With over three decades of providing top-notch hospitality service to guests from around the world, Accra City Hotel, one of Ghana’s premier hotels, is taking significant steps to revolutionize its services and infrastructure.
Yaw K, Mamphey, Chief Operating Officer, at Accra City Hotel, revealed in an interview that the hotel is investing massively in infrastructure to become the destination of choice in Ghana. These enhancements aim to meet the evolving needs and preferences of their valued customers, ensuring an unparalleled guest experience.
Except:
What used to be the name of the hotel before it became Accra City?
So, it was Novotel, the Accor chain hotels. Novotel was a franchise. The ownership was not Novotel, it was a Ghanaian shareholding. So eight years ago, the owners decided, they have gotten to a stage where they need to run the hotel themselves. We do not need a chain or that brand identity on this hotel to make it relevant.
So they decided to path ways with a Accor Novotel. And since then, it has been great. You can see the expansion going on at the back there. It started after we parted ways with Novotel. And it is been great. This year we roofed the building, next year the ground floor, the first floor should come live and that is going to add on a second restaurant to the existing restaurant.
We are also going to have about eight additional conferences, with the largest one on that floor taking about three hundred, four hundred but on a very top floor, we are building a thousand capacity event hall which we will do a lot of big events. Weddings, groceries, book launch, corporate events. Because Accra has grown a long way and Accra is becoming a major international destination for international events.
That is the MICE business. And so the hotels, event centers in Accra need to get themselves ready for these types of businesses. And Accra City Hotel is not going to wait until the businesses are in before we do that. We have anticipated the growth of the business in the sector and we are preparing solidly for that.
That is why we are building this four-story event centre to handle the business coming in the future of Accra. Apart from that, we are also expanding our recreational aspects. We are adding on another swimming pool. The existing deep pool, you can do long strokes in there. So another swimming pool is coming.
We have a tennis court. Anytime there is a major tennis tournament in Accra, because we are very close to where the tennis courts are, a lot of tennis athletes, and individuals like to lodge in Accra City Hotel. Because we have a tennis court they can practice before they go on the tournament.
So we understand the needs of what business people are looking for when they come to Accra, and the location is a perfect location. We are right next to the business district. Makola is one of the largest shopping areas in Ghana, not just in Accra. We are also right next to the ministries where all government business in Ghana is going on. We are close to the entertainment, the Accra sport stadium, close to the National Theatre, conference center.
So anyone coming to do business in Accra, Accra City is the best location to live in. Because once you are in Accra City, you are just like five, ten minutes away from all the major destinations you want to go and transact your business. So Accra City is a prime location. The rooms we provide are quality standard rooms, premium rooms, superior rooms. So we have different room type to meet different individuals need. And we also know just about our business. We are also very family friendly. We have guests from all over West Africa and international coming to Accra City. And these guests come, they want a place they can feel at home. And that is what we provide. A conducive environment for different markets.
Looking at the segment of your market and the category of your hotel, Where will you place yourself in that market?
As much as possible, we cover a very wide range of the segments. Because you have a lot of business people coming to Accra be it on a daily basis or maybe weekly. So, we accommodate these individuals because you want to come into the city, quickly do your business, and you are out. And when you are in the city, you want to live in a place which is close to all the major avenues of business you are coming to Accra for. And that is where Accra City becomes very relevant.
And we understand the needs of different markets. So for example, majority of Nigerian flights coming into Ghana are coming in the morning. So we are ready for them. Those who want to do early check-in, we will check you in. You check in, you drop your luggage, and then straight you are in town transacting your business. When you finish, because we are close by, wherever you are doing your business, you come back, you rest, and then you relax.
So yes, we will cater for a lot of business travelers. Weekends too, we get a lot of travelers who are coming to our Accra to shop. So they come, drop their luggage, go into the shopping district, the largest shopping area, Makola. We are just a minute walk from Makola. You enter, you can get anything Ghanaian you are looking for. Apart from that, Accra is also developing to be a major shopping fashion destination and we are close to all the major fashion houses in the city.
So you come, you drop your bag, you go and do your shopping and we have one of the top chefs in our hotel, Chef Matthew. He has won numerous international awards. So after a long day in town, you come back and you come to our restaurant, you are sure to get a wide variety of dishes, with specialized and Ghanaian authentic dishes. Your jollof, Wache, fufu, you can get all of them. Of course, if you also want continental dishes too, excellent. We provide all of these. We also have a wonderful line of buffet selection. If you do not want to select from the menu, you can then run through our buffet selection and then have something to enjoy.
How many rooms currently before the expansion?
We currently have 196 rooms. After the expansion, we should be pushing to about 230 rooms, including the conference and event halls.
In terms of logistics, if a guest arrives at the airport, how does he just come in? Do you have your buses?
Oh yes. Once the guest makes us aware they are touching down on a certain day, we just need your flight details. We will come to the airport and pick you up, the same way, we will drop you off if you request. And from Accra City Hotel to the airport, on a good no traffic day, you are just looking about 15 minutes to the airport. It is a straight road from the airport to Accra City Hotel.
With the growth of the city, would you say the services you provide for your target market is in tandem with the way the city is growing vis-a-vis the hotels coming up in the city?
Personally, I would say we need more hotels in the city of Accra, more than we currently have, because the more hotels we have in the city, at a highest standard, five-star, four-star, three-star, we will be able to hold a lot of huge international events. Because for these events you need rooms and room capacity we need more in the city.
So for me I love competition, so I won’t say more hotels coming on board would mean that we are not going to get business. We actually need more hotels in the city. That would be the only way we can host a lot of big international events, sporting events, entertainment events, MICE events, AU events, ECOWAS events, we need more hotels. So I don’t think it would be a bad business for us if there are more hotels in Accra. We actually need more hotels than we currently have.
