Tourism in Santa Catarina: Costão do Santinho Beach Resort

Interview with Fernando Marcondes de Mattos, Founder & Owner of Costão do Santinho Resort and Inplac

The first question is regarding the history of Costão do Santinho. Can you tell us how everything started?

Costão do Santinho started 20 years ago, to be more exact, in December 1991. We evaluated the project for 10 years, searching for international experience, especially from Costa del Sol in Spain, which was booming in the 80s. We had an area of one million m² and transformed 750,000 m² into a public park. It’s of great value to humanity and to the business, because it’s an attraction.

5,000 years ago, there were native Indians living here on this hill, they left inscriptions, and one of them is the company’s logo. We’ve really tried to preserve the cultural part, which are our historical roots. We’ve done this in a way whereby both the environmental/ecological heritage and cultural heritage form the most important foundation of this business. For the most part, we were careful to build an architectonic project which is compatible and integrated with nature and within the historical features.

After that, we had to train the staff so they could provide a service that was beyond people’s expectations. It’s very difficult, because the Brazilian coastline doesn’t have a strong tradition within the hotel business, so we had to train all of our labour force. Maybe five, or at best, ten per cent of the labour force already has some training, the rest we have to train here. We train our staff on a daily basis.

We built this business, which has 120,000 m² of built-up area, constructed within 12 years, and we’ve been quite successful because of everything that I mentioned. For seven years, we’ve been considered the best beach resort in Brazil, including the current year, 2012. Our competition includes powerful international groups that come from countries like France, Spain, Italy and the United States. In terms of events, we were considered the best for 10 years. In the last decade, we won the trophy of the best in the decade. Events are extremely important because half of our income comes from events, especially corporate events.

Apart from having the foundation and spirit that you had, in terms of the nature, location, administration, what are the advantages that Costão do Santinho has here compared to another resort? Why do you win all of the time?

First of all, Florianopolis is a very important tourist destination. It is a city that is sought after by all Brazilians; they say it’s the dream of many Brazilians. When we look at the business and its natural conditions of one million square meters in an urban zone, we know there is no other place like it in Brazil. There are other resorts that are far from the urban centres, but here we are only 30 minutes from the Palácio do Governo, and with the 5,000 year history, we already stand out. If I compare it to 50 resorts in Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic, none will have the environmental and cultural heritage that I mentioned. There are magnificent resorts, but none with this cultural and environmental richness. In some way, this sets it apart; the architectonic project also showcases the Portuguese culture, since the Portuguese colonized Florianopolis 300 years ago. For example, these arches are a representation of that. The Portuguese used bricks a lot, so we tried to show that, nothing was done by chance. We’re trying to showcase the old culture. The beach is amazing, and it’s one of the best beaches in Brazil, it’s 100 per cent pure, with no contamination. Apart from all of these qualities, is service; service in every respect. That’s what gets us these good results.

In terms of events tourism, what attracts a company to come here for an event? What are the main factors that set it apart from other places?

I think there are two things. First, everything that I mentioned: the cultural and environmental richness, the service, the architectonic project, the beach and the nature, these are all the first things a company checks. Second, it checks if there is equipment to have an event for 500, 1000 or 1500 people. Regarding resorts, we have the best events infrastructure of the Brazilian coast. That’s very important because it makes it possible for someone to hold an event for 1200 people. We have the equipment for meetings and parties and we can accommodate these 1200 people. These two things are essential.

What are the greatest challenges that you have to face in the hotel business?

In today’s world we are required to be alert 24 hours a day. Formerly, we would relax for a decade. Today we aren’t even relaxed for a week. Now we need to assess the business weekly, and check where our weaknesses lie. For example, at the moment, we’re examining the construction of two more restaurants, because we believe that we need to expand a little in the food and theme areas. We have many weekly events throughout the year, 10 weeks geared around a theme: Japanese Week, Rio Grande do Sul Farroupilha Week, Curitibana Week, Senior Citizen Week and so forth. This past week we filled up the establishment and that’s great, but next month we already need to plan for next year. We need to evaluate whether we can do all of this again or if things need to change. Food is very important, even though our food is very good, if it’s repetitive, and the person that came this year, comes back next year and finds the same thing, we end up having a huge challenge. We also have to make changes in the work clothing; the establishment can’t be exactly the same from one year to the next. We need to change something, like the colours. So there are permanent challenges.

