Free Custom «Marriott Hotel» Essay Paper

Introduction

Based in Washington D.C, Marriott Hotels and Resorts is Marriot International’s flagship brand. It consists of full-service resorts and hotels. It is always infiltrated among the Forbes Best companies to Work for list. Marriott Hotels and Resorts was proclaimed the fourth best company to be proud of and work in the United Kingdom, in 2009. This company has expanded its activity by August 2012, 502 hotels and resorts have been operating under this brand.  The company improves its royalty program by the name Marriott Rewards (Raffio 84).

History and Current Operations

J. Willard Marriott founded Marriott Hotel and Resort in 1927. During its foundation, Marriott was not a hotel chain to begin with but a root beer place situated in Washington D.C. Marriott believed that city’s residents were in need of a cool place where they could rest and get cold drinks as they chatted especially during hot summers. Marriott helped the humble root beer place to expand into a restaurant and later became a chain of family restaurants in 1932. In 1953, the restaurant had grown unanimously and started going public (Raffio 85).

In 1957, Marriott opened his first hotel and named it Twin Bridges Mariot Motor Hotel in Arlington, Virginia. Their second hotel Key Bridge Marriott was also opened in Arlington. Key Bridge hotel is Marriott’s longest operating hotel. In 2009, it celebrated its 50^th anniversary. Marriott’s son, J.W (Bill) Marriott Jr. has led Marriott’s company to a spectacular worldwide growth. In March, 2012, Marriott Jr. at the age of 80 took the position of the Chief Executive Officer. After a while, he handed over the responsibility over Sorenson Arne and assumed the role and title of Executive Chairman. Currently, Marriott International has grown to acquire approximately 3,718 lodging properties located in the United States and 73 other countries. This also includes the acquisition of the Ritz-Carton chain. Marriott has turned out to be one of the best companies after taking an important role especially through investment and assuming the debt of this company. Today, this company has lost its past image and is termed as one of the most luxurious hotel chains in the entire world including Ritz Hotel, in London (O’Brien 37).

Marriott is one of the best hotel chains worldwide with varied locations around the world. It offers a perfect gateway that is available to the majority of travelers around the world. It also offers Marriott incentive rewards, which are in the form of gifts that can be achieved by visiting the site or completing paid surveys in order to keep the cost down (Marriott 57).

Challenges

One of the challenges that Marriott hotel faces is that each division of property within Marriott had been using its own mobile phone contacting with various customers.  The solution for this was time consuming, fragmented, and complex to manage. This made Marriott develop the urge to rationalize its ideas and come out with consolidated solutions. These solutions were to provide more accurate and measurable reports, and, therefore, control the cost center. Marriott settled for Adams Phones, which was cooperated as an exclusive supplier in 2001.

The lodging industry was highly competitive, which made Marriott hotel face challenges in finding ways to distinguish its product from competitors. It also encountered difficulty in identifying ways of differentiating its value, quality, and efficiency from competitors. Finally, Marriott encountered challenges in distributing its services. This was because airlines addressed their distribution costs through new deals and eliminating travel agency commissions, and this had negative impacts on hotels, which turned out to be the biggest payer of commissions. This also led to the introduction of more rational economics with airline companies so that they could do their businesses in partnership and reduce costs (Taylor 36).

Marriott hotel believed that its success as a global hospitality was grounded on its values, purpose, and conduct, which were demonstrated each day through excellent service, commitment to the employees, ethical business practices, and its cultural practices. It demonstrated the purposes and principles of responsible business through policies on supply chain, environment, and food chain. Marriott hotel grew to be a leading lodging company. It achieved its high position in the global market because of its core values, which state needs and demands of consumers first, embraced change, pursued excellence, acted with integrity and served the world. Its relentless focus on innovations and action became the culture of its business; it had the most powerful brand portfolio in the entire world. Currently, its strengths interpreted more than just business models. Its unique and storied heritage is a way of doing business which enriches relationships and instills passion for what Marriott is. It also opens doors of opportunities for guests and employees, owners and franchisees, and associates (Taylor 37).

Marriott has automated reservations for hotel accommodations as management tools.  In this essence, MARSHA is a reservation network and a demand management tool, which is linked directly with the global distribution system (GDS) and is operated with major airlines and travel organizations.  On the same note, the global distribution system productivity is achieved because of the good coexistence. Marriott hotel has about 3 percent of the initial worldwide supply of hotel rooms. 20 percent of all realized reservations are made via global distribution systems.  Because of this scenario, MARSHA generated almost one out of every five-room nights to be booked through global distribution system. In 2005, MARSHA  handled 168 million gross room nights, 70 million reservations, and 22 billion US dollars in gross room revenue,  including 280 million dollars in cross-sales among Mariot’s brand. This is what boosted Marriott hotel to become one of the best hotel chains worldwide (Taylor 37).

 Being an international company, Marriott hotels and resorts can be termed as a supply chain and competitor. Marriott began as a simple root beer place in Washington DC but currently has its branches all over the world. It renders excellent services to every customer worldwide (Marriott 57).

In conclusion, Marriott hotel is a successful business that faces challenges like any other business. In the beginning, it did not possess unique qualities and had higher chances of failing to meet targets set in the financial market. Despite the challenges, Marriott developed strategic management program helped identify the areas of weakness and proper solutions to these problems. It managed to develop preventive measures for potential and actual future problems. The growth and development are recommendable because it gives unique and attractive services to customers worldwide. This has helped Marriott maintain a higher position in the world history and global market.