Palma de Mallorca (Apr. 10 2019) – The Executive Vice President and CEO of Meliá Hotels International, Gabriel Escarrer, and its Chief Operating Officer André Gerondeau, have completed their first annual tour of Vietnam, China, Myanmar and Indonesia, some of the countries with the greatest growth potential for the Company in a region that led the growth of international arrivals in 2018 with a 7% increase.
Growth in Asia Pacific is one of the key features of Meliá Hotels International 2020 strategy, focusing 100% on leisure resorts and urban leisure or “bleisure” hotels. Growth is being achieved primarily through hotel management agreements, which allow the company greater agility and appropriate returns with low levels of leverage.
“After more than 30 years operating hotels in Southeast Asia and almost 10 years of experience in China, we are a long way along the learning curve in a destination that is equally exciting and complex,” said Escarrer. “For a company with expertise in the leisure and urban leisure markets such as Meliá, Asia Pacific has a similar potential to other regions such as the Caribbean, both in regard to its contribution to the group’s results and to expansion and our international reputation over the coming years.”
In Vietnam, the Meliá executives visited other leading “bleisure” hotels including the well-established Meliá Hanoi, the INNSiDE by Meliá Saigon Central – the first hotel for the INNSiDEby Meliá brand in the region- and the Meliá Ninh Binh, each of which is an ideal option for both business and leisure travellers.
In the south of Vietnam, Escarrer and Gerondeau visited Sol Beach House Phu Quoc and the now-open Meliá Ho Tram Beach Resort. They also checked on progresse the Meliá Cam Ranh Bay development.
Meliá Hotels International has more than 50 hotels in Asia Pacific either already in operation or in the process of opening, with a special focus on Indonesia (16 hotels) Vietnam (13) and China (9). In Vietnam and Indonesia, Meliá is already on a par with all of the largest international hotel operators.
Sustainability and circular economy
Since the opening of Meliá Bali in the 1980s, the company has understood the importance of sustainability and corporate responsibility in this part of the world due to its significant social and environmental culture and awareness. This early vision of “responsible tourism” laid the foundations for Meliá to be acknowledged today as the third most sustainable hotel company in the world according to the ranking prepared by RobecoSAM, the sustainable investment agency whose ranking is used by the prestigious Dow Jones Sustainability Index.
Among the solidarity and environmental improvement projects in company hotels in APAC, the “Soap for Hope” project in cooperation with the Diversey Group is a highlight, and has been running since 2018 in 7 Meliá hotels in the region: Meliá Hanoi, Meliá Bali, Melia Danang, Meliá Yangon, Meliá Purosani, Sol Beach House Bali Benoa and Sol House Bali Legian. As part of the tour, Gabriel Escarrer and other group executives visited the hotels taking part in the project to learn more about their progress and listen to the exciting declarations from hotel staff and members of the community.
For the Meliá CEO, “Projects like Soap for Hope make it easier to understand that the circular economy is not only possible, but also essential to achieve a better balance between people, the planet, and economic development. I would like to congratulate Diversey, our business partner for more than three decades and promoter of the project, for allowing us to take part in a project such as this. “
The Soap for Hope project aims to recycle soap used by hotel guests (about 3 tons per year for an average hotel with 400 rooms) and give it new “life”, at the same time improving public hygiene, reducing waste and providing employment to the communities that most need it. In 2018, the hotels involved managed to recycle 13.3 tons of soap and help more than 9,800 people.
