That Dubai’s hospitality industry is highly competitive, and of late becoming hyper-consolidated, is a reality that isn’t lost on Anthony Ross. “It’s why we needed to create a niche that we could own,” he says.
Appointed CEO of JA Resorts and Hotels in January 2018, Ross spent the first year walking around the property looking at ways everything that the hotel did could be improved. “We operate in an environment where there are a number of four or five major hotel companies in the world that have become massive brand warehouses. So for there to be space for companies like ours we have to define what our space is,” he says.
JA Hotels and resorts was the first Emirati-owned resort company in the UAE when it opened its Jebel Ali Property in 1981 and attracts audiences from as far and wide as the colder climates in Europe to all across the Indian Ocean, from East Africa to Indonesia. It’s also a big draw with Emirati families owing to the fact that with shooting clubs, golf courses, stables for horses, and beach space it manages to attract all generations of families.
Deliberating over how to “create a niche we could own,” led to the realisation that JA Resorts and Hotels had an advantage no other property did. “We have the luxury of space. And no one else has some of the outdoor activities that we do,” he says.
Flagship property
Spread over 1 million square feet of resort space, JA Hotels’ Jebel Ali property is the largest resort in Dubai. A swim away from the Palm Jebel Ali, it starts at the beach, carries two hotels – Jebel Ali Hotel and Palm Tree Court – is surrounded by a golf course at the end of which is a lake. By all rights, there isn’t another resort in the GCC that you could contemplate getting lost in.
“What we’re now trying to be is a company that delivers hospitality experiences for those generations of families. There are some beautiful resorts in Dubai, but for us and our flagship property, the resort in Jebel Ali, we can appeal to kids, teenagers, mum and dad, as well as grandma and grandpa, together or individually,” says Ross.
The next few months of 2019 are going to be crucial ones Ross and the firm. The famed Jebel Ali Beach Hotel will be closed from May 6 to September for what he says is going to be “an intense renovation.”
“We’re going to get a lot done and then put some lipstick on it: Two new restaurant concepts, a new bar, cleaning up the older dining area to make it lighter, brighter and more ‘resorty’, completely new rooms, all-new children’s facilities. And the most important thing we’re doing is updating the late 70s architecture. The hotel currently has very heavy reinforced concrete parapets on the balconies. We’re replacing them with beautiful modern glass facades. And just by doing that the rooms will appear lighter and brighter,” says Ross.
New experiences
JA is also investing in creating some new experiences as well, including a new children’s facility with a world famous brand that will soon be an announced, as well as an outdoor cinema. Later this year, Ross will also inaugurate the third hotel on the expansive site called Lakeview. “So we’ll have a very large space, about 850 rooms. And to be honest, we could do with even more,” he says.
That statement would spark a cry from everywhere other hospitality industry representative in Dubai, where the struggle to fill up rooms has led to a depression in hotel rates and found luxury properties competing with mere premium locations.
Ross knows it, but can’t help that the numbers JA has been posting lead to him say he would like more rooms. “Our hotels typically have 80% occupancy. And it’s because of the longstanding reputation we have with our key markets, particularly Europe and the UK.”
In the future, experts have warned of an oversupply in the city’s hospitality market, but once again Ross isn’t too perturbed. “In Dubai we have the resort, two hotels in JBR and another in Hatta. And no, I wouldn’t say Dubai is in an oversupply situation yet. Things are normalising. You just have to be good at what you do and offer value for money to justify your market proposition,” he says.
In simple terms, according to Ross, “it’s about carving out a niche that others can’t occupy.”
The JA Way
The wealth of space at its disposal as well as unparalleled recreational activities are, Ross reiterates, its natural advantage. However, there’s more to “the JA Way” than simply that.
In 2019, the company is rolling out other plans that will cement its holistic positioning, including an AED 1 million investment in water filtration and bottle sanitation facilities across all its hotels as well as ridding all paper from its guestroom and administration services. “None of this is new to the industry, and we know it. But it’s new for us, and it’s important as well,” he says.
JA Resorts and Hotels uses approximately 1.7 million plastic bottles each year, something that visibly irks Ross. “And we’re still a small player. The amount of plastic our industry uses is not good. And think about it, the environment is something we rely on to sell ourselves. We rely on the ocean, the air, the beauty of nature in order to do business.”
Ross’ thoughts on the environment echo his style of management, as well as his personality. Each morning he wakes up at 4.30, and after parsing through world news looks into the latest in Australian Rules Football – a game unknown to the rest of the world but popular in Ross’ native Australia. “It’s the real football,” he says with a laugh.
That same persona finds itself in how Ross doesn’t believe in scaling back on plans because they won’t make a large enough splash. “I think sometimes you hang back and think about whether you can afford to invest AED 1m in a water filtration system, and that we’re small so we don’t really count but sometimes you just have to dive in and do it, however small.”
At the end of the day, Ross continues to call JA Hotels and Resorts a “boutique” hotel operator. But like he intends to with his thoughts on environmental friendliness, with the largest property in Dubai at his disposal, he’s intent about making sure it delivers an experience because it can.
“I still look at everything on the premises and wonder how we can do things better and faster. The company’s been around since 1981 and the danger with any organisation of that age is inertia. So it’s important to ask how some of those practices still make sense in 2019,” he says.
The answer very often is no, he says. “So then why spend time and money doing them that way when it adds no value? Let’s do things better shall we?”