After 20+ years at Millennium Hotels, career hotelier Karl Luxon joins SHG.
The appointment of Karl Luxon to the executive leadership position of chief operating officer for Scenic Hotel Group marks an important step for both the hotel and Luxon. The return to Christchurch after a spell of 30 years is something of a homecoming for the Luxon family as well as being the start of an exciting new chapter in Luxon’s tourism and hospitality career.
With a career forged over 20 years at Millennium Hotels and Resorts New Zealand (MCK), culminating in vice-president operations for MCK New Zealand, Luxon left the group at the end of 2020. His vision is to develop New Zealand’s tourism infrastructure further and help navigate it through what is agreed to be the most challenging of times for tourism globally.
Scenic Hotel Group board executive chair Lani Hagaman said: “Karl’s experience, core values and motivation to drive our industry into a new era were key to inviting him to join the Scenic Hotel Group executive.”
In evaluating its response and subsequent emergence from a year that decimated tourism globally, Luxon considers Scenic Hotel Group to have adapted remarkably well. It shied away from the quarantine business, and used its network of hotels to re-engineer its operations, placing some hotels into hibernation. The group has emerged intact and with a very clear way forward.
Luxon said: “While we have adapted to a new way of operating our businesses, there can be no illusions about the continuing fragility of the international markets that New Zealand relies so heavily upon. The recent pause on the Australian travel bubble has delivered a stark reminder of New Zealand’s ongoing vulnerability and uncertainty around international travel and tourism.”
There is an unprecedented level of competition within an industry that relies on a small population to share in an equally small domestic travel business as well as labour shortages and the lack of international labour, which is so heavily reliedon. “Resolving this is going to require a cultural shift not just in our thinking but also in our workplace practices,” Luxon said.
With his feet already under the Christchurch-based desk, Luxon has wasted no time getting around the regions to meet with local teams to gain insight into the challenges and opportunities ahead.
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