Jumeirah looks to educate the trade

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Grundner: we need to teach trade.

The Jumeirah Group is planning to tweak the structure of its sales team and introduce new interactive product training tools in a bid to better educate the trade about its portfolio of properties.

The move comes as the hospitality and hotel specialist looks set to roll out 57 hotels internationally by 2012.

"What we are planning to do is move into the direction of educating the market on product knowledge - that's going to be through a sales tool that we will use," explained Thomas Grundner, regional director of sales, Jumeirah Group.

"We have strong brand awareness in the market, but does the trade actually know what there is to do at Jumeirah Beach Hotel for kids, for example? We need to educate them about the facilities and functions of each property.

"As we open more hotels we need to cascade the product knowledge of each. Our Shanghai property opening soon is a good example of a product with great potential for the Middle East market, but the brand name alone won't sell it."

Grundner said his team would roll out a series of training programmes that initially would be available on DVD, but could eventually be rolled out online.

The initial DVD will be generic, providing an overview of the Jumeirah brand, the current properties in its portfolio and forthcoming hotels planned.

The idea is to create a series of training modules that will be presented to travel partners - namely travel agents, reservations staff and travel management companies (TMCs) by dedicated members of the sales team.

"Looking ahead we could tailor-make these to suit the travel partner's individual requirements," said Grundner. Each programme, he added, would be interactive and could involve playing games in order to improve product knowledge.

One obvious break-down of the product would be corporate and leisure, while essential information provided would include how to book on the GDS, Grundner said.

"There is so much to sell all of our properties - in Dubai, London, New York and those coming up in Shanghai, Majorca and Bermuda, to name but a few.

We need to make sure our key partners know the USPs of each," he concluded.

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