What is Asian hospitality? It’s a term that became popular in the early years of this century to categorise hotel chains from East Asia that were opening properties in the West and bringing higher and more gracious levels of service to their hotels.

When such chains as Mandarin Oriental and Peninsula (and, to a lesser extent Shangri La) opened luxury hotels in America and Europe their arrival was treated as a revolution because it showed up the take-it-or-leave-it attitudes of the big American chains.

The spread of the Asian chains made guests revise their expectations of luxury hotels. But there was a small irony at the centre of the Asian hospitality concept.

Within Asia it is such countries as Japan, Thailand and Indonesia (Bali in particular) that were regarded as epitomising grace and elegance in service. But almost all of the Asian chains were Chinese: Peninsula and Mandarin Oriental were from Hong Kong. Shangri La was owned by overseas Chinese. Of the newer luxury chains, Rosewood and Capella ended up in Chinese hands. (Usually the owners were either Overseas Chinese or companies from Singapore or Hong Kong.)

Few chains from the countries that were regarded as being centres of graceful hospitality ever made it out of Asia. And while the Chinese are brilliant they have no real reputation for being friendly (let alone hospitable) among their neighbouring countries.

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Thailand, which has some of the world’s best hotels, never really succeeded outside of Asia though, for a brief, misleading moment, it seemed as though such chains as Dusit would succeed globally.

That has finally begun to change.

Bangkok’s Minor group now has 640 hotels in over 60 countries and its luxury brand Anantara has a strong presence in Europe and the Middle East. And yet, despite the reputation of the Thais as being Asia’s great hoteliers Anantara has avoided being slotted into the Asian hospitality category.

Some of this may have to do with the man behind the group. Bill Heinecke is a legend in Thailand where his life story is the sort of saga that TV shows are made of.

Heinecke was born to American parents who lived all over Asia (his father was a diplomat and his mother was a journalist). The family moved to Thailand when Bill was 14 and he displayed an entrepreneurial streak early, succeeding in advertising before setting up Minor Holdings. The name came from his age: he was legally a minor (under 18) when he established the company.

He proved to be a remarkable businessman, entering several businesses and demonstrating a swiftness in his style. Thailand is full of Heinecke stories but the one that may have contributed most to the legend is the one about his tussle with Pizza Hut.

Heinecke’s company was the franchisee for Pizza Hut in Thailand and built the brand. But when his agreement with the US corporation was about to run out he was surprised to be told that it would not be renewed. Pizza Hut thought it had the upper hand and once the agreement finally expired Heinecke seemed outwardly reconciled to leaving the pizza business. In reality he was quietly creating a new brand called The Pizza Company which, freed of Pizza Hut’s global menu , created pizzas that would work better with Thai customers. When his 45 day non-complete clause expired, Heinecke suddenly converted all the Pizza Hut restaurants into outlets for The Pizza Company. The stores carried on functioning as before: only they were Pizza Company restaurants. Pizza Hut was blindsided and the Pizza Company is now one of Thailand’s biggest brands.

Minor remains a major player in the restaurant space but Heinecke’s real love was hotels. He started out as an owner letting Marriott and Four Seasons manage his hotels for him but he demonstrated an innovative steak that surprised professional hoteliers. For instance when he built the influential Four Seasons in Chiang Mai in the north of Thailand he had the idea of building branded residences as part of the complex. The Four Seasons had never done this before but agreed to let Heinecke give it a shot. The concept was so successful that it has now become a standard practice throughout the industry and Four Seasons itself makes huge revenues from branded residences at many of its properties.

Given his feel for the business it was inevitable that Heinecke would move into managing hotels, not just owning them. He set up Anantara as Minor’s luxury hotel brand and has taken it around the world.

Unusually he has managed to maintain relationships with the operators (Marriott, Four Seasons etc) who run the other hotels he owns while simultaneously setting up his own hotels as competitors to them. He took the Four Seasons in Bangkok back and now runs it himself as Anantara Siam but continues to own the Four Seasons in Samui, Chiang Rai and Chiang Mai. Even more unusually the Anantara Siam goes head to head with the St Regis (a Marriott brand) right next door which Heinecke also owns.

