Search

×

Gostelow Report: Hotel lifer back in Hong Kong

It was heartwarming to hear over 500 team members say welcome back, says Franz Donhauser, who returned as GM of Island Shangri-La, Hong Kong, after a five and a half year sojourn in Sydney.

Donhauser had a philosophy that he shared with the owners of Shangri-La Hotels & Resorts, namely look after staff and they will look after the guests. That is what Donhauser had always done since he first became GM of the 565-room Island Shangri-La in Hong Kong in February 2002. After five years, however, he wanted to transfer to Shangri-La Sydney to be near his two sons at school in Australia.

In March 2014, the younger son was about to graduate. “I agreed to come back to Hong Kong as long as I was able to be the general manager of Island Shangri-La,” he recalled. “I was not asking for corporate office or any other responsibility. Running hotels is my life and this is what I want to do forever.”

Franz Donhauser takes a rare, and momentary, chance to sit down
Franz Donhauser takes a rare, and momentary, chance to sit down

A favorite mantra is that a hotel is like a watch with hundreds of moving parts that most do not see, and Donhauser was literally born into the life. His family had a 50-room hotel in Kirchberg am Wechsel, Austria, for over three centuries. He worked his way up the professional ladder via Hyatt and ANA Hotels, joining Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts in 2002

“Coming back to Island Shangri-La, I found that in some ways little had changed during my absence,” Donhauser said. “With a mere 11% staff turnover, most of the team–about a thousand, including regular part-timers–were still in place. The five and a half day working week still remains. But in other respects there are big differences.”

Donhauser himself has to work harder now. Reservations are made closer in and, not so much despite more booking channels but because of them, he finds an increasing number of regular guests telephoning and emailing him personally to make a reservation, sometimes for tonight, or tomorrow.

When they are in-house, these guests are desperately short of time and need everything 24/7, and that includes IT support. When Donhauser ran the hotel the first time round, there was no round-the-clock IT support, no digital and social media marketing personnel. Today the hotel has a five-strong digital marketing/revenue management team.

In 2009, mainland China was barely a double-digit share of his market. When he returned it was up to 40%, but then the Chinese government restricted official business travel. He has now cleverly switched more to alternative business, and the mainland China share still hovers around 35%–despite the fact Hong Kong is, like Macau, a Special Administrative Region of China (SAR), and mainlanders still need a travel permit, usually for seven days maximum.

“We have to be even more creative on food and beverage today,” Donhauser added. “When I was here before, Michelin had not entered Hong Kong. I arrived back to find our Chinese restaurant, Summer Palace, had two stars, as did Pétrus, but then our French chef moved on and we lost those stars,” said the canny operator.

Pétrus has maintained revenue, partly because of its 57th floor views. In addition, its beverage sales have soared, thanks to brilliant sommelier Yohann Jousselin, who offers regular always-full wine pairing dinners, maximum 12 covers, charging up to HK$24,888 (US$3,190) per person. “The hotel was opened in 1991. This year is our 25th anniversary and, to celebrate, our dinners are going up to HK$25,000 (US$3,204),” Donhauser said with a characteristic mischievous smile.

Comment