Business Overview of Marriott Corporation

Bethesda, Maryland is the headquarters of Marriott International Incorporate. This unique organization transpired from a root beer stand in 1927 into a world-renowned hospitality hotel chain in 1957. Information provided will focus on the evolution of the root beer stand into the Marriott International Incorporate vast hospitality empire. Today, the Marriott hospitality industry has 5,756 hotels with 30 brands in 118 countries with 1.1 million rooms. Additionally, the Marriott generated $14 billion in revenue during 2016 and had over 85 million combined loyalty members between the Marriott and Starwood Preferred Guest reward programs. Furthermore, Marriott partnered with Universal Music Group to bring their rewards member’s additional

In this report, we will be concentrating on Millennial hotels - hotels that target Millennials or have a Millennial-liked mindset. We will discuss the factors, specifically revolving around the marketing mix, that are likely to affect the success of Millennial hotels.

In April 1988, Dan Cohrs, vice president of project finance at the Marriott Corporation, was preparing his annual recommendations for the hurdle rates at each of the firm 's three divisions. Investment projects at Marriott were selected by discounting the appropriate cash flows by the appropriate hurdle rate for each division. In 1987, Marriott 's sales grew by 24% and its return on equity stood at 22%. Sales and earnings per share had doubled over the previous four years, and the operating strategy was aimed at continuing this trend. Marriott 's 1987 annual report stated: We intend to remain a premier growth company. This means

(9) Marriott puts a lot of attention to hiring the best talent and based on the results they have achieved so far, we can conclude that their assessment center and the selection process work very well. The selection process includes several steps. Each step provides Marriott with valuable information about a candidate including information about his skills and experiences. The length of the selection process depends on the position, location and number of applicants. Marriott ranks several preferred candidates and if the first one denies the offer, it proceeds with the offer to the second one, and so on until one of the candidates accepts the offer. This saves a lot of time for the company.

Hampton decided to buy back their stock because they were confronting many dissident stockholders at the moment. Besides, the company had always maintained a conservative financial policy. Having to spend 3 million on the repurchase affected their cash balance, as well as their payable accounts, that in turn it increases creditors and suppliers claims against the company.

According to the article, “[i]n 1987, Marriott’s sales grew by 24% and its return on equity stood at 22%. Sales and earnings per share had doubled over the previous four years, and the operating strategy was aimed at continuing this trend” (HBR, 9-298-101, p.1). The article also noted that the company intends to “…aggressively develop opportunities within [their] chosen line of business” (HBR, 9-298-101, p.1). Currently, Marriott’s four components of their financial strategy are:

We determined the WACC of the Lodging business to be 9.70% by using the same method of analysis.

The Warsaw Marriott case that’s assessed in this paper is a decision case where Stan Bruns (at the time general manager of the Warsaw Marriott) had to make important decisions regarding its pricing strategy and think of ways to protect Marriott’s work force from its comp set.

The hotel chain, Astor Lodge and Suites, Inc., operates 250 properties in 10 western and Rocky Mountain states. The company’s customer base primarily comprises business travelers. In addition, the locations of the properties surround airports, large regional shopping centers, and major highways close to suburban industrial sites as well as office complexes. Projections of 2005 fiscal year forecast a fifth consecutive year of a gross loss for the firm. The estimates include an anticipated $422.6 million in company lodging revenues but a net loss of $15.7 million for 2005. As a result, Joseph James, president and CEO of Astor Lodge and Suites, Inc., initiated a challenging goal for executive management to devise a strategy achieving net profits in two years and sustaining positive growth in the future.

Since its foundation in 1927 Marriott Corporation grew into one of the leading lodging and food services in the US. With three major business lines: lodging, contract services and related business, Marriott has the intention to remain a premier growth company. To achieve this goal the corporation’s strategy is to develop aggressively appropriate opportunities within their business lines. Marriott would like to be the preferred employer, the preferred provider and the most profitable company in each of the operating areas. The financial strategy includes four key elements:

• What is the cost of capital for Marriott’s as a whole at the prevailing capital structure vs. at the target capital structure.

This case involves the study of the Hamilton Hotel and the use of forecasting to help predict their demand on a specific day. Marriott Hotels operated the Hamilton hotel. Marriott has been known for a culture that puts people first. Marriott is recognized worldwide for their enduring values, their spirit to serve, and their corporate commitment to creating better places to live and work.

In January 1980, the management of the Marriott Corporation found itself in an interesting dilemma: not only did the corporation have considerable excess debt capacity, but projections of future operations and cash flows indicated that this capacity was on the rise. For Marriott, excess debt capacity was viewed as comparable to unused plant capacity because the existing equity base could support additional productive assets. Management was therefore faced with two problems. First, it needed to determine the amount of funds that would be available if Marriott's full debt capacity were utilized. Second, management needed to decide whether to invest excess funds in new or existing businesses, or to return them to the companies shareholders

The following case analysis portraits the use of capital asset pricing model to compute the weighted average cost of capital for Marriott and each of its divisions. The flow of events below is following a string of different evaluations, each of which is assessed separately.

MGM Resorts is scheduled to report fourth quarter earnings February 18, after the market closes. The company is coming off 3 consecutive quarters of beating on the bottom line with similar expectations for this Thursday. The Estimize consensus is calling for EPS of $0.09, 1 cent higher than Wall Street, and revenue expectations of $2.282 billion, roughly $30 million higher than the Street. Compared to Q4 2014, this represents a projects YoY increase in EPS of 29% while revenue is expected to fall 3.6%. That said, the Estimize community has been bullish on MGM’s profitability, revising their top line estimates up 50%, since the company's most recent report. All eyes will be on casino performance in Las Vegas and Macau when the company reports