The Boutique Hotel Investment Conference, staged in New York on June 4th by the Boutique & Lifestyle Lodging Association (BLLA), was a “resounding success,” says Frances Kiradjian, BLLA’s founder and chairwoman, citing positive feedback from delegates.
More than 200 participants attended the conference, which featured instructive panels on acquisitions, debt financing, growing boutique hotel portfolios, and more.
Horst Schulze, chairman and CEO of the Capella Hotel Group, was the morning session’s keynoter. “The boutique guest expects more heart,” he says. “They are not looking for sleeping factories.” Later interviews with Ian Schrager, founder and chairman of the Ian Schrager Company and Eric Danziger, president and CEO of Hampshire Hotels, provided insights into the industry’s past and future.
The boutique conference-large enough to be highly relevant, yet intimate enough to allow for high-level networking-provides exceptional content, leading industry speakers, and unsurpassed networking. The event’s Diamond sponsors included Real Hospitality Group; The New York Institute of Technology – School of Hospitality Management; JF Capital Advisors; Richard Sandoval Restaurants; CohnReznick; Greenberg Traurig; and Vizergy.
The planning for the 2015 conference, to be held in New York on June 3, 2015, is already underway. Information on it and other BLLA events, as well as other select global conferences in the boutique and lifestyle luxury space, is available on the associations new conference website, bllaevents.com.
About BLLA
The Boutique & Lifestyle Lodging Association (BLLA) is the first and only alliance association dedicated to uniting the world’s independent boutique and lifestyle hotels and small brands. This organization was created to be the unifying voice of this distinctive subset within the hospitality industry. BLLA’s goal is to unite the world’s collection of independent boutique and lifestyle properties and the suppliers that sustain them, offering them the opportunity to successfully compete on a level playing field with major hotel companies, as well as market themselves to meet the ever-increasing demand from discerning boutique-seeking clients.
