Preferred Hotels & Resorts

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Preferred Hotels & Resorts

Type	Private
Industry	Hospitality
Founded	1968 (1968)
Headquarters	Newport Beach, CA , United States
Number of locations	Nearly 40
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	John Ueberroth​ (Executive Chairman) Gail Ueberroth​ (Chief​ Creative​ Officer​ &​ Vice-Chairman) Lindsey Ueberroth​ (CEO) Casey Ueberroth​ (Member​ of​ the​ Board​ of​ Directors)
Services	sales, marketing, distribution, quality assurance, and technology solutions[buzzword]
Owner	John Ueberroth Gail Ueberroth Lindsey Ueberroth Casey Ueberroth
Number of employees	300+[1]
Website	preferredhotels.com

Preferred Hotels & Resorts is the world’s largest independent hotel brand, representing more than 650 independent hotels, resorts, and residences, across 85 countries. The company's corporate headquarters is in Newport Beach, California, and it has sales offices worldwide. Preferred Hotels & Resorts does not own, operate, or manage any of the hotels within its portfolio. All of the hotels, resorts, and serviced residences within the Preferred Hotels & Resorts portfolio are independent entities.^[2] The organization's quality standards are measured by yearly anonymous on-site inspections^[3] and real-time quality assessment scores pulled from social media sites.^[4]

History[]

Preferred Hotels & Resorts was founded by 12 North American hoteliers in 1968, originating as a referral organization for hotels, under the name Preferred Hotels Association.^[5] By the organization's 10th anniversary in 1979, the company had begun international expansion with 14 European hotel members as well as its first member in Asia Pacific.

In 1981, the association rebranded under the name Preferred Hotels Worldwide, and ended the personal referral system previously used for membership. The 1990s saw increased transformation as Preferred Hotels Association became a for-profit stock corporation. During this decade, the company also developed a 1,600-point inspection used to determine a hotel’s muster for inclusion in the group. Further advancements were made in the company’s electronic distribution platform, and Preferred opened its first international sales offices. In 2000, the company created a new holding company called IndeCorp (Independent Hotel Corporation).^[6]

In 2004, John Ueberroth became the largest shareholder of IndeCorp and was named CEO and chairman, along with his wife Gail Ueberroth as vice chairman and his daughter Lindsey Ueberroth as executive vice president.^[7] (Ueberroth was a travel industry executive who had previously been a major shareholder of the Ambassadors International travel company together with his brother, former Commissioner of Baseball Peter Ueberroth.^[8][9]) By 2005, Casey Ueberroth had also joined the family business as a managing director for the western United States. That same year, the company decided that the IndeCorp name was lacking a connection to its business,^[10] and changed its name to Preferred Hotel Group.^[11] In 2014, the company entered its 10th year as a privately owned family business, implementing a succession plan with Lindsey Ueberroth as president and CEO,^[12] John Ueberroth as chairman, Gail Ueberroth as vice chairman and Casey Ueberroth as chief marketing officer.^[13][14] In March 2015, the company rebranded, with five distinct hotel collections: Legend, LVX, Lifestyle, Connect, and Preferred Residences.

Over the next nine years, the company made a variety of enhancements to its business model. In 2005, Preferred introduced its Preferred Boutique brand, the first major initiative spearheaded by Lindsey Ueberroth. One year later, Preferred introduced a guest benefit program called I Prefer that was implemented across all of its brands and offered soft benefits such as complimentary Internet and welcome amenities for travelers who enrolled in membership. Additionally, the company launched its corporate responsibility program GIFTTS, to recognize and reward member hotels within the hospitality industry in one of three categories: community, philanthropy, and the environment.^{[citation needed]}

In 2014, the company entered its 10th year as a privately owned family business, implementing a succession plan with Lindsey Ueberroth as president and CEO,[10] John Ueberroth as chairman, Gail Ueberroth as vice chairman and Casey Ueberroth as chief marketing officer.[11][12] 

In March 2015, the company made a bold move to go against industry trends by rebranding, a major undertaking that took its previous six-brand model to one master brand, Preferred Hotels & Resorts, inclusive of five distinct hotel collections: Legend, L.V.X, Lifestyle, Connect, and Preferred Residences.^{[citation needed]}

In 2018, Preferred Hotels & Resorts named Kristie Goshow as chief marketing officer, and promoted both Michelle Woodley to president and Caroline Klein to executive vice president, corporate communications & public relations – expanding non-family members’ roles in the company and increasing women executives in its ranks.^{[citation needed]}

Preferred Hotels & Resorts is managed by parent company Preferred Hotel Group, Inc., which also manages Historic Hotels of America, Historic Hotels Worldwide, PHG Consulting, and Beyond Green Travel.

References[]