Remarks of Saigon Tourist Hotel Chain

Majestic Saigon was established in 1925 at the downtown cross-road of Catinat and Quai de Belgique (now Dong Khoi and Ton Duc Thang). The hotel looks out on to the romantic Saigon river and boasts famous French-style domes, coloured glass and unique motifs. It has been highly rated several years by The Guide magazine as a quality hotel and together with Sofitel Metroplole Hanoi as a legendary chain of hotels in Indo-China. The hotel has applied ISOO 9001:2000 for quality management and ISO 14001 for environment management.

 

The Majestic Hotel regards Japan as a market of huge potential, developing a website in Japanese to provide information and facilitate hotel booking, joining with a restaurant in Tokyo to provide Japanese food, participating in Vietnam-Japan Cultural Week, and co-ordinating with Japanese travel companies to introduce tourist products and hotel service. Room 103 of the hotel is an attraction to Japanese tourists as it was the place where Japanese writer Kaiko Takeshi lived in 1964-1965 and wrote about the Vietnam war. Majestic Saigon has also been listed in most of Japanese Guide Book and introduced on Japanese television networks such as NHK and Fuji TV.

 

In the future, Majestic Hotel will be expanded in Phase 2 towards Nguyen Hue avenue to create a group of five-star hotels with high-class services while maintaining the Majestic’s classic style. The hotel takes pride in its trademark and tries to please local and foreign customers with quality products. At the same time, it continues to target Japanese market with traditional hospitality and the best possible services.

 

Sheraton Saigon has 374 rooms with all complete with modern equipment: a Sweet Sleeper Bed, 29 inch TV, marble bath room, and high-speed Internet connectivity. It has also 92 high-class apartments with full facilities at a competitive price. The ballroom is the biggest in Ho Chi Minh City with modern facilities such as wireless Internet and a robo-scan lighting system. The hotel offers Japanese food including Sushi, Sashimi, and Tamaki, and other services such as Spa, face massage, foot massage, and stress reducing body massage. In 2005, the Sheraton Saigon was elected by Business Asia magazine as the best hotel for business, a title suited to the Sheraton’s prestigious image.

 

A Japanese film making team with famous movie stars stayed in the hotel and produced a film on Vietnamese gastronomy shown in Japan on January 22, 2006. (From left to right: Ishida Jyunichi, Wentz Eiji, Hashino Emi, Ishizuka Hidehiko and Japanese Business Manager of Sheraton Saigon).

 

Among the many legendary hotels of the Far East, The Caravelle in Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City, occupies an especially poignant place in history. During the Vietnam War, which broke out shortly after the hotel opened in 1959, The Caravelle was home to many of the world’s foreign correspondents and diplomats. The Caravelle hotel fell silent for the best part of two decades following the war and has only resumed its place on the world’s hospitality map since Vietnam re-opened its doors to foreign business in the mid-90s. Today, under the management of Hong Kong-based Furama Hotels & Resorts International (FHRI), the timelessly-elegant Caravelle is again Saigon’s premier business address and leading 5-star hotel - the favourite choice for both affluent tourists and a stream of foreign businessmen. Views over famous Lam Son Square, the pulse of the vibrant metropolis, are a “unique attraction”. Meeting facilities host an array of prestigious events, ranging from conferences and meetings for both local and foreign organizations, as well as product launches, seminars, cocktail parties and private VIP dinners, with numerous foreign dignitaries and tycoons in attendance. The new business centre accommodates executives with high-speed broadband internet, secretariat and translation services, and meeting rooms for individuals or small groups.

 

The world’s media has quickly responded to The Caraavelle’s rebirth. In the annual Business Traveller hospitality awards it is repeatedly voted “Best Business Hotel in Ho Chi Minh City”. Similarly, Vietnam,’s leading lifestyle & leisure magazine, The Guide, habitually votes it ‘Best Luxury Hotel’. Guests during the Vietnam War will also be heartened to learn that its enigmatic Saigon-Saigon Bar remains unchanged and unparalleled as the most popular watering-hole in town.

 

The new ‘Executive Meeting Rooms’ and ‘Business Centre’ on the second floor are “designed after the atmosphere of a club with the city’s premier meeting facilities”, said General Manager, Stephen O’Grady.

In 2005, Saigon Tourist started upgrading the Rex to a five-star hotel in two phases : building a new Rex and improving the existing hotel to make the whole complex a five-star hotel. It will be the first five-star hotel under State management and will prove a turning point for the hotel. In 2005, the Rex recruited young and experienced staff capable of competition in the future. At present, the hotel has 217 rooms : 85 rooms in the East wing (Le Loi and Nguyen Hue streets) and 132 in the West Wing (Pasteur street), including 57 suites with Vietnamese typical architecture, bamboo and rattan furniture.

 

Ho Chi Minh city is changing rapidly, however, the nostalgia remains with old timers. John Evans, an ex-American GI, returned to the Rex in June 2003 and reflected on asia-hotels.com that “The Rex is still the Rex ! Central location. The Rooftop Garden. For a Vietnam vet, there really is no place else to stay if you are in the country on a nostalgia trip”.