The German hotel executive is the son of one of the founders of the iconic Marbella Club, where he learned as a child what is required in a “great luxury” hotel.
Friedrich von Schönburg has been the new general manager of the Rosewood Villa Magna Hotel in Madrid since the last days of August . At just 37 years old (Málaga, 1985) it could be quite an achievement, if it were not for the fact that his precocity in positions of the highest responsibility in luxury hotels had already made him, at 35 years old, the youngest director in Europe of a five-star great luxury, El Palace Hotel de Barcelona, in 2019, the year in which it became a centenary.
Now, the challenge increases in dimension by assuming the management of one of the most important hotels in the capital, the emblematic Villa Magna, flagship of the prestigious Rosewood Hotels & Resorts hotel chain in Spain. Completely transformed, after one of the most outstanding hotel reforms carried out in the capital so far this century, the Rosewood Villa Magna has everything to become a luxury tourist reference in Madrid.
His father was the director of a legendary establishment: the Marbella Club , one of the most emblematic luxury establishments on the Costa del Sol, making him the second generation of a top-class hotelier. How has the sector changed in the last twenty years?
There are a number of things that can never change, fundamentally, the service, which is what the customer demands. Luxury is knowing how to anticipate your needs and having everything prepared. Looking back, when my father founded the Marbella Club together with his cousin [Alfonso de Hohenlohe], in the fifties, everything was based on personalized experiences, things that were lost a little over the years and that now come back to take on a lot of importance. We now seek to develop personalized experiences for each client; we want to understand why they come to Madrid, why they choose to stay with us here at Rosewood Villa Magna, and from there give it a more personal touch. If the client comes for the art of the city, it may be to put a small art book as a detail. It is always necessary to have our concierges prepared, knowing what the client likes, to be able to make gallery recommendations, but not limited to having a contact to enter and see a gallery or a museum, as any other person could see it, but that, through us, that experience is more unique. That is luxury.
We are always working to offer that extra touch and get our homework done sooner. For example, it is also about knowing how you like the room, how you like the air conditioning, what kind of water you drink…
One of the things that has changed with respect to the concept of luxury is sustainability, knowing how to take care of the environment. Before, when entering a suite like the one we are in, it was normal to find yourself with a tray with I don’t know how many fruits, which you were never going to be able to eat during your stay. It was decoration. It was what-you-had-to-have: the bottle of champagne and a mountain of fruit. But, now, the client of a luxury hotel does not look for that, partly due to social responsibility. For me, the most important thing is that you arrive and find four apples, if it is the season, but that they are the best. And if it is the season for strawberries, let them find the best strawberries in Huelva. Take advantage of the fact that we are in Spain and we have products that they do not have in many other places.
All of this is also very important to me: sustainability and having zero kilometer products, and also supporting the small businesses that we have around us. That is something that I had already worked a lot on in Barcelona and here we are going to improve ourselves to continue surprising.
The customer database must be a top priority, so…
We work a lot on the knowledge of preferences. As soon as the reservation is made, our Guest Relations team begins to connect with the client or with their assistants or their travel agency to, from there, try to find out what they like: what time do they want us to do the room, the type of water you prefer, the temperature you want the room to be at, which side of the bed you sleep on, what type of milk you want with your coffee, etc. We have an incredible team, highly motivated to be part of the Rosewood Villa Magna, an iconic hotel in Madrid, which now, under Rosewood, gives them a new energy to see everything and share all the information.
I imagine that, even if the employees are the best, there will be additional training on your part.
Training is the most important thing we have to give to all our employees and associates, because we always have to keep growing and improving. They are training that they give us from the corporate department, but I also really like the training in the field: I like being with my teams. It is clear that I have my heads of departments, but I also like to be in the restaurant, on the floors of the rooms, to observe and share impressions. I loved when they corrected me, because they helped me improve. Many times one works and does and does, but nobody ever tells him if he does it well or badly. So I want to be there and we make sure that the department heads sit down with all of their employees to review how things are going. Improvement involves small actions,
With his family origins, I don’t know if he knew that he would end up developing this work. Did his father give him the hotel bug since he was a child?
This is a funny story. I was lucky to always be exposed to the hotel industry, being in the hotel a lot. But my parents wanted other things. My mother wanted me to be a diplomat and my father a banker. I wanted to be an actor and I went to an acting academy when I was still in high school. But in 2001 there was a general strike. I remember it was June and the hotel was in the middle of the high season, with everything full. The rates were very high and there were difficulties that day in finding workers. Then my father asked me to come down and help him run the hotel. I had no idea, but my father told me that since he had always been exposed to hotel life he could do it… and the truth is that
I had a great time. I started at the reception and then, at 11, I went down to the beach to open the Beach Club. I helped serve and at night I was at the Grill and, in short, I really enjoyed it because I was with the customers, talking and trying to give them that experience they had come for, without counting on all the employees in charge of offering that service. And I remember that it was a day when I even forgot to eat: I was running up and down all day, and as soon as I got home I fell asleep.
