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Sean ONeill

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Trouble with the Soho House & Co merger? MCR Hotels, a cornerstone investor, has gone wobbly at the finish line. MCR was supposed to bring $200 million to the table to help Soho House go private in… | Sean O'Neill

💰 MCR Hotels, a major investor, backed out of a $200 million funding commitment for Soho House & Co's $2.7 billion privatization deal. On Monday, MCR, the third-largest U.S. hotel owner-operator, notified Soho House it couldn't meet its financial obligation by the closing date. Despite this, Soho House plans a stockholders meeting on Thursday. Majority shareholder Yucaipa, owned by Ron Burkle, is seeking alternative funding, potentially from Apollo or other investors.
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The feature story I'm proudest of at Skift (so far) is The New Science of Hotel Pricing. While reporting, I learned that hotel pricing used to be guided by gut instinct and an obession with… | Sean O'Neill | 11 comments

🏨 Hotels are redefining profitability strategies post-pandemic, with a shift from occupancy-focused pricing to maximizing total guest value. This involves tracking various metrics, from airline bookings to pickleball court reservations. Revenue managers are transforming from data crunchers to leaders of commercial strategy and cross-team collaboration. Despite weakened pricing power since pre-pandemic times, luxury hotels remain an exception. This new approach is crucial as the industry adapts to current economic realities.
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Barry Sternlicht rewrote the hotel loyalty playbook with SPG a couple of decades ago. His team's latest attempt at hotel loyalty ditches significant parts of the formula, like tier status and free… | Sean O'Neill | 17 comments

🌳 Barry Sternlicht's 1 Hotels, part of Starwood Hotels, revamped its loyalty program by replacing points with tree plantings and charity donations, doubling membership to 200,000 since July. Members receive a planted tree upon joining, and 1% of spending goes to environmental causes. With only 14 properties, 1 Hotels focuses on community-building as average loyalty nights have dropped from 1.8 to 1.0 since 2016, despite program memberships rising. Skift Research notes travelers typically join 15 programs but engage with few.
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