The Singapore hotel’s general manager tells Nimmi Malhotra why luxury and convenience should go hand in hand — and explains why he’s not worried about customers popping bottles of Champagne behind the wheel. InterContinental Singapore positions itself as the ‘Home of Champagne’. It offers one of the largest hotel Champagne collections of any hotel with over 200 bottles, and is home to an official caveau for the Embassy of the Confrérie du Sabre d’Or. Now the luxury hotel is offering a novel way to buy Champagne. Visitors and guests drive into the hotel’s cobbled courtyard, order a bottle of Champagne from a curated menu and wait a few minutes for the butler to bring their selection in a two-tier gift box complete with two flutes or caviar. According to general manager Andreas Kraemer, the festive drive-through is “the logical next step” in pushing the hotel’s Champagne credentials further. The menu lists more than 30 Champagnes, curated in collaboration with sommeliers of Park 90, a Singapore-based wine club that maintains an outpost at the hotel. Kraemer says that the offerings are not limited to commercial Champagnes. “It’s actually the smaller Champagne houses because our guests are coming to try new things,” he says. The list includes Frederic Savart, JL Vergnon, Dhondt-Grellet, Chartogne-Taillet and more, a testament to Singapore’s growing Champagne-savvy clientele. This is the first alcohol drive-through concept in Singapore, and it differs from the traditional fast food drive-through concept. “Often, convenience doesn’t correlate with luxury,” Kraemer says. “The
This Article was originally published on The Drink Business - Champagne
