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DIALOGUE: Harmony, Elegance, Excellence, and Tranquility - Tangla Hotel’s Way to a Second International Six Star Diamond Award
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altThe Tangla Hotel in Tianjin has recently received the 2013 International Six Star Diamond Award from the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences (AAHS). Tangla is the first venue in Mainland China to be awarded this honour, and has done so for the second year in a row.

For the hotel’s General Manager, Irish-born Fintan O’Doherty, the recognition from the reputable AAHS is of great value. Business Tianjin sat down with him to talk about the significance of this award and about the brand’s development.

The AAHS International Six Star Diamond Award is a prestigious accolade to receive. What makes Tangla Hotel stand out from the competition?

It has to do with a range of aspects. Firstly there’s the structure of the hotel; the bedrooms start on the 36th floor, which gives guests an unparalleled view of the city. Our hotel is quite small; we have 116 rooms, of which 24 are suites. The smallest room is 60 square metres, while a normal hotel room is about 35 square metres, so we’re delivering a luxury product.

Then there’s the wide range of food and beverage outlets, with a fantastic restaurant on the 49th floor, and the highest bar in the city on the 50th floor. Additionally we’ve got two other restaurants on the lower levels. The biggest quality aspect, however, is our team. We use our Chinese corporate culture to get the team members to work well together and we spend a lot of time with them to teach them the art of service.

Before opening, I put together 14 short training courses that we used to make our staff more aware of their impact on the guests’ experience. They covered aspects such as body language and how to meet and greet people, because those things make the difference.

Tangla is a Chinese brand, unlike most of your five-star competitors in Tianjin. Does that make a difference in your approach towards guests?

About 95 percent of our guests are Chinese, and our business is growing dramatically, which means we can create the product the guests want. If you’re working in an established hotel like for example the Hilton, you’ll always need to provide a Hilton breakfast, which is essentially a Western breakfast. We have a lot more freedom to create a product more specific to our guests and to make them feel at home. It’s not about ego; it’s about making them happy. We are a small company, so we can still create our own standards.

How did your nomination for the Six Star Diamond Award come about?

We approached the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences last year and asked them to assess the hotel. That means they will have researched the company and sent some people over to evaluate the hotel anonymously. Last year when I was in New York, I took the opportunity to visit the Academy and convinced their president to come over to Tianjin. He saw the product and was wowed by it. As a Chinese company, getting the Six Star Diamond Award is a fantastic achievement and every one of us is very proud.

Can you elaborate on the unique personal service that Tangla offers its guests?

We have divided the hotel into sections, and for every section one person – a ‘Tangla ambassador’ – is in charge. They then have a team working for their section, which means that the guests always get to see the same staff members. We try to personalise the service that way, with people who are multi-skilled and understand what their guests need.

We are very fortunate, because before we opened, the AAHS sent over Donald Trump’s former personal butler to spend a few days with our team members and train them in the art of service. We try and deliver the best every day, and that requires good training.

You’re under pressure to compete with top-brand international hotels in Tianjin. Do you feel that makes you more cautious and more focused on things that other hotels might take for granted?

Definitely! When I worked in other international hotels before, I knew that just putting the logo over the door would guarantee 40 percent of our business, because the brand was that strong. With Tangla, we are still building a brand and opening new hotels to make it stronger. We’re still under pressure to make sure the brand is pure. That’s why our corporate culture is based around Buddhism; our values are Harmony, Elegance, Excellence, and Tranquillity. We try to create a service-based philosophy for the team members to make them feel good about looking after our guests. Whichever position they’re in, the staff need to feel that they are contributing and that we can’t do it without each other. When we did the training sessions, we mixed up team members from all different departments of the hotel, so they really did all feel part of a whole.

In hotels it’s all about trying to achieve consistency. Why do people go to McDonald's? Not because of the great food, or the nice plastic seats, or the cold lighting. They go because of the consistency, because they’ll get the same burger in Beijing or Paris or anywhere else. We need to make our service consistent, and then we have to be able to take it to the next step and personalise that service.

What does the award mean for your career and you personally?

Well it’s very nice! (stands up and takes an award from a bookshelf) This is a personal award that the AAHS presented to me last summer. I’m delighted of course, because we’ll always be the first in China to receive this award, and throughout our entire company people are very proud that a Chinese brand has been able to achieve this. It’s a challenge to keep getting better and better. Other hotels out there are opening, with newer ideas, new properties, but fortunately the competition hasn’t really managed to overtake us so far. In Tianjin, we’re directly competing with the St. Regis, The Westin, the new Wanda Vista, and now the Ritz-Carlton just opened its doors. As long as we keep the fabric of the building well-maintained, keep the team members motivated and trained, and keep improving things, we’ll hold the key. Guests like consistency, but they also like seeing new things that bring them value for money.

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What are your specific hopes or ideas for the near future?

I’m currently in talks with our head chef about our seafood buffet and doing something different with that every night. The bar upstairs, which is an enormous success, has been so busy that we decided to create a separate wine lounge one floor lower. We’re also looking at our Chinese restaurant at the moment to make that a bit more exciting.

Our brand is expanding as well. We should open a hotel in Sanya next month; it’s right on the beach and has 430 rooms. A hotel in Brussels is under construction, and our branch in New York is currently being rebranded. We’re continuously looking for new opportunities.

By Sanne Jehoul
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