Delivering Sri Lankan luxury
For Tamir Kobrin, General Manager, Anantara Peace Haven Tangalle Resort, the first property of the brand is dedicated to offer a quintessential Sri Lankan experience.
“When we set out to launch the Anantara brand in Sri Lanka, the idea was to bring a high-end international luxury resort in the country for the first time. The Anantara brand is known, not only to Indian, but international travellers as well. Also, Sri Lanka is one of the most popular destinations in the region today. According to me, it’s the right momentum for us to come up with something unique, which concentrates on excellent service experience, coupled with spa and exceptional culinary experiences,” says Kobrin.
Sri Lanka is seeing a sudden mushrooming of international brands including ITC, Hyatt and Shangri-La, but Kobrin says there’s no competition. “It’s an investment of $100 million in the country, a commitment that the owners have made to ensure that we bring excellence and concentrate on delivering service and develop local staff and talent. We believe that a brand like Anantara sets the tone for any future brand that’s coming in. The property will be a stepping stone to set up standards of excellence and quality, which everyone can follow and elevate the overall standard of hospitality on the island.”
He informed that Anantara’s next property — Anantara Kalutara will open in Sri Lanka very soon. Also, he added that Indian market holds prime importance for them.
“India is one of our top four markets. We have positioned ourselves at the top end of the market and we are basically looking at FIT travellers. We did a roadshow in India in order to tap into the relationships and the opportunities that we have with the travel trade, and specially with the DMCs which are doing inbound and outbound in Sri Lanka. We want to offer the Anantara hospitality coupled with the Sri Lankan luxury experience to our guests, right from their welcome to the various indigenous elements we have woven from the destination for them,” he said.