When some marketing guru came up years ago with the line “one island, one resort” to sell the Maldives as the world’s most elite destination, they could never have guessed what was coming in the form of COVID-19.
Even if maths isn’t your forte, the Maldives equation is blissfully simple during a pandemic: The tiny nation state (population 531,000) comprises almost 1200 coral islands (of which only 120 or so are private resorts) spread across almost 300 square kilometres, which basically equals plenty of space for everyone.
Almost all residents live on the main island of Malé, site of the nation’s sole international airport, billed as “the gateway to paradise”. Beyond that, hotels confined to their designated islands have for decades floated in a solipsistic bubble.
Coronavirus caused the nation to close its borders for 110 days, but since July 15 last year it’s been business as usual, albeit with precautions in place. Staff, for example, have been based on the island where they work, reached only by speedboat or seaplane. Quarantine rarely boasted such white sand.
“It’s like we were tailor-made for these times,” reflects Indian-British hotelier Sonu Shivdasani, who put down roots in the Maldives more than 25 years ago when he moved from London.
He now owns three properties: Soneva Fushi and Soneva Jani in the Maldives, and Soneva Kiri in Thailand. Nightly rates range from $US873 ($1128) for two people in the May to November low season to $US38,000 in peak periods for up to 12 people, including a private pool with water slide.
“Barefoot luxury is no longer the main selling point – it’s that you can hug people and stand beside them here with no fear,” Shivdasani says. “Our slogan used to be ‘no shoes, no news’; these days it’s ‘no shoes, no news, no masks’.”
Once a pipe dream for most travellers – the Maldives boasts the highest concentration of luxury hotels in the world with average nightly rates north of $US5000 for top villas – it is now the travel industry’s pandemic poster child.
As most nations watch tourism nosedive, the Maldives has held onto its designer flip-flop travellers despite losing its largest market, China, when that country closed its external border.
The Ministry of Tourism says it welcomed 550,000 visitors from Europe, America and the Middle East for the nine months it was open last year. And in February, an average of 3460 guests arrived every day.
“The world’s super-rich basically have nowhere else to go,” shrugs Nihat Ercan, JLL’s head of investment sales Asia-Pacific. “The Maldives continues to be pretty much the sole international beneficiary of that.”
In one of the strangest travel groupings of all time, the Maldives, Albania, Serbia and Tanzania made headlines last July for opening their borders to inbound travellers with no restrictions. By contrast, many European countries welcoming tourists banned the British when the UK’s rates spiked.
As Shivdasani points out, given that the Maldives’ economy depends on tourism and GDP was plummeting – but infection rates had stabilised – it seemed foolish not to try. Around this time, the World Bank was predicting the Maldives would be one of the hardest-hit Asian nations in terms of economic destruction.
“We knew we had the infrastructure and the skills to handle the situation,” Shivdasani says. “When the pandemic hit, I had 70 guests across our three properties, and none of them wanted to return to their homes in Europe or wherever. They said right away that the Maldives was the safest place, and so they stayed from March until July.”
Shivdasani pulled all-nighters to get his resorts COVID-ready, including flying in a fully kitted-out laboratory from Roche in Switzerland for fast-turnaround testing. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. “We just had our busiest December-January period ever, far busier than 2019,” he says.
All travellers to the Maldives are required to produce a negative COVID-19 test taken 72 hours before their flight. On arrival in Malé, they’re flown by seaplane to their resort with minimal contact.
“Once our guests arrive, we perform a test right away; they’re confined to their villa for six hours or so, then free to enjoy the whole island after the test comes back negative,” Shivdasani says.
As for Ercan, he’s glad the early reopening has been successful and hopes more people will consider the Maldives – only four hours from Singapore or Bangkok – as a family destination.
“There are some very reasonable entry-level hotels like Mercure, Novotel and Holiday Inn, plus the Hard Rock Hotel, priced from $US250-$US350 a night,” he points out.
Ask Ercan if those properties come close to the $5000-a-night joints, and he’s nicely philosophical: “Once you get there, the crystal-clear water is all the same.”
The May issue of AFR Magazine, including the Philanthropy 50 list and women's watch special, is out on Friday, April 30 inside The Australian Financial Review. Follow AFR Mag on Twitter and Instagram.
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