In the morning my mother called me: “Hey, you have a call from a hotel client.” And I, worried: “what happened?”. I pick up the phone and hear: “Hello, Friedrich, we just called you to say thank you, because we have never been so well looked after. Please let us know the next time there is a general strike so we can come back.” I still remember that joy I felt; of that call and that emotion that entered my body having done something that made me receive that feedback from a person for doing something with which I had also had a good time. It was then that I realized what I wanted to do.
Now, looking back, thinking that my father wanted me to be a banker, my mother a diplomat, and I an actor… If, in the end, you put all that in a cocktail shaker, what you get is a hotelier. And here I am.
How old was he then?
I was 16 years old at the time and at 18 I came to Madrid, to my first “official” job. I was a telephone operator at the Palace for six months. From there I went to Switzerland to study. I did my internships in Paris, London and Berlin, and after graduating I returned to Spain. There was a season where I wasn’t 100% sure how I wanted to approach my career. First I went to Valencia, to work with my sister, who had set up an events and communication company called Culdesac Experience and I started helping her because I love organizing events, but after eight months I missed the hotel business, and I decided to go to London. There I was working in different hotels: in the first one as a receptionist, it was the Metropolitan, of COMO Hotels & Resorts and a year later, at the Savoy, in its reopening, which had been closed for four years,
And from there to Rosewood?
The Savoy’s sales manager went to Rosewood to work. The Cheng family, from Hong Kong, were rebranding and the Rosewood London was to be the first hotel under the new brand. He asked me to go with him to help create this new hotel. I didn’t know Rosewood, but I did some research and I really liked their new philosophy of personalizing services, which reflected a lot of what I liked. And I accepted the proposal. I was at the opening of Rosewood London and stayed for three years, and from there I was contacted by the Maybourne group, which has three hotels, The Connaught, Claridge’s and The Berkeley and I stayed another three years as director of The Connaught accommodation division before moving on to restructure des Claridge’s.
After all that time, ten years had passed in London, which I love, but I needed new challenges and I wanted to return to Spain. And the proposal came up to go to Barcelona, to direct the Palace.
I arrived for the centenary of the hotel, in 2019. I saw that it was a hotel that had a lot of potential and that I love very much, because for the last three and a half years I have made it as if it were my own and worked hard to position it. It was a slightly forgotten hotel, which lived off the prestige of earlier times, when it was the Ritz. But now it was El Palace and we worked to position it and connect it with the local population. We set up a new restaurant, with Rafa Zafra, and we managed to make many changes. Currently it is very well positioned, despite the fact that we had to live through all those very hard and complicated moments of the Catalanist “procés”, the confinement and the pandemic.
I have very good memories of Barcelona, but when I found out that Rosewood was coming to Spain it was clear to me that I would love to be part of this project, so when they contacted me in April because they were looking for a general manager… and I had no choice… Always I have been a big fan of Rosewood since I first worked with them, and my dream was to be able to work or lead a Rosewood in Spain, which for me is my home. Although I am German, I feel much more Spanish than German.
And what changes do you want to apply? I don’t know if the word is “changes”, but things that you feel like doing…
I think I am very lucky, because it is a well-positioned hotel. And in the location where we are in Madrid, it could not be better located, with all the luxury shops, art galleries and museums next door. Its garden also makes you not feel surrounded by “city”. I am also lucky that it is already reformed, so there is no need to make structural changes. Everything difficult –or the most expensive– is already done.
Now, I think this hotel has the potential to be the social center where something is always happening. We have so many different things to offer: the garden, the restaurants Las Brasas de Castellana and Amós… that, really, my mission now is to work to establish many collaborations and do many activities, so that there is always something happening at the Rosewood Villa. great. And we are working on that with the team, always taking into account the local population, knowing that we are in Madrid, in the capital of Spain.
What will your mark be noticed?
My arrival was two weeks ago and I am talking to all the members of the team. We are 280 people and I am someone who likes to be very close and very present in operations. Just by doing that, we are making a change, because the presence of the CEO in all decisions already encourages a change in teamwork. But among the things we want to do and the ideas we are working with is to organize something very, very special for the winter season, especially Christmas, which I cannot share yet, but I know it will be unique in Madrid.
How have you found Madrid after all these years?
Madrid has undergone incredible change, especially since 2003, which is when I was here. I remember that, being German and looking like a foreigner , I felt that it was a more closed, more traditional city than other Spanish cities. Now, it has undergone an incredible 180° change: it is an open city, where all kinds of languages can be heard speaking in the streets.
Madrid right now, with all the restaurants and all the hotels that are opening, is being promoted. It is a clean city. It is a safe city, compared to many other capitals in the world. I think that Madrid is now, and I am not the only one to say this, the city in Europe that moves the most, where there is more activity and where you have to go. Every day something new happens. I think we have one or two years left before everything that is happening is reflected, because I have many friends and acquaintances who travel internationally and ask me about Madrid, where they had never been. I think there is going to be a fairly strong and very positive boom.
We work so that it is known that it is a hotel also for local people. It is very important that the local public can enjoy what happens in the hotels of their city.
