50 new staff being recruited for hotel group

A NEW Irish hotel group with its head office in the Quin Road Business Park, Ennis is recruiting 50 new staff.
Great National Hotels was formed at the end of 2009 and five three and four-star hotels in Ireland, including the Woodstock Golf and Spa Resort in Ennis, joined the group in February and March. Four three and four-star hotels in the UK’s Midlands also joined Great National Hotels.
Managing director of Great National Hotels, David Byrne, explained that the company is a new Irish hotel brand. “Independent hotels can avail of a number of services from Great National Hotels, including a reservation call centre, on and offline marketing, national advertising and promotions, as well as group discounts, all enabling economies of scale making it possible for hotels to reduce their costs and offer a real competitive edge,” he said.
Mr Byrne said that the concept of the hotel group is “quite unique”. “The hotels are part of our group, but remain independently run hotels, with Great National Hotels managing some aspects of their business for them. We are also operating as a reservation centre and in terms of marketing for the four UK hotels who have joined the group. It is a testament to the skills and expertise in the Shannon Region that an Ennis company can provide these services to Irish and UK hotels,” he added.
He believes that the group will grow as word of mouth about the services they provide spreads. The reservation contact centre in the Quin Road Business Park opened in January. “We currently have 10 staff and are looking for five staff for an immediate start, rising up to about 50 by the end of the year. Since advertising for these positions earlier this week, already we have had 70 applicants of a very high calibre,” he said. The planned jobs will comprise management staff, operations personnel and reservations agents for the group’s head offices and customer contact centre in Ennis.
Mr Byrne said that there were a number of reasons why they chose Ennis for their head office, including the availability of broadband and IT in Ennis and the Shannon region, which he described as “exceptional”.
Another aspect of the business, is that Great National Hotels are ensuring that their member hotels pledge to use 85% of Irish food suppliers, as well as requesting them to give preference to Irish suppliers for all of their purposes.
He said that another two hotels would be joining the group in the next fortnight.
They will be announcing another two hotels in the next fortnight and are planning a further 10 hotels in Ireland over the course of 2010, and a further six hotels in the UK.
Mr Byrne’s business partner in Great National Hotels, David Collins, who is also marketing director of the company, lives in Bodyke. Reservations director, Edel Hayes is from Crusheen, while the company’s call centre manager, Margaret McNamara, is from Ennis. 
Speaking at the announcement of the group’s expansion programme in Ennis, David Byrne commented that the launch of Great National Hotels has coincided with arguably the most challenging time in recent history for Irish hotels, combined with the flight of overseas chain brands which were previously a shelter for independent hotel operators. 
“Aside from the quality and proven experience of our core team, Great National is founded on proven best of class marketing and management expertise, which is delivering our hotels certainty whilst significantly accelerating growth, reducing costs and improving their market reach,” Mr Byrne said.
The brand itself is comprised of two distinct collections of hotels: the Great National Collection and the Great National Classic Collection.
Other Irish hotels under the group include the Blarney Golf and Spa Resort, the Abbey Court Hotel and Spa, Nenagh, Darby O’Gills Country House Hotel in Killarney.