Giveaways – WTM

Kempinski Hotels and Resorts

The group will use WTM to launch its first guest loyalty programme, Private Concierge, for individual travellers.

Membership is by invitation only and will initially be offered to 10,000 of Kempinski’s most valued customers.

Benefits include personalised check-in, cash advance on credit cards, automatic room or suite upgrades and early and late check-out facilities when staying at a Kempinski property.

When not staying overnight, members can still have full use of health and fitness clubs, 24hr access to the hotel concierge, a 15% reduction on selected restaurants outside Germany and access to executive floor lounges and meeting rooms as well as an upgrade with any Sixt rental car.

The hotel group will also be launching a corporate advertising campaign that will appear on CNNin November 1999.

At its newly designed stand this year, Marriott will be concentrating on its Hotel Excellence training course for agents and its new preferred agency scheme.

Under the scheme, agents must complete Hotel Excellency in order to qualify for the full 10% commission rate. Those who do not complete the course will only receive 8%. The upgraded Web site for agents will also be on display at the stand.

The group will be sharing its stand with representative reservation agents SRS-WorldHotels.

As well as focusing on its Dream Holiday Islands, Far East Gateway Hotels and Activity Destinations products, it will also be promoting its conference and incentive facilities.

There will also be a special promotion for the group’s new Sutera Hotel Kota Kinabalu, Borneo, which opened this year.

Marketed as a new holiday resort and venue for conferences, it will be the basis for a prize draw with a mountain bike as first prize.

To mark its debut at WTM, this international hotel group will be promoting its first hotel in the UK – Shaw Park Plaza hotel – which opened on the Euston Road in London in September 1999.

The four-star hotel is a business-orientated property that is performing well as a conference and meeting venue.

Park Plaza Hotels Europe is part of Park Plaza Worldwide which has 152 hotels in 22 countries.

As well as launching its new guest service programme and its own Web site, Radisson SAS will announce at least three new hotels in the UK.

The company will also discuss its new property in Muscat, Oman which is due to open this month.

Sandals and Beaches Resorts

Sandals is using WTM to officially introduce the Sandals Signature Spa Collection which came on line in September. The collection will include spa properties in the Bahamas, Antigua, St Lucia and Negril.

Information on the new French Village at Beaches Turks and Caicos Resort and Spa, which is to be unveiled on December 20 and forms part of the group’s £62.5m expansion programme, will also be available, along with Beaches’ new destination in its portfolio – Varadero in Cuba.

Staff from the Spanish group’s first hotel in the UK – the new Melia White House in Regent’s Park which opened in September – will be unveiling a £9m renovation project to the property.

Plans for further expansion in Europe and the Americas will also be detailed. European hotels represented at the stand include Gran Melia Salinas in Lanzarote, the Melia Sancti Petri in Cadiz, the Melia Brussels and Melia de Mar in Palma de Mallorca. Latin American exhibitors include the newly renovated Melia Cancun in Mexico.

Starwood’s stand will incorporate its Sheraton, Westin, St Regis, Luxury Collection and W brands this year. New hotels highlighted will be the Sheraton Sapporo in Japan, the Westin Portland in Oregon and the Westin Sydney, the brand’s first property in Australia.

Sheraton Moriah Hotels will be celebrating its newly announced business hotel, the Sheraton City Tower, located between Tel Aviv and Ramat Gan in Israel. Executives will also be on hand to discuss the Westin St Louis in the US which is under construction.

Following talks with top golfer Colin Montgomerie, Starwood has also just announced it is to open a series of golf academies in Europe.

The Taj Group of Hotels will be promoting the soft opening of two properties in India by the end of this year.

These are the Taj Exotica which will join its other three hotels in Goa and the Taj Hari Mahal in Jodhpur.

A delegation of senior figures from the group, which owns properties spanning the India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and the Maldives, will be at WTM.

Hilton International, Regal Hotels and Thistle Hotels will not be having stands at this year’s WTM.

Choice Hotels is running a prize draw giving away two all-inclusive, fortnight holidays for two people to the Sydney Olympic Games worth around £7,000.

Pan Pacific Hotels is promoting its Sutera Hotel in Kota Kinabalu, Borneo, and has joined forces with tour operator Borneo Travel to offer a prize draw for agents. First prize will be a mountain bike. Agents will receive a photo of an Orang Utan prior to WTM and all they have to do to enter the draw is get it stamped at both the Pan Pacific and Borneo Travel stands.

The French hotel giant’s core objective at World Travel Market is to raise trade awareness of its brands – Sofitel, Novotel, Mercure, Ibis, Coralia and Thalassa.

The group will also emphasise to agents its commitment to developing its presence in the UK with information about its expanded sales office in London. Development plans for 2000 in Morocco, Cuba, Tunisia, Israel and Egypt will also be discussed.

This year Inter-Continental, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn and Express by Holiday Inn will all be exhibiting together at the Bass stand. Details on all brands as well as new marketing and technology initiatives will be available.

Bass intends to announce details of its first ever multi-brand deal in Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

In addition, a new benefit for Six Continents’ Club members will be launched which, the group claims, will be a first in hotel loyalty schemes.

Visitors to the Concorde Hotels’ stand will be treated to Taittinger champagne as the French hotel group unveils its new corporate identity.

The group, which has hotels in 18 countries worldwide, says the new identity will represent traditional values and high quality and symbolise the evolution of the company.

The new look will be featured in Concorde’s new corporate directory for 2000, which features the portfolio of 70 hotels.

Elegant Hotels and Resorts

The luxury hotel group, based in Barbados, invites the trade along to its stand to talk through its imminent expansion plans. As well as looking to double its portfolio of five, it is casting an eye further afield in the Caribbean.

Elegant’s Turtle Beach resort will also be getting a push towards the family market now that its kids’ club, Tommy Turtle, is firmly established. A strong contingent from Barbados will be at the stand including general managers from each hotel.

The newly created hotel management company, which follows Canadian Pacific Hotels’ acquisition of Fairmont Hotels and Princess Hotels, will be making its debut at WTM with the purpose of launching itself and raising awareness within the trade. The group has 35 hotels around the world and will compete in the luxury segment of the market. The show also coincides with the opening of the group’s new Fairmont Vancouver Hotel.

Travelodge, Posthouse, Heritage and Le Meridien will all be present on Forte’s stand this year. The new worldwide directory for 2000, featuring more than 400 properties, will be promoted alongside the second edition of the agents’ leisure brochure, Forte Worldwide Collection, which for the first time includes all Travelodge properties.

Details on Posthouse rolling out its new branded restaurants and superior rooms will be available and the brand will be launching its new interactive Internet site.

Heritage Hotels will be discussing the changes it has undergone following its multi-million pound investment plan and Le Meridien will be updating the industry on its rapidly increasing international network.

Celebrating the opening of what it calls its ‘Millennium Babies’, the group will be showcasing its new resorts in St Lucia, Lake Las Vegas, Nevada and Sharm El Sheikh.

The Hyatt Regency in Kathmandu, which is due to open in April 2000, the Grand Hyatt in Bali and two Hyatt properties in Orlando will also be highlighted.

Around 30 representatives will be at its stand including staff from its recently opened properties such as the Grand Hyatt Amman in Jordan, the Hyatt Regency Thessaloniki in Greece and the Grand Hyatt Muscat in Oman.