" the ability to add value to assets both through improvements and operating performance , as Well as layering on design and branding , makes the hotel industry easily one of the most fascinating industries there is ."
InsIde the
mInd of a deal maker
Starwood Capital ' s big man in Britain leads a team going the extra mile to create two new , U . K . -centric brands .
by Jeff Weinstein , editor in chief
COdy BradSHaw says tenacity is the key to success as a hotel dealmaker . When you work for Starwood Capital Group mastermind , Chairman and CEO Barry Sternlicht , tenacity is likely a prerequisite to not only see opportunities but to aggressively pursue them and find creative ways to make the winning bids .
Take Starwood Capital ’ s February 2013 acquisition of the 23-property Principal Haley portfolio , one of the linchpins of Starwood Capital ’ s soon-to-be-launched U . K . -platform , which includes three recently acquired portfolios ( add Four Pillars and De Vere Venues ) totaling some 50 hotels and 7,000 rooms . Add another four bolt-on acquisitions , three in Scotland , and the combined investment is somewhere north of US $ 800 million .
Bradshaw , senior vice president at Starwood Capital Group and head of European hotels , describes how his team went above and beyond to underwrite a deal . They met with OTAs , group travel agents , wholesalers and corporate accounts to access and identify forward-looking demand data that wasn ' t publicly available . “ They actually gave us insight in to their future bookings in to these markets . Even when the industry ' s headlines warned of a double-dip recession , we had demand data on all these markets that suggested otherwise .” To take it a step further , Bradshaw ’ s team accessed Principal Haley ’ s Google analytics account and audited its website to develop a strategy . At the end of the day , his team made the deal that is key to the upcoming reveal and opportunity .
“ Everybody else relied on basic underwriting and newspaper headlines ,” says Bradshaw , who also happens to be a 6-foot- 8-inch former Cornell University basketball player from Memphis , Tennessee , who discovered his love for hotel real estate while in college . “ I think it ' s going back to that tenacity , judgment and experience that allows you to be an effective dealmaker .”
Emerging hotel company Now that Starwood Capital ’ s first wave of U . K . dealmaking is done ( there could be additions to the distinct portfolios of urban and country hotels ), efforts are underway to reposition the assets into what Bradshaw loosely refers to as the U . K .’ s version of Kimpton hotels , where every property tells a story and the portfolio is food and beverage and design driven – both Starwood Capital trademarks .
" the ability to add value to assets both through improvements and operating performance , as Well as layering on design and branding , makes the hotel industry easily one of the most fascinating industries there is ."
www . hotelsmag . com April 2016 HOTELS 31