Last week, Marriott opened two five-star hotels in Chandigarh and Jaipur. BrandLine, there at Marriott's invitation, spoke to Rajeev Menon, its India head, after the launch ceremony of the Jaipur hotel. , It was almost six in the evening. “We have to fold up before seven, as I have a couple of meetings and a flight to catch tonight for Bangalore,” said Menon. As Vice-President of Marriott International Inc, in charge of operations in India, Australia, Maldives and Malaysia, Menon seems to be more airborne than on the ground these days. He shuttles between these countries and the company's regional headquarters in Hong Kong. He had flown in from Pune just that morning. A day earlier, he had been in Chandigarh for the launch of the luxury JW Marriott. The previous week he had been in Malaysia.

He speaks slowly, as is his wont. “We are doing pretty well in India. We have 14 hotels now, and are opening two more hotels in the next few months. Our pipeline is even stronger.” He goes on …

How would you describe your India experience so far?

Oh! Our India experience is phenomenal. We are 12 years old in India. Our journey started in December 1999 with the opening of the Goa Marriott Resort, and subsequently we opened three properties over three years — the Renaissance Mumbai Hotel, Marriott Executive Apartments and the famous JW Marriott in Mumbai. However, our real growth spurt started about a couple of years ago. Starting late 2009, we opened eight hotels. Our JW Marriott in Chandigarh is the 13th and this (Jaipur Marriott) is our 14th hotel in India. So, now we have an inventory of 3,200 rooms in India — across five brands — JW Marriott, Marriott, Marriott Executive Apartments, Renaissance, and Courtyard by Marriott.

What is your India game plan?

We have aggressive growth plans. We are on a journey to have 100 hotels and over 15,000 rooms up and running by 2015. Before the end of this year, we will open a Courtyard by Marriot at the City Centre in Pune and our third JW Marriott in Bangalore.

Starting next year, we would pretty much open one hotel a year for several years, as we speak now.

How does your India business help your international business?

We have been seeing phenomenal growth in the number of our reward customers in India. Whenever they travel abroad, they stay with us. We are also seeing a lot of Indians travelling overseas choosing Marriott.

How much does it (India business) contribute to your global topline?

It's very negligible as of now. However, with these hotels in the pipeline coming up in the next few years, I see 30 to 35 per cent of our Asia-Pacific business coming from India.

Are you among the fastest growing foreign hotel brands in India?

Well. We are a pure management company. We have not franchised any hotel. From that point of view, yes, we have 14 hotels with an over 3,200-room inventory … maybe one of the fastest growing international brands in India today.

Of all your brands in India, which do you think suits India the most and will grow the fastest?

We see opportunities across the board. However, as we speak today, the fastest growing brand is Courtyard by Marriott. As that's our four-star brand and can get into the Tier-II and Tier-III markets too. As of now, we have six Courtyards … one opening next month and another 18 under construction.

And, interestingly, the second fastest growing brand is the JW Marriott. Now, we have two JW Marriotts open and another eight under construction. After that, comes Marriott, and then Renaissance.

But, when we bring our Fairfield brand to India, as we are planning to, I have a distinct feeling it will end up becoming the fastest growing brand here. Again, because it falls in a little lower segment and is much easier to build … and also can go to a lot more places than even the Courtyard.

Is occupancy in your India hotels driven by domestic or inbound travellers?

I think it has shifted. Earlier, when we only had six hotels, most of them located in key gateway cities, we were seeing about 60 per cent international travellers and 40 per cent domestic travellers. Today, with 14 hotels spread well across tier-II cities too, it's gone the other way. Now we see around 35 per cent international travellers and 65 per cent domestic travellers. And with four MICE hotels in our fold, this segment accounts for about 22-25 per cent of our business. As this property (Jaipur Marriott) and our Pune Marriott, which opened at the end of last year, get established better, and the proposed JW Marriott in Chennai gets established, MICE will pretty much be one-third of our business across the country.

With Fairfield, we are targeting domestic consumers to bring in 80 per cent of the business.

How have your occupancy levels been this year?

