Hotel operator says time is ripe for ‘boutique resorts’
By Zsarlene B. Chua
HOME-GROWN hotel brand, the Henry Hotels, is embarking on a quite ambitious expansion as its sights are set on having ten hotels by 2020, with some rising in resort locations such as Panglao in Bohol and in Palawan—a departure from the two current hotels which are set inside city centers.
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“Now, we have boutique hotels. Why not open boutique resorts?” Henry ‘Hanky’ Lee II, chairman of Innovoterra Properties, Inc. (which owns Henry Hotel Cebu and Henry Manila), told BusinessWorld in an interview on Feb. 2 at Henry Manila in Pasay City.
Aside from the 38-room Cebu property, which opened in 2012 as a boutique hotel with a decidedly artsy bent (as no two rooms are alike), the company is planning to open a boutique resort in Mactan.
The Henry Manila property opened in 2015.
“The island [of Cebu] is beautiful, there’s a lot of beaches and in the north [there’s] Bantayan and Malapascua [islands]. In the south there’s Moalboal and Oslob,” he said before adding that if an opportunity arises, he would like to put Henrys in those islands.
Much of the expansion will cover Luzon and Visayas as a company press release noted that Mr. Lee and his team are eyeing places located in Manila, Baguio, Batangas, Panglao, Palwan, Dumaguete and ‘two new areas in Cebu’.
“In Panglao, it’s not just Alona beach. There are places there with pocket beaches that are actually as nice as Boracay,” Mr. Lee said, adding that with the addition of the Panglao International Airport, scheduled to start operations by late 2017, more hospitality properties are needed.
He reasoned that building and opening eight hotels in five years is doable as the company is known for turning existing properties into Henrys—thus ensuring that each Henry hotel will have its own personality.
“Our mode of expansion is actually going into existing hotels and resorts and basically polishing them and re-conceptualizing them—that’s how we like to approach our expansion,” he said.
Mr. Lee said that while they are still building boutique hotels, a large part of the eight hotel goal will be resorts. He has set the budget for each property at P 100 million.
For the “future Henrys” as Mr. Lee put it, they are also planning to collaborate with Apartment 1B—the restaurant present in the 34-room Henry Manila located in F.B. Harrison in Pasay City.
The restaurant has become somewhat of a destination as people, even though not checked in, still dine in the location.
He did not divulge which specific properties they are taking under their wing but that they are talking with ‘several owners this year and late last year’.
Aside from expanding their properties, Mr. Lee said that they have their sights set on attaining IPO (initial public offering) status and thus become a listed company once their ten hotels are standing.
“Once we have ten [hotels], my feeling there is there’s already scale so [we plan on doing the IPO] to get more capital in either expand here in the Philippines or abroad,” he said before mentioning that he dreams of having a property in New York as “that’s where it all started, the boutique hotels.”
