This was the news today – consolidation continues, money flows in, Huston exits
Proving that there’s never a dull moment in travel, while WIT Indonesia was happening inside the ballroom of Grand Nikko Bali yesterday, these things happened in the world outside.One, China’s HNA Group, which is on its path to building a global travel empire, buys Carlson Hotels Inc., owner of [...]
Letter from Bali: It’s Indonesia’s time in the digital sun
It’s a full flight. The beginning of a long weekend for Singaporeans and Bali’s always a quick and good two-hour-flight escape for stressed out city folks.There are lots of Australians too on the flight, connecting via Changi which, to no one’s surprise, has just been named “best airport to [...]
Letter from Penang: The artists who call it home and the making of a festival
It was a wonderful coincidence that on the Sunday I was in Penang to mark the Ching Ming (All Soul’s Day) festival, it happened to be the night for “Whispers of George Town Festival”.It was a sneak preview for media as well as the local artist community to get an idea of what’s in store for [...]
I stayed in four hotels in 10 days. Here’s my report card.
Recently, I did one of those crazy city hops – going from Hong Kong to Seoul to Bangkok and Saigon in 10 days. In the process, I stayed in four hotels that, to me, capture the diversity of hospitality in Asia and how the industry's changed, and is evolving.Hotel ICON, Hong Kong This is a city know [...]
The Millennial Traveller: To earn customer love, hoteliers have to be modern-day Casanovas
Traditionally, customer loyalty could be gained by a simple reward structure, trading in loyalty points for free nights like a kid trading in his arcade game tokens for the large teddy bear from the kiosk.Now, with digital players like OTAs and meta-searches commoditising hotel rates, hoteliers need [...]
“Safe travels” is the greeting for the new normal
Over dinner in Bangkok, while drooling over the best crab angel hair pasta ever at Il Bolognese, our conversation inevitably moved to travel. The three of us, all working in the travel industry, had flown in from different places, one from Taipei, one from India and myself from Singapore via Hong Ko [...]
Addicted to change, the stuff of startups who can also stuff it up
This is the longest stint I’ve not been travelling since I started WIT 12 years ago. Two solid months on the ground – and it’s been wonderful, I feel like I’ve kinda settled into myself .Travel is not necessarily about movement, it can be mental. And my mind has certainly done a lot of trave [...]
Hoshino’s mission – building ryokans everywhere and championing family businesses
Yoshiharu Hoshino, who owns and runs Hoshino Resorts in Japan, a fourth generation family business, has two dreams. One, to see a day when there’ll be Japanese-style hotels (ryokans) everywhere just as there are sushi bars and two, to write a book about family business management. In this intervie [...]
Stories that go beneath the armour to get under your skin
As someone who tries to exercise regularly, I’ve watched sporting brands come, go and come back, and I’ve watched them expand their space. Today, sports wear is everyday wear.New Balance is an example of a brand that’s made a comeback. Once it made only good running shoes, now it makes shoes t [...]
The Millennial Traveller: Girl Code or the Lack Of
With feminism to the fore this week following International Women’s Day, Expedia held a private screening of Code: Debugging the Gender Gap, a documentary which served to portray how gender issues are evolving as we delve deeper into the world of technology.
Both the film and the panel discussio [...]
