Onyx plans spa expansion
Onyx Hospitality Group, the operator of the Amari hotel chain, has created two spa brands to increase its sales by 10-12 percent annually.
Breeze Spa will be paired with the four-star Amari Hotel, while Maai Spa will be with five-star Saffron hotel. Spas are considered one of the major money makers for the group.
Kirsty MacCormick, the group’s spa director, said Breeze Spa will replace the existing 7 Sivara Spa. Each renovation will cost about Bt7 million and will take a year to complete. With the Maai brand, the firm expects to open three or four locations over the next two years. It will expand more slowly than Breeze, MacCormick said, because it is a premium service that will need more time to study its business prospects before opening.
Amari hotels are currently in Bangkok, Pattaya, Samui, Phuket, Krabi, Koh Chang, and the Maldives. Thai-based Onyx manages hotels both in local and international markets. Over the next two years, the firm will look for hotels in the Middle East and India to manage.
At the same time, MacCormick said the firm would open free-standing Breeze Spas outside the hotels, such as in airports. She said it costs Bt12 million for a fully-equipped spa and the minimum space is 250-square metres.
Onyx also plans to work with high-end hospitals to promote Maai Spa by offering complementary therapy for patients. The project is considered promising because of the government’s promotion of medical tourism.
Currently, the spa market in Thailand is highly competitive and has reached a saturation point, but MacCormick said she expects it will rebound over the next two years
