The fight for the world’s top luxury hotel chain position gets fiercer every year. Personally I don’t buy into chains or groups, I prefer individual relationships, built over time. Which is why this ad is so good..

Like many other people with an international outlook on life, I subscribe to the FT Weekend newspaper, which often features the glorious ‘How To Spend It’ magazine. This ad has ben cropping up a lot lately.

For a brand I didn’t know very well before, the Belmond has entered my life not only through the pages of the FT Weekend, but also through the recent renaming of the Orient-Express Group to the Belmond group. This included, of course, the Belmond Mount Nelson hotel – 2oceansvibe’s (and my) official Cape Town residence. I wondered what they had up their sleeve with this move, but now I’ve put two and two together. There is clearly an all-encompassing brand ethos which epitomises the Belmond collection and indeed the Mount Nelson.

Does this ad above not mirror this photo and message I Instagrammed and Tweeted last month after one of our quarterly stays at the Nellie?

See below.

The copy in that ad above couldn’t better detail what I love about the Mount Nelson. It’s being able to sit down at the Oasis Bistro and, whilst finishing off an email on my iPad, the large sparkling water and cappuccino has already arrived – without being ordered. Because that’s how Margeret and Katie roll. It’s the fact that Wilson and Washington at the lobby know how many weeks my wife has before giving birth to our prince/ss. And it’s because Byron, Bryan and the concierge team simply do not know how to utter the word ‘no.’

Why would I do my breakfast and lunch meetings anywhere else? Why would I risk struggling for parking, getting bad service and running into bothersome urban cretins? God, I couldn’t bare the thought.

I’m starting to understand how it is possible to buy into a group/collection’s brand, and if the Belmond group have a knack of finding hotels like the Mount Nelson (and according to their marketing, this style of service is their number one priority) then I think I’m going to feel very at home visiting the rest of their collection.

Portofino, here we come..