After a decade of unstable ownership and a lack of brand clarity in the marketplace, Le Méridien is poised to not only recapture but to exceed the allure and infinite promise of its early days in 1970’s Paris with the support of new owner Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:HOT). Since its acquisition by the hotel giant in November 2005, Le Méridien’s financial performance has exceeded all forecasts and the brand is set to substantially grow its footprint worldwide. In addition, Starwood, well known for its innovations and branding prowess, has developed a unique brand positioning that capitalises on Le Méridien’s heritage and distinguishes it from competitors in the upper upscale hotel arena. Over the next few months, Le Méridien will reveal a series of brand defining initiatives, partnerships and artistic events that signal a fresh approach aimed at attracting the world’s creative class.

Marketers are finding it hard to sell their products and services in a virtual world, as a recent report in the Los Angeles Times states. With a low active user count and low tendency of Second Life users to make purchases online, savvy companies who purchased & developed land in the virtual world are re-considering their investment. Even Starwood's Aloft brand, the first hotel to enter the virtual world is pulling out and donating its land to charity... the virtual Aloft was a great way to gather feedback that could be implemented in the real world hotels, but now thats done, there doesn't seem a more 'compelling reason to stay', as Brian McGuinness, vice president of Aloft says.

tags: wane, decline, pull-out, marketing, aloft, hotels, resorts, starwood, second-life, virtual, community, social, cgm, social-media, 3D

By Jeff N Ross: Developing and implementing an effective hotel recruitment strategy is all very well, but how many organisations actually seriously focus upon employee retention, which is arguably the most important component of a resourcing strategy?

There are obvious benefits of managing effectively employee retention, and these are well documented academically. Reduced recruitment costs, reduced labour turnover percentages, higher workforce efficiency and competency, reduced training costs, higher customer satisfaction… all common sense really. For hospitality graduate recruitment, the issues and benefits of managing employee retention are magnified. Generally speaking, it is likely that a higher level of training and time investment have gone into both the recruitment and induction of a graduate. Perhaps more importantly though, the benefits that can be gained by retaining and developing a graduate within a business, far outweigh the argument of cost.

A short video shot recently of the HTW Chur (Switzerland) and a talk with Gregory Root, who's been instrumental in launching the new BSc Tourism degree program. More information and support in the UAE. Next semester begins September 17, 2007 (absolute deadline for applications is July 13, 2007). Following year begins on September 17, 2008 > Application deadline June, 2008.


tags: video, education, htw, chur, switzerland, bsc, degree, bachelor, tourism, hospitality, management, travel, gregory-root

With Dubai the wonders never cease! The scope, pace and nature of the developments and projects in Dubai and the United Arab Emirates in general is mind-boggling. The hotel industry is also abuzz with new properties - the city of Dubai is currently host of about 40,000 rooms in various categories and this number is set to grow to almost 94,000 by 2016! The biggest project, Bawadi, itself will account for 29,000 hotel rooms, with the biggest hotel in the world, Asia-Asia (6,500 rooms). This article gives a short brief of the hotel industry and a list of the top 20 hotels in Dubai by popularity (Read it here)

tags: travel, tourism, hotels, hospitality, resorts, motels, dubai, uae, united-arab-emirates, middle-east

HVS Executive Search ranks Starwood at the top of their Hotel Industry Board list for the second year in a row. 2nd Place goes to the Walt Disney Company, followed by Highland Hospitality, DiamondRock Hospitality, Priceline.com and Maui Land.

The Microsoft Surface Teaser Video

What is MS Surface? Microsoft Surface (Codename: Milan), is a forthcoming product from Microsoft which is developed as a software and hardware combination technology that allows a user, or multiple users, to manipulate digital content by the use of natural motions, hand gestures, or physical objects. It was announced on May 30, 2007 at D5, and is expected to be released by commercial partners in November 2007. Initial customers will be in the hospitality businesses, such as restaurants, hotels, retail, and public entertainment venues.

