Radisson was recently named the largest upscale hotel brand in Europe, with 170 hotels and 38,079 rooms, ranking ahead of Hilton and Marriott. Ninety-nine percent of the Radissons are operated by The Rezidor Hotel Group, which Carlson owns a huge chunk in, and the latest numbers further show why Carlson is planning to bring the essence of the European Radisson (Blu) to the U.S. as part of its new Ambition 2015 plan. Heck, Rezidor must know what it’s doing to have that many successful hotels there and even Carlson execs admitted the brand has not had that success in this country.

A quick update on the ARDA convention going on at the Venetian in Vegas…Optimism reigns despite a challenging year. ARDA chief Howard Nusbaum was almost giddy over the prospects going forward during yesterday’s opening general session, saying he had never been “more bullish” on the timeshare industry. Sure, many changes have taken place during the past year, and more are in progress, but the industry does seem to be on solid footing. More than 2,500 attendees are in town for the almost week-long event. Every speaker and attendee I heard or talked to was optimistic about the industry’s future. Check LHonline.com tomorrow for a more in-depth report on the conference.

That annual rite of spring—the launch of daylight savings time—comes this Sunday for most areas of the country. (Those not participating include Arizona, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands.) While all of you will probably remember to reset your clocks at home and in your cars, it’s important not to forget to do so in your hotels.
A few years ago, someone on our staff was in a Florida hotel on spring vacation. The hotel failed to change the clocks (or, more easily, remind guests to do so) so she and her family missed their flight back home on Sunday morning. Technically, the hotel didn’t do anything wrong since it’s everyone’s personal responsibility to remember these things. However, people on vacation tend to lose track of everyday concerns so it’s easy to understand how they can forget the switch to daily savings time.
Here is the easy solution to this situation: Print a reminder about the switch and have your housekeepers put it on every guestroom bed this Saturday.
Happy spring.

The politicians in Washington may be ineffective and sometimes loony, but they’re no match for their counterparts roaming the 50 state capitals. Here are two particularly harebrained schemes dreamed up by sad and desperate state legislators that seem to have no rationale, except as ways to torment the hotel industry:
• In budget-strapped Tennessee, officials hope to raise an additional $10 million by taxing the value of the food hotels serve to guests as part of complimentary free breakfasts. The proposal in the general assembly is to collect taxes on the food at prevailing sales tax rates by county. A maximum of 9-3/4 percent could be levied. Naturally, the Tennessee Hospitality Association is fighting the proposal, as well it should.
Since the cost of free breakfasts at hotels are built-in to room rates, guests already pay taxes on the meals. My guess is this idea won’t gain much traction, but it’s an example of what lengths states, cities and even the federal government may go to shore up their budgets. We all need to stay vigilant to these kinds of tactics.
• An even wackier idea (although not one related to taxes) is floating around the Minnesota state legislature. That proposed legislation would prohibit spending state funds at any hotels in the state that offer violent pornography on their pay-per-view TV systems. The idea raises a number of interesting questions: Who determines which porno movies are violent and which are not? Is it okay for state employees to stay at hotels with violent porno while they’re out of state?
I’m nearly certain this bill won’t get passed either. It’s a touchy subject for hotels, however, so I’m sure the state’s lodging industry lobby will tread lightly on this and hope it dies a natural death.

I earlier this morning had the chance to talk to Kurt Ritter, Rezidor CEO, and specifically ask about the potential of Hotel Missoni coming to the U.S., and maybe with the help of Carlson. He said Rezidor would love to have a Hotel Missoni in the U.S., like New York City, but there were not currently plans in the works with Carlson to make that happen. “No,” he answered when asked if that might have been the brand Joly was referencing yesterday. “I mean when I say no, that doesn’t mean they would not look at it. We have talked about it some, but have not formalized it. With such a new brand, I think it would be much better if we grow and have five or 10 and then look into it.”
So whether that was the lifestyle brand Joly mentioned having a file on, who knows. But it does sound like it could be a natural fit, although it may be more higher end then the upscale lifestyle segment Carlson would like to fill. Missoni will add its second location this year in Kuwait in late summer and has projects underway in Oman, Brazil and South Africa.

During a media briefing with Hubert Joly at Carlson’s Global Business Conference in Orlando today, Joly was asked whether Carlson had plans to either develop or acquire a lifestyle or economy brand to fill in the only segment blanks left with its other five brands (Regent, Radisson, Park Plaza, Park Inn and Country Inn & Suites, from top down). “We have a file with an upscale brand that’s ready to go, but we’ve decided after some debate not to launch this year and to focus on getting our core brands right,” he said. “And in this market, to launch a new-build brand would be hard. We’re almost ready to go and we will have more innovation.”
I assume by upscale he was referring to a potential lifestyle offering in answer to the question. I also wonder if it might be possible to pluck more than just top executives from European partner Rezidor, which recently launched its own lifestyle brand, Hotel Missoni, which debuted last year in the U.K. It’s a partnership with the Italian fashion house of the same name. I have no idea if it would be possible for the collaboration to extend to a third partner in North America, but it’s an interesting thought.