The Inns and Outs of Hotel Management

Foreign businesses take one of two roads — the road of assimilation or the role of education. A hotel is a bit different because it has to fill both of these roles at once. The Holiday Inn in Gwangju has been under the leadership of Michael Wilson for the past two years and over that time it has really worked itself into the fabric of the city as something both local and foreign all at once; it is a melting pot of east meets west and it doesn’t cut back on any of it.

Anyone who has taken a trip out to Sangmu can attest that the Holiday Inn in Gwangju is something to write home about. On the edge of town, across the street from the Kimdaejung Convention Center sits the modern-looking hotel that lights up with neon colors at night. The hotel is a place where east and west come together under the direction of Michael Wilson, an Australian who has been in Gwangju for the past two years managing the hotel and giving a dynamic and bold vision of what western dining can be like in Gwangju.

Michael Wilson has been with the Holiday Inn in Gwangju for the past two years and he will be in Gwangju for this next year as well. Michael has worked in hotel manager positions all over the world. He has been in Fiji, Vietnam, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia and many other countries operating Intercontinental Hotels. With that being said, for the time being he has no plans to return to work for hotels on his home soil.

Michael Wilson and his assistant Kang Min-ja met me downtown at Joe Espresso in sight of the new Kunst Lounge, the owner of which is a friend of Michael.

“That is bold,” he told me.

We had been speaking of the western cuisine at the Holiday Inn and the foreign food available in Gwangju as a whole and Michael pointed to the lack of anything bold or daring. The restaurant should stand out as something new and educational, not something that caters only to the local flavor. There should be restaurants offering purely authentic food.

This is a large part of what he feels the Holiday Inn can also be doing here in Gwangju. Over the years, he has brought in chefs from Europe and America and in the last week of September a new chef from Germany will arrive. The Holiday Inn stands out as one of the only institutions in Gwangju offering a foreign head chef overseeing the kitchen and planning the menu.

This is bold.

The way Mr. Wilson sees it, you can either choose to educate your clientele with authentic food or you can meet them with comfortable food. He has opted to take Holiday Inn on the high road, offering both authentic western cuisine and local Korean food.

Pay a visit on a Thursday, Friday or Saturday night in the Lobby Lounge for happy hour to get a sense of the hospitality and dining experience with their Snack Buffet. As the only institution with a professional foreign chef, the Holiday Inn has only one place it can occupy for foreign food: the top. The Holiday Inn is making a statement and a case, much like the Kunst Lounge is, for authentic foreign cuisine in Gwangju that will educate and transform, rather than assimilate with a familiar landscape.

Having authentic food here in Gwangju will discourage people from going to Seoul to find authentic foreign cuisine. It will be here, as long as someone is willing to make it with no exceptions.

Needless to say, hop on a bus, head over to the Holiday Inn and try the food.

While the food takes an educational role in the hotel, Michael also keeps in mind that he is running a business for mostly Koreans. So, with this in mind he runs a hotel that caters to anyone who walks in the door. He is in the business of comfort, after all. He runs his business in English so that his staff will feel comfortable and familiar speaking and hearing the language. He offers three levels of English classes to all of his employees and he likes the kind of mentor role he takes in the hotel.

Under Michael’s leadership the Holiday Inn has seen steady growth over the last couple of years and it is doing it in style. The style of the Holiday Inn in Gwangju is something to note — namely, it is a beautiful, sleek and sophisticated hotel. This is a far cry from the mid-range hotel chain I was familiar with in the United States and it begs the question, “What happened?” The Holiday Inn in Gwangju is part of a re-branding movement within the Intercontinental Hotel Company that began in 2006. It represents the new vision of the company that they are starting to brand overseas.

Michael also noted that the Korean and Asian clientele at large holds hotels to a higher standard, and with roughly 85% of Holiday Inn guests being Korean, the hotel holds itself to a high standard.

This has been an aspect of the job that has kept Michael and his wife, Gilda, in Korea. Apart from working in a hotel where the clients expect more, Michael maintains that running a hotel in this part of the world is more fast-paced. He also enjoys the ability to work with people, train them and mentor them. He says there is a greater willingness to please here and that passes on to the customers and to him. He also enjoys more sophistication on the part of the customer. The customers who come to the Holiday Inn from Korea know what they want and they expect a certain level of excellence from their hotels. This poses a challenge at points, but it makes for a more interesting, dynamic and creative workplace.

After seeing the success of the Holiday Inn in Gwangju, more hotels are planned for Korea in the next two years. However, Michael seems to be going along with the “keep calm and carry on” mentality here in Gwangju. He sees the hotel is doing well and he foresees it doing well in future. He is just going to keep offering what no one else can in his little pocket of Korea: authentic western food and a comfortable place for Koreans and foreigners from all over the globe alike. Anyone who has paid a visit to the Holiday Inn has an idea of the kind of food and hospitality the hotel has to offer and it is well worth the visit to have the experience.

It really is a bold statement here in Gwangju. On a side note, the Presidential Suite is around 3,000 US dollars a night.