Marriott's Edition Hotels Face Challenge of Scaling Up Uniqueness
25.08.2023 - 14:30
/ skift.com
/ Anthony Capuano
/ Ian Schrager
/ Sean Oneill
/ Marriott International
Marriott International’s Edition brand, co-created with hotel impresario Ian Schrager, may finally be clicking with developers after a decade-long slow burn. The Tampa Edition that opened in September marked the 15th property in the series. Top executives expect to double that footprint within five years.
“Since we opened Tampa, we now have leads coming in from South America at a greater pace,” said Josh Fluhr, who earlier this year became Edition’s senior vice president and global managing director and spoke to Skift in his first media interview since. “Each new outpost reaches a new layer of concentric circles of people to experience what the brand is all about, and that drives growth.”
Marriott’s Edition brand of hotels straddle lifestyle and luxury segments by taking a strict approach to hiring, training, and development. Yet it’s proven harder for Marriott to crack the lifestyle category than it had hoped back in 2007 when it first partnered with Schrager to create Edition. In 2008, executives forecasted they would have opened about 100 Editions by around now, rather than 15.
“The design is very bespoke,” said Marriott International CEO Anthony Capuano on stage at Skift Global Forum in September. “So I’m not sure I necessarily think it’s not moving as rapidly as we would like. We always want things to go a little more quickly. But behind that 15 open hotels, there are another 12 to 15 signed, or under development, projects. It’s not a brand that we’re going to have 1,000 hotels.”
Brand executives said that their playbook for hiring, for selecting culinary partners, and maintaining luxury-level standards of service will help the brand thrive.
Edition fits into the “lifestyle” segment of hotels. Lifestyle properties aim to mimic the appeal of independently run boutique hotels first created in the 1980s. Marriott is one of a few companies betting on the segment as a way to diversify from more formulaic hospitality designs. To mention a few: InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) has Hotel Indigo, Hyatt Hotels has Andaz, Marriott also has the W brand, and Accor has SLS and Morgans Originals.
Yet some developers and investors have balked at the properties, which typically come with billion-dollar price tags. While hotels that straddle the lifestyle and luxury categories like Edition can generate significantly more revenue per room, they also require more operational finesse and financing to build and keep fresh.
Yet developers seem to be cottoning on to the concept as a way to stand out in crowded markets. Edition will open shortly in Rome and Riviera Maya, for example.
A debate in the hotel community is whether the level of care to make properties like the Tampa Edition succeed can be replicated again