The two properties of ‘Bloom Hotel Group’ in Calangute have made a huge name for themselves in affordable hotel space category. The group may be operating in budget category, but it provides features like Grohe rain showers, Egyptian cotton linen and Fresh Air systems to its guests at its properties. The Goan caught up with Tom Welbury, vice president strategy, Bloom Hotel Group in an exclusive interview.
Karan Sehgal
The Goan: In a short period of time, your two Bloom properties in Calangute have become really popular. Moreover, Bloomrooms at Janpath in Delhi has recently won an award called ‘Best Budget Hotel of the Year’ at The Hospitality Leaders Industry Choice Awards 2019 held in Goa. How did you achieve so much in so little time?
Tom Welbury: Bloom takes pride in being quality obsessed and as a result it is leading the affordable hotel space category. Our world-class approach immediately hits you when you enter a Bloom Hotel. The product feels premium and even at a lower price point, we offer award winning Grohe rain showers, Egyptian cotton linen and Fresh Air systems that only a few select leading hotels can boast about.
In fact, Bloom is the first mid-market brand globally to trademark its sleep experience - the CloudBed - demonstrating our commitment to excellence. We have vibrant atmosphere in our properties, which combined with technology-enabled guest experience, has helped our hotels in quickly becoming segment leaders in their respective locations attracting both domestic and international global travellers.
TG: Hoteliers in Goa have complained that the number of foreign tourists is declining. How has the experience been at your two properties?
TW: As we are only into our second year of operations in Goa, it is not wholly accurate for me to compare year-on-year for Bloom. But, it is certainly true that there has been an overall decline, especially with the Russian market. We are fortunate to have very strong relationships with the major charter operators and we have been able to drive a strong share of the British market into our hotels to make up for the overall decline.
Bloom’s direct bookings and repeat guests are one of the highest in the industry. So, we also enjoy good traction with foreign guests returning to Goa who stayed with us last year and that has really helped.
As an industry, we must be mindful that international travellers have multiple options when it comes to beach destinations and we need to work together to ensure Goa as a whole remains competitively priced.
TG: When you say ‘Budget Hotel’, what kind of tariff are we looking at and which segment of tourists are you targeting?
TW: The irony of winning the ‘Best Budget Hotel of the Year’ award is that we actually ban the word ‘budget’ in our company because the only thing budget is the rate. For us that rate typically starts at Rs 3,000 per night and it can move up to Rs 5,000 depending upon the market.
In many markets, this rate would be classed as mid-market. So, we don’t really play in the ‘budget segment’ per se, which many would deem to be sub Rs 3,000. Regardless of what we call the segment, the key is to deliver superior value to guests for what they are paying.
We are targeting value seekers. These guests don’t think about rate first. Rather, they think about the experience of stay and also about what they are getting for their money. Typically these travellers are younger in outlook and are highly aspirational – they value our better locations and attention to detail when it comes to design.
Our travellers tend to be tech savvy and opinion leaders. They like to explore and get out of the hotel, be it hitting the beaches, trying the fabulous array of restaurants in Goa or enjoying the local nightlife – they are an active bunch.
TG: What would you expect the State Government of Goa to do to improve tourism?
TW: It’s critical we look at tourism through a long-term sustainable lens. If we don’t look after the environment, there is no long-term. We, as a community, need to look for guidance from other success stories from South-East Asia, where the planning of hotels and infrastructure is done with purpose and clear objective in mind.
Goa is a destination and needs to be built to appeal to tourists. We must understand that the beauty of Goa is the natural landscape, which we must maintain and preserve. By designing Goa to be sustainable in the long-term, we will have a destination that can be marketed more aggressively to the world. It is a hyper competitive landscape and therefore we must have a compelling vision to sell in order to attract more domestic and international tourists.
TG: Do you have plans to launch new properties in Goa?
TW: Absolutely - we are extremely bullish about Goa and believe deeply in the potential of the market. The huge success of our first two properties (125 room BloomSuites in Naika Vaddo and 52 room Bloomrooms in Umta Vaddo in Calangute) has given us great confidence.
We are, however, very particular about our growth. There can’t be any compromise on product quality, which ultimately starts with a shared vision to build a world-class hotel asset with our developers, whether it is a new build project or the conversion of an existing hotel asset. We are passionate about predicting the future needs of our travellers, which helps us truly in designing superior guest experiences. Finding owners to share this mindset is our main objective and we have partnered already with some of Goa’s most progressive hotel asset owners. We are currently exploring multiple new hotel opportunities and you can expect to see more world-class hotels blooming in Goa very soon.
