Lodging Daily News

When Paul McGowan was looking for a real estate opportunity in New Haven, Conn., the former executive at Starwood Hotels & Resorts, wasn’t necessarily searching for a hotel. But as fate would have it, he came upon an opportunity to acquire what he describes as a “very old and tired, 86-room hotel on Chapel Street.” The property was in the shadows of Yale University and never one to shun an opportunity for creative thinking, McGowan,

Every Wednesday, Roger Bloss and Jordan Langlois find themselves talking to both existing and potential Vantage Hospitality members across the country. For a company that prides itself on openness and transparency, Bloss and Langlois decided to take those concepts one step further and created what they call “The Spin.” The Spin is a weekly unscripted webcast that is done live. The pair chat up existing and potential members who register and, quite simply, talk about

While RFID technology has been on the radar of hotels for a while, one of the questions has been: Are hotel guests in the United States really ready for it. RFID technology allows guests to receive check-in information, such as room number, and us a special keycard or their mobile device as a room key and for other access throughout the hotel. It, in effect, allows guests to skip the check-in process upon arrival. Because

On a very warm April afternoon Best Western’s senior vice president of marketing Dorothy Dowling sat on a stage in the press center at Phoenix International Raceway. Along with Michael Waltrip, two-time Daytona 500 winner and co-owner of Michael Waltrip Racing, she introduced three uber-NASCAR fans to the assembled media. It was not only the debut of Best Western as a main sponsor on the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, but also the unveiling of Dowling

If a hotel wants to eliminate energy waste, it first has to know how much energy it is wasting. Sounds simple enough, but for most hotels, calculating their energy usage and where they can more efficient is an inexact science. At Hilton properties, that process recently became easier to calculate with the unveiling of “LightStay” the company’s proprietary system developed to analyze environmental impact. “The purpose of LightStay is to quantify the measures of sustainability