What are your plans for the following years?

We are preparing the business to be a sub-venue for the 2014 Soccer World Cup. We will be hosting a team here, probably one of the six most popular teams. We’ve already been visited by the German, Japanese and American delegations, as well as smaller delegations. We will probably be hosting Italy, Spain or Argentina.

Where are the closest stadiums?

Porto Alegre is 40 minutes away, Curitiba 30 minutes, São Paulo 50 minutes and Rio de Janeiro an hour and 15 minutes away. With regards to the main urban centres, everything is near; the furthest places are in the Nordeste. We are starting to develop a project for a multipurpose arena for concerts and corporate events, and sports events as well.

Would this be a new niche for you? Your audience would end up being different, wouldn’t it?

I don’t think this would change the type of client, but we would get to compete in the market more.

Now let’s look at your other business, the plastic industry business. You are in an interesting niche, where did this idea come from? How did it all start?

It all started 38 years ago, I intended to build a factory, so I did a technical analysis and examined various sectors: metal, electrical, mechanical, food, ceramic, chemical and plastic and I focused on the plastic sector. After that, I studied what to do and concentrated on 50 kg valve packaging to package fertilizers and 25 kg valve packaging for mortar, which is a ready-made cement mixture for construction and for plastering civil construction. We’re the leaders of these two market segments in Brazil.

What are your plans regarding this market segment?

We plan to develop technologically, each time reducing the weight of the packaging, which represents 50% of the cost of raw material. We need to reduce this because the competition is very tight. We need permanent technological innovation, training and productivity.

Is the number of clients very reduced?

We have approximately 200 clients, and 30 of them represent about 70% of our income.

Is building abroad an economic strategy?

We went many years without seeing any results or profit due to the high value of the Brazilian Real in comparison to the Dollar, but we kept the structure in Charlotte and now things are improving and we are thinking of increasing our participation.

Is the United States important in terms of profit or is it just a bridge?

We have the structure and it works quite well. We have already captured the market and we are going to try to increase it in about 5 years and go from getting 5-6million dollars to 10 million dollars, which would already be a significant amount.

As a businessman from Santa Catarina, could you give us an idea of what it’s like to do business here? For someone coming from somewhere else how does the State assist such people?

I think they could go to the Federação das Indústrias de Santa Catarina (Industry Federation of Santa Catarina). There are many areas where you can get advice, or help, like with SEBRAE. The State government also has departments with that specific purpose.

Is Santa Catarina a good place to invest in?

Yes, I think Santa Catarina is one of the best places to invest in Brazil due to: the quality of life, the people, I think we have the best HDI (Human Development Index) of Brazil and we are also the best in terms of safety and education. It’s a State that doesn’t have a big city that is very far from the other cities. For example, Rio Grande do Sul has Porto Alegre, in Paraná, it is Curitiba, in São Paulo it’s the city of São Paulo. In Santa Catarina, the largest city isn’t the capital, it is Joinville and our spatial distribution is very interesting. We have an economic diversity that is like none other in Brazil because we have several market segments: textile, mechanical, electronic, ceramics, food. We may have the largest market segment of the food industry in Brazil. We also have an interesting ethnic mix because there are Germans, Italians, Japanese, Austrians and Portuguese, so it’s a very interesting State. In ports, we have four different: Imbituba, Itajaí, São Francisco do Sul and Itapoá. In geographical terms, we are close to Porto Alegre (500km), São Paulo (800km) and Buenos Aires (1200km). I think it’s one of the most important States to invest in.