BACOLOD CITY – As the City of Smiles is aiming to be a super city in the next few years, property giant Megaworld announced on Tuesday, Nov. 22, that it will build a P2-billion iconic hotel at The Upper East here.
Cleofe Albiso, managing director of Megaworld Hotels and Resorts, revealed in a press briefing at Lanai by Fresh Start here that the 12-story Kingsford Hotel Bacolod is expected to open in 2028.
Currently, this city can only accommodate at least 5,000 guests during conventions, according to City Tourism Officer Teresa Manalili.
She said they are targeting to have at least 10,000 hotel rooms to make this city ready as a Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, Exhibitions (MICE) destination.
Manalili said they are planning to put allocations by next year to promote MICE and develop the capabilities of people, frontliners, and hotels to prepare this city as a top MICE destination.
Based on Manalili’s presentation, this city only has 20 hotel categories with 1,587 rooms, 49 Mabuhay accommodations, including pension houses, tourist inns, hostels, apartelles, and residences with 1,734 rooms and five resorts with 150 rooms, with a total of 3,471 rooms.
Thus, she noted, this city does not have enough accommodation or sufficient hotel rooms to cater big conventions or conferences.
Manalili said that as they prepare to cater big MICE market like foreigners and locals, they look forward to more hotels and developments here.
“One of the primary tourism goals of the city is to make Bacolod a MICE capital in Western Visayas in the near future, which is in line with the vision of Mayor Alfredo Abelardo ‘Albee’ Benitez to make the city a super city in 2025,” she added.
Manalili said this city now is developing and enhancing priority tourism products such as MICE tourism, smart tourism, food tourism, heritage, cultural, and arts tourism, clean and green, and beautification.
With Kingsford Hotel Bacolod, Albiso said they want to help boost Bacolod’s position as a very attractive MICE location.
Kingsford will offer 300 rooms, making it the biggest hotel so far in this city to have such number of rooms, considering that L’Fisher Hotel, which tops the current list of hotels here, has 200 rooms at present.
“We are bringing the Kingsford Hotel brand to Bacolod, our second one next to Manila, with so many upgraded facilities and amenities,’’ Albiso said, making it as a game-changer in this city’s hospitality industry.
Albiso said that Megaworld is bringing the best to Bacolod because this city has a very sophisticated market.
She said that it will take five years to construct the hotel, thus, she assured residents that the property will best fit the kind of market that this city has. “We are building this hotel that will hopefully match the requirements of the very discerning business travelers.”
The announcement of Megaworld’s new project here came a day after they kicked off its holiday event dubbed ‘’Balik Gugma sa Paskwa’’ through a simultaneous Christmas lighting ceremony at The Upper East and Northill Gateway here on Monday, Nov. 21.
Megaworld is celebrating ‘’Paskong Pinoy’’ through festive Christmas displays at the 34-hectare The Upper East and the 53-hectare Northill Gateway. It will run until Jan. 15 along with the Christmas Bazaar.