The sweet smell of success

After more than 20 years in business, Dimara International started to work with the Middle East hotel industry in Dubai just five years ago, and now with offices in Dubai, Saudi Arabia and Qatar the firm is the preferred supplier of luxury amenities and fine linen to five-star hotels throughout the region.

“We’re dealing with all of the major five-star properties in Dubai, and from this office we deal with Oman, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait – all around the Middle East,” explains the firm’s managing director Farah Aslam.

“We also cater to the linen and amenities needs of palaces and resorts and we’re working with every new hotel group now in Dubai.”

Working to European quality standards and guidelines, Dimara creates products like Dimara Black and Nature’s Fusion, newer ones such as Blooms, and the uniquely Arabic Nadah Al Oudh range.

“We offer shampoos and body lotions and we have a new luxury amenities range. They’re not like the regular products that you see in hotels that are unbranded,” says Aslam.

“They are really beautiful items that we provide for rooms and spas, as well as public areas. We also do little gifts, but instead of chocolates we do facial mist, foot sprays and special hand-cut soap, so it’s unique items – something special.”

A bespoke service is also available. “We do custom design for Habtoor Grand and other Habtoor hotels, and we’ve done a complete custom design programme – special caps and bottles that are designed especially for the hotel, and amenities that have Arabic fragrances, like the Nadah Al Oud collection, which has Oud in each bottle. It’s the first time that anyone has incorporated Oud into a bath and body product range,” says Aslam.

A 24-hour service is also aprovided by Dimara International.

“Hotels are always calling up because they get products nobody else is offering, so we really believe that since we have captured so much of the market we don’t have a true competitor.

“We are part of the Sheikh Mohammed Establishment of companies, so we do have a little bit of an edge over other companies that offer the same kinds of products,” Aslam explains.

For Dimara International the key to providing the right amenities is knowing your guests, demonstrated in their Little Ones range for children and Bliss for teenagers. And regarding linen, hotels are no longer concerned with durability; clients are simply requesting “thread counts of 600-800 TC and the finest Egyptian cotton”.

Aslam says the current trend is for contemporary styles.

“Before everyone was looking for something fancy and now again we’re …more contemporary. They were looking for things that were more ornate and now everything has been overdone,” she says.