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Hotel industry: Accor will cut between 300 and 400 jobs in France

2020-10-20T08:58:13.715Z


In all, the French giant will cut at least a thousand jobs around the world.The French hotel giant Accor, which has brands such as Ibis, Sofitel, Novotel, Mercure and Pullman, is now engaged in “ a marathon ” to get through the coronavirus crisis which will last. Sébastien Bazin, the CEO of the group, at the head of 5,099 hotels in more than one hundred countries, believes that the situation " will not get better " in the coming weeks for the hotel industry in France, bec


The French hotel giant Accor, which has brands such as Ibis, Sofitel, Novotel, Mercure and Pullman, is now engaged in “

a marathon

” to get through the coronavirus crisis which will last.

Sébastien Bazin, the CEO of the group, at the head of 5,099 hotels in more than one hundred countries, believes that the situation "

will not get better

" in the coming weeks for the hotel industry in France, because of the cover -fire established in eight metropolises.

Read also: The hotel industry is sinking into the crisis with no prospect of recovery

This summer we were at -40% compared to the summer of last year, in March we were at -90% so there was a short-lived rebound, from July 1 to September 4.

Now we are at -60%,

”he said Tuesday on France inter.

The hotels in town are much more affected, because they receive international business customers who are not there.

The very high end is closed, the low end suffers less,

”he said.

"

And then things will not work out, with the curfew, in the weeks ahead of us,

" he continued.

It's not going to be very pretty

Sébastien Bazin, CEO of Accor

Asked about a possible rebound in activity during the school holidays of All Saints' Day, he replied: “

We do not know damn nothing because now people reserve 4 days before their departure.

But it's not going to be very pretty

”.

Read also: The public authorities at the bedside of tourism

In Europe, where Accor makes half of its turnover, "

it's a disaster,

" said Sébastien Bazin, pointing to "

a total inconsistency between the measures taken between the States of the Union: for the traveler it is is incomprehensible, so it does not travel

”.

"

It is high time (...) that we put a common procedure between the different countries

" to allow movement between them, he said.

Faced with China which

"left

exactly as before the Covid in the space of 9 months

" and the United States which "

suffered less because they have 350 million customers in the same territory

", "

Europe is the place where we suffer the most, with Latin America,

”he said.

In August, he announced a savings plan of 200 million euros, on a cost base of 1.2 billion in 2019, which will involve the elimination of a thousand jobs in the world (out of 18,000 in total ).

He specifies that these job cuts, "

between 1000 and 1200

", concern "

the head offices in the world

".

In France, "

between 300 and 400

" positions are threatened.

"

Small salaries will continue to have a salary for two years, but we will provide training for them in a profession other than the hotel industry,

" he said.

Despite state aid, "

we continue to lose money,

" he said.

In the first half, the group recorded a net loss of 1.5 billion euros, for a turnover of 917 million euros, down 52.4% over one year.

Read also: Covid, videoconferencing ... the business travel crisis is causing cascading damage

Accor hotels lend their kitchens to restaurateurs subject to curfew

In this particularly gloomy context for tourism and the hotel and catering sector, the new curfew measures are seen as yet another blow.

"

We have collapsed (...) it's terribly complicated

", he judges.

To "stick together", the CEO of Accor proposes, with the voluntary hoteliers of the group, to provide the kitchens of the hotels to neighborhood restaurateurs, subject to curfew.

It is a question of "

offering restaurant owners who wish to come to us, to take possession of our hotel restaurant with our teams, and to ensure that their customers come to sleep with us at cost price

", he explains. , by putting “

their brand, their identity, their concept, their menu, their checkered tablecloth

”.

"

They will welcome their neighborhood customers and ensure that these customers come to sleep with us at a cost price

" in order to respect the curfew at 9 p.m., which will give rise to "

a margin sharing

", explained Sébastien Bazin.

Among other operations of this type to try to fill its rooms, the group has been offering rooms from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. in its 250 hotels in Great Britain since the beginning of August for teleworking enthusiasts.

In addition, during confinement, 300 Accor hotels were ready to welcome patients with Covid-19.

But this operation did not really work, according to Sébastien Bazin.

Source: lefigaro

All business articles on 2020-10-20

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