Brian Fitzgibbons, managing director of The Glen Hotel and Osbourne Hotel in Brisbane, has joined the Pub Leaders Summit speaker line-up to discuss accommodation opportunities, and the year ahead in general for the industry.
Brian is looking forward to the Pub Leaders Summit, stating that it’s up to every good operator to keep themselves abreast of what’s going on in the industry.
“I think we’re all hungry for information, aren’t we? It’s a competitive market we’re in. In the same way that you’re constantly going to different restaurants, you can’t help but learn and reflect on your own situation and look for improvements – it’s an ongoing thing.”
“What’s happening this year is different to what’s going to be happening next year, so we all need to stay informed. That’s why we like to see what’s happening in Sydney and Melbourne.”
With almost 40 years’ experience in the hospitality industry, Fitzgibbons is a market leader for hospitality in Queensland. A third-generation publican, Brian’s flare for hospitality has stood the test of time, through restaurant openings, nightclub launches and now into the era of UberEats. Fitzgibbons owns and operates the award-winning Glen Hotel in Eight Mile Plains complete with 4.5-star accommodation, and the newly reopened Osbourne Hotel in Fortitude Valley.
Participating in the ‘Be Our Guest: Capitalising on Accommodation’ panel, Fitzgibbons will discuss his own experiences with taking the leap into an accommodation offering at The Glen Hotel, and the rewards that has reaped for the business.
“It’s been a very good experience. We procrastinated for a long time, just because we were wondering how it would be accepted, being in a pub, and if there would be stigma attached to it. So we decided that we weren’t going to muck about, we’d go right for the top end of the market and we got the AAA-approved 4.5 star rating. We opened up and we gained popularity very, very quickly. So there was a market there waiting to be satisfied.”
You can hear more from Fitzgibbons and more than 25 other respected hoteliers from across Australia at the Pub Leaders Summit on Monday 19 March at the Royal Randwick Racecourse in Sydney. For more information and to purchase tickets, click here.