‘Labour of Love’ to ‘Best in Class’

The Bridgeport Hotel team accept the ‘Best Overall Hotel’ award at the 2021 AHA|SA Hotel Industry Awards for Excellence.

HOTEL SA INTERVIEWED DARREN STEELE, GENERAL MANAGER OF OPERATIONS (SA) FOR EDP HOTELS, ABOUT THE BRIDGEPORT HOTEL BEING NAMED JOINT HOTEL OF THE YEAR AT THIS YEAR’S AHA|SA HOTEL INDUSTRY AWARDS FOR EXCELLENCE.

WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE WIN TO THE HOTEL GROUP?

“The Bridgeport has been such a labour of love for our owners, Ian Tregoning and Graham Hobbs. To win Best Overall Hotel vindicates their early vision and their persistence.

“I think the first drawings took place back in May 2012 and it's well documented that we spent six years in planning, fighting tooth and nail to get through to the point where we could even start construction.”

IT REALLY WAS A VERY STRATEGIC VISIONARY MOVE. YOU ARE IN SUCH A GO-AHEAD AREA OF THE STATE.

“That’s very true. A lot of people have assumed that we were backing on to projects like The Bend etc. with this development.

“But when you look at the chronology, and how far back it was, it really does show how visionary Ian and Graham were for the region, well before many of these other major developments were in the pipeline.

“Of course, the timing has been great. We're coming online at a time when Monarto is about to spend significant money on their operations and The Bend Motorsport Park has been a great success for the state.

“There is also a myriad of other business development investment going on in the region at the moment.

I SAW THE OWNERS’ REACTION ON THE NIGHT. HOW DID STAFF IN THE HOTEL REACT TO THE NEWS?

“Staff were over the moon.

“It's really difficult to describe to anyone the enormity of opening a hotel of this scale from scratch.

“Just opening the doors with effectively 150 staff that are largely new to the industry, and the excitement that goes with that, but also the challenges staff face until your systems etc. are bedded in.

“All of our staff went through the hard yards early on. To come out the other side with the ultimate accolade of being Hotel of the Year gives them a sense of pride and achievement for all the hard work that they've put in.

“We have had a huge team involved with this project. You also have to remember that we are unlike most of our contemporaries. Due to our scale and our sister business, Living Choice Australia, our design team is all in-house, the architectural team is in-house, our builders are in-house and we operate the hotel in-house.”

IS THERE ANY PARTICULAR PART OF THE HOTEL THAT'S GOING GANGBUSTERS OR HAS SURPRISED YOU HOW POPULAR IT IS?

“The whole place is going gangbusters.“Food and beverage, in particular, has been fantastic.

“We’ve been really happy with the way our food department has gone as that shows us that we're bringing a lot of people to the region to see our hotel.

“In hearing from the other hoteliers in the town, they haven't been overly impacted.

“That is a really positive story from our point of view. We obviously want to entertain the locals as much as possible, but we also aim to bring new visitors to the Greater Murraylands.

“Given the trading results and the sheer volume of people coming through the doors, we are clearly achieving that at the moment.

“t's really difficult to describe to anyone the enormity of opening a hotel of this scale from scratch... with effectively 150 staff that are largely new to the industry... but also the challenges staff face until your systems etc. are bedded in.

“Accommodation has been building organically. Unfortunately, we opened up straight into a lockdown in July, so border closures and other COVID-19 restrictions have certainly had some impact on us.

“We’re very, very happy with how it’s building though and, heading into the summer months, bookings are looking fantastic.

“Whilst the whole industry has traded around COVID-19 restrictions, we have certainly been impacted by the resulting postponement of a number of major corporate events and conferencing bookings. The venue has been designed to cater for these activities, in particular, and they certainly bolster accommodation.

“A number of customers have postponed major events in the first six months of the year, because of the uncertainty around COVID-19 restrictions and fear over things changing by the time they get to the event.

“Thankfully, many of these are postponements only and are re-booked for early 2022, which is great. Hopefully we are all operating with more certainty by then.

“We’re obviously all just moving with the times as they strike us at the moment.

“We have also had a number of local events like the Pedal Prix and rowing regattas etc., cancelled for COVID-19 reasons. Obviously, these will have had an impact on us as well.

“But to be honest, given how well we are going at the moment, the sky’s the limit for us once we do get back to a level of normality.”

ARE YOU USING THE HOTEL OF THE AWARD IN YOUR MARKETING?

“It's certainly been a key focus in recent times and will obviously be a pillar in any form of marketing that we're doing anywhere now and moving into the future.“It's just a wonderful accolade.

“We're really keen to use it as the borders are opening up, to really market into those interstate areas that we haven't pushed too hard into yet for obvious reasons.

“This award will certainly help us market into those markets.”

HOW DO YOU SEE THE FUTURE? ARE THERE ANY PLANS TO MODIFY, DEVELOP, EXTEND?

“Ian probably mentioned on the night we opened that we're renovating already.

“It's one of those things - we're in a world that moves very fast.

“We certainly aim to be as contemporary as we can, and remain so well into the future. Where we can improve, we are definitely not afraid to continue reinvesting in the site.

“Having said that, there’s isn’t too much that I think we’ve gotten wrong at this stage.

“We’re pretty happy with what we’ve got, and look forward to developing more on our systems, moving with the times as new opportunities and technologies emerge, especially in the digital space.

“For future business and marketing, we certainly want to embrace those technologies as much as we can.”