And for us, the strategic location of Accra City Hotel, being in the middle of the government business, the commercial business, the entertainment business, we are strategically in an ideal location which would always favour Accra City Hotel. And what is most important is that we are not stagnant. We have been operating for over 35 years now. It is all about the needs of our customers.
That is what makes us evolve and provide essential services. We don’t provide services just because we think that is what we want to do. We always listen to our guests. What the guests want is what we do. It is for that very reason we are expanding and building the conference center because that is the needs of our guests right now.
By the next five years, all these projects must have been completed. Where would you be seeing yourself in terms of the number of guests, the patronage, and the larger in overall performance?
Oh, for the next five years, it is just going to be win-win-win for our Accra City Hotel. Once this conference centre is completed, we are expecting to do huge international bookings coming into the city, be it for business, for leisure, students, corporate.
So we are building ourselves to be very broad and dynamic and not stagnant in only one category. Because we have a conference centre, we are a place for accommodation, we are a place for relaxation, we are a place for great food, swimming pool, tennis court, so we are all around. And that is the future Accra City sees occupying. And notwithstanding, we have also great hotels around us. And majority of the time, we are working in collaboration with them. Because the business coming in is bigger than Accra City Hotel, and we need to work collaboratively to handle all these international events.
What is your relationship with tour operators who bring people who want to come in here for vacation from other countries. In terms of affordability, what is your relationship with them?
Tour operators are very important to Accra City hotel. They are actually very integral to us. So we do not play with tour operators at all. As much as possible we work hand-in-hand with tour operators and at any given time we do very special offers and deals for tour operators which you will not find anywhere. Because it is these tour operators who also know and understand the clients from various countries who are bringing in volumes of business into the city of Accra. So at any given time we are looking out for them, when we approach them, we are looking to give them the best of deals so they can bring in volumes into the city of Accra.
How often do you do maintenance and upgrading of your facilities?
For maintenance it is key to us. It is for that we have a strong team of over 20 staff in the maintenance department and as I mentioned earlier, we are a 35 years old hotel, so certainly you know that you have equipment, the building, you need to refurbish, you need to change equipment and it is this that keeps us relevant. Because the last thing you want is, when guests coming into your property and they say your place looks too old or your things are breaking down, I don’t want to come there. And that is what drives us to make sure our maintenance culture is paramount. It is for that reason we are still relevant in the Accra market. Because we have many hotels that have come and gone and are no longer in the market. But we are still relevant in the Accra business, because maintenance culture for us is top there.
After 35 years of doing this business, are you still one of the leading hotels in Accra. And what do you think are the main reasons why you are still having this sustainable operation?
The bottom line of this, I would say, is customer service. We are in a customer service business, despite everything. We are here to serve. Once you lose track of the fact that you are here to serve, you are going down drain. Because it is the customers that have made Accra City what it is and what we want is a repeat business.
It is a client coming, feeling good and wanting to come back again. That is why I said we have top hotels, we have five-star hotels, chain hotels surrounding us. But month by month, the volume of business we are getting is comparable to all these new hotels in the city. Because customer service is top priority for Accra City Hotel. It is about making the guests feel good, no matter what.
Providing what they need. So for example, when you look on our books, we have a huge number of Nigerians coming to Accra City Hotel to lodge and we understand this. So a good number of times in the restaurant, because we know we have a big number of Nigerians in-house, we try as much as possible to incorporate some of the local dishes from Nigeria into our buffet. And we have come to understand the minor nuances and taste of different people from different parts of the world, so our kitchen team has also adapted.
If we have to cook Chinese food, we are ready to do that. If we have to cook Indian food, we are doing that. I remember last year around the Nigerian independence in October, that period, that whole week, we cooked only Nigerian food in our restaurant. And we did not make any noise about it. So Nigerians who were coming in and seeing Nigerian food, they started calling their Nigerian friends in Accra that we are cooking Nigerian food at Accra City.
From nowhere, we had Nigerians trickling in that whole week just to come and enjoy. And those dishes were all done by Ghanaian chefs in the city. And the Nigerians who came to us, were asking, do you have a Nigerian chef in the house? We went all out to make sure it was authentic Nigerian food we cooked in the restaurant. So for us, it is customer service, understanding what our clients are looking for, that is paramount for us. And also the maintenance culture, is top, top, notch for us.
Do you think the pricing of hotels in Accra is competitive enough, and has it also affected your patronage?
So, prices in the city of Accra hotel wise, as compared to other parts of Africa, you could say yes, that it is on the high side. But comparatively within the city of Accra, our rates are very competitive.
Notwithstanding, there are a lot of factors that go into rates being what they are in the city of Accra. This could be taxes, tariffs, high utility costs, everything having to be imported, all these things play into the cost ratio of hotel pricing in Accra.
So what you are saying, yes, comparatively to a good number of other African countries, hotel prices in Accra are high, but within Accra, our prices are very competitive in the local Accra market. But of course, a lot of factors go into to making these prices. That is where our regulators play a major role and some of these concerns have been brought to their attention, it has been discussed and we are seeing ways in which some of these things could be mitigated to help bring down some of the taxes, the utilities, and prices down.
Do you have a bigger space here for events?
So, currently with the expansion project ongoing right now, the largest hall takes a thousand plus. And this hall should be completed within the next two years and that takes a thousand plus. Aside that very large hall there are other syndicate rooms, some taking 300, 200, smaller ones for board meetings. So all in all the capacity for events in the hotel is pushing over 3000 in multiple syndicate conference rooms.
