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Shubhra Tandon

Mumbai, Sept. 11

Indian Hotels Company Ltd plans to introduce an upper upscale category in its offering of hotels in the future. This segment of hotels will be placed between Taj's luxury properties and the new all-new profiled Gateway brand, launched on Thursday. The upper upscale new segment would be on the lines of Hyatt Regency or JW Marriott.

Mr Ajoy K. Misra, Senior Vice-President, Sales and Marketing, told Business Line, "We might have an intermediate brand (between Taj and Gateway) but no details of that as yet."

This new segment will be above the category of the all new Gateway, which IHCL has introduced to target the `new generation of entrepreneurs, artists and thinkers'. The company has three existing properties in Surat, Vijayawada and Bangalore operating under Gateway, but now they will be upgraded to the features and services of The Gateway Hotel, as it would now be called now on.

Upgrading

To begin with, IHCL will upgrade 16 existing hotels to Gateway brand. These will be the likes of Taj Banjara in Hyderabad and, Taj View in Agra etc. Some Taj Residency properties will also form a part of this new brand. Though the company officials did not give a clear picture of the fate of Taj Residency, industry sources said that the company is likely to phase it out by either "up-scaling them to premium level or get it under Gateway brand."

Gateway hotels will come up in outskirts of metros cities, upcoming business districts and tier two and three cities, said Mr Misra.

It will have 150 to 200 rooms depending on the location they come up and a price range of Rs 3,000 to Rs 6,000. It will be on the lines of Courtyard by Marriott, Novotel by Accor group and Aloft by Sheraton.

New properties

Ten new hotels have already been signed up and active negotiations are going on for 10 to 15 more properties. It plans to have 50 hotels under the Gateway brand in the next three years. IHCL said that it has aggressive expansion plans for the brand and are is open to owned hotels and management contracts.

Explaining the reasons for keeping `Taj' away from the two new brands (Gateway and Ginger), Mr Misra said, "We wanted a clear demarcation of our brands for the customers. For example, if a consumer had stayed in Taj in Mumbai, he expected the same level of service from a property in Varanasi. But unlike `Ginger,' which is operated by IHCL's subsidiary company, Gateway is under the parent company's umbrella."

With this restructuring of brands, the hospitality major has classified its offerings under Taj Luxury, The Gateway Hotel - upscale segment and Ginger - the budget segment, he said.

More Stories on : Outlook | Brands | Hotels

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