In the beginning...
p. 44 · Read in the full issue
■ suppose it all began with Northern Hotels. Sir Hugh Ragg started his chain of hospitality in the early fifties culminating with the deve lopment of Korolevu Beach Hotel, ably operated by Bill and Kathy Clarke.
This set the tone of what a South Pacific resort was all about, and highly successful it proved to be.
The point was that nobody at this stage had professional sta tus as far as hotel management was concerned. It was a fully amateur adventure. But after all the human race was started by a pair of amateurs.
In 1960 another group of amateurs got in on the act.
I had spent 18 months fool ing around with 1,600,000 square feet of concrete com prising the new jet runway at Nadi. If I never saw another bag of cement it would still be too soon!
I met an American, Pete Slimmer, and an Australian, Ray Wilson, and got into the hotel game with the creation of Skylodge at Nadi Airport.
Our calling card proudly announced “American, Austra lian and Irish spoken fluently.
English understood.”
We, of course, were also amateurs. Maybe a new breed of hotel cat, but amateurs nevertheless.
Time passed by during which we were joined by a group of PanAm pilots (professionals in the air, but very amateurish on the ground), acquiring the Mocambo Hotel (built by Barry Philp) and finally developing the Fijian at Yanuca.
Having been project mana ger for the construction, I got the job as general manager, not on any professional qualifica tions, but because 1 knew where all the plumbing was located.
Then the professionals ar rived. Travelodge, The Regent, Hyatt, Courtesy Inn etc.
Having served a stint with
Fiji’s tourist industry is in a state of flux, says industry pioneer PADDY DOYLE, who also asks some questions and offers a few answers.
The Fiji Visitors Bureau, which gives you exposure to advertis ing and a lot of public relations, I suppose I had by then ac quired a certain amount of professionalism by “osmosis”.
I therefore offer comments on the basis that 1 have seen it all even if I don’t know it all.
One thing that bugs me is the number of divisional meetings that seem to be held daily at the large hotels. If you ring the G.M. (on a first name basis) you invariably find he is holding a rooms banqueting, mainten ance, F&B etc. division meeting and will call you back, which rarely happens.
The way to get through is to say the Prime Minister wants a word with him.
Robert Townsend (my man agement guru) of Avis fame, says, on the subject of meetings “The fewer the better”, and favors a weekly meeting of department heads of fixed duration at a fixed time for
information, not problem sol ving.
This allows the top brass to spend more time with their guests, the raw material of the hospitality industry. A general manager has got to be seen to be believed.
Fiji is at present in a state of flux. We are urged by airlines and wholesalers to build more rooms and promptly react by closing down hotels.
We complain for years that we are dominated by the Aus tralian market while at no stage have we developed a strategy for penetrating that so called “sleeping giant”, North America.
Now we take on large chunks of the States when a city like Los Angeles could flood Fiji if properly motivated.
In this respect, I believe Fiji has not really worked out the image it wishes to create. Gol den beaches, palm trees, the
sun? Australia has it all, and better. Big game fishing? Ever heard of Cairns? Duty free?
Singapore, Hong Kong and Sears Roebuck do a better job.
Food? Read about Bali.
Somehow we have to paint an image of the people, the culture and the environment before the individual products.
We are really trying to play chess without creating the chessboard in the first place. In a world where tourists are either hi-jacked, shot, blown up or hate “honkies”, Fiji is unique.
The history of Fiji as a colony that was never taken by force of arms is unique. The dedication to the royal family is unique.
The simple artifacts made by villagers out of palm leaves are unique. The Sandalwood trade, The Reverend Baker, mul ticultural society, anti-gun laws etc. are all to some degree taken for granted when they could be welded into a major draw card for our industry.
Finally, I believe that our government has some home work to do.
The cost of liquor, in particu lar wines, is giving Fiji a high price image. The restrictions on certain food imports makes it hard to compete in the in ternational market, where these items are an expected norm.
Substitution should be encour aged but so also should the quality of the substitute.
Fiji needs a North American terminator. By hook or by crook this is a must even if it means bending bi-laterals, lob bying at the United Nations or sending President Reagan a ton of yaona! In a world where airlines sell long haul traffic, we are disadvantaged to a great extent by our “whistle stop” status.
So much for the fulminations of a crusty old SOB who should have been put out to grass years ago. I hope our conven tion this year produces some really constructive thinking. We badly need it.