Business hotel «Proton», «It’s better for us to be pointed at our shortcomings by professional organizations than by our guests»

The"Proton" business hotel is located in a green and quiet area in the west of Moscow, near Fili Park. It is convenient for the guests to reach the «Expocentre» on Krasnaya Presnya, Krylatskie hills and Poklonnaya Hill. «Proton» belongs to the State Research and Production Space Center named after M.V. Khrunichev. First it served only for the delegations heading to the space plant but now it is open to everybody. George Gorgadze, Deputy Director of the Proton hotel, speaks about its new history.

— «Proton» was built in 1997, but since the hotel has gone through many changes. What has happened in recent years?

— «Proton» is a part of a state-run enterprise. When the hotel was built for the needs of the plant, there was no idea about payback. But now the situation has changed. First, the number of visitors, in comparison with the 90’s, has greatly reduced. Now there are no more delegations of 30-40 people — they are usually represented by a group of two or three employees. Secondly, now the factory pays attention to whether the hotel brings profit. We need to enter a wide market, to compete with other hotels. The a dilemma appeared: on the one hand, we are a state-run enterprise in specific and are constrained by quite hard limits that do not promote commercial activity. On the other hand, we are expected to show good financial indicators.

— What kind of difficulties do you mean?

— As a public company, «Proton» is not free in the pricing policy. Tariffs are approved a year ahead and we must exist within these limits, and therefore cannot release special deals.

— What advantages of the hotel you can highlight?

— First of all, the location. The hotel is built in a quiet and green place, away from the road, near Fili Park. We even tried to get certified for the title «Eco-hotel», but some mismatches with the «green» standard were revealed and we still cannot eliminate them. For example, we cannot completely ban smoking in the atrium, establish separate collection of rubbish. But our guests appreciate the opportunity of living next to a large forested area within the city where you can, for example, go jogging or walk safely at night.

— Who prefer to stay in the «Proton»?

— About 90% of our guests are business travelers, in other words, people who come to conferences, symposia, visit exhibitions and participate in sports. It is easy to reach the Krylatskoe sports complex, so we often receive sportsmen. They tend to stay for a long time — for two or three weeks. In total, about 70% of our guests are corporate clients.

This summer, we first started to receive usual tourists. All of the major exhibitions are held in Moscow in spring and autumn. In winter and summer the capital’s business activity stops. That’s why for us winter and summer is the time of experiments. Tourists in their turn come mostly in summer, when the hotel is less loaded.

— What do you do to increase the hotel’s fillability?

— We consider our customers’ opinion; we work on the service and try to resolve any conflicts. We want our guests to feel happy when leaving the hotel, not to be frustrated and ready to leave negative reviews on the sites for travelers.

— What do you do to increase the hotel’s fillability?

— We consider our customers’ opinion; we work on the service and try to resolve any conflicts. We want our guests to feel happy when leaving the hotel, not to be frustrated and ready to leave negative reviews on the sites for travelers.

— Are you satisfied with the hotel’s financial indicators?

— The situation is good on the whole, although we still did not reach the pre-crisis volumes. However, each year the number of customers of «Proton» increases even more significantly than in Moscow hotels on average. For example, last year the increase in the number of guests was 32%, the number of nights has increased by 36%. The marketing department is actively working on attracting new partners. Many speak about the coming crisis, but we try not to think about it. Being depressed means to mess up today’s business.

Of course, we depend on the fact whether people travel to Moscow or not. During the first half-year the number of tourists in the capital increased by 20%, and this whole trend is convenient for us. I think that now people travel not just to a city or a country, they are eager to attend certain events. Thematic tourism is becoming more popular, that’s why it’s important to hold various events in Moscow, like the Festival «Spasskaya Tower» and the reconstruction of the Battle of Borodino near Mozhaisk.

— What do you think could help the hotel score a better success?

>- It is necessary to work constantly with staff to improve the quality of service. This is the main issue. Customers want to see smiling people, willing to help them, to solve their problems. They do not want gloomy and unhappy staff. The building and the landscape around the hotel are difficult and almost impossible to change, but the service can and should be improved.

— What sales channels do you use now and which of those are you planning to develop in the near future?

— We plan to increase our online sales. Last year Internet sales comprised about 7-8% of the total and this year the number has already achieved 20%. I think that we worked hard, but there is still something to aspire to. As far as I know, the number of e-commerce sales in Europe is 50-60%, in the U.S. it comes up to 90%.

>We will develop our site. We’ve already made a news section which is being updated automatically; we’ve set an engine for flights, created a virtual tour about the hotel. All this has let us to increase the number of online bookings by 2.5 times.

— What attracted you in the program of «Business and Conference hotels certification»?

— Well, let’s say that certification is in line with our plan on the development of e-commerce. ABT is working closely with the HRS.com portal and we hope that, if passing the certification, our sales through this reservation system will increase. Moreover, we plan to display news about the certification on our website — we’re sure that the potential guests, especially corporate client, will be interested in this information.

— How did the certification process pass? Did the recommendations appear to be useful to you?>

— Perhaps, the main incentive for passing the certification was the fact that the hotels are assessed by experts from hotel industry. It’s better for us to be pointed at our shortcomings by professional organizations than by our guests. In addition to that we were attracted by an active PR-campaign of the Association of Business Tourism (ABT). We are planning to join it when we pass the certification.