History and Details of the Company Marriott International - Case Study Example

TOURISM RESEARCH PAPER History and Details of the Company Marriott International, Inc. is an American hospitality company that manages a broad portfolio of hotels, corporate housing and other lodging facilities in the global market. It is a public limited company and the company was founded by J. Willard Marriott in the year 1927. The company is served its services in more than 80 countries in the world. The headquarters of this company is situated at Maryland in United States. This company has more than one franchise in Europe, Latin America, U.S, Canada, Middle East, Africa and Asia – Pacific countries. Bill Marriott is the executive chairman and Arne Sorenson is the President & CEO of this company. Carl T. Berquist is the Executive Vice President and Chief financial Officer. Simon F. Cooper is the President and Managing Director of Asia Pacific region, Davis J. Grissen is the Group President, Carolyn B. Handlon is the Executive Vice President – Finance, Bancroft S. Gordon is the Vice President, Senior Counsel and Corporate Secretary. Branding and Marketing The above mentioned logo is used by Marriott International, Inc. Current slogan or tagline of this company is ‘A World of Opportunity; Your Home Away from Home; Live like a Local’. This new tagline represents the mission of the company. They want that each guest can feel that they are in their temporary residence and lots of space; great bedding facility and form of personal relationship with friendly and cooperative staffs will help to build their home feelings. Basically their target market is upper middle class and high income group, corporate, families, honeymoon couples etc. Among corporate segment this can be said that the company lent their conference halls to different business entities for the purpose of meeting and other official programs. They are also targeting the business travelers in different countries. The company is using mostly the news media for attracting their target customers throughout the world. Among the news media they are using television, radio, print media and online media as their mode of communication with target market. They are also using social media to disclosure various information about the company. Again they are using their official web site for receiving feedback from the customers about their services and any further suggestion that can improve their services more than the present stage. Direct marketing, reference group are also used by Marriott International, Inc. Marriott International, Inc. has acquired the Gaylord Hotels brand from Gaylord Entertainment at $ 210 million. This acquisition is added 4 more hotels with 7, 800 rooms in the portfolio of Marriott. Again in April, 2014 the company has acquired 116 hotels from Protea Hospitality Group (PHG) which is based in Africa (Aswathappa, 2008). From the above mentioned acquisitions the company is getting significant benefit as they have expanding their business activities as well as they can provide more number of room to their customers. They can provide their services in new regions in the world and also can meet more demands and expectations of their huge number of customers. Employees Presently they have more than 3, 00, 000 employees in their business. This huge number of employees are employed in their 3, 700 lodging properties in 80 countries and territories. Nearly 10, 000 employees are employed only in New Jersey and New York. Currently few openings are there at different departments of this company. These departments are administrative department, food, beverage & culinary department, landscaping and grounds, loss prevention and security and housekeeping & laundry department. Some available positions are Front office supervisor, Front desk supervisor, Executive administrative assistant, director for sales and marketing department, night auditor, guest service representative, guest room attendant, housekeeping supervisor etc. The employees are getting competitive benefit packages for the purpose of their own travel to any city and country. This package may vary from country to country and also for employment laws and practices. Employees are getting hotel room discount at any branch hotel of this company throughout the world. They are getting discounts on food and beverage items and retail discount offers in the gift shops which are situated at the lobby of each hotel. Again employees are getting suitable and affordable pay facilities and also competitive advancement opportunities (Thompson and Martin, 2010). Global Impact Marriott International, Inc. met the expectations of customers for more than 85 years and also in a successful way. So the company has a strong global impact in the international market. It has a high class brand value than its competitors and uncompromising ethical and legal standard in all the aspects of its business. They believe that their success is grounded on the basis of their values and purposes. Marriott International, Inc. holds 5.6 % of market share and ranked second in the market where as Hilton Hotels Corporation holds 7.2 % of market share and ranked 1st in the market. Taj Hotels, Starwood Hotels, Hilton Hotels etc are the major competitors of Marriott International, Inc. (Marriot, 2014). Effect on Ecology The sustainable strategy of Marriott International, Inc. supports their business growth and along with the growth it also helps to preserve and protect natural resources of this planet. This company has taken some goals regarding environment in their business activities. These goals are – reduction in energy and water consumption at least 20 % by the year 2020, empower hotel development partners to build green hotels in the world, conducting proper training for staffs and awareness program for guests to preserve and conserve natural resources such as power, water when they use for their own purpose and last but not the least green the supply chain system. So this can be clearly observed that the company is an eco friendly company which maintains the ‘green’ concept in their business activities. Again this can be said that this company is a carbon neutral business entity which calculates the carbon foot print. Marriott International, Inc. has taken some steps or initiatives to fulfill the above mentioned purposes. They launch a plan to conserve water resource, improve energy efficiency and support those projects which can reduce deforestation. They use Energy and Environmental Action Plan (EEAP) in this regard. Marriott International, Inc. is working in partnership with the U.S. Green Building Council for developing ‘green’ hotel concept in their business (Wetherly and Otter, 2014). Corporate Social Responsibility Marriott International, Inc. is a responsible business concern who delivers not only the exceptional business services but also demonstrate business principles based on human rights, environment etc. Corporate social responsibility is a very common practice in this company. The company is always standing against exploitation of children and human trafficking activities. They publish their human right policies and provide training also on this issue. The business ethics training program conducted by this company also reinforce the importance of ethical responsibilities and corporate values. Growth Potential Marriott International, Inc. is one of the largest hotel business companies in the today’s world market and it can be said that this company has achieved this position for the growth it has faced in the previous 85 years. The company faced positive earnings per share growth for last two years and annual average sales growth of 2.52 % over the past 5 years. In future they will go for implementing few of their upcoming growth plans. They decided to build 15 additional hotels by the end of 2016 and more than 30 hotels in the next 3 years only in U.S and Latin America. The management of this company has planned to expand their business activities in new places and new regions of the world in future. These places include Nanjing in China, Los Cabos in Mexico, Macao, Bali in Indonesia, and Panama City in Panama, Tunis in Tunisia etc (Cullen and Parboteeah, 2009). References Aswathappa, K. (2008). International Business. Noida: Tata McGraw-Hill Education. Cullen, J. and Parboteeah, K. (2009). International Business: Strategy and the Multinational Company. New York: Routledge. Marriot. (2014). Environment. Retrieved from: http://www.marriott.com/corporate-social-responsibility/corporate-environmental-responsibility.mi. Thompson, J., and Martin, F. (2010). Strategic Management: Awareness & Change. Hong Kong: Cengage Learning EMEA. Wetherly, P. and Otter, D. (2014). The Business Environment: Themes and Issues in a Globalizing World. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More