PHOENIX—Best Western’s international distribution already spans the globe from Belgium to Malaysia. But with markets like Asia, the Middle East and Latin America showing unexpected strength, Best Western has moved aggressively in the past 18 months to build its presence there further.
President & CEO David Kong and the Best Western board visited India in January, for example, to experience firsthand the development opportunities presented by that country’s booming economy. “We want to establish a foothold in all the major locations in a market like India, but we’re also targeting secondary and tertiary cities. As in China, these cities hold a major opportunity for us. Many companies are relocating to these cities and there are virtually no quality hotels there,” Kong explained.
Ownership of Best Western’s hotels in these emerging markets is a mix. “Many are locally owned, but we also have members in North America who own hotels in China and India. At the same time, there are international members who own hotels in North America. The ownership base is very diverse,” he noted.
And Kong expects this trend to continue as “markets outside North America grow at a faster pace than here. As the world gets smaller, it’s not only easier to travel, but to develop hotels across regions.”
As Best Western builds its presence in emerging markets, Kong and his marketing team are well aware that such efforts can pay double dividends.
“As the middle class grows in these countries, people are able to increase the amount of time they spend traveling. We want to build recognition of the Best Western brand, so that when they leave their home country—not only to travel to North America, but to elsewhere where we have distribution—they’ll have a positive association with the brand,” Kong said.
“Brand awareness in these markets begins with the quality of the hotels, which is why we want to make sure that every hotel that carries the Best Western sign becomes a good billboard for the brand. Consequently, we’re strict when it comes to the design and quality assurance requirements for every hotel that enters our system,” he said.
However, this hardly means the hotels are cookie-cutter. “To the contrary, we encourage individuality. Guests comment on the unique experiences they have at our hotels,” Kong said. “We have different brand standards for Asia, Europe and North America, reflecting the different guest expectations in each of those cultures.”
Given Best Western’s interest in hosting more inbound travelers from emerging markets, it’s no surprise that Kong has become a strong proponent of visa reform.
“An increase in inbound international business is crucial for the industry, not only to generate revenue for our hotels, but to help create jobs. And visa reform is one sure way to increase the flow of international travelers. People want to come here, but we continue to make it more difficult than it needs to be,” said Kong, who has been a long-time supporter of the American Hotel & Lodging Association’s position on visa reform.
“We’ve seen improvement on the visa issue, both in terms of wait times and ease of getting a visa, but there’s still more work to be done. The Administration in Washington has now committed to adding people in the different countries to process visas, shortening wait times even further, and adding more countries to the visa waiver program,” noted Kong, who is a past chair of the AH&LA, having served as chairman in 2010, the same year he was appointed to the U.S. Travel & Tourism Advisory Board of the Commerce Department.
“Finally, we need to make the arrival experience for people visiting our country more welcoming,” he concluded. “We’re not there yet, but we are making progress.”