Hotel News in Brief

Nov 11, 09 | 1:45 am

The 16th and 17th ships in Costa Cruises fleet, the largest Italian travel group and Europe's number one cruise line, will be called the Costa Favolosa and Costa Fascinosa. The two new sister ships, 114,500 gross tonnage with a capacity for 3,780 guests, built by Fincantieri at its Marghera shipyard will be delivered in Summer 2011 and Spring 2012 and signal the end of Costa Cruises' major fleet expansion program. The new ships' names were chosen after approximately 40,000 travel agents across 40 countries submitted more than 16,000 pairs of names as part of the "Send us a sea of names" project. Travel agents, customers and web users all over the world were encouraged to choose the names for the two new Costa Cruises flagships.  Twenty-five pairs of names were shortlisted and posted at www.worldofcosta.com where travel agents could then choose their favourite pairing. The winning names of the new fleet reflect how travel agents see Costa's ships as "magical" and "glamorous" places.


The Rezidor Hotel Group, the Brussels-based hotel management company, announces the Radisson Blu Resort & Thalasso, Monastir in Tunisia. The second Radisson Blu resort in Tunisia, the newly re-branded 280-key hotel is set on a five-hectare beachfront site facing the Gulf of Hammamet in the Mediterranean Sea.


Two golf resorts within Benchmark Hospitality International's portfolio have achieved a place on the recently released Golf World Readers Choice Top 50 Golf Resorts in America List for 2010. The properties include Stonewall Resort with its Arnold Palmer Signature Course, located near Weston, West Virginia, and Turtle Bay Resort with its Arnold Palmer and George Fazio courses, located on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii. Stonewall Resort placed at #22 and Turtle Bay Placed at #43 in the Top 50. The Golf World Readers Choice Awards are determined by reader input gathered through Golf Digest Publications Research Resource Center via an online poll. More than 46,000 individual facility ratings and 600,000 criteria evaluations were collected, grading facilities across the nation based on criteria that included quality and condition of course, reputation, golf practice facilities, speed of play, clubhouse facilities, hotel and food & beverage accommodations, caddie program, golf pro shop, off-course activities & amenities, and overall service and value.


Great Hotels of the World and Special Hotels of the World are delighted to have joined The Luxury Network as official hotel UK partners. The Luxury Network is the world's most exclusive and proactive private luxury affinity marketing consortium with more than 60 premium brands in each luxury capital of the world working together for mutual client and business development. The group covers all areas of the top-end market including boating, finance, insurance, motoring, concierge, health & beauty, aviation, property, travel, golf, events, jewellery and watches, entertainment and fashion. Member brands include Aston Martin, Tatler, Dom Perignon, Bentley and Villeroy & Boch. Carly Gotz, group director sales & marketing comments "More than ever it is important to  ensure our members fees stretch further and by joining this network, it will allow our member hotels to reach a wider luxury audience in a cost-effective way." www.theluxurynetwork.co.uk. 


At the glittering British Travel Awards ceremony, von Essen hotels beat stiff competition to win Gold Award for Hotel Chain of the Year, 2009. The UK's travelling consumers and agents and professionals from the travel industry voted in their tens of thousands to show that they thought von Essen hotels deserved a British Travel Gold Award for excellence. von Essen hotels was delighted and proud to beat large prestigious hotel chains such as Hilton, RIU hotels and resorts, Warner Leisure hotels and Shearings. von Essen's executive director of sales and marketing, Greg Ward commented: "It is a great honour to be recognised by our customers as well as the industry. von Essen hotels continues to invest in staff, major refurbishments and in acquiring new and unique properties such as The Forbury, Reading, the first hotel in our Metropolitan set. We look forward to further developing our Metropolitan set with the opening of Hotel Verta in 2010 and continuing our extensive development programme."  


Singapore based GHM has announced the appointment of Stefan Noll as General Manager of The Chedi Club at Tanah Gajah, Ubud. Stefan joined GHM in November 2005 as Club Manager at the formally GHM managed property, The Club at The Leela Goa, before being transferred to The Legian in Bali in 2007. Over the last two years at The Legian, Stefan has played an integral role as Executive Assistant Manager in the continued success of the resort. Educated in Germany and Switzerland, Stefan began his career in hotel management in Germany before moving to London to spend a number of years at the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park Hotel in various Food and Beverage Management positions. Announcing Stefan's promotion, Mr. Jenni said, "Stefan has been a valuable member of the team at The Legian in Bali since 2007 and we are pleased to announce his promotion to General Manager at The Chedi Club, Tanah Gajah, Ubud.  Stefan has shown great dedication to GHM over recent years and we look forward to a successful future for The Chedi Club under his leadership".


In anticipation of its grand opening in early November, Hullett House planted a series of stylized scenes these past couple of weeks throughout different Hong Kong hotspots to build excitement around the reinvigoration of the city's heritage. Created under the motto "By Hong Kong. For Hong Kong. We Give you Old Hong Kong," Hullett House will bring the city an entirely experiential destination, consisting of an all-suite hotel and five food and beverage venues, all housed within Tsim Sha Tsui's former Marine Police Headquarters.


Ray Stone is retiring as senior vice president sales and marketing of Accor Hospitality from next year and will serve as senior advisor, where he will continue to build and maintain relationships with customers and partners for Accor. Replacing Stone will be Graham Wilson, currently vice president marketing Asia-Pacific. Chairman and COO Asia-Pacific Michael Issenberg credited Stone for helping to establish the Accor name in the region and develop a network of supporters throughout Asia. Stone also conceived the World of Accor (WoA), he said, and secured the sponsorship of the Australian rugby team Wallabies for Novotel, during a golden period when the national team went on to win the World Cup. Issenberg told TTG Asia e-Daily: "I met Ray in 1996. I conducted an Asia-Pacific search to fill the role (of general manager sales and marketing for the Pacific) and when I met Ray, I thought it was too good to be true that a quality executive was available and wanted to take on this role. "As it turned out, I had nothing to be worried about. Ray has been the consummate professional to work with in the past 13 years, and one of the most delightful people I've worked with in my career." Stone will continue to represent Accor at major trade shows next year and each of the new WoA events scheduled for 2010, including Mumbai. Stone said: "Without question, virtually every one of these past years with Accor has been among the very best of my almost 40 years in the hotel industry."