The culture carriers

Coming straight from the CEO's desk is the good news first. Soaring gas prices and the US economy's downward spiral has not caused much gloom in the industry, thanks to the blistering growth in the economy, in a way reinforcing the decoupling theory. Occupancies and RevPARs are expected to grow next year too, if perhaps not at the same pace. Hotels are going green, while employees are getting paid more green than last year. One might think all will be rosy in the future with the cash registers tinkling, guests extremely satisfied, and employees supremely happy.

Unfortunately, this hospitality utopia is non-existent. Topping the list of bad news is that land at affordable prices is still scarce in a country of 3.29 million square kilometers. Employees are still running away to greener pastures and the government's helping hand is still not forthcoming.

Despite this, the CEOs are upbeat and are getting innovative at beating the odds. Mixed-use developments are gaining popularity, branded residences and condo hotels are readying to make a debut and fractional ownerships are gaining momentum. At the same time, brand clutter is increasing vertiginously from a handful of hotel brands present a few decades ago to the scores today.

But more than just developmental and branding efforts, hotel brands are interested in making a difference too. As culture carriers of their respective countries, they assimilate into the adopted country with multi-cultural employees, merging their ethnicity with the local cultures and traditions. CSR coupled with concerns for the employee, the environment and the entity itself hasn't diluted the guest focus but has strengthened it. With these efforts they attempt to be truly 'glocal' - global, yet local.

In all this is the company or group head who is giving shape to this new face of hospitality to mould the future generation of hotels. Here, they give voice to their opinions on the future of their company and the overall industry.