One of Hyatt’s big weaknesses has been that they lack the global footprint of Hilton, IHG, or Marriott. They’ve struggled to grow, especially in the full service sector. We’ve heard several rumors of them acquiring other brands, though it has never worked out… at least until now. That’s why this announcement is really exciting.
Continue reading: AWESOME: Hyatt Announces Acquisition Of Up To 85 New Luxury Hotels
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
why is this awesome? another cookie cutter brand just putting its vanilla stamp on some beautiful smaller hotels....only awesome for you because you can use your points to get a free room/upgrade.
This is awesome news. I stayed at Alila Villas Uluwatu a couple years ago in Bali, and it is breathtaking. Can't wait to take advantage of the new points redemption opportunities this offers.
@ Drew -- Not just to redeem points, but I'd be much likely to stay at these properties if I could earn elite points. I understand your point, but there's no reason a hotel can't remain unique while joining a global loyalty program. The two aren't mutually exclusive.
Excellent. Just for fun, guess what month in 2019 I’ll be able to book an award stay in the new properties.
the big problem is their footprint in europe, and this does not help. This seems to have a big overlap with their existing footprint.
Agree with Hotcrab. Is Hyatt afraid of Europe? I realize their upcoming deal with Fine Hotels or whatever it's called is slated for late '18 closing but until they show us the details of that this latest combination does very little(if anything) to address their tiny European presence.
To what extent is it just hard to expand in Europe through acquisitions due to the EU's anti-monopoly laws? Accorhotels is a very large company -- does the EU make it a headache to allow a non-EU company to dominate the European market?
This is great news. The Park Hyatt Maldives started life as an Alila, so I imagine there will be some potential re-brand opportunities that will bring a lot of value — Park Hyatt Bali? — to both the brand and also guests.
With the exception of a few resort areas, most of these are largely in areas where Hyatt has coverage. I don't think this moves the needle all that much when you dive deeper into the property locations. If anything this adds a few places in the US, and allows for multiple places in large cities like San Francisco and NYC where you could earn and redeem points.
I’d love to see Hyatt adding more category 3 and 4 properties. We stayed at Alila Uluwatu and it has category 6 or 7 written all over it. It us nice to be able to redeem on aspirational properties but the average Joe’s like me will not do that too often.
@ Stephen
"does the EU make it a headache to allow a non-EU company to dominate the European market?"
Quite the reverse: the EU is all about open markets (with a few exceptions related to "national security", whatever that means).
Some individual member states are more enthusiastic about the policy than others - the UK sells off its companies to overseas bidders with gay abandon, such that there aren't many UK-owned multinationals left. France and Italy, on the other hand, are more, er, protective.
Wow this is awesome. These hotels are great for me... Seattle area, Maui, Bali surf spots, some other cool spots. I was hoping for more Europe... hopefully the Small Luxury additions will beef that up. Definitely looking forward to staying at the Thompson Seattle, best roof in the city.
I've recently had some chances to stay at small boutique hotels and it's a refreshingly unique experience. Love this news + the SLH partnership. Can't wait to stay at Park Hyatt's in bigger cities and then these luxury boutique in smaller cities. This is the kind of stuff that makes me keep coming back to Hyatt over Marriott even though it's harder as a business traveler to stay at Hyatt.
@Drew considering Hyatt's luxury game is on point, do you care to expand on your strawman argument? Park Hyatts are amongst the top luxury hotels in the world and are almost always reflective of the environment they are in, unlike the generic luxury of Ritz-Carltons and St Regis.
Doesn't help the global footprint but there are some great places on this list that I love staying at.
Nice blend for Hyatt (which I always thought was a quality bland Chicago product that lagged behind Starwood......... (with Marriott being the most bland).
This now expands Hyatt with the excellent product of Thompson Hotels.
They have bought their properties in the past (Miami Beach).
It gives them the asian quality boutiques with Alila (sp?).
Starwood has DesignHotels.com
This really helps Hyatt with locations at TabletHotels.com
smart move
Wow, great...however confusing news. I see at least a few of these properties which were under the Starwood banner and now obviously are Marriott properties such as the Talisa in Vail, CO. Can someone let me know how the same property will exist under the Marriott and Hyatt banners? Or will one assume control?
FWIW, Two Roads is 40% owned by Geolo Capital which is owned by John Pritzker, brother of Hyatt's Chairman.