Pathumwan Princess reaches for the stars

How long have you been working at the hotel for?

It’ll be two years this November. Before that I was working at the Sheraton Prague Charles Square Hotel in the Czech Republic. My wife, Nathalie, and I were there for one year. Nathalie didn’t enjoy it so much though so we were ready for a change.

What made you decide to come to Thailand?

I first came to Thailand 19 years ago on a six-month work placement as a management trainee at the Royal Orchid Sheraton Hotel & Towers Bangkok. After that, I came back on vacation around every three or four years, so I knew a bit about the country. Nathalie and I had discussed the possibility of working here, and when we both agreed we could do it then we set about making that happen.

How long is your contract?

Two years. So it’s coming up in November. It’s gone by very fast. During that time so much has happened – we arrived, adapted, and then found ourselves in the middle of the political turmoil. Ensuring the hotel ran smoothly during that period was a challenge, but we have come out of the other side ok.

What is your main goal during your contract?

Our management, KPI, sets goals in all areas, but the main goal over the past two years has been to achieve five-star standard, which I hope we will have soon. The assessment took place recently and we are confident we will get it. We hope it’s going to be our 15th anniversary
birthday present. If we do get it, it will be a great sense of achievement for the entire team. It’s been a great team effort.

How many rooms do you have at Pathumwan Princess?

We have 455. Of these 85 are suites, and the remaining 370 are our Deluxe rooms.

Are occupancy figures healthy at the moment?

They are healthy. Thanks to our excellent location, we’re one of the occupancy leaders of Bangkok. This July we missed the occupancy figures we had budgeted for more than a year ago by less than one per cent. We are currently operating over 80 per cent so the figures are quite good.
Some of the  competition in town is not so lucky with their occupancy levels dipping. The problem here of course is that many hotels are trying to tackle the problem by entering into a price war.

I don’t think this is the solution. The price in Bangkok is already fair and I think that visitors already get good value for money. Once you put your prices down it’s difficult to go back up again.

What sets your hotel apart from the competition?

I don’t win a prize for this one, but location is number one. We’re not only connected to the MBK Center, which in turn is connected to the National Stadium BTS station, but we’re also near all the big shopping malls, cinemas, and many restaurants. If you want to get some last minute souvenirs for people at home, it’s really easy to do it here.

Second, we work very hard on keeping our staff and associates happy. I quite often visit other hotels and I feel that the staff is too stressed and worried that they’re not doing the right thing, and it all seems unnatural. We want our service to be relaxed and natural. This is one of our key concepts, and it works well in our favour.

Third, we have recently renovated the hotel and it looks great. I must admit that I’m not usually a fan of a hotel which has an escalator in the lobby, but we manage to do this quite well. On the upside it gives us a spacious lobby with a very high ceiling and a feeling of generosity when you enter the hotel. Our contemporary design provides plenty of cool modern elements without losing any of the traditional Thai charm. The overall atmosphere is warm and welcoming.

When you put together all these elements, then what we provide is unique.

What’s your main target market?

We try to cover as many markets as possible so that we’re always ready for any problems that may arise, such as the global financial crisis, for instance. Our core feeder markets are still areas close by: Singapore, Hong Kong, New Zealand, and Australia. We have also developed a lot of very good relationships with Eastern Europe as well as South Africa. So we’re quite active in every market.

We see a lot of developments in China, maybe not for this year but little by little it is growing. India is also a fast emerging market. Medical tourism, especially from the Middle East, is becoming quite strong. It is not necessarily our core market, but there is definitely development in this area.

Do you have a strong MICE trade?

The MICE market is one of the most sensitive when it comes to political crisis because it’s very easy for international companies to postpone meetings or even change locations – choosing to go to Vietnam or Singapore instead, for example. We see local and wider Asia coming back now, though, and business is picking up steadily. We believe that by the middle of next year we will have much higher demand, and we’ve prepared for this by renovating and upgrading our meeting rooms.

What meeting facilities do you have?

We have four meeting rooms on what we call the M Floor. This recently renovated area overlooks the pool area and has a very nice foyer which is great for exhibitions and networking functions. Currently we’re renovating our basement, which used to be a salsa club, to become another business center with a further three meeting rooms. So this is definitely an area we want to tap into.

Finally, please can you tell us about the hotel’s most popular restaurants?

Most popular locally is Konju, a multi-award winning Korean restaurant which specializes in charcoal grills. We also have Kayageum, which hosts a wonderful Korean buffet for lunch. Another restaurant we are now placing more in the fine dining sector is Loop, our Italian restaurant by the pool. It’s located on a nice terrace in a very quiet setting. We also serve set breakfasts here, and our foreign guests love starting their day sat outside enjoying the cooler temperatures. In the evening we stay natural and relatively laid back. It’s not a tie and jacket restaurant, and it’s not a tank top and bathing shorts restaurant either. It falls somewhere in-between the two.

Pathumwan Princess Hotel, 444 MBK Center, Phayathai Road, Wangmai, Pathumwan, Bangkok,
Tel: 02 216 3700 www.pprincess.com