Interview with Mr. Golze, Managing Director of COLUMBIA Hotel Wilhelmshaven

Please give us brief account of your company COLUMBIA Hotels & Resorts.

COLUMBIA Hotels & Resorts include four first class and luxury hotels in Germany and three luxury hotels in Cyprus.

With the opening of the COLUMBIA Hotel Wilhelmshaven seven exclusive COLUMBIA Hotels & Resorts residences have now secured their position in the hotel market. In addition to the hotel just mentioned the exceptional collection comprises a five-star superior luxury hotel in the Baltic resort of Travemünde, a renowned business hotel in Rüsselsheim, Hesse, a romantic wellness and golf resort in Bavarian Bad Griesbach and three beach hotels on the island of Cyprus.

The hotels in Germany and Cyprus have specialized in the modern requirements of business and private travellers. The unusual beauty&spa concepts, culinary gourmet restaurant concepts, the generously sized rooms and the special attentive service of the employees turn a stay at COLUMBIA Hotels & Resorts into a very personal and memorable time.

You decided on Wilhelmshaven as the location for your new hotel. How was your attention drawn to Wilhelmshaven and which decisive criteria led you to choose this location?

Thanks to the billion-euro project JadeWeserPort, Wilhelmshaven will gain even more in importance as an economic location in the next few years. The first giant ships will be docking in Germany’s only deep-water port as early as 2012 – besides Rotterdam it will be the second largest port in Europe.

We expect such a huge port to have a pull that will not only result in a lot of new companies locating here, but will also generate strong growth on the business hotel market and conference business.

With its capacity for holding events, its restaurant concepts and rooms the COLUMBIA Hotel Wilhelmshaven is unique within a radius of 100 kilometres. The World Natural Heritage area also represents a unique feature and attraction for private travellers, so that the construction of the COLUMBIA Hotel Wilhelmshaven was only a matter of time.

What expectations and goals did you come to Wilhelmshaven with and how does it look now after nine months of hotel operation? Have your expectations and goals been affected by the economic crisis?

Of course, we have also been affected by the knock-on effects of the global economic crisis and are having to take appropriate measures and respond to the market in a more flexible way. However, we will emerge from the crisis all the stronger and are banking on the economic location of Wilhelmshaven.

In terms of the past year we have achieved the goals we set ourselves and even exceeded some of them. This confirms the need of the market and reinforces our decision to build a hotel of this kind.

The JadeBay region is putting its money on business tourism to an increasing extent. How many of your guests at the moment are business tourists and what importance do you think will have in the future?

The distribution is approx. 55% to 45%, with 55% being the private travellers. On the strength of the World Cultural Heritage nomination and the marketing of this we assume that the market in this segment will expand. We will define appropriate measures to develop this market for our hotel. With the completion of JadeWeserPort the business traveller segment will also take up an increasing share of our business.

How should the environment develop so that a hotel of international calibre continues to ride the road to success?

The economy will be strengthened and promoted with the construction of JadeWeserPort and other projects in the region. Good connections, a functioning logistics network, the marketing of tourism and an international focus are essential elements for a sound environment.

We expect the development of the region and the location of Wilhelmshaven to be very positive and have made a good decision with the right product in the right place.