"Best Night in Korea" hotel plan didn't get noticed, didn't work.

The Korea Times had an article two weeks ago about the government's plan to make more tourist hotels. A lengthy excerpt:

This is exactly the situation the Seoul Metropolitan Government and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism were waiting for when they jointly launched a domestic hotel chain, ``BENIKEA,'' to win some market share back from established foreign brands such as InterContinental, Hilton, Hyatt and Novotel.

However, just two years into its existence, it's hard to tell whether BENIKEA, which is short for ``best night in Korea,'' is dead or alive. Perhaps the most telling indicator of its health is that it's Web site (www.benikea.com), which accepts reservations for member hotels and has been a central part of promotion efforts for foreign travelers, hasn't been operating for the last two months.

The Korea Tourism Office (KTO), a sub-organization of the Tourism Industry that's been managing the BENIKEA project, is now reportedly considering pulling the plug.

``BENIKEA hotels basically failed to differentiate themselves from motels,'' said Geum Ki-young, a researcher from the Seoul Development Institute.

``The services, facilities and prices were never competitive and a brand image for BENIKEA never existed, and this easily explains the crisis.''

Foreigners have constantly griped about Seoul's high accommodation prices. The city's five-star properties charge about 300,000 won (about $223) per night, a rate that rivals those in Tokyo and Hong Kong, two of the world's most expensive hotel cities, and significantly more than hotels in Shanghai, Taiwan and Singapore.

At the other end of the spectrum are the cheap but often trashy motels, many of them infamous for their poor amenities and shady atmosphere, built for sex-seeking locals rather than foreign travelers.

BENIKEA hotels were supposed to exploit this gap in the hotel market, providing clean and comfortable facilities without the unnecessary frills at about one-third of the prices of rooms at luxury hotels.

The plan was to convert a number of motels and budget hotels to BENIKEA tourists hotels, requiring them to meet certain quality standards and tailor their services for foreigners and charge 30,000 won to 50,000 won per night.

But currently, BENIKEA so far has only 36 member hotels, making a mockery of the government predictions for 300 properties by the end of 2010. And the quick read on the list proves that it's failing to find its niche market.

With the lack of interest becoming apparent among budget properties, BENIKEA began accepting luxury hotels as members to maintain its pulse, thus falling out of the price range of many cost-conscious travelers.

About 10 of the 36 BENIKEA hotels are four-star properties, including the old President Hotel in front of the Seoul City Hall and the Crown Hotel in Itaewon, and these hotels account for more than 40 percent of the 3,867 rooms provided by BENIKEA properties.

Hmm, last week was the first I'd heard of that. I do remember reading that during the 2002 World Cup Korea made some "World Inns" to avoid some of the stigma attached to the ubiquitous love motels. Last week the BENIKEA website was under construction, and this morning it wasn't working at all. On the English-language section of the KTO website the section for budget accomodation is quite limited (with only three options in Jeollanam-do and two in Gyeonggi-do).

You really can't go wrong with motels, though, especially since they're one-half or one-third the price of "tourist hotels" and come with way more perks and amenities. As I said in a longer post on motels and hotels, these tourist hotels have one big advantage: they often turn up in English-language searches. You run a search for Suncheon hotel and you come to pages for the Suncheon Royal Tourist Hotel, which charges 90,000 won per night. That's nearly three times what you'd pay at a motel on a weeknight, but unless you're familiar with Korea or really looked into the matter---and found out that there are more motels than grocery stores---you wouldn't know any better.

It seems like there would be a market for hotels that cater to English-speaking foreigners and tourists. Sure, most of us can find motel rooms under most circumstances, but how many times have you wanted to book something in advance? How many times have you wanted to check out the rooms online? How many times have you wanted to get information from the front desk in English? Or get some breakfast without finding a Family Mart? I stayed at the Toyoko Inn---a chain of Japanese hotels---in Busan's Jungang-dong in January, which ended up costing 60,000 won for a double room. Being a Japanese chain it of course catered to the huge number of Japanese tourists in Busan, and offered Japanese-language service and tourism information, in addition to the sort of rooms Japanese had come to expect as well as a free Japanese-ish breakfast in the morning.

I think opening an English-language version would be a hell of an idea, though "Western" and "English" have historically translated very poorly in Korea. As it stands there's little justification to paying $100 - $150 per night at a low-end tourist hotel.