AMRivlin

I am really shocked this hasn't been discussed here yet.

In November 2013 Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Chairman of Kingdom Holdings (Major Shareholder of Four Seasons and FHRI) discussed a merger of the 2 brands and possible IPO. He will divert to his analysts advice.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-1...-fairmont.html

It does make sense, seeing as 4S and FM are both HQ in Toronto.

The Prince also owns the physical hotels of FM Savoy, 4S George V, FM Sonoma, RF Praslin, FM Monte Carlo.

There would no doubt be major overlap in luxury sectors, but I think they could rebrand Raffles/4 Seasons into their high end brand, and FM as more of their midrange. I would personally think they should merge Swiss and FM brands, as I still think Swiss has no brand loyalty due to sporadic coverage.

Additional Conjecture... Kingdom Holding also owns 33% of German Hotelier Movenpick. Could there be even greater consolidation?

I welcome this with open arms!

Statistics:
Raffles - 10
Fairmont - 70+10
Swissotel - 29
Four Seasons 92
Movenpick 81
(About 300 properties between the 3 companies)

Overlap 4S vs FRHI (About 30 cities have both brands)

AMRivlin

Cities with both Four Seasons and Fairmont/Raffles/Swiss.

New York
San Francisco
Chicago 1-FM, 1-SW, 2-4S
Boston 2-FM, 1-4S
Washington D.C.
Seattle
Los Angeles
Scottsdale
Dallas
Austin
San Jose/Palo Alto
Santa Fe
Toronto
Vancouver 4-FM, 1-4S
Whistler
Cairo 3-FM, 2-4S
London 1-FM, 2-4S
Geneva
Paris
Sydney
Shanghai 1-FM, 2-4S
Singapore 1-FM, 2-SW, 1-RF, 2-4S
Bangkok 2-SW, 1-4S
Bali 1-FM, 2-4S
Jakarta
Baku
Istanbul 1-FM, 1-SW, 1-RF, 2-4S
Moscow
Amman
Riyadh
Seychelles RF-Praslin, 4S-Mahe

Singapore (6) and Vancouver (5) would have the most joint overlap.

Jasper2009

Interesting. There´s always a lot of movement in the market concerning who owns/manages a particular hotel or group of hotels. But a merger of the Four Seasons and Fairmont brands would be a huge thing.

Be careful what you wish for. From a customer perspective I´m not sure this would be good: FS doesn´t have a true loyalty program, Fairmont has a pretty decent loyalty program and the Swissotel program is quite unremarkable - management may just decide to choose the smallest common denominator.

I agree Raffles and Four Seasons could easily be combined when looking at it from a product perspective, but would properties such as the Raffles Singapore really want to change their brand affiliation?

I very much disagree with your Fairmont - Swissotel merger proposal. In terms of product, pricing and customer segment Fairmont is much closer to FS than Swissotel.

Swissotel does have some brand loyalty in Europe and Asia, but not much in NA. Even the better Swissotel properties aren´t particularly impressive.

Jasper2009

Do you happen to have a source regarding the 100% ownership? The most recent information I could find was the 2012 annual report of Kingdom Holding and according to the report Kingdom Holding only owns 33.3% of Mövenpick.

AMRivlin

You are correct. I will edit the first post. (Wikipedia misled me)

http://www.kingdom.com.sa/investment...nies/movenpick

AMRivlin

Perhaps all 4 brands could reflag/categorize. Raffles Singapore would never lose it's affiliation. Singapore, Dubai, Vancouver, Shanghai have more than 4 properties, they could be the brand centres for the group with flagships of each brand.

You could easily rebrand Plaza and Savoy as Raffles or Four Seasons. You wouldn't want to lose the Four Seasons flag as it has quite a strong brand, but you could say: Four Seasons @ Raffles Singapore.

-Raffles could become the Heritage Place Brand synonymous with Colonial Historic Properties, or be decommissioned outside of Asia.
-Four Seasons could be used in all 4-5 star properties
-Fairmont could be used on most 4 star properties
-Swiss/Movenpick could be used to represent Business Hotels (3 Star)

FM and SW are a story of extremes.

Swissotel Tallin, Estonia is quite nice. It is centrally located and is quite luxurious.

Fairmont Newport Beach, USA is quite a dump, and in a less than desirable location (even though it says Newport Beach, it is located in Irvine, but closer to Santa Ana than Newport.)


Four Seasons Loyalty Program: "By Invitation"
http://loyaltylobby.com/2013/08/27/f...yalty-program/

Jasper2009

I agree that some properties could be rebranded, but the brand affiliation of many FS and Fairmont properties is very strong. I´m not convinced merging the brands would make a huge amount of sense. However, many Swissotel properties are somewhat generic properties that could be affiliated with any 3.5*-4* chain.

The status of "By Invitation" is somewhat ambigious, see this thread. In any case I wouldn´t call it a true loyalty program - more of an unofficial guest recognition program without any published qualifying criteria and somewhat vague benefits.

gpapadop

I believe I read somewhere that Four Seasons was working on a true royalty program.

Thinking selfishly....I don't think the Fairmont Lifetime Plats will make out fine here if this merger goes through. I think a lot of stars will need to align. Would love to have another choice and perhaps another...robe

ZenWorld

It is great news if Fairmont can finally come up with a loyalty program that could compete with the other major chains. I would really welcome the addition of 4 Seasons if it has a great loyalty program. (Else what is the point of the addition where there is no branding synergies?)

Fairmont and Swissotel are quite different; a loyalty program of 4 Seaons, Raffles, Fairmont, Swissotel is fine. Starwood does a good job with their different brands too. Just figure out a good loyalty program.

LarkSFO

Now that would be my kind of program!

DYKWIA?

Ancien Maestro

The Four Seasons loyalty program by invite has been discontinued.

Frankly, it doesn't excite me to have Four Seasons in the fold as the Four Seasons Loyalty program will probably run separate from FPC, swissotel, and raffles. Might be exciting for the owners, but to consumers, it will be business as usual.