Diving Into Hotel Conversions – Thailand Tourism Forum 2024
Good evening good evening um anybody who’s in the hotel industry would know that hotel investment is a long-term commitment and very Capital intensive and also once you stuck in you stuck for years so it is critically important to find any way possible to optimize its value and conversions is on
Of the tools through renovation repositioning or rebranding there are a few lens we should put on first is a property cycle is it newly built 2 years old 5 years old or it’s quite sometimes and the second one is the market cycle is there any fundamentally changing Trends how is our competitive
Landscape what is the market sentiment and and lastly what is the way you uplift is it a short-term game or a long-term play looking across the industry conversion has uptrend since covid in 2022 conversions accounts for onethird of hotels opening globally and almost half of Southeast
Asia and looking at the signing uh the deal signings 1/4 of the signings globally are conversions and that accounts for almost 40% in Southeast Asia and looking at isg is it moving okay looking closely at isg in Southeast Asia since 2022 conversion represents over half of our deal signings across brand
Segment these are a few highlights of conversions properties across the region in diverse location and uh destination and also diverse AET types I just want to showcase that for the Heritage building conversion we have kimton Marco Sydney we have InterContinental Shang the mapping and in urban destination like
Singapore wal Singapore Archard and also Sinton Midtown which we will talk about later on and the destination of like Bali InterContinental balur and wo goost in Australia and closer to Thailand also the Resort destination which is Dina Resort and Villas and also holiday in Resort
Kby so the next key question is what is the brand value proposition there are four main pillars here that we should consider one this the brand standard and system the commercial infrastructure the cell distribution that would allow your property to tap into the global audience and second one is the loyal the brand
Loyalty platform that would allow you to attract higher quality demand then the SEC the third one is the training the and the talent pools and the final one is the efficiency that you could benefit from uh savings from procurements the digital uh advantage and so on so before we jump right into the
Conversion case studies um let’s first have some understanding of the conversion process overview first begin with to understand your property status condition back to to the first slide what is the property cycle at the moment and align interest between owners and operators second is to talk about the brand fit what is the
Brand option what is the brand commercial value uplift from the brand and getting into more of the financial feasibility studies and performa and third one is a very critical Pit Stop which is the property Improvement plan So-Cal pip and the key takeaway here here is to find any way possible for
Facing pip if it makes commercial sense once it’s all align you get into execution from contract to on ground renovation work and rebranding so in Thailand for isg over the past few years we have many opportunities to look for and study with the owners for the conversions
And I think around more than 50% of our deal signings in the since Co are in conversions and 2023 alone it’s up to 90% and these are the fields of Storytelling first is the Sinton Midtown bangco when we first initiate the discussion with owner there was a clear
Alignment to respect the bone and the structure given its very new condition and open less than a year old back then so we work with the owner team on a super fast pace to convert to isg as a white label within six months after initial discussion in 2021 and completely rebranded to winette
Collection as a first in Asia in later in 2022 some of the snap shot photos the next one the next one is in puket din saw Resort and V Pon when we first studied this opportunity back in 2020 the property was partially completed with such need character and
Setting and so the branding was a focal point of discussion and another challenge is to beat the pet peak season in December so we start working with the owner team on the PIP works even before the contract execution and eventually to smoothly uh uh take W white label this property
Right in time in December 2022 and thereafter ongoing renovation works and rebranding worked and it just rebranded fully as a winard collection in December last year so a month old only last but not least in Oro Resort location holiday in Resort Krabby which was a scenario of brand switching overnight hence challenges lie
In the transition of operation during the switch over so to support the owner and collab at with the previous Brands we implemented task force from commercial Finance it and HR this property met a record of two months fully rebranded after contract execution that’s it guys thanks so much that’s all for me
This is a session from the Thailand Tourism Forum 2024 featuring Saowarin Chanprakaisi. TTF2024 was an ‘in person’ event held on 15 January 2024 and part of an ongoing series, with this being the 13th year. The event is organized by https://www.c9hotelworks.com together with our tourism industry partners.