Alma’s Herbert Laubichler-Pichler named Vietnam’s top hotel general manager

Herbert Laubichler-Pichler, a hospitality veteran with life-long experience making guests feel welcome at hotels and resorts in Asia and Europe has been recognised as Vietnam’s Best General Manager in the prestigious Travel + Leisure Luxury Awards Asia Pacific 2024.

Travel + Leisure Southeast Asia, Hong Kong & Macau readers deemed Laubichler-Pichler, who has been at the helm of 30-hectare resort Alma for five years and worked and lived in Vietnam since 2008, the country’s best general manager.

Announcing the award, presented at a ceremony in Bangkok this week Travel + Leisure Southeast Asia, Hong Kong & Macau’s website states “Austria-born Herbert Laubichler-Pichler is the hospitality life-timer at the helm of Cam Ranh’s Alma - a 384-suite resort with 14 food and drink outlets and 12 beachfront swimming pools. Having worked across Vietnam’s best hotels for nearly 18 years, the industry veteran brings together leadership, vast experience, and local cultural familiarity to showcase Vietnamese hospitality at its finest.”

Laubichler-Pichler, who, in addition to Alma, has managed some of the country’s most acclaimed hotels including the Nam Hai in Danang, The Reverie Saigon and The Anam Cam Ranh, said he was thrilled to receive the recognition but wanted to share it with the resort’s “hugely supportive” owner and “exceptional” team at Alma.

He advised “I am so thankful for the privilege to work with such a genuinely supportive owner and talented team of hospitality professionals at Alma, who tirelessly work day in and day out; our staff members are our greatest ambassadors and obviously play a crucial role in the guest experience.”

Born into a hotelier family, Laubichler-Pichler started out in the industry working at his parents’ guesthouse in his native Austria as a bellboy at 10 years of age during the summer season.

He later studied hotel management at the Hotel and Catering College Schloss Klessheim and became a certified chef before steadily rising through the ranks to become the general manager at properties in Austria, Germany and Cyprus. He also studied an Executive MBA in Hotel and Tourism Management with Chur University of Applied Sciences in Switzerland.

Readers of Travel + Leisure Southeast Asia, Hong Kong & Macau also voted Alma in the top five of the Best Hotel Pools in Vietnam category.

Alma offers world-class facilities including 12 swimming pools that cascade down to the beach, an eclectic range of restaurants helmed by leading chefs, a science museum and a 6000 metre² waterpark with a lazy river, wave pool and water slides.

Travel + Leisure Southeast Asia, Hong Kong & Macau said of the awards “taking in the hospitality industry in 15 countries and territories as well as the travel industry more broadly across Asia-Pacific, the Travel+Leisure Luxury Awards winners for 2024 reflect the ballots of you hotel guests, frequent fliers, cruise-lovers, points guys, and wellness junkies, and highlight the places and people that make for the best high-end wanderlust.

“With so many tried, trusted and true hotels getting your votes, and well as the slew of new openings in the region and ideas in luxury hospitality percolating out there, we’ve put together a special print edition: The Hotels Issue 2024.”

Click here to view a full list of Vietnam’s award winners. 

Images: Herbert Laubichler-Pichler (top) and yoga at Cam Ranh’s Alma resort (below).