Happenings behind-the-scenes of the GOP

Hard Rock Hotel Desaru Coast certainly knows how to throw a party.

Grace Chiam [Standing Left] with her Rockstar Marcomm
team at the morning briefing with the JOCOM team 

It’s no mean feat to pull off a stunning and successful Grand Opening Party (GOP) in the Hard Rock Hotels tradition and Hard Rock Hotel Desaru Coast accomplished it.

There was a great deal of groundwork, hard work and commitment on the part of the organizing team to execute the event while coordinating the multitude of responsibilities to do with guests, celebration activities, Food & Beverage catering and seeing to the needs of VVIPs and performing artists.

Hard Rock Hotel Desaru Coast (HRHDC) has a lean team and they are focused on their tasks but there was just too much to do and so few pairs of hands.

Media tags for the Grand Opening Party

With their hands full of a host of responsibilities related to the hotel, VVIPs and the official opening event, HRHDC decided to outsource the responsibility to look after media guests to Johor Bahru Collective Media (JOCOM), an alternative media club.

In fact, it was pure genius to assign the task of looking after visiting media to a media group who are experienced and familiar with the mindset of the media!

The roles are reversed for JOCOM members who stepped into the role as hosts on behalf of HRHDC. With this Peer-to-Peer approach, the battle is half-won even before the war started!

The working partnership between HRHDC and JOCOM as their official Public Relations Agency kicked off with a series of meetings with JOCOM represented by Harish Mustak and K K Lew, to understand the job scope, roles and responsibilities, and work schedule, before the real work began.

Tagged with media wristbands for the GOP 

Soon after the list of media guests was identified, invitations were sent out and replies collated and finalized into three main groups from the region, namely media from Indonesia, from Singapore and from Penang, Kuala Lumpur and Johor.

These include print and digital media, newspapers, magazines and blogs in English, Chinese, Malay and Bahasa Indonesia. Incidentally, two media guests also write for online magazines for readers in the Japanese and Indian markets.

Based on HRHDC’s requirements, a working committee of 10 JOCOM members was formed with volunteers to participate in the project and work with HRHDC to ensure that visiting media are well taken care of and professionally managed.

Jack and Jane Yap, a brother and sister pair, were responsible for Registrations and general administration, Mohd Ekhsan Othman and Chong Hau Sun were assigned to take charge of the Indonesian media while Tony Wong and Kim Tee looked after the Mandarin media.

That left Shirley Lee and I to take care of the English, Malay and other media.

Identity tag with Media tag belonging to Harish Mustak

A week before the GOP weekend, the JOCOM working committee made a trip to HRHDC for a meeting with their Marketing and Communications team, led by Marcomm Director, Grace Chiam.

After the project briefing, the JOCOM team went on a guided tour of the property to familiarize themselves with the building layout, F & B outlets and to be equipped with essential information, ready to share with the visiting media.

Identity tags, similar to that of hotel team members, were prepared for each member in the JOCOM team with our name and favourite music artist listed below.

Grace doing a demo on how to tie ribbons!

Working closely with the HRHDC Marcomm team, the JOCOM team received all the necessary information on land and air transfers to coordinate travel arrangements among the media in the three groups.

First to arrive was the Indonesian media. Their flight plan, based on the available flights between Jakarta and Johor Baru, had a late arrival on Thursday night and an early departure on Sunday morning.

JOCOM team members, Ekhsan and Chong, along with Harish were at Senai International Airport to welcome the Indonesian media and escorted them safely to HRHDC.

The hotel had graciously arranged for the late arrivals to enjoy a late supper, even in-room dining, if they so preferred.

But I later learnt that some of the Indonesian media who are familiar with Johor and Malaysia, made their desire for some local street food known and compelled the driver to stop for a satisfying snack of roti canai!

Jane Yap at the Registration table in the Media Center

I also learnt that JOCOM team members even coordinated a takeaway of grilled fish better known as Ikan Bakar, as a special treat for our Indonesian colleagues!

On Friday morning, the rest of the JOCOM team arrived at HRHDC and their first task was to lend their hands to arrange gift packs for VVIPs and guests, with Press Kits for the media.

The JOCOM team was led into the back-of-the-house to sort through the items and assemble the packs as instructed by the Marcomm team.

The adage of “Many hands make light work” rang true as the team formed ‘assembly lines’ and in a few hours, all the tasks were completed to great satisfaction.

Mohd Ekhsan with Dale Hipsh
in the Rock Shop

Meanwhile, the Indonesian media were up and about for an itinerary to experience the Desaru Coast Adventure Waterpark and have lunch at the Desaru Fruit Farm before taking a tour of the farm.