Touch wood, this year has been so positive, and we have been seeing double-digit RevPAR (revenue per available room) growth across the country. Most of our hotels are leading in their respective markets. If you take our Courtyard by Marriott hotels in Gurgaon, Mumbai and Chennai, or JW Marriott and Renaissance in Mumbai, we see reasonable, double-digit RevPAR growth year-on-year.

Today, is that driven by occupancy or rates?

As I see it, it is predominantly driven by occupancy. This is because, with occupancies coming down as a result of the global financial crisis, hotels across the globe were experiencing rate rationalisation. When it recovers, occupancies will go up first and then the rates. And, I believe, beginning with the end of this year, the mix (of room rate and occupancy) will be healthier as the rates will surely firm up, as has not been the case in the last two to three years.

Don't you think hotel rooms in India are overpriced as it is?

Malaysia, Indonesia … maybe. But, honestly, I find Singapore a pretty expensive destination. If we look at the two hotels Marriott has in Singapore…be it the Singapore Marriott or the Ritz Carlton Singapore, they drive phenomenal rates. Our rates are nowhere close to that. But, talking about India, there are a couple of factors that traditionally keep hotel rates here a little bit higher than some of our South Asian counterparts. One is the land cost. It is considerably higher in India than in most other countries in the region. The other is the supply and demand equation. In some geographies here, the supply is very low where the room rates are pretty high. However, overall, in the last 2-3 years, India has seen certain amount of rationalisation of rates. Now, again, we are at a phase where we can start to show a reasonable growth year after year. We are back in that cycle.

What does your market research say about the Indian market? What does the Indian market want?

We spend a considerable amount of time studying the market first. That has helped us in a big way. It is very evident that there has always been a bigger need for food and beverage, one has to focus more on the local cuisine.

Second, there is a great need for MICE hotels across the country. Hence you see a circuit of MICE hotels being developed by Marriott across the country.

What kind of cities do you propose hotels in?

It's across the board. We are opening Courtyards in places such as Bhopal, Bilaspur, Kochi and Lucknow. And we have Renaissance (which is a brand on a par with Marriott) being built in cities such as Guwahati, Raipur and Shillong.

Are you planning resorts at holiday destinations too?

Yes, of course. But, our pipeline is more of MICE and mid-segment hotels.

What is Marriott's strength and what would you attribute its success to?

As I told you, F&B is one of our key strengths. We do on an average 15,000 covers every month at each Courtyard, which typically have much smaller banqueting spaces and restaurants compared with our other models. For example, in Ahmedabad, we recently launched our first all-vegetarian restaurant — Shakahari — the first in any Marriott hotel across the world. It's a resounding success story. Now we have replicated that model at our Pune hotel too. Wherever we go, we strive to cater to the local taste — a true local experience, which we think is very important. If you take the JW Marriott at Chandigarh, our chefs were touring the city and the neighbouring States to study the local cuisine, several months before the launch.

Second, our success also comes from our very strong strategic partners who we develop hotels with. Tell me who better than Mr Dangayach (promoter of the Jaipur property) who knows Jaipur back to front, who better than the Rahejas who know Mumbai so well, the Reddys of Hyderabad, or the Chordias of Pune, the Salgaocars who know Goa so well… I can carry on and on …

How would you compare India with other markets in this region? Do you focus more on China too?

Yes. China too is a key market. We have 60 operating hotels in China as compared to 14 in India. We have a very strong development pipeline there as well … very aggressive about China. If you look at our global pipeline, we will be adding about 135,000 rooms across countries to our existing 600,000 rooms. But, in the Asia-Pacific, it's China followed by India.

Is finding talent a problem in India?

I think talent is going to be a considerable challenge as we move forward. It's something a lot of us — hotel companies — are focusing on. Luckily for us, as we have been clearly recognised as one of the top companies to work for, over many years, we are able to find the right talent. In fact, a lot of Indian talent in Marriott is getting picked up by my counterparts in other parts of the world.

This also mounts great pressure on us to groom people here. Hence, we are trying to partner with a number of universities and hotel management schools to create a lot of localised programmes. In India, over 90 per cent of our employees are Indians.

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