More Than A Place to Grab A Quick Drink

To Mr. Marriott, hip is something that is chased but never caught, a lesson learned over visits to hundreds of hotels and bars, including Studio 54. "That was a bar that was going great," Marriott said, sipping a glass of water in the lounge. "So I went to see it. When I left there I knew they weren't going to make it and they didn't. There was a hot factor, but that's all there was." It was, he thought, in bad taste.

In many respects, with nearly 3,000 hotels, it would be impractical for the chain to even attempt hipness. By the time a hip concept was implemented in all its hotels, it could fall out of favor. "Staying relevant over time is really so much more important to our owners and our franchisers, who have to make big investments in changes, than in making a splash just at one time," said Michael E. Jannini, Marriott's head of branding.

"It's about this: How do you take this hard-working stereotype of the road warrior and this stereotype of the black-T-shirt-wearing, 4-in-the-morning person, when real life for a lot of our people is in the middle of that?" Jannini said. "How do you create an open environment where people can have a BlackBerry in one hand and a glass of wine in the other?

"What I think our competitors do is create places to play. Our competition is all over play. But the work-play thing has broader applications, and that's where I think we are innovating."

The broader implication, from a business perspective, is to generate more revenue per square foot, because ultimately hotel investors and owners look at hotel properties as pieces of real estate, like office buildings or housing developments. As a manager of hotels, Marriott International has to persuade owners to invest hundreds of millions of dollars on the upgrades. Then, if the changes work, Marriott's management fees will blossom.

The changes will be introduced over the next year or so in 35 hotels, though executives declined to say which ones. A broader rollout will follow as individual hotels make capital improvements.

Marriott will have competition in the lobby-transformation department. Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc., which created the chic W Hotels brand, has a new brand called Aloft that will feature lobby spaces where guests can eat and drink. So will Hyatt Corp.'s new brand, Hyatt Place. Every large hotel company is trying to lure younger, more sophisticated business travelers.

Marriott confesses that some of the changes in style befuddle him.

"We have a generation traveling today that wants to get out of their guest room and be in the lobby," he said. "Maybe they are down there to have a drink. Maybe they are down there to be on the computer. Or to network. I hate to say this, but noise is a big factor. The noisier places are, the more business they seem to do. I don't get it but it's true."

For Marriott, a hands-on executive who is known to lecture his chefs on the importance of toasting hamburger buns so they don't get saturated with juice, the beverage business, given that he doesn't drink, is just about the only part of his company where he steers clear of the little details. "I delegate the beverage side of the business to other people because I don't understand the beverage business at all," he said. "But I have great people who do. I stay away from it and let them do it."

His point people on the project are Robin Uler, senior vice president for food and beverage, and Matthew Von Ertfelda, a vice president and former finalist on the TV show "Survivor," for which he spent 39 days in the Amazon displaying a rare aptitude for swinging a machete and eating just about anything the earth offered.

Neither say they feel any pressure to tiptoe around Marriott because of his religious beliefs, which is the way he said he wants it.

"I've got a company to run and I need to take care of customers," Marriott said. "I live my faith to the very best of my ability but I don't try to impose my beliefs on the customer."