Caspian Energy (CE): Mr. Eratay, how do you evaluate the results of activity of Grand Hotel Europe in 2014?
Kemal Eratay, General Manager, Grand Hotel Europe: The latest quarter of 2014 was just like the way we expected. Despite that the beginning of the year was tense we managed to substantially increase the guests flow in the latest quarter. We have recently carried out improvement work and introduced little changes. Thus, I can say with confidence that Hotel Europe is the hotel meeting customers’ expectations.
CE: Hotel Europe has been operating for many years. What innovations shall it present in coming year, and what kind of innovations should they be?
Kemal Eratay: Hotel Europe has a 18-19-year history. As is known, our hotel hosted guests during the Eurovision 2012 song contest. Moreover, after the opening of brand hotels in Baku, expectations of guests arriving in Azerbaijan increased sharply over the past 5 years. Therefore, the objective of Hotel Europe is to raise the service up to the level of brand hotels so that to be able to compete with them in full. Every day we work over short-comings that are detected. Certain innovations are introduced every day. For example, we have already allocated funds to replace the furniture. Besides, we plan to renovate elevators that do not meet modern top range requirements. We have already carried out important work for increasing the speed of Wi-Fi and its use in accordance with the latest technologies. It is also planned to renovate the sports-fitness complex Olympus. We believe that in 2015 we will manage to enhance the level of the hotel so that it can compete with brand hotels of the country. It concerns the quality of service, design of rooms as well as provision of all necessary accessories and hygiene products. Improvement of the service quality in the restaurant is also an important matter for us.
CE: Summing up the abovementioned, what shall we expect from Hotel Europe in 2015?
Kemal Eratay: 2014 was to some extent transitional for us. We carried out a big preparatory work. We have big expectations since Baku will host the First European Games in 2015. Considering the hotel’s location, its convenience and sports complex, the expectations are quite substantiated. Therefore, we assume that the guests of the city will choose Hotel of Europe. A preparatory work is carried out in this regard in order to make people who shall come to the European games and choose Hotel Europe feel satisfied. We intend to eliminate all existing short-comings before 2015. Approving the budget for 2015, we consider all our expectations which are much higher than those of 2014.
CE: To what degree is the hotel business promising in Azerbaijan?
Kemal Eratay: The hotel industry in Azerbaijan has surely made a big step forward in recent years. All hotels representing world brands were built in the capital. All these hotels including Hotel Europe play an important role in recognition of the country by providing the highest service.
CE: What brings big profits to the hotel?
Kemal Eratay: A hotel can bring big profits in Azerbaijan. The work in this direction must be continued. It is necessary to attract more tourists and hold big events for it. I also would like to note that a serious competition is nowadays observed among 5-star hotels in Azerbaijan. Every hotel works for increasing its profits. We constantly seek for ways to increase profits without lowering the level of services we provide.
