Monday, February 28, 2011

Famous leaders in hotel industry

Conrad Hilton
Hilton Hotels Corporation is a leading hospitality company because it has over 2,000 hotels across the country. Conrad Hotel is the founder of the Hilton company and is a key tool in helping Hilton Hotels become international. The Hilton Hotel has locations in many other countries such as Australia, England, Turkey and Singapore. In 1919, the founder Conrad Hilton owned his first hotel. Until the late 1940s, Hilton owned a worldwide chain of premium hotels. However, in the 1960s, Hilton transferred its interest of international operations to management contracts and franchising. The most successful factor of Hilton Hotels is that it created innovative joint-venture arrangements which became standard industry practice. Conrad Hilton’s idea of innovation kept the Hilton company developing in different areas ceaselessly. Also, the Hilton corporation developed casino-hotels which becomes a prime source of revenue for the company. Actually, gaming provided about 50 percent of the company's income by the following years.

Steve Wynn
Stephen Alan Wynn was born on the 27th January, 1942 in Connecticut. He was raised in Utica, New York with a younger brother. His idea of beginning business of gambling had big influence from his father who owned a chain of Bingo parlors in his early age. Durning the lifetime, he played a very important role in the development of the Las Vegas gambling oasis in Nevada, USA. His casino industry in Las Vegas continue to grow in size, ambition, lavishness, and even excess.

Steve graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and then took control of his father's bingo enterprise. This important step seemed to be the headstream of a continually expanding gambling and entertainment empire. Wynn bought some stakes in the Frontier Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas using the revenue from the bingo business. After moving to Las Vegas with his wife, fortunately , each new investment brought Wynn greater profits, allowing his casinos and hotels to expand in size and reputation.

"Wynn Las Vegas" which seems to be his most impressive building to date was opened in Aril ,2005. The Wynn Las Vegas is perched upon the famous Las Vegas Strip and stands 50 stories high, making it one of the tallest buildings in Las Vegas. There are 2,716 rooms and more than 111,000 square foot of gaming area. To be different from the previous tactic, Wynn spent 2.7 billion in a more elegent and subtle way. The Wynn Las Vegas is relatively understated from the outside, however, it encourages visitors or punters to enter the building to experience something extraordinary such as The Wynn Art Collection and the Lake of Dreams.

http://www.answers.com/topic/hilton-hotels-corporation
http://www.woopidoo.com/biography/steve-wynn/index.htm

Witness History in the Making

Could you be convinced to travel to Egypt or Tunisia after hearing the continuous news of many violent protesters taking over the country? Surprisingly, Bahrain, a major internet cruise agency, is taking the bold risk of promoting a cruise that will visit ports in Egypt, Israel, and Jordan.

Classified as “Freedom Evolution”, the cruise is determined to promote “history in the making” by hosting regional experts as lecturers to enhance the experience. "We believe that many people want to witness a piece of modern history in the making. This region of the world has already been a witness to some of the greatest events in ancient history," said Anthony Hamawy, president of the online retail giant Cruise.com.

The voyage will consist of ten lavish days in different cities, where guest will have the opportunity to stay overnight in order to experience the unique culture and ventures. "The fact is it's an incredible region of the world. These are truly historic changes going on," Hamawy describes the vast Middle East. Yet, the most important factor of exploring such cultures is most importantly the security and safety of the passengers. "Safety of our loyal guests and employees always comes first. We will continue to monitor the climate in that part of the world and take whatever security measures will be needed," said Edie Bornstein, vice president of sales and marketing for the cruise line.

The most important issue of the cruise is to reinsure that the cruise will not be political in nature. The focus is to experience history in the making, yet the cruise is also to provide leisure, pleasure, and pure fun. Although the excursion is not official yet, depending on security conditions at the time, passengers now have the chance to book their occupancy on “Freedom Evolution.”

InterContinental Sees Growth

InterContinental Hotel Group PLC (IHG), which is the world's leading hotel operator by number of rooms is considering extending its growth through possible acquisitions to come in the next few years. Chief Financial Officer Richard Solomons said “The sky is the limit. We have around 4% to 5% of the world's hotel rooms and 18% of the global pipeline. The sector is in a very fragmented position and we are in a very good place”. He also stated that 2010 recovery trends have been leading to continued growth this year, “as business and leisure travel continues to revitalize”. The prestigious hotel group has seen tremendous growth around the world, and is expecting even more this year at a rapid rate, which is very impressive considering today's economy and the decline in demand for luxury goods.

The hotel group's strong financial position has encouraged the consideration of acquisitions, including possible brands in North America and China. InterContinental's existing brands include Holiday Inn, Intercontinental and Crowne Plaza.

The groups runs over 4,500 hotels and 657,000 rooms world wide and has been benefiting from a significant recovery since 2009, in its more established markets in the U.S. and Europe.
The company has been seeing a substantial rise in revenue since, and future growth seems to be a very realistic goal for InterContinental.

http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20110215-703410.html

Hospitality Industry: Hotel Business HR Trends & Influential Leader

The hotel industry provides employment to a very large proportion of part time workers, who after gaining substantial experience, leave for other lucrative jobs. Low wages in the hotel industry is one of the primary reasons for low retention rates.

Hotel industry Gurus are already thinking of ways to attract and retain qualified workers by increasing the pay scales and by reducing the long working hours. The top management is now devising constructive methods that will retain the existing workers by sponsoring education and creating attractive career paths.

One of the influential leaders in the hospitality industry is Arne Sorenson President/COO of Marriott International. Arne Sorenson changed a way on the technology business. Hotel‘s CEOs watched remote conferencing technology as a lucrative for group business. However Marriott chose to embrace it rather than fight with them. Sorenson said "If the threat's there, we can make sure we're participating in that space. Personally, I believe these technologies allow for more travel rather than less."

Sunday, February 27, 2011

A New "Green" Company

Courtyard by Marriott has started using an LEED-design on some newer hotels in an attempt to cut down energy costs and develop a strong reputation as being a “green” company. They are currently building a hotel using the LEED-design in a Pittsburgh suburb, and if that is as successful as the LEED-design hotel in Settler’s Ridge, Pennsylvania, they will consider making the design standard. The stated advantages of the LEED-design are:

· More energy-efficient light fixtures and water-saving showers, lavatories and toilet fixtures

· Enhanced heat recovery energy system, which reclaims building exhaust air to pre-heat the building’s fresh air system

· More effective energy management system that further reduces unnecessary heating and cooling run times in unoccupied guest rooms

As you can see, Courtyard by Marriott is taking the necessary strides to have a strong Corporate Social Responsibility in which people will acknowledge them as being entrepreneurial in the amount of energy needed to run a hotel. Courtyard by Marriott is ok with the investment because they “will save some 30 percent in related costs, enough to pay back the investment in approximately five years,” according to the article. It will be interesting to see if other hotel companies upgrade their current hotels and build their new hotels using this LEED-design. Five years does not seem like that long of a time to make the money back from the investment. This investment makes sense from an economic, green, and CSR standpoint, so it seems like a no-brainer to me. It is also possible that the hotels can receive some funding from the government, to make the investment even cheaper.

http://www.hotelinteractive.com/article.aspx?articleID=19830