Nobody seems to mind this unusual arrangement. And it works to everyone’s benefit. The Four Seasons Samui, which Heinecke owns, gained enormously from the success of The White Lotus TV show in which it featured. But Heinecke also owns the competition: the Anantara in Samui, and he says that hotel benefitted hugely from The White Lotus too because the show put Samui on the map. (Much of The White Lotus was also shot in the Samui Anantara and the Anantara Phuket.)

Oddly enough for a man who knows India so well (he is best friends with Vandana and Mukesh Luthra of VLCC and often stays with them when he is in Delhi) Heinecke never opened any hotels in India. He concedes now that he should not have left it so late but argues that one reason for the delay was that Minor did not follow an asset-light model. It tended to own its own properties or to at least have a stake in them. With Indian laws that was difficult to do and there were many opportunities in other countries where investment was much easier.

Over the last few years Minor has moved to what Heinecke calls an asset-right model, mixing its owned hotels with those it operates for other owners. This shift in strategy has now led to a massive push into India.

Heinecke was in Kolkata this week to sign the deal for a Anantara at the new World Trade Centre and to meet with owners who wanted Anantara to manage their hotels. A deal for an Anantara resort in Coorg was also signed . And Anantara already operates a hotel in Jaipur.

It sounds absurdly ambitious but Heinecke’s target is 50 hotels in the next five years. Many new deals are already being negotiated.

So will Anantara bring Asian hospitality to India? It’s an interesting question because none of the great Chinese/Asian brands have come to India. We have no

Mandarin Orientals, no Peninsulas, no Banyan Trees, no Capellas and no Rosewoods. The only Chinese chain that’s come to India is Shangri La and neither of its properties have made much of a splash.

As far as I can tell Heinecke (who renounced his US citizenship years ago and now carries a Thai passport) does not see Anantara as having much in common with the Chinese chains. The greatest influence on his idea of hospitality has been the Four Seasons and I

suspect that he sees Anantara as a softer, more gracious Thai version of the Canadian chain. His hotels aim to pair the efficiency and high quality of the Four Seasons with an elegant Thai edge.

Anantara is not his only brand though it is the most luxurious. He bought the huge European NH chain a few years ago at least partly because he thought that the NH Collection ( the upmarket range of the NH brand) had many undervalued properties. Some (in Amsterdam for instance) have been overhauled and rebranded as Anantaras but Heinecke has enormous faith in the future of the regular NH properties which he believes offer very good value for money. I imagine that eventually NH will also come to India. So will Elewana which runs jungle lodges and hotels in Africa. As will Avani, the second, more affordable lifestyle brand of Anantara.

Like all self made men who started with nothing Heinecke has learned to take reverses in his stride. In 1997 Minor suffered when Thailand was hit by a serious economic crisis. But Heinecke saw the crisis as an opportunity because he was sure that Thailand would bounce back and bought new properties. Minor was badly affected by the Tsunami which caused huge damage to its properties in Phuket and the Maldives. But once again Heinecke held firm and acquired more properties in the Maldives. (Minor now has nine hotels in the island nation.)

It was Covid which, he says, really shook the group. Minor lost a billion US dollars during that phase. But says Heinecke now, “what struck me the most was that we could afford to lose a billion dollars and still keep going!”

It’s the sort of spirit with which he handled the bad publicity in England when Minor clashed with the celebrated London restaurateur Jeremy King whose small group of restaurants included London’s trendiest places. Minor invested in

King’s group, eventually owning over 70 per cent, at least partly because it included such celebrated restaurants as The Wolseley which it believed could be replicated in other cities. King refused to cooperate turning down every suggestion Minor came up with. Eventually King was ousted from the company after a battle during which the British press took King’s side.

But the restaurant group has flourished without King. A second Wolseley has opened in London and Heinecke has turned the restaurant brands into hotels. A Colbert hotel (after the group’s Colbert restaurant in Sloane Square) is rumoured to be in the works in London and The Wolseley itself has become a hotel brand: the first Wolseley Hotel will open in New York soon.

So what will Heinecke do in India? His attitude seems to be that the group has expertise in most areas of hospitality so he is open to all options. The Anantaras will be the most high profile of the new ventures and he says they will be efficient but luxurious city hotels with a resort feel.

And isn’t 50 hotels in five years too ambitious a target? Yes, he concedes, it is an ambitious target. But that’s why he likes it. He is at his best when the challenge is the greatest.

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