When Juan Riu Masmitja and his wife Maria acquired a small 80-bed American hotel in Mallorca, Spain, in 1953, they had little clue that the family’s small summer business will take giant strides in South Asia over sixty years later.

Having grown to 92 hotels in 19 countries, the family is opening two hotels in the Maldives this year, with focus on swelling the number of Indian tourists who prefer the neighbouring island for a quick getaway. However, the expansion to South Asia brings along its own set of challenges.

While the Riu Hotels and Resorts are setting base in the Kedhigandu Island and Maafushi Island of the Maldives this year, Ivan Garrido Mayol, Vice-President, Sales and Business Development, Riu Plaza Hotels told BusinessLine that challenges of setting up a hospitality business in South Asia are unique.

“One of the greatest challenges for the Riu Group is the upcoming hotels in Maldives. The islands are scattered and one needs to fly from Male to the preferred island destination of choice in another flight. To reach the island in itself is a tough task. For us, to transport construction materials to the islands, finding separate space for the staff to stay and so on are challenges we are grappling with,” said Mayol. Though the group has not considered building hotels in India as yet, tapping Sri Lanka, the Maldives and the Middle East has attracted Indian travellers, Mayol further said.

“While the Sri Lankan branch of the hotel, set up in Ahungalla, three years ago, initially was not attracting many visitors, the numbers have spiked over the years,” he said.

One of the primary reasons for the lacklustre appeal early on was the food. “In Sri Lanka, when we started, we thought we are doing everything right by introducing the most exotic sea-food dishes lifted off from the menu in Jamaica. This would just not appeal to the Indian tourists. We later tweaked the menu to suit the local tastes and saw a spike in visitors,” Mayol said.

Family-run model

“What makes the experience more personal for visitors is that the family chain has not let anyone from the outside run franchise branches for the group, and keenly looks over every detail while setting up the hotels,” said Mayol.

Riu Hotels and Resortshas invested, as on December 2017, €600 million for funding construction and refurbishment, and made €2.156 million in revenue, a statement released by the company stated.

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