Articles tagged “starwood”

Last year marked a pivotal moment in terms of keyless room technology, as Starwood, Hilton, Marriott, and other brands announced investments in the mobile tech. And while there is consumer uptake, this still feels like a transitional technology that has us asking: What's next?

Starwood shareholders probably want Marriott's stock price to rebound following the Brexit vote if they want to get a better deal from the merger.

Consider this the eventual next evolution of making your hotel room a real home away from home.

The biggest news from last week’s hospitality conferences was that there wasn’t much news. But where there was, it all had to do with a single theme: branding. Here’s why.

Marriott is already one of the biggest players in the hospitality industry and in a few months, it'll be the biggest. Whatever the company decides to do — whether that's speaking up for LGBT rights and issues or pushing more direct bookings — is having a larger impact on the industry as a whole, and we spoke with CEO Arne Sorenson for his take on those issues, and other big challenges facing hospitality.

What's the most overused travel marketing buzzword out there? Our vote goes to "experience" (although "authentic" isn't too far behind.) Love it, or love to hate it, "experience" isn't not going away anytime soon. Here's why.

Don't know if you've noticed it, but we definitely see a trend: Merger or not, Starwood isn't letting up on its brand development investments anytime soon. It'll be interesting to see how much it can differentiate a legacy brand like Le Meridien when positioned against Marriott's Renaissance Hotels or AC Hotels brands.

We've said before that not enough travel brands are taking full advantage of this increasingly popular social media channel. So, kudos to Starwood's SPG loyalty program for delving into it even further than it already has, even if SPG will most likely be rolled into Marriott Rewards in just a few years' time.

Hotels are getting more people to join their loyalty programs than ever before. Now they just need to raise their engagement levels to keep them coming back — booking direct, as they'd prefer.

Despite troubles in Macau, the usual suspects — namely gaming CEOs — took home the most money in 2015, with Wyndham’s CEO grabbing the No. 2 spot.