Interview: Fairmont Hotels & Resorts President Jennifer Fox

Luxury chain Fairmont Hotels & Resorts late last year appointed as president Jennifer Fox, who previously had served as InterContinental Hotels Group's COO of managed operations in Europe. Fox recently spoke with Business Travel News lodging editor Michael B. Baker about corporate travel trends, luxury's role in corporate travel and Fairmont's growth strategy—particularly in Europe. 

As transient business travel rebounds overall, have you been seeing the same trend at Fairmont?

Absolutely, and it's fantastic to see it. Business travel is a very important segment for Fairmont. We've seen very good growth this year in terms of requests for proposals. Volumes are up a little less than 10 percent year on year. There still are short lead-in times, but the hotels, particularly in North America, are performing well this year, so there's a bit of pressure for people to try to book a little earlier. Sometimes they can't get in because Monday-to-Friday traffic is very strong. We're also seeing rates go up slightly, which is very positive.

Have you had to increase your sales staff as a result?

We have approximately 80 global sellers out there selling our 63 hotels. If you look at the ratio per room count, that's quite a high ratio, so we've always been robust in that area. Those global sellers augment the hotel salespeople as well. We're always looking to adapt. When business travel is up and you have the demand, you need to adapt hotel by hotel.

Are you seeing the same rebound in group travel?

Absolutely. That really suffered during the downturn. Now, it is starting to pick up. Automotive is up, financial is up and technology is up, and pharmaceutical also is very, very strong right now. With some of those, meeting times are short, but they're actually coming a little longer than what they were before. We're also getting a lot more incentive leads now for later in 2012, 2013 and 2014.

Is it still a challenge selling luxury properties for corporate purposes, particularly in the wake of the recent criticism of the U.S. General Services Administration's events?

Fairmont properties are luxury hotels, but we're positioned at a price point where I think we can be seen as a smart alternative to, say, Four Seasons, where the rates probably are higher. For corporates, when you go through the RFP season—and travel planners and travel managers within corporations are thinking about where they're putting their business—Fairmont is positioned very nicely for that. Travel managers also are always looking for rate integrity. We've implemented dynamic flex-down pricing. Anyone with a corporate negotiated rate can flex down if there's a lower rate in the market that day through a best available rate or special day rate.

Where do you plan to open new properties this year?

This is a big year for Fairmont, having five hotels open in one year. We opened our 63rd Fairmont hotel three weeks ago in the beautiful city of Kiev in the Ukraine. We have a couple of new hotels opening this year. We have a wonderful hotel opening Jaipur, India, in the summer, which is probably more of a leisure hotel but very big for the MICE business. We also are opening [in Dubai] in September the Fairmont Palm—you're right in the business district, but you feel like you're in a little of a resort location because you're away from the madding crowds. Then, we're opening in Manila, right in the Makati business district. It's going to be a Fairmont Hotel but also has a small Raffles part. We're also opening in Baku [Azerbaijan] this year. It's right by all the government buildings and offices. There's a lot going on in those Commonwealth of Independent States countries, especially in the oil and natural gas resource area. They're very interesting, upcoming destinations that didn't have any great luxury hotels until recently. A lot of the major brands are going in there.

With supply growth expected to be low for the next few years, is development beginning to pick back up?

We went through a couple of tough years. Everybody did, in terms of development. The capital markets weren't as robust. It's quite positive now, and things are picking up quite dramatically. Fairmont is going to be the fastest-growing small luxury brand over the next few years. Like a lot of our competitors, we're doing a lot in China. We've got the beautiful Peace Hotel in Shanghai. We've got a great hotel in Beijing. We also have a resort hotel in Kunshan. We've got Nanjing under development, which we'll open next year, and Chengdu under development. We've also got a lot of development going on in the Middle East. We want to get the brand into more locations in Europe. We've got six hotels today in Europe—London, St. Andrews [Scotland], Montreux [Switzerland], Monte Carlo, Hamburg and Kiev—and we have a project in Moscow under construction. We're targeting Paris, Rome, Milan, Barcelona, Berlin and Frankfurt.

What about North America?

We'd love to do more in North America. We just bought the Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn and Spa [in California]. We've managed it for some time, and the opportunity came up for us to invest in it. We'd like to have more, because we have a few distribution gaps. We have two great hotels in Hawaii, and we'd like to add Honolulu to that. We'd like more in California. Florida is a target for us. Atlanta and Houston are two areas we're really looking to grow. We also think we could easily handle another one or two hotels in New York City or Los Angeles.

What are some of the initiatives Fairmont has done specifically targeting the corporate transient market?

We’ve always been very conscious of the corporate business traveler and some of the trends around what they've been doing. Over the last few years, we've developed some innovative products. One of them is Fairmont Fit. Business travelers are struggling to stay fit and healthy when they're on the road, but they don't want to check luggage. Taking your gym shoes and workout gear can often be the difference between carrying on your luggage and checking your luggage. Fairmont did a partnership with Reebok, so if you're a member of our Fairmont President’s Club, you can let us know your shoe size and clothes size, and every time you're in a Fairmont hotel, you'll have a pair of workout shoes, socks and workout clothes so you can arrive, work out and leave them there. We implemented that about a year ago, and it's been hugely successful. The other is Fairmont's lifestyle cuisine, which also was responding to the business traveler. It has a section where it's raw if you're on a raw diet, or if you're eating macrobiotic you can do that, or there's low-carb selections. You can get something on that program when you're staying at any of the hotels, in any restaurant, for breakfast, lunch, dinner or room service.