News & Stories
London. The British low budget lifestyle brand, Yotel, announced a global expansion in December: There should additionally be more than 3,000 "cabins" by 2018. However, the new planned city centre properties in Singapore, Paris, Miami and San Francisco and in a second hotel in New York City will be transformed from the windowless sleeping boxes that are at the airport hotels into pleasant comfort rooms. Hubert Viriot, Chief Executive Officer of the hotel group since May, 2014, explained how the change of mind and strategy had come about in a conversation with hospitalityInside.com. Viriot will also be a guest on the CEO Panel on March 5 at this year's "ITB Hospitality Day", the hotel conference of ITB Berlin.
London. Many companies focus on the 3Cs of organisational wealth: Financial Capital, Intellectual Capital and Human Capital. Today, corporations must add a fourth 'C': Trust Capital. A new trend report reveals it.
Frankfurt. The most stable hotel groups emerge if the individual members are perfectly matched to one another. This is particularly true of consortiums. Worldhotels wants to convey just this to both their current and potential future members. Since yesterday, the association with its 500 members across 65 countries is meeting in Guangzhou, China, not far away from Hong Kong, and the new Managing Director Kristin Intress is paving the way for a new course: the consortium is making a sales promise. If a member hotel is not satisfied, it is allowed to exit.
Hong Kong/Augsburg. The Asian Shangri-La Hotels & Resorts has gained a foothold in Paris and London, but Europe indeed remains to be interesting to them - even when the Chinese luxury hotel group will maintain their expansion focus within the booming market of China. In 1971, the Malaysian Kuok family laid the foundations of their hotel empire in Singapore. Also in the future, every hotel should keep its individual character that is always moulded by the local atmosphere, first-class F&B, sophisticated art and top-notch service. These pillars are important to President & Chief Executive Officer, Greg Dogan. But the expansion is also important: "By the beginning of 2016, we would like to have more than 100 hotels in the large, key cities of the world," he reveals during an interview with hospitalityInside.com. Toward this, he is prepared to discuss every contract form and every equity engagement.
Madrid. Adults-Only concepts and female travellers stand for specialized segments with a growing demand in tourism – at least in Spain. On the Canary Islands, Adults-Only hotels have increased from one hotel to 30 today; in the Balearic region, there are currently more than 70 Adults-Only hotels. In addition, Adults-Only hotels can be found in more star categories meanwhile. "Spain is a world power in tourism. But we have to go for continuous innovation", says Fabián González Checa, a specialist in hotel innovation and partner of the business development agency Digitalmeteo in Madrid. Is specialization the lifeguard of a mature country? "It is the only way to survive", says González Checa convincingly.
Vienna. The late snowfall led to abrupt increases in winter bookings in Austria at the turn of the year 2014/2015. Only a few locations are suffering from Russians staying away. Despite this, many interviewed in the latest "market" survey carried out by the tourism department of the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber see a gloomy future for winter tourism.
Hamburg. Richard J. Vogel had asked for "100 days" free of interviews. Side to side with the major shareholder Horst Rahe, the new partner of DSR Hotel Holding in Hamburg now aims to secure systematic growth for the company's small hotel collection which includes the brands A-ROSA and a-ja. He will also push forward with the Jacob Group. Whether the former manager of TUI Cruises will succeed with what Rahe has failed to secure since 2008? With the four A-rosa resorts and the first a-ja resort, the start is good. A-rosa will have to continue to refine its resort profile though. And the recent addition a-ja has already taken the plunge with a new experiment, about two years after its creation. The concept of these resorts - module holidays - is now to be translated 1:1 in cities. This has never been done before.
Milan. A noticeable number of investment companies, including American Starwood Capital Group, Spanish Meliá Hotels and NH Hotels, as well as French Accor and the most important Italian tour operator, Alpitour SpA, have made offers to take over Italian UNA Hotels & Resorts partly or completely.
London. Consolidation amongst major hotel companies will be one of the key themes of 2015 as large groups seek to grow their business or risk being taken over themselves.
Paris. Accor and the Chinese Huazhu Hotel Group, also known as China Lodging Group, have entered into a mutual participation and close cooperation within the Chinese market. Accor itself has pledged the quick acceleration of its expansion within the country. Additional details were provided during a press conference also broadcasted live in the internet.