How the Heron reinvented itself

How does a hotel erase a bad reputation when standing on grounds that once stood for something you don’t believe in? How do you turn this image around and build something on top of this old colourful lore? And how long can this reputation to be expunged given that the place was notorious and legendary in equal measures?

These are questions that Heron Portico Hotel along Milimani Road, in Nairobi might have asked themselves as they embarked on a long journey of re-invention.

But you will learn fast that there are no easy answers to such complex questions. What you will know for sure is that in the 40 years the hotel stood where it’s standing now, almost 30 of those years were cast under the shadow of its predecessor and it took time— lots of it— new thinking, complete structural upgrading and sometimes renovation to finally free itself off that old image.

Popular night spot

Maybe it’s worth mentioning the elephant in the room even though it’s been rendered inconsequential. Back in the 70s, what stood there was Buffalo Bills Hotel, which was one the first furnished apartments in Nairobi.

For those who remember this hotel, it wasn’t exactly a hotel that inspired a lot of awe and if it did it wasn’t the flattering type. But it was a popular nightspot that also served juicy meat during the day. Eventually after the management finally decided to shift their business focus and turn it into a hotel the reputation of the Buffalo Bills clung on its back like a monkey.

Over time, they chipped away at the old Buffalo and worked up a new hotel that would stand along that road as a respected establishment.

Serious work started seven years ago, when they decided to bring down some walls, put up some, knock out windows, upgrade the décor, hire new staff and retrain old ones, bring artefacts from Arabia and from the coastal Swahili villages to give that Coastal/ Arabian feel it has now. In short, make it sexy, classy, and habitable by businessmen who appreciate staying in the city without staying in the city.

Then two years ago, they brought in The Sarovar (yes, with an “r”) Group of Hotels to manage it. The group already had a reputation, at least in India, with over 78 hotels under their portfolio including one hotel in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

The group was previously managing Ole Sereni Hotel, which they had managed from its inception but which some two years ago, they handed back to its owners to manage. What they needed was a new exciting project, something challenging, a hotel with 108 rooms, 76 staff (now 110) and a shadow to completely extinguish. Heron was it.

Four-star

Now it’s rated four-star. Trip Advisor has ranked it number 15 out of 106 hotels in Nairobi. Their location, they say, is their biggest strength for those who might not want to get into the concrete of the city, but need to stay close in case they need to dash in there for meetings.

“It takes a lot to bring a hotel to where it is now,” Sanjeev Tiwari, their general manager told me as we sat at their Bashasha Café, a garden-y café that overlooks Milimani Road.

Many recognisable faces – mostly company owners, CEOs, wheeler-dealers and a senator sat having meetings.

“It takes more than just building it and painting it anew, it takes shaking it from within, retraining staff, getting in new chefs, changing the mind-set from within first. Because change should come from within before it shows outside. We are happy with the hotel now, it’s doing well.”

Their junior suite is particularly impressive, very Swahili with that homely coastal feel, cushions, Swahili furniture, a kitchenette and large windows which when you slide open, you might invite the soothing sounds from Maxwell Church in the next compound if it happens to be a Saturday.

Which is quite telling, ironically and otherwise, this spiritual influence. It’s as if the church stands there to continue chasing away the ghosts of Buffalo Bills.