Southern Sun Mayfair Hotel’s swimming pool. Fredrick Onyango
Having spent close to $1 million (about Sh90m) on renovations, the new owners of Southern Sun Mayfair Hotel, the former Holiday Inn, are not ready to settle for anything less than making their property a preferred destination for leisure tourists and corporate events.
Mr Paul Norman, the hotel’s general manager, says it is all about maintaining their identity and expanding to grow new business. The huge amount of cash that has already gone into the first and second phases of renovations attest to this.
“All public areas, including the guest lounge, restaurants, and conference facilities have been given a new look. We are now working on rooms as we seek to tap into growing demand for affordable accommodation in the city,” he said. For example, under the old management there was no bar area at the hotel. Now, final touches are being made on the part of the restaurant that is set to be a bar.
The space overlooks one of the hotel’s two swimming pools and although not yet complete, it promises to be a favourite spot for guests out to enjoy a drink by the poolside.
Business centres
The gift shop and business centres that were previously located at the lobby have been shifted, creating a bigger seating space for guests. On the extreme end of the lobby is an outsourced restaurant.
“We are located close to the Westlands area that has quality restaurants. We often encourage our guests to try out meals in other restaurants as well,” says Mr Norman. Upon realisation that most guests were concerned about the cost of accommodation and quality of service, he says, management decided that the facility stays middle level yet maintains the identity of the hotel group.
Until July last year the hotel was owned by Holiday Inn while Southern Sun, a South African group of hotels, was involved in the management of the facility. This stretched back to 1995 when Holiday Inn opened its doors in Kenya. The facility that was built in the 1940s served as a hotel and United States International University (USIU) campus previously.
Rebranding to Southern Sun Mayfair hotel came about after the business was taken over by the Southern Sun group. Similar rebranding happened earlier in Dar-es-Salaam (Tanzania), Lusaka (Zambia) and Maputo (Mozambique) at facilities which were owned by Holiday Inn and managed by Southern Sun, and eventually taken over by the South African company after the lapse of their respective leases.
Southern Sun hopes to introduce a new wave of hotel experience across East Africa that concentrates on average priced services.
Various brands
“I cannot say that we have a property we have identified in Uganda already, but we want to expand. Southern Sun has various brands that cater for different markets and are ideal for East Africa,” said Mr Norman. In South Africa, Southern Sun has 80 hotels under its different brands. They are categorised according to target customers, ranging from two-star to four-star facilities. Garden Court is one of the group’s brands that represents three-star facilities. Hotels in this category charge less than conventional four and five-star hotels, making them more affordable for corporate events and conferencing.
Stayeasy, another of Southern Sun’s brands, targets individual guests by offering locals special rates. It is a two-star facility and thus more affordable. The concept has worked well, attracting weekend guest bookings. The Stayeasy model is set to be replicated in Central Africa. At the Nairobi facility, focus points for revenue generation are mixed. Leisure tourism, which the group is keen to tap into, has seen the introduction of cuisines especially targeted at locals, Indians, and Chinese guests.
These are included in the menu depending on the type of guests at the hotel. If Indian, for example, the breakfast serving includes spicy foods that they are accustomed to.
Another key revenue generating opportunity is corporate events. Pricing for such events is negotiable, a factor Mr Norman says is necessary to attract new business. Since last year, when Southern Sun took up ownership of the hotel under a 10-year lease, the group has invested $350,000 in renovating four of the eight conference rooms.
The facelift targets at installing audiovisual presentation equipment to tap into conference tourism. “To be honest the business has been on a straight line. There has not been any increase in business, but we are hoping that once we are through with the renovation we shall be looking at more bookings,” said Mr Norman.
It remains to be seen how the hotel will perform once the facelift is complete given that Nairobi is host to new hotel chains that are keenly eyeing conferencing as the city continues to gain favour as a regional business hub.
