Three major hotel chains yesterday launched a joint campaign to aid their coronavirus-affected businesses by giving employees NT$100 million (US$3.31 million) of hotel vouchers.
L’Hotel de Chine Group (LDC, 雲朗觀光), Hotel Royal Group (老爺大酒店集團) and Caesar Park Hotels and Resorts (凱撒飯店) teamed up to prevent a further decline in business as foreign tourist arrivals have come to a virtual standstill amid travel restrictions and health worries.
“We decided to set aside competition and join forces to prop up the industry is bearing the brunt of diminished economic activity,” LDC president Emile Sheng (盛治仁) told a news conference at Caesar Metro Taipei Hotel (台北凱達大飯店).
Photo: CNA
The stimulus campaign could generate NT$500 million in tourism revenue by encouraging employees to visit their properties, Sheng said.
That estimate could increase if other local businesses give similar incentives to employees who cannot travel abroad, as nations have shut their borders to foreign visitors, Sheng said.
Marketing teams from the hotel chains are to contact corporate welfare committees to bring more companies on board, Sheng said.
Taipei hotels have been the hardest hit by COVID-19, with average occupancy rates slumping to fewer than 10 percent due to their heavy reliance on international business travelers and individual tourists.
Caesar Metro president Gary Pi (皮金營) said that he no longer checks daily operating reports, the first thing he used to do every day prior to the coronavirus crisis.
Infection worries have prompted companies to avoid organizing business conferences, meetings or banquets, leaving large banquet rooms empty, Pi said.
Hotel Royal Group CEO Winston Shen (沈方正) said that local individual tourists are its sole source of customers, as the numer of tour groups has dropped to zero.
Domestic travel is safe, as the virus outbreak in Taiwan is mild, Shen said, adding that hotels from the three groups have adopted strict hygiene standards.
Companies such as Taiwan Cement Corp (台灣水泥), Chia Hsin Cement Corp (嘉新水泥), Fu Tsu Construction Co (互助營造) and Hung Kuo Group (宏國集團) have rallied behind the campaign.
Separately, Formosa International Hotels Corp (晶華酒店) yesterday launched a series of training programs to improve housekeeping services, as well as hygiene requirements.
Chairman Steve Pan (潘思亮) said that he had planned such courses and is now taking advantage of the slow business to upgrade its competitiveness.
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic gas stations are to fall NT$0.2 and NT$0.1 per liter respectively this week, even though international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices continued rising last week, as the US Energy Information Administration reported a larger-than-expected drop in US commercial crude oil inventories, CPC said in a statement. Based on the company’s floating oil price formula, the cost of crude oil rose 2.38 percent last week from a week earlier, it said. News that US President Donald Trump plans a “secondary
RSS