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Media
Freemantle Hotels
The board of the Freemantle hotel group were reviewing their existing policy and
considering future developments. They were particularly concerned that any change in
direction would open them to substantially higher levels of risk, and involve major changes
in promotional policy.
The existing hotel operation
Freemantle had grown rapidly during the past 5 years, and had become famous
throughout Australia with its slogan - 'You're free at Freemantle' - and its innovative hotel
formula. Freemantle Hotels were large, custom built units on the outskirts of all the main
Australian towns, normally between the town and the airport. Hotels had been built at
Perth - the original site near to Freemantle, the port of Perth; Sydney, Brisbane,
Melbourne, Adelaide, and Darwin. There was also a small resort hotel of 80 rooms on the
Barrier Reef, which had become an important part of the group promotional policy. The
main hotels had between 400 and 500 rooms, two swimming pools, a health club. The
group had always built hotels as part of shopping complexes. This meant they had access
to, on average, 15 restaurants and eating places, and the widest possible range of retail
outlets. Another innovative development was the provision of regular bus transport from
the city centre and the airport. Buses ran at 30 minute intervals throughout the day and
night.
Freemantle carried out detailed research on all customers, via a lengthy questionnaire
completed with one in 400 visitors to the hotels. This formed part of its comprehensive
information system, which analysed occupancy and cost centres on a weekly basis, a
whole range of personnel, supplier performance on a monthly basis, and a complex range
of macro-environmental issues in the planning process. The profile that the hotel had
defined was fairly clear, and was consistent for all the outlets. It is in Table 12A. As might
be expected, the customer was predominantly male, aged over 25, and of the higher
socio-economic groups.
Table 12A. Freemantle customer profile by year with year 5 the most recent.
Year
1
2
3
4
5
Business
47
49
49
56
62
Conference
20
19
20
18
18
Government
10
7
6
9
10
Tourist
23
25
25
17
10
The main hotels were designed on a standard basis with air-conditioned rooms, ample
working space, a bathroom, and cable television with a daily library of 30 recent films
available. At ground level, the hotels contained extensive secretarial facilities, a large bar,
numerous seminar and conference rooms, and a large coffee shop with 24 hour service.
All the hotels were linked together by a satellite communication system which speeded
transfers between centres, and accounted for a substantially greater proportion of internal
reservations than achieved by the competition. The hotel group had invested heavily in
computerisation to control the accounting system and to speed guest payment. It had won
the accolade of the 'Fastest Checkout in the East', from one of the leading hotel
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