Regent Opens Biz-Class Clubs For Upscale Travelers.
<FONT SIZE="+3"><B> Regent Opens Biz-Class Clubs For Upscale Travelers</B>
By Carolyn Green
Hong Kong - Targeting corporate travelers at the senior executive level, Hong Kong-based Regent International Hotels has introduced a 24-hour business-class club floor.
The hotel, part of the Four Seasons/Regent Hotel & Resorts chain, says that the facility differs from other concierge or business-class services such as upgraded bedrooms, private lounge with buffet breakfast and late-afternoon hors d'oeuvres and cocktails. The Regent Club, available now in the chain's Bangkok and Jakarta properties, offers a 24-hour mini business center, a private lounge and a separate dining area for use by any hotel guest willing to fork over a $40-a-night premium on top of the daily room rate. Regent will likely raise the rate to $50, once the concept is better known and accepted by its clientele.
The Regent Club was designed to give those guests whose needs exceed the typical Four Seasons' or Regent's services a place to set up shop and do business, said Duffy Keys, vice president of marketing for Regent International Hotels. "What really drove the change for us was understanding how customers were using the hotels differently today in Asia than they were using hotels in North America or Europe," he said.
Because many Asian cities are growing in leaps and bounds, a large proportion of guests, unfamiliar with the city they are visiting, are holding the majority of business meetings in the hotel, Keys said. Each lounge has a separate board room for private business meetings. The open portion of the facility features several desks equipped with telephones and dataports, and an office with printers, fax and photocopiers.
Keys said Regent realized that its blue-ribbon guests had very special needs. "The consistent feedback was: 'check me in and leave me alone, and then when I need something, give it to me unconditionally.' "
The Regent Club, which was introduced in Jakarta in February, Bangkok in March and will open at other properties later this year and in 1997, takes its competitors' concierge-floor concept one step further. Like at other chains, breakfast and hors d'oeuvres are complimentary, but made-to-order breakfasts also are available.
Guests who want more substantial fare can order "one-dish" meals such as a bowl of pasta, French bread and a green salad, which are comparable in price to similar selections served in the hotel's restaurants. "Guests just want something to eat and they want it now, because they'd like to get back to their reading or make phone calls or just go to bed, and they don't want room service because they hate sitting in a room by themselves," Keys said.
Ondrea Levitt, a hospitality consultant with BDO Seidman in Chicago, believes the Regent concept benefits the hotel because it's a better way to manage room yields.
"If you're in a sold-out situation, you don't need to hold concierge-floor guest rooms," she said. "Or, if you're giving them away, you're saying, 'I'm really using a room that normally we sell for $120 but now we are selling for $100 because we need to fill the room,' " she said. "With the Regent concept, it's not an issue of your room inventory."
To Robert Mandelbaum, director of research and vice president of PFK Consulting, San Francisco, the service helps distinguish Regent from its competitors. "One of the advantages that Regent has is they're in that upper-end category where the traveler staying in those top-class hotels appreciates that premium service and is willing to pay for it," he said.
Asked about including the Regent Club in negotiating corporate rates, Keys said, "the premium is the same for everyone, so your leverage as a corporation would be on the base price of the room.