NEW DEVELOPMENTS & (RE-)POSITIONING
Feasibility Studies
Find potent investors for your project, convince the best operators to run your establishment, get the franchise of your preferred brand or simply influence the authorities to easier obtain licenses and permits thanks to a professional feasibility study established by SIHC.
Every great undertaking starts with a detailed study of its feasibility. This comprehensive document shall not only confirm or reject the viability of the project, but also be instrumental in pointing the direction to take. Time and money spent on a professional feasibility study are invaluable and largely enhance the quality and financial success and reduces potential risks of any project.
Scope of work: While every project has its own characteristics, a standard feasibility study does:
A comprehensive feasibility study by SHIC includes, but is not limited to:
Cross-Sector Branding
Many hotels around the world enjoy a powerful brand or brand association. It is a fact that strong brands can increase revenues up to 32% depending on location, brand image and brand recognition within the respective market.
SIHC is specialised in helping existing strong brands of various industries entering the hospitality or leisure market to increase brand equity. Be it a restaurant chain of a celebrity or a group of lifestyle hotels of a well known fashion label, there is hardly a better place to take advantage of an established brand name and to grow its awareness and reputation than through high traffic establishments like hotels and restaurants.
Excited by the successes of NOBU, Laura Ashley or ARMANI? We facilitate and accompany your entry into the leisure and hospitality industry from the feasibility study to the brand standards till the financing contract with the investors.
Change Management
In today’s fast moving world, we constantly need to adapt to new market conditions, new industry trends, new guest expectations or new economic situations. We need to CHANGE or we DIE.
Most people are resistant to change, reason why professional change management is most important, if change should be effective and sustainable. Let SIHC be the engine and the driver to achieve your ambitious goals of change.
When to call upon SIHC:
-
Performance Gap (i.e. loss of market shares)
-
(Economic) Crisis (Downsizing / Layoffs)
-
Management Transition (incl. Change of generations)
-
Merger & Acquisition
-
Identification of Opportunities
-
Modernization (incl. new technologies) or New Company Strategies
Why to call upon SIHC:
The cooperation with an outside consultant gives the intended change a much higher sense of urgency and relevance. Therefore, the buy-in of the team is far greater and consequently the results much better. Moreover, in many cultures, there is a lot of natural resistance to change and therefore, change processes driven by its own management may easily lead to conflicts between some leaders and their teams. SIHC has great experience in defining, initiating and executing the change process at the most professional level and with the best possible outcome.
SIHC principals of change management:
-
Create a sense of urgency: Through the involvement of a third party like SIHC, the sense of urgency gets a completely different dimension. SIHC, together with senior management underpin not only the positive outcome of the change, ("what is in" for each team member), but also explains the NO CHANGE scenario.
-
Form a guiding coalition: Ideally, the (senior) management team will be involved in the creation and decision making process of the upcoming changes. Their buy-in is crucial to achieve the goals, as they will form the guiding coalition.
-
Create a vision: Together with the coalition team, a detailed CHANGE strategy will be established that defines the vision and milestones on the way to CHANGE implementation
-
Communicate the vision: Now the entire team gets involved. Complete transparency and appropriate communication will minimize uncertainty. The explanation of the WHY as well as the WHAT’S IN FOR ME is as important as the NO CHANGE scenario.
-
Get buy-in through empowerment: The buy-in from the team is a vital stage of the CHANGE process. Best achieved through additional empowerment
-
Create quick wins: Like in any bigger/important project, milestones are important to measure the advancement und the achievements of quick wins (reaching those milestones) will provide further dynamism to the process.
-
Build on the change: Keep explaining the reasons for change and let the momentum grow as you go. CHANGE is less scary when you are driving it and even fun, when approaching the finishing line as a winner.
-
Institutionalize the change: Make sure old habits are erased and allow the new ones to penetrate to every corner of the enterprise. Update written documents to reflect the CHANGE and adopt it in your language.
-
Celebrate achievements: Often forgotten to reflect after successful CHANGE management to celebrate the achievements and award the key stakeholders.
(Re-)Positioning
The financial success of a hospitality or tourism asset always starts with its correct strategic positioning. We define positioning as: Putting the right product (asset) with the right services (quality) at the right location (market) and price (value) to the right customers (target customer).
Be it for new developments or existing operations, the (re-)positioning decision is probably the most difficult and most profound to take. That the correlations of product, service, market, price and customers are hugely complex and intricate does not make the decision any easier.
A (re-)positioning evaluation requires a thorough understanding of the industry and the marketplace in which your organization competes.
Positioning Strategy:
A Positioning/Re-Positioning exercise through SIHC include, but is not limited to the following focus areas:
-
Familiarization with the assets
-
SWOT Analyses (own & competition)
-
Price Positioning
-
Brand Evaluation
-
Positioning Statement
Successful (re-)positioning of a hospitality or tourism asset increases its financial returns, therefore extends its useful life and consequently underpins its initial and ongoing investments. It is a seminal (re-)orientation involving tremendous efforts and possibly additional investments. You will not do this every year, so you want to do it right, the very first time! SIHC has done it over and over again and is delighted to assist you yet drive your (re-) positioning efforts.
