Langham Hospitality Group (LHG) expects to set a record post-pandemic winter period at its Australian properties, as domestic leisure travellers venture north and long-haul travellers support major sporting events, says regional head for the group, Jeffrey van Vorsselen.Speaking at a media event in Sydney last week, van Vorsselen, Managing Director of Langham Melbourne and Regional Vice President, Operations for the Pacific for LHG, said business this winter has been booming.
“We’re having the best winter that we’ve had post-COVID across all our hotels in Australia,” van Vorsselen said.
Langham Hotels & Resorts has three properties in Australia, in Melbourne, Sydney and the Gold Coast.“It’s not limited to the people from Sydney and Melbourne that venture north to the Gold Coast to get away from the winter weather, but a lot of international business is coming through. That’s certainly helped by concerts, sporting events, but very, very strong domestic leisure and domestic MICE.”
“Typically, we really struggle a bit during the winter months in Australia in these big cities,” the hotel boss said. The group more commonly relies on Corporate and MICE business at this time of year to help fill rooms. ” it’s going to be a record,” he forecast for the current season.
“We’re seeing some reasonable numbers of long-haul international coming through. Traditionally, Northern Hemisphere markets travel down under during our summer months, but what we are seeing now is that people are travelling during our winter.”
van Vorsselen highlighted that the highly anticipated return of the China travel market, after COVID, was now at the doorstep for Australia.He said the luxury Chinese traveller was seeking a “slightly different experience to pre-COVID”.“Their trips are now one- to two-generation family holidays (mum and dad and children), instead of three-generation families with grandchildren.”“The luxury Chinese traveller has all their brand names, so they aren’t coming to shop, they are coming for experiences.”“The Melbourne average length of stay is three to four nights. They want to go see the penguins. They want to go see the Great Ocean Road. They’re happy to daytrip and be out all day. It’s all about the experience.”“I would predict by the end of next year we’ll be back on par with pre-COVID levels from China. But it’s about quality over quantity. They are spending more and they are staying a little bit longer. It’s a more quality visitor getting here. They are spending on good food, they’re spending on activities, putting that money into regional .”
Having recently attended ILTM Asia Pacific in Singapore, van Vorsselen the level of interest from luxury travel agents in China had skyrocketed.“Three years ago, I had one scheduled meeting with a luxury agent from China, compared to 50% of my appointments last month in Singapore. Fifty percent of my appointments were from luxury Chinese travel agents that were already putting business in, and their pipeline is very strong,” he said with enthusiasm.
