Tuesday, June 5, 2012
SWISS hotel brand Mövenpick Resorts and Spa Cebu has announced a temporary suspension of its hotel operations for five months as it will embark on an extensive renovation.
The renovation will run from July 15 to Dec. 15, Mövenpick Cebu General Manager Knuth Keifer said in a press statement.
He said this will involve extensive renovation of the hotel amenities such as guests’ rooms, swimming pool, and the external area including restaurants and lounges.
Keifer said new amenities will also be put in place like those that are “never seen before in the Philippines such as the innovative new entertainment and event facility.”
He said the renovation program is “not a conventional refurbishment but rather a completely fresh approach to the overall guest experience.”
Oikonomos International Resources Corp. will be investing P200 million to finance the hotel upgrade.
Oikonomos, owned by Manny Osmeña, is the company that went into a business venture with Movenpick Hotels and Resorts to develop the Movenpick Resort and Spa Cebu. Last year, the company invested some P100 million to improve the hotel’s main lobby, among other facilities.
Scale
“We are very excited by the new features we have planned and believe they will offer guests wonderful reasons to visit Cebu again and again,” Keifer said.
Given the scale of the renovation project, Keifer said they have decided to close the hotel so as not to inconvenience guests.
“In this case the scale of the renovation is so ambitious and so transformational that we wanted to focus on creating the best possible environment for work to be completed to our high standards. As a result we decided to temporarily suspend operations for five months,” Keifer said.
Movenpick has been informing their guests, as well as the travel industry, of the scheduled temporary suspension of operations for about a week now, said Oikonomos assistant director of communications Joanna Cuenco.
She said the major transformation of the hotel is meant to elevate further its image given the tough competition among resort hotels in Mactan and to provide a new attraction in Cebu as a destination.
“The occupancy rates throughout the market are slightly lower than expected currently due to fewer travelers, especially from the very important Korean market. We scheduled the renovation in a way that we can re-open toward the end of the year, when we expect the market conditions to be stronger again,” Cuenco said.
She said that the company will retain its core employees across various departments on-site during the renovation while others will be offered opportunities within other companies of Oikonomos.
A large delegation of the team will also travel to Russia to support the upcoming Apec Summit in Vladivostok during the renovation period.
Reservations
As for hotel reservations, Cuenco said the hotel will continue to accept bookings up to the night of July 14, while those guests with hotel bookings beyond July 15 are already being assisted to book with other resorts.
Movenpick Hotels and Resorts is an international upscale hotel management company represented in 24 countries with 71 hotels and resorts currently in operation. More the 30 properties are planned or already under construction, including this year’s openings in Egypt, Turkey, Thailand, Palawan in the Philippines, Dubai and France.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on June 06, 2012.
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