While the Lagos hotel market welcomed a number of new entrants last year, the emergence of Blu Atlantic Hotel on the scene was with a difference.
The boutique hotel is truly bringing innovations in service and offerings starting from the check-in, while also positioning as a business hotel with corporate budding clients in mind.
Rightly located at The Rock Drive Lekki, the business bay of Lekki in Lagos and behind the famous Filmhouse IMAX Cinema, the new hotel offers 48 rooms across five floors, amid parading the latest hotel furnishings and fittings.
The non-smoking rooms speak volume of comfort as luxury is in each detail; from a balance of design, a sense of beauty and furnishing made with the highest quality.
From Classic, Superior, Junior Suites to Executive Suites, a stay in each of the rooms confirms that luxury is not just a state of mind, but an art, which Blu Atlantic has mastered.
If you are a freak of innovation, Blu Atlantic delights with the most modern check-in system; guests do not need to hang around at the lobby to get their room keys, they are taken to their rooms, while the personal staff attached to them get the details done.
As well, you don’t ask the staff the direction to the restaurant or bar, they gladly take you there.
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That is comfort and convenience, which Gozie Nwachukwu, chief executive, Blu Atlantic Hotel, said is part of a service culture the Lekki-based hotel is committed to upholding.
Talking about the innovations, it parades some of the most modern hotel fittings from lightning, switches to energy saving technologies.
The rooms are all soundproof, the walls and other parts of the building are padded with fibre wood, which are fire and heat resistant, ensuring safety of guests.
Explaining the glass facade of the hotel, the hotel’s chief executive, noted that it has to do with the corporate image, which the hotel brand is trying to build.
The glass is insulated, soundproof and tampered as well. These combined to give the edifice a beautiful exterior look.
The hotel, which sits on over 1600 sq meters land, also parades one of the waste recycling systems that in turn, offers it reusable gas, amid water treatment that makes its water drinkable.
Apart from the smart-rooms, other facilities in the hotel include; a small meeting room seating about 25 people in the first floor, a resultant and bar, an outdoor bar for Cherokee. For fitness buffs, there is an arrangement with a nearby Tennis Club where guests can go for tennis, while talks are in progress with IMAX for guests to see complementary movies at the cinemas.
Speaking of his inspiration for the hotel, the chief executive noted that he was challenged by the lack of quality offerings and tired of many complaints by people on the same issue in Nigeria, hence he decided to build a hotel that will address the issue of poor quality offerings.
“I have always had it in mind to build a hotel when I was younger. The second reason is that I have traveled across the world and have seen hotels, as well as heard many complaints about hotels here and I started thinking that maybe I should build the kind of hotel I want to stay in, that is how the idea came up”, he said.
On service culture, Nwachukwu explained that with his stay at some Ritz Carlton brand hotels across the world, he was exposed to topnotch service culture, which he thinks should be replicated in the Nigerian hospitality market.
He is optimistic of building a domestic hotel brand that can compete with international ones.
“We are a local brand that will compete with international brands, it is all about doing the right things, training our people, getting the right facilities, service culture and quality offerings.
I am very optimistic that we can build it. It is possible, all we need is dedication and commitment to it, training and retraining our people, with these we can offer the same service with international brands and even exceed them”, he said.
With the opening of the Blu Atlantic Hotel, the chief executive insisted that the team of hospitality professionals led by a Danish general manager is committed to replicating the high-level service culture he experienced at Ritz Carlton in Lagos.
Having opened the hotel in December 2021, after three and half years of construction, the chief executive assured that, “Now we are focusing more on service and replicating the highest international service culture here because this is a service oriented industry”.
He is optimistic of building a domestic hotel brand that can compete with international ones.
“We are a local brand that will compete with international brands, it is all about doing the right things, training our people, getting the right facilities, service culture and quality offerings.
I am very optimistic that we can build it. It is possible, all we need is dedication and commitment to it, training and retraining our people, with these we can offer the same service with international brands and even exceed them”, he said.
With the opening of the hotel, Nwachukwu is now riding on the success of the huge accomplishment for the future and his original dream for the Lekki coastal corridor.
He initially opted for Blu Atlantic Hotel and Waterparks in order to take advantage of the huge Lekki-Elegushi coastline; a $1 billion industry, which is wasting. Better informed now and better positioned, he will now go for his dream of having something along the coastline, especially a waterpark that will lure Nigerian leisure seekers with irresistible offerings and curb outbound tours to Dubai, Paris, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.
