A growing number of luxury world-class international hotel chains are arriving in Beijing as the business travel market continues its boom.
The Beijing Best Western hotel is set to open soon, and the Park Hyatt, a luxury brand in the Hyatt Group will follow soon. Ritz Carlton has already chosen a site downtown for its first hotel in Beijing.
Whether it is in eastern coastal cities like Shanghai metropolis and Ningbo, or southwestern cities such as Chongqing and Chengdu, business people have a wide-ranging choice of international hotels.
"Following 20 years of development, China's hotel business is nearly at the same level of those overseas. That's why we chose to come here now. We believe that through franchise management, the brand hotels will become increasingly popular across China," said William W. M. Dong, chief representative of Best Western International China.
Best Western now owns more than 4,000 hotels worldwide. Over the past few months, it signed contracts with five Chinese hotels in Xiamen, Beijing, Wuhan and other cities.
Shangri-La opened its first hotel or the first international hotel in the scenic capital city of Hangzhou in east China's Zhejiang province. It currently has 16 hotels in China and plans to build a top-quality resort hotel in Sanya, another prestigious seaside city in southern Hainan island province.
"China is one of the fastest-growing economies and is set to be a world player within the hospitality industry. The growth of trade and economy has brought a huge influx of customers. We are now concerned that many of our hotels are constantly booked," said Giovanni Angelini, Shangri-La's chief executive officer and managing director.
Qian Jin, vice-president of Starwood, shared the same view. "China's hotel business has entered a golden period. Our sales goal here is expected to grow 25 percent over that of last year," he said.
Starwood, known for its Westin, St. Regis and Sheraton brands, is quite optimistic about development in China.
Qian said, "Foreigners have agreed that these hotels are well-equipped and can offer very good service. We should now innovate based on the Chinese culture and foreign management experience."
(People's Daily November 22, 2002)
