Embark on a journey rich with discovery

Located on the eastern crescent of the iconic man-made marvel on Dubai’s coastline, the Palm Jumeirah, is the luxurious and pristinely beautiful Anantara Dubai The Palm Resort & Spa. Highly popular among Russian tourists, it is surrounded by lush gardens and boasts 293 beautifully appointed rooms and villas designed with contemporary Asian flair, overlooking tranquil lagoons and the 400-metre beach or the Palm Jumeirah. Aviamost spoke to its General Manager Jean-Francois Laurent, on what sets it apart as unique and about the property’s plans for the future

So it’s almost one year since you opened this hotel?

It’s a bit more than a year as we opened on Sept. 15. So it’s a year and 15 days since we opened it.

What have you achieved?

Well on the whole, the opening of this hotel was really a success as from the first day that we opened we had a lot of guests and so we can consider it a very successful opening.

How do you say it’s unique as you have plenty of competition with other hotels on the Palm?

Well first of all, Anantara as a brand was a very large part of the success. A large part of our business partners, tour operators etc know Anantara for the quality of its establishment, and the uniqueness of its destination. And the reason for it being located in Dubai and particularly on the Palm was also a big reason for the success of its opening as you have the best of both worlds. I mean you are a little bit far away from the buzzing city of Dubai yet you are close enough to immerse yourself in activities like shopping and other kinds of activities.

Its design makes it exclusive. Anantara is the only resort in the Middle East and in Dubai to have over-the-water villas which each have glass viewing panels to watch the sea life beneath. Plus the design is very Asian, it is not high rise, it’s very widely spread on the property. And we are surrounded by water. Plus we have over 10,000 sq m of lagoon pools throughout the resort, with many rooms enjoying direct access to the lagoon pools from their balcony.

We also offer ‘room-service on water’ – a floating bar, a typical Thai market boat without engine, where our associates paddle over and directly serves the drinks on your terrace. You don’t call room service, but you wave to him, he sees you and comes over. We also have electronic tuk tuks that not only look great and add to the Thai-inspired architecture, but they’re also really quiet and clean too, so great for the environment. There are many good hotels but it is such small things that make us very unique in Dubai. It’s a touch of Thai in Dubai with a 5-star luxury service.

Why would you say Russians are attracted to Anantara?

We have been extremely popular amongst Russian guests. As mentioned, it is one of our key markets and we receive fantastic feedback. Many Russians travel to Maldives and Thailand so they know about the brand and the fact as well that this hotel is on The Palm for the Russian market it is very significant. The Palm is unique so it is a unique space to have a hotel. And then you look at the architecture and you look at the way the hotel is designed. You feel you are in Dubai but you could be in Asia anywhere. So I think our Russian guests like this environment.

Villas with attached pool are completely private. In all our water villas and there is a large space in the lagoon where you can sunbathe and what do you want when you come from Russia where it is cold? You want to enjoy the sun, the swimming pool and having a nice drink. And last but not least we have Russian-speaking staff all over the hotel both employees and associates in our restaurants, bars, around the pool and everywhere. It helps to communicate and also helps us deliver 5-star service. We also cater typical Russian food. But we notice that Russians like to experiment with different foods. And Anantara offers a variety of different cuisine. Our Mekong restaurant offers Thai, Vietnam, Chinese food all under the same roof. And if you want Australian food like, crocodile or kangaroo meat you can visit our Bushman restaurant. You can enjoy a nice salad or elaborate meal too at our Mediterranean restaurant.

We also do something very unique called ‘Dine by Design’ where you have your private chef, private menu and private menu perfect for a romantic dinner. We have a limited space for it so it has to be booked in advance. We talked about food and beverage section, but our spa too is very unique and offers a very large array of treatments where we have Russian-speaking staff.

For families, Anantara offers the Tuk Tuk kids club where they can enjoy tattoos, making pancakes and other activities. So if you want some private time with your spouse, we take care of the young ones too.

Do Russian guests have special demands?

The sky is not the limit anymore. What we do is to ask our tour operators to communicate about our guests special preferences, so we can deliver their special drink to their room.

You have a great experience here. What are the challenges you meet in managing this hotel?

There are always a few teething problems. We were missing one of our restaurants and the spa was delayed by a few months. But this gave us the opportunity and also more time to focus on everything else in the hotel and on making the opening so highly successful. First we opened the spa and later the Bushman restaurant and now we are fully operational. So I would say that was the main challenge.

Maybe it was a marketing strategy as it proved beneficial?

Haha! You could say that! It also gave us a lot of ideas. For example we will have a shuttle that will take the guests from the hotel to the Marina on a typical Thai, long tail boat. This is unique. So it can be used for special events a romantic drink etc.

So the challenge we faced during the opening has helped us focus on what unique features and experiences we can offer our guests. And we have a lot of ideas we will be implementing on this property.

What’s your relationship with the Chinese market?

We were lucky to be part of the big Chinese event that drew Nu-skin which drew 45,000 mostly welcome the VIP guests. We are very strong in the Chinese market but it’s still a new market and it needs to be developed more. Just like the Russian market we have adapted our services to this market when it comes to the rooms, accommodation and the food. It’s a very important market.

We recently welcomed guests for the Chinese Visitor Summit and we are attracting more attention from the Chinese media, having hosted many channels and news portals for site inspections and film/photoshoots. We believe this market will increase further in 2015 and we are looking forward to welcoming more Chinese holiday makers.

And we see a lot of developments and changes in the habits of the Chinese travellers, from large groups it has become smaller group and to more and more individual travellers. From one or two nights stay we now see four, five and six nights stay. So there is a change of habits in the Chinese market. So just like in everything, things change and maybe our first Chinese guests were looking for something specific and once our hotel became known in the market we are now tapping into a different segment in China.

Could you tell us about the specific numbers of your guests this past year?

Our main market is European, Russian, British, China as well as emerging markets like India which are coming more and more. But to be specific in terms of numbers would be more difficult. But these are our main markets.