News & Stories
New York/Lisbon. Under its new parent company, the technology company GuestCentric, the consortium for MICE hotels, Great Hotels of the World, has embarked on a growth course. The focus is on Europe, but the company has also been reaching out to destinations such as Asia and the USA.
Hamburg. The white label operator RIMC Hotels & Resorts in Hamburg has undergone a number of changes in its corporate structure and personnel. The goal remains to expand the group in Europe from currently 35 hotels to 70 hotels.
Hamburg. At the IHIF in Berlin as well as at the MIPIM in Cannes, hospitalityInside.com noted the absence of the prizeotel logo from the brands pictured on the Radisson Hospitality stand. And there was indeed as reason for this.
Bad Arolsen. It's rare that a hotel group achieves such scope within such a short space of time. Since 2014, the German H-Hotels Group has founded six of its own brands and has split from its former brands Treff Hotels and Ramada. With Hyperion, H4 Hotels, H2 Hotels, H+ Hotels, H.omes and H.ostels it has established itself between hostel and first-class. A double-brand hotel marked the beginning of today's success. Its expansion is opportunistic, and the group provides almost all services itself. The special passion of CEO Alexander Fitz and CCO Andreas von Reitzenstein is digitisation. They have established their own lab in a small hotel.
Berlin/Munich. The out-of-home market is booming – and with it system catering. Almost one in three euros is now sold in a brand catering business. The German Hotel and Restaurant Association Dehoga has therefore published its current yearbook for this segment; at the same time Treugast has published its 3rd Gastronomy Ranking Germany 2018.
Washington DC. "Trump first"? This doesn't seem to be the case – at least when it comes to the hotel activities of the Trump Organization. This name unites 500 Trump businesses, which are headed by his sons. Donald Trump, acting President of the United States, also likes to use his own hotels, especially the ones with golf courses. Despite all show concerning hotels, the following is the case: The number of Trump hotels is decreasing systematically as the owners remove the name and no longer extend agreements. They want to avert damage from their properties, or they complain about poor hotel performance. Only the business in the Trump Hotel Washington is thriving. The Trump Organization has put its hotel expansion on hold at the moment. Macy Marvel provides details with spicy background information.
St. Christoph/Arlberg. Together with two German entrepreneurs and inspired by his own Arlberg Hospiz Hotel, the renowned Austrian luxury hotelier Florian Werner recently founded A3 Tourism Pearls AG in Vienna to rescue family-run hotels with no internal succession arrangement in place. The business model: Private hoteliers without successors exchange shares in their hotel for shares in Tourism Pearls. The project is still very much in the starting blocks. Florian Werner himself is the 31st Hospiz hotelier and knows where the challenges of the next generation lay.
San Francisco. Airbnb acquires HotelTonight, the last-minute deal hotel booking app for over 400 million dollars. The home-sharing platform is preparing for an IPO and this acquisition will help boost its presence in the boutique hotel segment.
Geneva. Kempinski AG, Munich, and Kempinski Hotels SA, Geneva, have announced last Wednesday that Markus Semer will not extend his mandate as Chief Executive Officer. At the same time, Colin Lubbe resigns as Chief Financial Officer and Vice Chairman at Kempinski AG. Currently, there are no successors for either one of them. This is surprising as well as incomprehensible news.
Berlin. Big show this week in Berlin during the International Hotel and Investment Forum: Accor celebrates itself as disruptor – with "Augmented Hospitality”. The message: Everything's about the customer/guest. The core: a new mega mobile app covering all brands. The novelty: As the first hotel group to do so in the world, Accor will allow everybody to become a member of its loyalty programme ALL – that is, even people who have never stayed at an Accor hotel and who may never do so. Guests as well as non-guests can all collect points and exchange them, even in external restaurants or at sporting events. In addition to this, Accor also surprisingly presented two further hotel brands. The Tribe and The House of Originals as brand no. 39 and no. 40. In three years, Accor will presumably count 50 brands.