Noteworthy quotes from this week's stories include Hilton's luxury brand head Dino Michael talking about his obligation to bring back the Waldorf Astoria New York just right.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“Everybody I talk to has a story about the hotel [Waldorf
Astoria New York] and everybody says, ‘don’t mess it up.’ So, I take that
obligation quite seriously to give it back to New York.” – Dino Michael,
Hilton Read story
“Over the last five years, they [Life House] have made us
think deeply about who we are as a company, what our value proposition is for
our stakeholders, and who we want to be going forward. As we come together, we
look forward to incorporating the best practices of both of our companies to
deliver exceptional experiences for our guests, investors, hotel owners and
teams.” – Rob Blood, Lark Hotels Read
story
“If the mid-single-digit growth in visitation continues, it
is unlikely that inbound international travel will recover in 2025. Regionally,
inbound travel growth on both coasts has slowed materially.” – CBRE Read story
“As we near repayment of our corporate strategic financing –
the primary focus of our efforts in 2024, we are excited to partner with our
advisor and property managers to deliver on this next initiative. We are
turning the page on COVID and look forward to beginning the next chapter for
Ashford Trust.” – Stephen Zsigray, Ashford Hospitality Trust Read story
“We will continue to invest in skills that are unique and
critical to the G6 business, such as supply, account management, corporate
sales, brand standards, offline marketing, safety and security. Over the years,
OYO has been able to successfully leverage already developed capabilities in
India on technology, revenue management, e-commerce, procurement, legal,
finance, and HR and will enable this for the G6 business too.” – Gautam
Swaroop, Oyo International Read story
“Postcard Cabins' vision for providing a retreat from the
modern world is incredibly well-timed and well-executed. We’re excited to
leverage our operational strengths to enhance guest experiences while helping
expand Postcard Cabins' portfolio nationwide.” – Al Smith, Hotel Equities Read story
“It really fits within our investment strategy. This is a
bullseye. It’s great real estate, newly built, in this case, and built to a
very high spec. It’s in a great location. It’s right on the lakefront. It’s not
a well-known property, but if you look at where it’s located, it’s one of the
very few lakefront hotels in Seattle, and it’s new to boot. There’s just a
great story with it, where it’s a first-time hotel owner and a passion project
for him, and he did an amazing job developing it. We’re operational experts.
So, we’re inheriting that setup and I think we can take it to the next level
with our platform.” – Eddie Yu, Ohana Real Estate Investors Read story
“In 2025, we hope to see continued increased adoption of the
design-build approach because it allows project teams to stay flexible.
Design-build unifies competing voices into a single team that works together
throughout the full project. By nature, it is a continually iterative process
that allows teams to continue refining the design throughout the entire
building process, ensuring that changes can be made in real time. This helps
prevent cost escalations down the line.” – Jake Zwaagstra, TriCelta
Development Read story
“Switzerland is a natural market for the Me and All Hotel
brand’s debut beyond Germany, and we remain committed to exploring
opportunities to expand the brand across the wider DACH region and greater
Europe.” – Briana Swift, Hyatt Hotels Corp.
Read story
“We are thrilled to have acquired such a high-profile hotel
in the fast-evolving Miami Beach hotel market. The Gates Hotel South Beach
offers significant potential for repositioning into one of Miami’s leading
lifestyle hotels. This is an exciting first move for the Dean brand as it
begins to build its presence across the U.S., following the recent expansion of
the Dean Group into Munich and Berlin.” – Keith Evans, Lifestyle Hospitality
Capital Read story
“The launch of our first signed hotels underscores our
confidence in deepening cooperation [with Marriott International], establishing
a pioneering model in China that merges franchising and brand affiliation. In
the future, we expect to jointly launch more high-quality hotel projects and
build a new engine for growth in the premium hotel market.” – Donglin Li,
Delonix Group Read story