Eight stars in one year - Falkensteiner takes over management of Stara Planina hotel at Jabucko Ravniste

(Stara Planina hotel)

Although it is going to open a luxury hotel in New Belgrade in early November, which we already wrote about, the famous Austrian hotel chain Falkensteiner will not operate exclusively in the Serbian capital. The start of the construction of a four-star hotel in Belgrade last year was Falkenstainer's first move in the Serbian market. The next move Falkensteiner made in early September this year, when it took over the management of Stara Planina hotel.

Namely, the Falkensteiner Michaeler Tourism Group AG (FMTG) took over the management of a recently opened four-star hotel at Jabucko Ravniste on September 1st for the period of next 15 years, which will be an ideal addition to the Falkensteiner hotel in Belgrade, said Chairman of the FMTG Managing Board Otmar Michaeler.

- Serbia is an important market for our company, and FMTG's presence in this country can additionally boost our sales.

State-owned property managed by Austrians

- Stara Planina hotel will stay in the possession of the state, as before, but a good news is that FMTG will be developing hotel business at this mountain over the next 15 years said State Secretary in the Ministry of Finance and Economy Goran Petrkovic.

The Managing Board of the famous hotel chain will from now on be completely in charge of the management, marketing and promotion of the hotel Stara Planina in domestic and foreign markets. As Petkovic explained, Falkensteiner will take certain fee from the revenue, meaning that they are motivated to achieve as good results as possible, which is also good for the national budget.

(interior of the hotel at Jabucko Ravniste)

Chairman of Falkensteiner's Managing Board Otmar Michaeler said that that group had decided to invest in Serbia after a thorough analysis and consideration of the potential offered by Stara Planina mountain.

- Development of this location has been done professionally, and Serbia must continue to develop its tourism industry in the same way.

Family idyll

The Falkensteiner Michaeler Tourism Group AG will operate the hotel at Stara Planina mountain in the way only certain hotels in Belgrade are operated, and it will also introduce family tourism, where everything is adapted to suit the needs of children.

- We took over the management of Stara Planina hotel on September 1st, when we also started a marketing campaign and presented this hotel at Falkensteiner's official website. Our role in the whole process of development of Stara Planina mountain will be to stabilize hotel management in order for it to start operating normally, that is, to start making profit. We will also do a positive marketing for the destination and promote it to investors - Falkensteiner Southeast Europe Director Agron Berisa said to our web portal.

According to him, the first step will be to reposition the product to adapt the hotel to the family concept.

- In the future, the hotel will offer an all-inclusive service package for families and free ski equipment, ski school and ski lift passes for children aged between 4 and 10 years. That will contribute to our good positioning in all markets, given that no other hotel in the region, or even in the Alpes, offers something like this.

New investment

The hotel Stara Planina at Jabucko Ravniste, which was opened in December 2011, is only first out of the six hotels to be built in that location. The state invested over EUR 30 million from the budget in it, thus making the first greenfield investment in the domestic tourism industry in 20 years.

Petkovic stressed that people at the Ministry hoped that Falkensteiner would build a new hotel at Stara Planina mountain, as well as another two hotels in Belgrade, considering that their intention was to have a total of five hotels in Serbia.

Berisa confirmed to eKapija that they were interested in making new investments in Stara Planina mountain and Serbia in general after investing in Belgrade.

Falkensteiner operates 32 hotels in six European countries. In the region, they have hotels in Croatia and Slovenia at the moment, but Berisa did not rule out the possibility of expanding the business to some other markets, notably Bosnia, Montenegro and Macedonia.

Ivana Bezarevic