the way to neighbouring Laos or Vietnam. On the bright side, the city has a natural
beauty and great charm and, as Cambodia is a Buddhist country, it’s genuinely very spiritual. Infrastructure in and around Siem Reap is good and its international airport is undergoing a US$100m (€73m, £60m) upgrade which will increase its capacity to fi ve million passengers annually. When talking to spa operators already
in the region, it’s evident that they want to support each other. Their willingness to share knowledge and expertise in order to grow the industry as a whole (and not just their individual business) is encouraging. In the following pages, we take a look at
four diff erent spa business models in Siem Reap with unique selling points.
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spabusiness.com / digital 67
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