Industry Research #1
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, one of the world’s largest hotel companies own 9 brands; Westin, Sheraton, Four Points, The Luxury Collection, W Hotels, St. Regis, Le Meridien, Aloft, a Vision of W Hotels, and Element by Westin. Most recently, Adam Aron, Chief Executive Officer of Starwood Hotels & Resorts has announced the name of their 10th brand. Their newest brand, Tribute Portfolio inspires their guests to stay independent. The first location is at Royal Palm South Beach Miami, Florida with North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia and South Carolina in the works. To inspire their Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG) members to try something new, they are celebrating their 10th brand by offering SPG members 10,000 starpoints when they stay in a Tribute Portfolio hotel. The concept of Tribute Portfolio has been compared with Marriott International’s Autograph Collection and Hilton Worldwide’s Curio. However, Starwood executives would have to disagree because their newest brand will be tightly focused on the Upper Upscale portion of the 4 stars segment. I believe this is great news for Starwood Hotels & Resorts. Being that the company already has over 1,000 branded hotels worldwide, this new collection could bring up revenue, profit, and guest loyalty. http://www.forbes.com/sites/douggollan/2015/04/16/why-starwood-launched-tribute-portfolio/
It is such a great news from Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide. I believe too they are really keep investing in their global brand organization to further invigorate innovation, marketing and guest experience. I am looking forward to see Tribute Portfolio hotel to offer inspired style , superior service and achieve their biggest goal which is going to have 100 hotels by 2020. Also, I am agree with Marr mention that travelers have become more comfortable booking unbranded hotels and this has emboldened developers of new hotels to become more comfortable going it as independents. Undoubtedly, independent hotels typically offer the lifestyle features that appeal to today’s customers so they can become more prominent.
This is valuable information. Providing a new layer in what they offer will allow their frequent guest more opportunity to stay in a hotel which fits their needs at a particular time.
As you understand, I love the idea of lifestyle brand and I believe bringing the Tribute Portfolio is a great idea. As the article says, “Getting Starwood into locations where it doesn’t have a presence is also part of the plan,” I believe opening new hotels is a excellent way to market the brand and chain itself. But at the same time I always wonder if opening too much division of a hotel brand becomes challenging, since the same chain hotels are technically completing against either other.