January 5, 2009 | Link This | Email this | Comments (3)

I am using this forum to lay down a challenge to the franchise companies; yes, I mean you, Marriott, Hyatt, Hilton, IHG, Choice, Wyndham, Starwood and any other franchise brand. This will be a three-part gauntlet, and Part 3 will be a matching test. I am not offering a prize (for now), but, perhaps, that will change.

I have been doing some research for a client to determine some basic physical facts regarding the brands’ requirements for its midscale and economy brands. I am not looking for franchise deals, I am not looking for contact information, and I am not looking for terms of a franchise agreement. All I am looking for is the following information – for a typical hotel (using the brands’ prototype plans):

* Site area
* Number of parking spaces
* Key count and mix
* Number ...Read More

December 29, 2008 | Link This | Email this | Comments (12)

In a time when hotels are trying to boost revenue in any way they can (legally, of course) and franchisors are, allegedly, prepared to work with franchisees, I wonder if any brands have thought about creating women-only floors or areas in their hotels? Several boutique and independent properties have done this, but I know of no brands who have either mandated or allowed a “women only” floor as part of brand standards.

I do not know the statistics, but anecdotal evidence (I do travel a lot) tells me that more and more women are traveling for business and other reasons and, frequently, travel alone. (Someone in our industry need only look at the registration at one of our major conferences; over the last 10 years, I’d bet the percentage of women in attendance has at least doubled.) If a brand can mandate “no smoking&r...Read More

December 23, 2008 | Link This | Email this | Comments (2)

I’ve been wondering whether the path to the top of the Hotel business is through either a hotel school education or a first job (after school) in the Hotel industry (by this, I mean, a hotel company, a hotel REIT or other investment firm, a management company, a hotel broker (e.g., JLL, The Plasencia Group, HWE), a hotel service provider (e.g., HVS, Four Corners Advisors, PwC), or other, similar starting position. 

For example, I do not qualify on either criterion (no hotel school, no first job in the industry), and each of my children qualifies on both counts (Adam:  Cornell Hotel School degree, first job at KPMG; Carey:  Ohio State degree in Hospitality Management, first job at The Boulders Resort (and, while in school, a full-time job at Hyatt Regency Columbus)). 

So, I checked, somewhat unscientifically (by looking at proxy sta...Read More

December 17, 2008 | Link This | Email this | Comments (0)

Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels’ excellent semi-annual HISS (Hotel Investor Sentiment Survey) was published in the last few days. Every six months, JLLH takes the pulse of hotel investors around the world and highlights the hot cities for buy, build, hold and sell considerations. As a snapshot, it provides a superb measure of how industry investment professionals feel at the time the survey is taken (though, unfortunately, intervening events, such as the Mumbai terrorism attacks might skew the data). I am particularly taken by the charts of expected IRRs (internal rate of return) by city, which is then categorized by area (Americas, EMEA, Asia Pacific). Because the IRRs are averages, there seems a degree of precision that I find incredible. Thankfully, JLLH does not round to two or three decimals of percentages, as this would take us into the ten-thousandths in frac...Read More

December 10, 2008 | Link This | Email this | Comments (0)

I stayed recently at one of the many, many select-service hotels at the Orlando Airport. Upon check-in and throughout my one-night stay, I was struck by the number of signs all over the hotel, including on the toilet paper roll sticker, inviting guests to inform the front desk before you leave if “your stay was not a 10." Needless to say, it was not, and I did not (else I might not have had a chance to blog about it).

But, I was thinking about the operator’s challenge to its employees and the manager’s oversight of this program. This is a high bar to set, particularly for a “limited-ervice” hotel. I applaud the manager for setting the bar, and it is a lofty goal. However, it may be an unreachable and entirely unrealistic one. I have written before that “sometimes a hotel is just a ...Read More