FEATURE11 February 2015

Room service

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Features Impact Travel

When executives at The Peninsula Hotels group say they take a long-term view of the market, they really do mean long-term. China’s luxury hospitality brand opened its first property in Kowloon, Hong Kong in 1928 with the ambition of creating ‘the finest hotel east of Suez’. Its combination of Eastern and Western grandeur still stands out in a city now replete with luxury hotels; the property boasts a fleet of signature Rolls-Royces, its Afternoon Tea is legendary, and ‘The Pen’ remains a byword for opulence across Asia.

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The Peninsula marque was launched by two brothers from Baghdad, Ellis and Elly Kadoorie, who arrived in Hong Kong via Shanghai. It remains a majority family-owned business; Sir Michael Kadoorie, the current chairman, is the third generation of family caretakers and one of his daughters recently joined the business.

“That history and family ownership really does differentiate us from everyone else, and is really at the core of the brand’s DNA and ethos, ” says The Peninsula Hotels vice-president of marketing Rob Cheng. “It allows us to have a very long-term view and drives everything we do.

“First of all it dictates where we actually will have our hotels. We have a really strong philosophy of being in the most dynamic gateway cities. We’re very careful and very, very patient in making sure that we have the right location and that it’s in the heart of the city. It has to be an iconic address, and ...