Tag: Hotel Industry News

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Eek! Design Hotels Now Partly Belong to Starwood Hotels

December 6, 2011 at 2:20 PM | by | Comments (0)

This is an interesting development--Design Hotels, a collection of 200 awesome independent, boutique, design-forward hotels, is now a part of Starwood Hotels. But if you fear that your favorite assortment of art, design and fashion hotels will be corrupted by Westins, Sheratons and Ws, feel free to exhale.

The partnership is purely an investment deal as Starwood will not be involved in Design Hotels day-to-day operations nor will Design Hotels be a part of Starwood's reservations system or Starwood Preferred Guest program. That's reassuring but we're still suspicious of this whole deal.

But let's not focus on the negative, let's focus on the fun instead. Design Hotels has just kicked off their online Advent Calendar.

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Disney's Hotel Dreams Are Dead

December 6, 2011 at 2:00 PM | by | Comments (0)

Sorry kiddies, we hate to put a damper on the holiday spirit but there will be no more Disney Hotels for a while. The Orlando Sentinel reports that Disney's vision for standalone resorts, like their recently open Aulani Resort in Hawaii (above), has been put on hold due to some money woes, namely because the House of Mouse has been so busy spending money on its theme parks and cruise lines.

The company recently scrapped plans for a 500-room stand-alone D.C. hotel even though they already bought the property in 2009 for about $11 million. Disney said the timing wasn't right but given that the Aulani has had some missteps in its opening (the time-share hotel is not expected to reach goal occupancy levels until 2015), it's clear that Disney was just looking for an out. And besides, who's gonna wanna see Mickey randomly in D.C. without a theme park to visit?

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Maybe China is Not So Hot After All?

Where: China
November 16, 2011 at 11:21 AM | by | Comments (0)

Starwood Personalized Travel's tea cup and amenities menu translated to Chinese.

Hotel companies have gone gaga for China over the past few years opening tons of new hotels in the burgeoning economic powerhouse but maybe they were a little too overzealous?

A new report out says that four in 10 hotel rooms in China are empty, for about an average occupancy rate of 61 percent. And that number is not so comforting with more and more hotels in the pipeline. BusinessWeek had the full story including this omnious quote from a hotel analyst:

"Hotels in some markets of China are clearly oversupplied in the next three to five years and they won't be generating good returns, " said Nigel Summers, Hong Kong-based director at Horwath Asia Pacific, which tracks the hospitality industry. "China has had a very strong demand. The question is whether the increase in demand is going to be big enough to handle all the new hotels."

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Crowne Plaza to Freshen Up, Move Up and Then Hopefully, Shine

October 25, 2011 at 8:15 AM | by | Comments (0)

Crowne Plaza Birmingham, UK

Have you stayed in a Crowne Plaza Hotel lately? Yeah, neither have we. But this bit of news from InterContinental Hotel Group's Annual Investors & Leadership Conference today has us thinking a CP could be in our very near future.

IHG has announced that Crowne Plaza is will undergo a three-phase repositioning strategy, starting with a new brand identity and a modern look and feel for its U.S. properties (Crowne Plaza is way savvier abroad.)

This first phase, also known as the "Freshen Up", will also expand the brand's Sleep Advantage program which offers guests rooms in designated Quiet Zones and lots of pillows to get comfy with. As we type, Crowne Plazas are already getting freshened up and the makeover should last through 2012.

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Morgans Making Major Moves in London

October 19, 2011 at 8:45 AM | by | Comments (0)

Last week, news came out that Morgans Hotel Group would be selling their interest in both The Sanderson and St. Martin's Lane but this didn't concern us too much as hotels sell off their interests all the time without ever losing their management contracts. And indeed, Morgans will still be running both hotels now until the end of time, or 2041, which ever comes first.

But then just the other day, some very interesting news about Morgans came out--the NY-based hotel group would be acquiring The Hoxton Hotel famous for its £1 rooms. Hospitality.Net reports that Morgans has teamed up with Invesco Real Estate to purchase the hotel for about £70mil.

A piece in the Sunday Times also said the Hoxton will then turn into the Hudson London to align it with the Hudson New York. Crazy! And a little sad because we think the Hoxton shouldn't have to give up their identity in this whole trade.

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Are You Sitting Down? JDV Hotels and Thompson Hotels Have Merged.

October 3, 2011 at 11:19 AM | by | Comments (5)

What do you get when you merge The Custom Hotel with The Hollywood Roosevelt? JT HOSPITALITY. Note: JT is not actually involved in this one.

When we got an email in our inboxes a short while ago with the subject heading, "JOIE DE VIVRE HOSPITALITY AND THOMPSON HOTELS MERGE" we thought for sure someone was playing a prank on us. Or maybe that someone was celebrating April Fools Day six months early.

But given that the news came from JDV's director of public relations, we knew that this was no joke. So now let's get into the details of this seemingly unholy merger.

The merger took effect on October 1st and it is purely a management partnership involving only hotel management operations but not real estate assets. Together, the company will now be known as JT Hospitality (did anyone just think of Justin Timberlake? We did.) and will manage 45 properties under the Thompson and JDV brands. The company is set to be officially announced/rebranded in early 2012 when the global branding strategy is rolled out.

