Top Stories
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France’s legendary Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc goes real estate shopping in London
DestinationsThe company behind the famous Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc in the south of France is on the hunt for a London property to add to its portfolio. The Oetker Collection, part of German family conglomerate the Oetker Group, wants to find a base in the capital as part of expansion plans which include New York and [...]
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Trendy travel buzzwords for your next mancation or floatel stay
RoomsAs a boating holiday specialist comes up with a grating new buzzword – flocation – we round-up some other awful examples. This week Lateboat.com, a boating holiday specialist, unveiled the latest in a long line of irritating travel buzzwords. According to a report in Travelmole, the travel industry publication, the firm is now calling on [...]
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The Chinese firm that wants to cram an entire city into the world’s tallest building
DestinationsA Chinese firm best known for building air conditioning units is constructing a vertical city. Broad Sustainable Construction (BSB) said this week that next month it will finally break ground on its the tower that will not only be the world’s tallest but could, according to BSB, become a model for how China deals with mass urbanization. The 838-meter-tall (2,749 [...]
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Dubai’s Atlantis hotel is in the market for loan to refinance its debt
DestinationsAtlantis the Palm, the hotel owned by Dubai World Corp. unit Istithmar World PJSC, is seeking an $850 million loan to refinance debt due in 2017, according to two people with knowledge of the matter. The resort, which spent $20 million on its launch party in 2008, has hired Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank PJSC, Barclays [...]
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Starwood hotel vet and Hawaii/Pacific local to step down from leadership role
DestinationsLongtime Starwood Hotels & Resorts veteran Keith Vieira is retiring at year’s end from his leadership role as head of a region that includes Hawaii and French Polynesia. Vieira, 57, who has been Starwood’s senior vice president of operations for the two areas since 1998, has been a fixture in Hawaii’s hospitality industry for 40 [...]
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Luxury hotels personalize wake-up calls to build brand loyalty
RoomsIn the ever-competitive race for loyal customers, however, many properties, especially luxury and boutique hotels, are now getting creative with the wake-up call, he says. Some boutique hotels even have recordings of celebrity voices. Personalizing the wake-up call, Chekitan Dev, an associate professor of marketing and branding at Cornell University’s School of Hotel Administration says, is [...]
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Choice Hotels’ big three priorities on tech: cloud, mobile, big data
DigitalChoice Hotels‘ tech team has identified three tech trends it hopes to capitalize on in the next few years: cloud-based technology, mobile and big data. Having Choice’s property management system housed in the cloud–which [it] says is the first of its kind–means owners and managers can access a property’s performance data from anywhere at any [...]
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TripAdvisor CEO bullish now but takes blame for slow move to Kayak-style search
DigitalTripAdvisor users long-complained about the pop-up windows that appeared when they searched for a hotel on its sites, but CEO Steve Kaufer long-resisted transitioning to the more-appealing Kayak-style hotel metasearch. Speaking to financial analysts the other day at the J.P. Morgan Global Technology, Media and Telecom Conference in Boston, Kaufer said he now “takes the lump” [...]
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Viceroy Hotels takes first step into Dubai with management of $1 billion resort
DestinationsSKAI Holdings – the Dubai-based, family-owned real estate investment company – yesterday announced plans for a US $1 billion hotel with refurbished residences, which will be operated by Viceroy Hotels and Resorts marking the company’s first venture into Dubai; its second in the UAE alongside sister-property Yas Viceroy Abu Dhabi. The company says construction on [...]
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Inefficient shower heads at hotels are now climate change issue, SEC rules
RoomsShareholders of Choice Hotels, one of the country’s biggest hotel chains, have struck down a resolution that would force the company to consider replacing energy-guzzling shower heads with more efficient ones—yet its backers are claiming victory. Although only nine percent of Choice’s shareholders voted in favor of the resolution, the proposal is one of a [...]
