Accor’s Hotel Owners Are Clamoring to Become Lifestyle Brands

Accor’s CEO is steering the brand towards more luxury and lifestyle properties. Fortunately, hotel owners are more than obliging. “I’ve been at the helm of this company for the past eight years, and I’ve been trying to wake up a sleeping giant, which Accor has been for a number of years,” Sebastien Bazin told Skift’s hospitality reporter Cameron Sperance at Skift Global Forum on Thursday. “I decided eight years ago to be asset light, and it was five years of pain.” Shortly after, however, the pandemic struck — which coincided with his plans to move away from Europe, and move higher up from mid-scale hotels. Following a restructure, ultra luxury and lifestyle hotels became independent divisions. And in November, Ac