{"id":197773,"date":"2025-04-22T10:45:47","date_gmt":"2025-04-22T08:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.voyages-d-affaires.com\/?p=197773"},"modified":"2025-04-22T10:54:18","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T08:54:18","slug":"slh-interview-hyde-hilton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.voyages-d-affaires.com\/en\/slh-interview-hyde-hilton","title":{"rendered":"Richard Hyde (SLH): \"A win-win partnership with Hilton"},"content":{"rendered":"

Small Luxury Hotels of the World (SLH) passed the 600-hotel mark at the end of last year. To go even further, would you now like to reach the 800 or even 1,000 hotel mark? What would be the right size for your group?<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Richard Hyde -<\/strong> It's a question we still find difficult to answer internally. The important thing is not so much quantity as quality<\/strong> that matters to me. But it's nice to see that so many hoteliers and customers love the SLH brand. Without necessarily pursuing a massive growth strategy or diluting our brand, we could easily reach 650 or 700 hotels in two or three years, simply by adding hotels where our customers want us to be.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Where do you see opportunities to add new hotels?<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

R. H. - <\/strong>In France, where we currently have around forty hotels, including 7 in Paris and 25 on the C\u00f4te d'Azur, there are probably a good dozen urban destinations where we could have a presence, such as Marseille and Lille among others<\/strong>. The same applies to other cities in Spain and Germany. We would also like to have more hotels in the United States, in cities like Boston or San Francisco. But the number one destination for our customers is Hawaii. It's there, more than anywhere else, that we'd like to have a hotel. Don't forget that most of the hotels in our top 10 are in seaside destinations<\/strong>\u00a0Ibiza, Marbella, St. Barths and the Maldives. But we also have great development opportunities in China, where we have 21 hotels and could have many more, as well as in India and Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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\"The\r\n
The Grand H\u00f4tel du Palais Royal, Paris.<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
\"Le\r\n
Le Norman, in Paris.<\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

What do business customers mean to Small Luxury Hotels?<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

R. H. - <\/strong>A third of our hotels are in city centres, another third are country houses and the final third are seaside resorts. So, although it's not necessarily related, I would say that the proportion of business travellers is similar to the number of urban hotels, around 30 %<\/strong>. In addition to the leisure clientele, there is also a good proportion of 'bleisure' travellers. In light of environmental issues, people want to travel less, combining business trips with extended weekends. This is a trend that we are seeing with longer stays.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Is the MICE segment important for SLH?\u00a0<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

R. H. - <\/strong>We have a small MICE department. It's not a big business for us, few of our hotels have real meeting facilities<\/strong>Some of our hotels, such as the Breidenbacher Hof in D\u00fcsseldorf or the Grand Hotel du Palais Royal in Paris, have beautiful rooms. But we do get requests for exclusive events, and many of our hotels can be made private.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n