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Thai Commerce Minister General Chatchai Sarikaya's dinner in Hoi an Restaurant

Long night on  the 21st of April, but the challenge of serving respected person from other country soothed all the stress of preparations. Credits all goes to my team in Hoi An Restaurant who executed the plan as expected and to my sales team who were so detailed in communicating the organizer's requests, from simple table set up to the tedious food requirements. Cheers!     

   

RUSSIAN PRIME MINISTER MEDVEDEV'S DINNER

High end market is a challenge to work with but all those late hours and long days of analyzing business can just be compensated by one dining visit of big political figure.Oriental Saigon the management company of Mandarine and Hoi An restaurants located in Ho Chi Minh City's central district was proud to be the venue of Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev's first dinner upon his arrival in Saigon on April 6, 2015. Preparation was tedious but to be informed of a "brilliant" result was enough for my team to celebrate. Cheers Russian Embassy for the trust!

GENERAL MANAGER

    With my ambitious aim to run a business, I was given opportunity to operate two high-end restaurants after my stint with Ocean Hospitality.   

    Oriental Saigon trusted and appointed me to be the Acting General Manager for Mandarine and Hoi An restaurants with over 120 personnel.
      I was balancing towards being critical to details in the operations while at the same time implement yielding strategies to increase revenue.
    Managing two high end products & services are a big challenge that it is a must to be more creative and innovative to beat the odds of having a complex structure.   

  I have a kitchen team that cannot speak English at all. Yet, my guests are 98% foreigners. It is a tall tasks to connect them to the needs and demands of  the guests.   This is on top of the challenge to maintain, if not increase the volume of repeat guests.    However, I was given the full title of General Manager.  At Oriental Saigon, I am able to bring some of my clients from the former company I work with. But the sweetest part of my achievement in this job is that I have saved a big chunk of the operating expenses including the increase of staff productivity. If you are in Le Thanh Ton or Ngo Van Nam by any chance, come and have a chance to meet me and my team, Hoi An Restaurant at 11 Le Thanh Ton and Mandarine Restaurant at 11A Ngo Van Nam. The two outlets were included in the Top 101 Restaurants in Asia survey of the US based website The Daily Meal.  Hoi An and Mandarine were among the five restaurants chosen in Vietnam as Top 101 restaurants in Asia.

DIRECTOR OF SALES & MARKETING

                               
With my understanding in the hospitality business in Vietnam coupled with my strategic ideas in generating revenue, I got the chance to elevate myself from mere sales & marketing manager to Acting Director of Sales and Marketing for an opening 4-star property of Ocean Hospitality in Ho Chi Minh City, the StarCity Saigon Hotel.  Selling and promoting the hotel's 199 rooms was not an easy task with the limited volume of demands for a property located near the airport.  However, my patience in lobbying for groups paid off when StarCity was chosen as the home for the Japanese crew of Vietnam Airlines and Angkor Air with a total of 47 room night- requirements a day.  I was given the DOSM title and was assigned to form the corporate sales office of OCH using my team in Saigon.  A challenging tasks but I made it with OCH for almost three years.

SALES & MARKETING MANAGER

       My sales and marketing management skills were put into test when I was offered a job at Lasapinette Hotel, a 4-star property in Dalat. The job was to oversee the Sales Representative Office in Ho Chi Minh City.
       The hotel market for Dalat was mostly locals escaping the raging heat in Ho Chi Minh City during summer or golfers eyeing for a nice 18 holes Golf Courses.
       It was a challenge, I have to sell the destination first before I can raise the revenue that the owner expected. But during my stint, Lasapinette hosted the 8th East Asian Forum that brings together the leaders from all over the world to Dalat.
       International exhibits, sales calls and hard work in being innovative and creative was my trick in surviving a tough market. "If there's no demand, create demands, after all, it's what business is all. "