Vinpearl Resort & Spa on Phu Quoc island. — VNA/VNS Photo

US business magazine Forbes has recently published an article highlighting the Vietnamese hospitality sector’s creativity to survive the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the article, titled “Viet Nam’s hotels get creative to survive the pandemic” by Brett Davis, COVID-19 forced some in the industry to rethink their approach to how to cater to guests and innovate their offerings.

It said one such innovation was developed at Alma Resort on the shores of Cam Ranh Bay in southern Viet Nam, which built its own in-house app to create a safe, contactless way of delivering key information to guests.

Developed by the resort’s IT team and available for download on Android, Apple, Windows and Amazon devices, the 'Alma Resort' app provides COVID-19 health and safety tips, menus for the property’s restaurants, activity schedules and promotions as well as live stream broadcasts and information about events.

The resort’s general manager, Herbert Laubichler-Pichler, said he believed it would soon be incumbent for five-star resorts across Viet Nam to offer the same technology.

The author went on to note that thanks to the Government’s drastic measures, Viet Nam was one of the world’s leading countries in controlling the spread of the pandemic.

It said domestic tourism, and the steadily growing purchasing power of Vietnamese consumers, came to be viewed as a lifeline for the local tourism industry, provided it could change its strategy in some key areas. One such example was in the food and beverage offerings.

Looking forward, Herbert Laubichler-Pichler predicted there would be a strong rebound in the Vietnamese tourism sector because of the pent-up demand for travel after a year spent in various forms of isolation. — VNS