Sudamala Resorts on Bali, Lombok and Flores-Komodo are locally-owned and managed and achieve standards of style, service and luxury which have gained international respect and admiration. To find out how this all came about, Publisher Alistair Speirs speaks to an old friend, passionate CEO and Founder of this boutique hospitality group, Ben Subrata, whose vision and dedication to Indonesian culture shone through every word.
What inspired you to start Sudamala Hotels and Resorts?
Hospitality has been my passion for a long time. I don’t know whether I’ve ever shared with you but Bill Marriott once visited Indonesia because we invited him, but things fell through during the 1998 financial crisis. Anyway, at the time, I was still very much engaged in engineering related activities, power generation in particular.
But, I’ve always been very fond of architecture and the design of buildings and interiors, and extensive travel has given me exposure to various hospitality experiences. I used to travel a lot for business, from the US to Europe, and of course a lot of Asian countries as well. Well, with my love for architecture, interiors, and the fact that I believe Indonesians are naturally hospitable, I decided that hospitality was the challenge I wanted to pursue. Indonesia also has the unique position where we have the beauty of nature, local art, culture, sunshine, and every part of the country is unique and diverse.
To me, these are the elements that are advantageous for tourism — and I’m talking more of a resort focus and not of city hotels. With Indonesia’s unique position of having diverse culture and nature, this is the type of tourism we should pursue. These are factors unique to a particular location, and I think we are pretty blessed. If you want to compete in manufacturing, you can’t compete with the likes of China or Vietnam, but when you talk about promoting unique selling experiences, we are pretty well positioned. I think you can’t create the same environment in any other part of the world.
Absolutely. In fact in several conferences in the past, I’ve recommended to the government to focus on our strengths, which are not manufacturing, that’s China. And it’s not even technology because India has 380 million tertiary educated people. So do what you’re good at, which is nature, fantastic fisheries, amazing agriculture, and unique spices. But instead, we want to get into electric vehicle manufacturing!
So what was the starting point for your first property? Which was the first property, and how did you design it?
When I first secured a property in Sanur, Bali, I thought ‘Let’s build an art gallery and a place to meet, have some discourse and discussion’. I have a number of friends in the art community. But a friend said that the land was too big for just a gallery and suggested to build a resort around it as well. You’ll see at the front of Sudamala Resort, Sanur, our ‘Sudakara’ gallery at the front.
That was our first property and we just celebrated our 12th anniversary. We started building in 2010, and Made Wijaya was also involved in the landscaping.
The late, great Made Wijaya. So how many properties do you have now? Where are they and why did you choose those locations?
We have five operating properties and one under construction. We are operating on three islands: Bali, Lombok and Flores-Komodo. In Bali we have Sanur, and we have a lodge in Amed, and we are building in Ubud. In Lombok, we have one in Senggigi. And in Flores-Komodo we have one on the main island, then we have one also on the island of Seraya, which we have just renovated and extended, we added more keys and built the Sunset Bar. We have a new kitchen, and renovated the restaurant, so it’s very, very nice. That would be the best island resort in the area. I’m very pleased how it turned out.
Let’s talk about tourism. You are dependent on tourism, you’ve got resorts. How do you feel about the current state of tourism? Are we handling the increased number of visitors correctly? Are we giving them the right experiences?
My concern on our tourism is the management of the environment. We could, and should, do better in looking after our environment, because the abuse of the environment will eventually take a toll on us, and as you can see, the garbage, plastic, all that is very prevalent now. That is a threat to longevity. In terms of experience, I think we would do well to learn from Thailand on how they really sell experiences to guests. We have more to offer than Thailand because we have more diversity, but we do not package it quite as well.
We mentioned earlier about Made Wijaya, who was very astute in observing the landscape. He could masterfully put things together in a very exotic presentation. Even the celebrated hotel designer, Bill Bensley, learned from him. What I’m trying to relay is that if we have somebody like Made Wijaya in the tourism industry, who knows the culture and knows how to present it to people properly, then it can be enjoyed to the fullest.
For example Tenganan, one of my favourite villages, a unique Bali Aga [Indigenous Bali] village home to the double ikat cloth. It’s the only place in Indonesia that has double ikat, one of four in the world! They hold a magnificent ceremony every year, but the experience of it could be better managed for visitors.
When it comes to marketing, we can certainly promote Indonesia a lot better. But we should also look at limiting number of arrivals: even Galapagos is putting a quota on how many people should visit. So places like Komodo or Rinca Islands should really be protected from over-tourism.
Absolutely. Tourism is the key economic driver especially in Bali, Lombok and Labuan Bajo, but the local tourism offices also have no power to control the factors affecting tourism like traffic, water, waste, energy… these are managed by other departments.
On that note, I understand sustainability is at the core of what you’re doing, can you tell us a bit about that?
We really launched this initiative last year and, whilst we don’t have a grand plan, we do have definite goals that have implemented. Firstly, we have no more plastic, especially single-use, like our toothbrush and comb amenities are now bamboo. No more plastic bottled water. We’re measure our energy usage, our carbon footprint with a target to reduce the kilowatt hour per occupied room. We change linens every three days unless requested otherwise by the guest. When it comes to waste we’re recycling our plastics, compost our green and organic waste, and have these facilities. We’re doing our best so that very little waste leaves the property. We’re doing these initiatives honestly and sincerely, so that’s my message to colleagues in operations. And they’re committed.
What would you say is Sudamala’s distinguishing mark? What’s your special ingredient?
We have really connectivity to the locale in which we operate. Through our architecture, interior design, our cuisine, our values representation of the local values and culture. If you look at the hotel industry in Labuan Bajo, I would say we are probably the most respectful of the local architecture: our restaurant’s roof reflects that of the Wae Rebo village, villa roofs reflect vernacular Bajo style, we utilise real Tenun Flores (Flores weaving) in our interiors, the artworks featured are ethnic, primitive design from the Flores culture. Even the choice of vegetation of our landscaping is reflective of the environment. So the feeling of being ‘there’, in that locale, is in every resort.
Another feature is that we really do not try to squeeze as many rooms as possible out of a limited space. My friends say: “You’re crazy, this land is expensive, and you just build 84 keys? Isn’t that a very low use of the land?” I say, yes, but I don’t want to squeeze too many keys, because then I would just be another one of “those” hotels. I want people to feel the space and the rooms are ample in size. I think this will be more timeless.
Is there anything else that is on your mind about what you have done in Sudamala Resorts that you want to tell us about?
Well, as a luxury brand that has a presence on three different islands — Bali, Lombok, and Flores-Komodo — we celebrate this with a programme called Indonesian Odyssey, where our guests can experience all three destinations. The different languages, different lifestyles, different perspectives. In Bali they’ll see temples and offerings, and eat ‘babi guling’ (suckling pig), then in Lombok, there are mosques and you can’t even touch pork there! Already the language and architecture are different. Then they cross over to our Flores properties where there are churches and are welcomed by a different ethnicity of the archipelago. To Europeans, it’s like every destination is a different country.
After Ubud I’m planning to develop something in Sumba. We have already got a very nice property there and we’re going into a design stage probably the later part of this year which will strengthen our presence in the eastern part of Indonesia. But you know, this expansion is not about adding rooms, it’s about enhancing experiences. So, the destination and the location that we will expand to should actually enhance the experience of our guests. I often remind my folks not to degrade themselves to just selling accommodation because we are providing experience and that we should really deliver that and mean it.
Thank you Pak Ben, I look forward to experiencing more of Sudamala myself.
@sudamalaresorts | sudamalaresorts.com