That evening, at the Els Golf Club they enjoyed a golf experience led by the golf pro and ended the day with dinner at the clubhouse.

On Saturday, the day for the Grand Opening Party (GOP), the hotel was bustling in full swing with arrivals of VVIPs, music artists and their entourage, Hard Rock fans and other media groups.

A Media Center was set up within the Sessions Restaurant for the JOCOM team to coordinate arrivals and departures and as a base to work from.

But before these arrivals, the JOCOM team was involved in two special events held back-to-back that same morning.

It started with the Memorabilia presentation by legendary Rockstar, Amy Search to the Hard Rock music memorabilia collection followed by a Press Conference with Senior Vice President of Hard Rock Hotels, Dale Hipsh, and Hard Rock Hotel Desaru Coast General Manager, Clinton Lovell.

The Press Conference with Hard Rock VVIPs

The Press Conference, attended by the Indonesian media and the JOCOM team, was effectively conducted by Harish Mustak, who made the VVIPs comfortable with his convivial manner, and the event progressed smoothly as the media managed to elicit essential information from the VVIPs.

While this was happening in the hotel, media arrivals from Penang and KL were met at Senai International Airport by JOCOM president, Edey Suresh, who escorted them safely to HRHDC.

Meanwhile vehicles were dispatched to collect the Singapore media comfortably from their homes and ferried to HRHDC.

We are familiar with how unforgiving the causeway traffic can be on Saturday afternoons so it was a great relieve when the vehicles safely passed through the two checkpoints and arrived at the hotel with time enough for the guests to chill before the evening’s festivities.

Chong with Johor legend, Rockstar Amy
of Search fame, on his arrival at hotel

As Hard Rock’s signature guitar-smashing ceremony is unique to the brand, the media guests were advised to have their dinner on time and go to their places reserved for Media Rockstars in front of the stage to witness this.

Armed with cameras and other recording devices, media guests along with the JOCOM team were in our privileged places up front to enjoy a clear view of the stage for the guitar-smashing ceremony and enjoy an entertaining rock concert in the GOP.

That night, instructions were given to the hotel for wake-up calls to the Indonesian media guests so that they could have an early breakfast before checkout and departure for the airport.

By 6.15am on Sunday morning, the breakfast buffet spread was ready to serve, and the Indonesian media had a good meal before leaving for Senai to catch their flight.

As for the other media, it was a Desaru Coast Adventure Waterpark experience for them after breakfast.

Malaysian media arrivals at Senai with Edey Suresh

Escorted by some members of the JOCOM team, the visiting media from Singapore, Penang, KL and Johor, had a wet and wild experience in the waterpark that ended with a sandwich lunch.

Then it was time to pack and leave HRHDC in a transfer schedule to send the various media guests by road to Senai airport for return flights to Penang and KL, and through the causeway into Singapore.

Everyone was gathered in the Media Center for checkout and comfortably awaited their turn for departure.

After the active fun at the waterpark, those who were physically drained, just dozed off in their cosy corners.

Early departure for the Indonesian media group

While waiting, the hungry ones had a meal or snack while those who anticipated a long drive ahead decided to arrange for takeaways.

After the JOCOM team waved farewell to the final departing vehicle, we returned to the Media Center for a debrief session.

As arranged, Grace joined our meeting for a post-event review, and it was heart-warming when she graciously thanked and commended us for our partnership in this project.

The comments and words of appreciation from our media guests also mean a great deal to us. Some of their text messages (dotted with emojis!) read like this:

“Thank you awesome team HRHDC”

“Thank you Harish, KK and Peggy and team for every effort of bringing out the #rockstar stay experience! It’s memorable.”

“Thank you team for the great organizing! It was a fun and memorable party weekend.”

Saying "Farewell" to the Singapore media

At about 5.40pm this was received: “Thanks everyone for the arrangement. We reached Singapore already.”

[This message assured us that our media guests escaped the horrendous traffic jam into Singapore that happens every Sunday evening!]

Another message from Singapore media: “Thanks Peggy, KK, Harish and team for organizing the weekend. Our car reached Singapore a while ago too!”

“Thank you JOCOM media team, HRHDC and also for the thoughtful present.” [This line came with a photograph of the limited-edition Farewell Gift presented by HRHDC.]

Likewise, all of us in the JOCOM team are also grateful for the privilege to work with HRHDC to give our media guests an amazing and memorable experience.

For a start, Grace and her Rockstar Marcomm team were wonderful to work with.

Among her kind comments, the words that means a great deal to me was simply, 

“You make us look good!”

Photo Credits: Courtesy of Johor Bahru Collective Media (JOCOM) team.