Cyprus hoteliers keen to ‘go orange’
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Stelios Haji-Ioannou, the serial entrepreneur and easyGroup chairman, has set his sights on opening his first low-cost easyHotel franchise property in
Three such hotels are presently operational in
Stelios hopes to develop a regional master franchise that will see 38 easyHotels popping up in
In
“Ideally, the brand suits locations where there is demand through the year and is town centre, rather than resort location,” Alexander told the Financial Mirror.
His presentation will be simple, just like the easyGroup concept.
“I will be on my own. I will go through the background to easyHotel, its current status and development plans. In terms of opening, that depends if we can find a hotelier who believes the brand is right for him,” Alexander said.
“We are looking for hoteliers or property owners who have a hotel/property of at least 20-plus rooms who are prepared to invest to convert them to easyHotel standards. Typically these will be 1-star or 2-star properties in an urban or suburban location with potential demand outside of the standard tourist season.”
“Standard beachside properties will not benefit greatly from the concept,” he said.
As regards the franchise fee, this is calculated on a percentage of rooms’ revenue.
Alexander said that between hotels or hotel apartments, they “would look at either as a conversion opportunity.”
As regards the basic room-rate, he said: “I cannot give you this information at present as I do not have a good enough knowledge yet of typical room rates in
The standard contract would be for 20 years and each contract will be considered differently, while sales will be exclusively online, just as all the other easyGroup ventures.
As regards the hotel’s facia, we asked Lawrence Alexander if this would include the group’s identifying orange in its colour scheme:
“There are certain brand standards, which include a certain amount of orange,” he said.
At a press conference in
As with all easyHotel premises, easyHotel
The easyHotel in
In less than a year since launch, easyHotel has proved successful with very high occupancy rates. As a result the company has proved attractive to franchisees and recruited a CEO to take over the day to day running of the business from Stelios.
Lawrence Alexander took up his new challenge in July. He has over 25 years experience in senior management positions within the hotel industry including Ladbroke Hotels, Merit Hotels (part of ILG) and Penguin Hotels prior to joining Jarvis Hotels in 1990.
As CEO he plans to establish a strong management team to guarantee the growth of the company leading to a stock market listing in the next 3 to 5 years. Stelios will remain as Chairman of easyHotel for the foreseeable future.
“I am delighted to welcome