THE INTERVIEW : MICHAEL GROSS
THE MICHAEL
GROSS FILE
BACKGROUND : Gross grew up in an international business family gaining global exposure to the hospitality business , which still serves as inspiration for him today .
WORK LIFE : Working as a former consumer Internet analyst for Lehman turned investment manager for a Ron Burkle fund that invested heavily into Morgans gave Gross his path to the CEO chair . While he doesn ’ t have a hotel background , he does have a hospitality school degree from Cornell .
HIS VISION : Nasdaq-listed Morgans Hotel Group operates 13 hotels today and still owns two , with the Delano in Miami Beach listed for sale . Three concepts are being developed into brands — Hudson , Mondrian and Delano — with 10 properties currently under development from Marrakech to Moscow and Doha . The goal is 30 to 40 hotels within three or four years .
HIS DEFINITION OF ‘ LIFESTYLE ’ HOTELS : Less cookie-cutter , more personalized , featuring public spaces that connect more to local communities , and design-forward . “ If you look at the state of our industry , when people define a hotel , all of those things are top of mind , and increasingly so ,” Gross says . “ At some point soon , people will stop calling these lifestyle hotels , and they will just be hotels , as that is where demand is going .”
FURTHER INSPIRATIONS : Drawing from exciting innovations in technology , fashion and music — disciplines where Morgans guests come from , as well . “ Our goal is that each new hotel will be brand-additive and hopefully will inspire the next phase of design for this industry ,” Gross says .
Michael Gross has spent the past 18 months keeping a somewhat low profile while working on the transformation of Morgans Hotel Group , New York City . An original lifestyle hotel company that suffered from serious debt obligations has sold five of its seven owned assets while retaining management as it morphs into a more pure , publicly traded hotel management company .
The 36-year-old industry outsider with a degree from Cornell ’ s hospitality program joined the Morgans board after managing a US $ 75 million investment into Morgans by Ron Burkle ’ s Yucaipa fund . Since his appointment as CEO in March 2011 , Gross poached former Marriott veterans Dan Flannery and Yoav Gery to act as heads of operations and development ,
Guestroom at the Mondrian in South Miami Beach respectively . He also has brought in new heads of revenue management , sales and design — in addition to a new F & B team . All the while , the one-time equity researcher at Lehman Brothers covering consumer Internet companies worked to grow the company by trading off the legacy assets that were attached to the birth of the lifestyle hotel movement in the 1990s .
The view going forward is to scale the company appropriately on a global level by further developing three core brands — Hudson , Mondrian and Delano . With these brands , Gross says Morgans can effectively retain guests throughout their lifecycles .
The entry-level , edgy Hudson brand has its original hotel in New York City and one under development in
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