Thompson's CEO and co-owner Stephen Brandman has been named CEO of JT Hospitality and the company will be headquartered in NYC. John Pritzker, whose private equity firm, Geolo Capital, took a majority stake in JDV last year, will serve as co-chairman as will Jason Pomeranc, Thompson Hotel's other co-owner and poster boy.

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Hyatt Welcomes You Into Their New Hyatt House

September 20, 2011 at 12:41 PM | by | Comments (4)

If you're a frequent guest at Hyatt's Summerfield Suites, things are going to get a lot more homey during your next extended stay. That's because Hyatt Hotels has announced they are rebranding all of their Summerfield Suites hotels (38 in total) as well as the Hotel Sierra hotels they just acquired (16 of these) into a new Hyatt brand called Hyatt House.

Hyatt Hotels made the announcement this morning saying:

Inspired by extensive research and consumer insights, Hyatt House seamlessly combines form and function to create a warm, inviting, and comfortable environment. Upon arrival, guests are encouraged to relax with design elements and amenities that feel closer to home, allowing them to easily connect with others through enhanced social spaces.

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Bye, Bye A Club: Accor Renames Loyalty Program

September 13, 2011 at 1:58 PM | by | Comments (0)

Very big news for Accor Hotels today. The company, which holds Sofitel Hotels and other big European hotels under its umbrella, has announced a reorganization of its hotel brands, particularly in the budget spectrum, as well as a new loyalty program name. Once called the A-Club, the program is now going by the name Le Club Accorhotels. (Yes, Accorhotels is one word like that.) Hmm...we liked A-Club better but oh well.

The biggest change is actually happening with the company's ibis hotels. ibis hotels will become a "megabrand" for Accor with all seasons hotels now going by the name, "ibis styles" and with the Etap hotels going by the name, "ibis budget. Accor hopes to finish this new segmentation by early 2013 with a large-scale communication campaign happening in 2012 to let everyone know about the changes.

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LVMH is Indeed Looking at Amanresorts After All

September 6, 2011 at 8:50 AM | by | Comments (0)

Looks like our well-heeled source who claimed that luxury goods company LVMH was thinking about buying the Amanresorts chain was right after all. Bloomgberg News is now reporting pretty much just that.

DLF Ltd. (DLFU), an Indian real estate developer, has received at least five non-binding bids of $400 million to $450 million for Amanresorts, one of the people said, speaking on condition of anonymity as the details are private.

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The Yas Hotel in Abu Dhabi is Now a Viceroy Hotel

Go To The Hotel's Web Site Where: Yas Island, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
July 18, 2011 at 2:41 PM | by | Comments (0)

The Yas Hotel in Abu Dhabi, our favorite phallic racetrack side hotel is now officially a part of the Viceroy Hotels chain. The company put forth this statement today:

Viceroy Hotel Group is thrilled to announce that it has been selected as operator of the renowned Yas Hotel on Yas Island in Abu Dhabi, the Emirate’s leading leisure and entertainment destination. The hotel, owned by Aldar Properties, Abu Dhabi’s leading property development, investment and management company, will officially transition to Viceroy management immediately.

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The Dorchester Collection Has a New Sibling in Geneva While The Ritz-Carlton Heads to Oman

July 1, 2011 at 3:00 PM | by | Comments (0)

Before you check out of work and into your hotel for the long weekend (woot!), here are some luxury hotel news to be aware of.

First up, the Dorchester Collection has decided that seven hotels catering to crazy celebs is simply not enough. So they adopted an eighth property in Geneva, Switzerland--Le Richemond Hotel, previously a Rocco Forte hotel. Hotels Mag reports:

Le Richemond will undergo a refurbishment of its public areas, including the restaurant and bar, as well as its guest suites. The hotel will remain open during the project.

The Le Richemond will officially reopen as a Dorchester Collection hotel in August. Another bonus? We see a little tidbit on the 45 Park Lane hotel in London which will now open in September.

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Waikiki Edition Wanted More of Schrager's 'Edge', Not So Much Marriott's

Go To The Hotel's Web Site Where: 1775 Ala Moana Boulevard [map], Honolulu, HI, United States, 96815
June 1, 2011 at 8:08 AM | by | Comments (0)

Yesterday after a long day of working on the internet, we were looking forward to putting our feet up and reading the latest issue of The National Enquirer The New Yorker when up popped a Google Alert in our inbox with the headline, "Owner of Waikiki Edition Hotel Files Lawsuit Against Marriott and Ian Schrager." Hmm...been there, read that.

But just as we were about to focus on Arnold's housekeeper, er, we mean the latest crisis in Syria, we noticed the source of that Google Alert--PR Newswire.

Yes, the owners of the Waikiki Edition put out a press release about their lawsuit, even after it was written up last week in the WSJ. As if this couldn't get any better, the press release included a PDF to the lawsuit filing. For hotel geeks, this is akin to shirtless pics of Bieber. So we clicked and began reading all 27 pages.

We totes recommend you read it in your spare time but allow us to pull out the juicy parts.

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