INTERVIEW
STARWOOD HOTELS & RESORT WORLDWIDE, INC.
Starwood Hotels & Resorts (SHR) was originally created in 1995 by real estate investment fi rm the Starwood Capital Group (SCG), and was also known as Starwood Lodging. Since its inception SHR has been listed on the New York Stock Exchange – although its brands such as Sheraton and Westin have been serving guests for more than 60 years. In 2000 SGC exited its investment in SHR. Today, SHR, which is headquar-
tered in White Plains, New York, is one of the world’s largest hotel com- panies and as of end of 2009, it owned, leased, managed and fran- chised 979 hotels, with approximately 292,000 rooms in around 100 coun- tries. It employed over 145,000 people and had revenue of us$4.8bn (€3.7bn £3.1bn).
* These numbers are estimates and may change
ſt (232sq m) and there will be at least four treatment rooms. “It’s not an exact formula,” he says. “But most of the time we have found that you have to have four revenue generat- ing areas to make it worthwhile.” Despite all of these key touch points,
however, is the brand strong enough for customers to identify when there’s so much room for interpretation? Kyricos says: “I go back and forth on that. T e goal is to have customers recognise Shine Spa. But our overall job is to enhance the experience of the hotel and if people come away saying they’ve had a fantastic time at a Sheraton spa then I think we’ve achieved our objectives.”
LEVERAGING OPPORTUNITIES So far, there are six Shine Spas open – the original in the Maldives, two in China and one in Vietnam, Gerogia and Slovakia. It is expected that 12 more will be open by the end of 2011, mostly in China, although other existing Sheraton spas will possibly be converted sooner. While Kyricos and McCarthy both main-
tain that there is a time and a place for third-party spas at Starwood, having an in-house brand brings certain advantages. McCarthy says: “As an luxury hotel com- pany, our owners expect us to have a spa
STARWOOD’S NINE HOSPITALITY BRANDS INCLUDE*:
TURNBERRY RESORT, SCOTLAND
the luxury collection – luxury, full- service hotels and resorts (73 existing properties, 11 in development)
ST REGIS BANGKOK , THAILAND
st regis – luxury full-service hotels, resorts and residences (19 existing properties, 25 in development)
brand. From a guest experience standpoint, hotel guests really feel like the spa is an inte- gral part of the stay and that it’s a good fi t. It’s also easier to manage an in-house spa – simple things like having the hotel concierge recommend the spa to putting up a sign, or adding the spa menu to the hotel room wel- come pack are more straightforward. T is ultimately helps the business too.” However, there are also challenges, espe- cially when – as with Kyricos and McCarthy
– you’re rolling out multiple brands across many countries on limited resources. Kyricos says: “I think sometimes our management philosophy is a little diff erent. We’ve just opened our 1,000th hotel this year – we are never going to have a centralised spa team that’s big enough to support the businesses ourselves. So we have to rear talent and management in our hotels to be capable of developing and operating our future spas.” McCarthy adds: “My strategy is to create
development, design and operational tools and guidelines so spas can be as self-suffi - cient at possible. It’s also about leveraging the power of our group. I look at ways that our spas can learn from each other, so it’s not necessarily just me assisting every single spa. Right now, we’re looking at exchanging lead therapists in T ailand and India so they teach each other new modalities.”
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spabusiness.com / digital
W BOSTON HOTEL & RESIDENCES, US
w – luxury and upscale full-service hotels, retreats and residences (35 existing properties, 26 in development)
Finding staff can be tough in places such
as India and China where modern therapist training is limited, especially training which also incorporates English, he says. As Star- wood is so big, one way they get around this is to recruit from other established proper- ties within its portfolio. McCarthy says they’re also possibly look-
ing to work with Himalayan Healers – a training organisation, which aims to help Nepali people from the lowest social orders to become well-rounded, international- standard therapists (see SB07/2 p44). When the properties are really remote,
however – such as in smaller Chinese cit- ies – McCarthy’s other strategy is to leverage the partnership with GdC. “Because of the scope of work they’re doing for us, we can ask them to support a project – even though it might be outside of their normal realm of operations.” Kyricos says that this also applies to SpaEquip, Starwood’s globally pre- ferred spa procurement partner.
DOUBLE VISION T e strategy of leveraging and teamwork, is set to continue as Kyricos and McCarthy work towards launching two more in-house spa brands for Starwood this year. T e fi rst is Explore Spa, which has been created for Starwood’s Le Méridien proper-
SPA BUSINESS 3 2010 ©Cybertrek 2010
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