The InterContinental Hotels (InterContinental, Crowne Plaza) in Dubai Festival City are set to open soon, and are looking to recruit qualified hotel professionals in various supervisory and managerial roles. If you know anyone who’d be interested, please feel free to pass on this information. While many more positions are still open, the main key positions include:

1) Front Office Manager - Crowne Plaza - Arabic speakers preferred, must have Crowne Plaza experience
2) Assistant Chief Engineer - InterContinental / Crowne Plaza/ICRS
3) Food & Beverage Manager InterContinental / Crowne Plaza / Arabic speakers preferred
4) Front Desk Managers - Crowne Plaza
5) Reception Supervisor - Crowne Plaza

A hotel blog aggregator has been launched at www.hotelblogs.org to provide a one-stop update on what high-profile hotel bloggers are writing and talking about. The site allows for free syndication for quality blogs pertaining to the hotel and tourism industries and points all content to original author blogs. The Tourism & Hospitality Blog has already been syndicated as the first member!

tags: blog, blogging, blogger, aggregator, hotel-blogs, hotelblogs.org, hotels, resorts, hospitality, tourism, travel

Blackstone Group has just purchased the Hilton Group of Hotels for a record $26 Billion! This acquisition gives the Blackstone Group, whose 2,800 hotels include brands such as Hilton, Doubletree, Embassy Suites, Hampton Inn, Homewood Suites and The Waldorf-Astoria Collection, approximately 500,000 hotel rooms, which is about 60,000 less than the current market leader in terms of number of rooms, InterContinental Hotels Group.

77 students on internship from Swiss School

Beginning of June 77 students from Swiss School of Tourism and Hospitality in Chur/Passugg began their internship, which is part of the study plan to finally receive the diploma. For either 6 or 12 months they will be gaining work experience in a department of the hospitality industry, such as in the food & beverage departments including banquet and room service, kitchen, front and back office, administrations or marketing and events.

A video demo from the Conference Fall 2006 San Diego. GrandCentral's CEO, Craig Walker, presents GrandCentral.com.

Google has announced the purchase of Grand Central, which offers an innovative solution to managing your phone numbers and voice mailboxes. A highlight from the Google Blog post:

GrandCentral offers many features that complement the phone services you already use. If you have multiple phone numbers (e.g., home, work, cell), you get one phone number that you can set to ring all, some, or none of your phones, based on who's calling. This way, your phone number is tied to you, and not your location or job. The service also gives you one central voice mailbox. You can listen to your voicemails online or from any phone, forward them to anybody, add the caller to your address book, block a caller as spam, and a lot more. You can even listen in on voicemail messages from your phone while they are being recorded, or switch a call from your cell phone to your desk phone and back again. All in all, you'll have a lot more control over your phones.

Boeing will broadcast the Premiere of its newest technologically advanced passenger jet - the 787 Dreamliner - to viewers around the world. The 787 Premiere will be carried live and in nine different languages on Sunday, July 8, at 3:30 p.m. PDT or 10:30 p.m. GMT via satellite and Webcast. To view the Webcast, viewers may log on to www.boeing.com or www.newairplane.com. Boeing will broadcast the Premiere to more than 45 countries using 35 satellite TV networks. Satellite television subscribers may tune in the following channels, depending on their satellite service provider: Specific channel or frequency information can be found on the Premiere Web site.

I had the pleasure and honor of doing an interview with Futurist Rohit Talwar recently, after his inspiring and dazzling presentation at the Travel Distribution Summit in London (eyefortravel TDS 2007 at the London Business Design Centre). In this special Talent Jungle People interview, Rohit tells us about his life, his approach to work and some trends related to hotels, travel, tourism and business in the Middle East, China, India and other emerging markets - JJ

Name: Rohit Talwar

Current Company and Title: CEO at Fast Future Ventures