Owner's Representation for new Developments
The value of an owner’s representative during development projects must and can be a multiple of its cost. While architects focus on design and aesthetics, their aim is generally to create a visual landmark that raises his/her name to more popularity yet celebrity. Practicality and operational excellence are rarely a priority nor are – if not constantly reminded – financial framework requirements. Operators may love creative designs as long as it fits into their brand and service standards.
Unfortunately, design combined with practicality – if at all possible - always pushes the (financial) envelope, often without a reasonable chance of return on investment. This is where an experienced owner’s representative comes in.
…is unbiased with no own future gains
…‘s priority is neither merely design nor just customer satisfaction, but simply the highest possible return on investment
…orchestrates even the most impressive groups of soloists
…can manage conflicts between the various parties involved in the project
…avoids potentially expensive mistakes
An owner representative by SIHC is someone who…
…has the knowledge of the value engineering process and controls the most efficient allocation of the project budget
…understands the needs and wants of each member of the project team, and keeps the owner’s goals in mind
…objectively judges at any given stage whether the project team is fit for the task
…knows how to constantly challenge the project team to perform at its best
Pre-Opening Assistance
Pre-Opening Assistance (POA) is SIHC’s core competency. From the island beach resort to the mixed-use city center development, the success of an opening lies in the professional planning of the development and pre-opening process.
Whether you want to compare it to the jump from a springboard or to giving birth to a child, the opening of a hotel is equally exciting and rewarding, the chances of making costly mistakes however are far greater. (see matrix below)
Once again, SIHC services are tailored to your very own needs. Whether you lack of expertise or time or simply need re-assurance, SIHC fills the gap and helps you to optimize the pre-opening journey. There are many important pre-opening investments, where quality must win over price. A professional consultancy through SIHC experts should be one of them!
All associates of SIHC have extensive project management and pre-opening experiences in various key markets of this globe. A top professional project management is crucial to ensure best quality of the project, but most importantly for the long-term success and profitability of the undertaking. Hundreds of important decisions are made during the planning and pre-opening phase and you want to do them well. With SIHC, you have a perfect partner for best possible long-term results.
Common Pre-Opening Mistakes to avoid:
Critical Path
The critical path is the framework of any project manager. It is a guiding agenda that supports and structures the project. While many entries on the critical path follow a logical sequence, some are simply indispensable yet milestones of the plan. During the complex process of planning, designing, construction and pre-opening activities, it is the critical path that helps you to:
-
Stay on track, on time and within the budget
-
Not to forget important tasks/decisions
-
Avoid getting under time pressure
-
Do all tasks at the right time, the right sequence
-
Guarantee efficient progress (in terms of time and finances)
Thanks to our experience in various parts of the world, SIHC is able to design a detailed critical path for your project that makes best use of time and money and that will enable you to make the best possible decisions at anyone stage of the development.
Pre-Opening Budgets
SIHC has vast experience in establishing accurate pre-opening budgets that facilitates the financial planning of your project. Accurate estimations are a result of detailed planning and each dollar wisely spent in pre-opening will have its positive impact in post-opening.
Each project, each market place, each location has its own characteristics. It is our expertise to know from salary ranges to sales & marketing costs and administrative expenses, which you will occur during your pre-opening phase.
A Pre-Opening budget by SIHC is a most comprehensive document that may not be limited to include:
-
Project Brief
-
Key Assumptions
-
Summary of Expenses
-
Disbursement Schedule
-
Organization Chart
FF&E Renewal Schedule
Furniture, Fixture & Equipment (FF&E) Procurement
Approximately 15% of your total hotel investment is spent on FF&E and 4-5% of annual revenue thereafter provisioned for its replacement. FF&E spending is a key factor of hotel development that determines the look and feel of your asset and greatly influences the quality standard of your final product.
More often than not, it is a tremendous source of disagreement between developers and operators. Its impact on the overall quality (or its perception) and costs are often underestimated. Reason why SIHC considers professional procurement and skilled negotiations between the various parties of the project a priority and a key element in the development process.
Depending on the location, SIHC already has a wide network of trust worthy quantity surveyors or procurement companies or, depending on the size of the development, we are getting engaged ourselves. Essentially, we can help you in finding and negotiating with the best partner options and streamline the FF&E procurement in both, time and money.
Relax and have SIHC:
-
Establish your FF&E Budgets
-
Apply the secrets of smart FF&E planning
-
Source and negotiate with trust worthy FF&E procurement companies
-
Compile a FF&E Renewal schedule
It is a fact that guests typically remember three most important impressions: The look of the lobby, the feel of their room and the quality of customer service.
Management/Franchise Selection
It goes without saying, the selection of the optimal management / franchise company is one of the top decisions any developer/owner has to take. Just like a marriage, the partnership with a hotel brand should not only be based on its beauty and glamour, but rather its core values and the level of compatibility between the brand and the product, the target market, the differentiation to the competition and the required brand standards.
The Associates of SIHC have worked for countless years with many of the most successful hospitality brands and know their pros and cons like no one else. Moreover, they personally know the development teams and are able to negotiate the best deals on your behalf.
