Design Hotels is SPG’s latest brand addition
Starwood has made a “soft” acquisition of another brand to its portfolio. This time, it’s Design Hotels, a collection of selected hotels across the globe. To me, this sounds more like a partnership than a full portfolio brand, but lets see how things progress over time. Till then, here's what you need to know about Design Hotels, their Indian connections, and how you can benefit as an SPG member.
SPG Members staying at participating hotels will receive the following benefits:
Other on-property benefits such as upgrades, late checkout, Your24 or Suite Night Awards will not be available at participating hotels. Free Night redemption is expected to be available early 2016. Here are some FAQs as well.
What exactly is Design Hotels?
From Starwood's page, launching Design Hotels:
Established in 1993 as the first of its kind, Design Hotels represents and markets a hand-selected collection of hotels around the globe. Its large, vibrant, and engaged community of followers understands Design Hotels' portfolio offers them the unexpected and the original, as well as genuine hospitality, cultural authenticity and thought-provoking design and architecture, all in a wide variety of settings, including great capital cities, island retreats, mountain resorts, offbeat spots and far beyond.
A selection of Design Hotels is now proudly joining forces with the Starwood Preferred Guest® Program.
For SPG Members this means the opportunity to experience additional amazing hotels in top destinations – while being recognized and rewarded with SPG benefits unique to Design Hotels. Design Hotels exhibits a passion for genuine hospitality, cultural authenticity and thought-provoking design and architecture.
A selection of Design Hotels is now proudly joining forces with the Starwood Preferred Guest® Program.
For SPG Members this means the opportunity to experience additional amazing hotels in top destinations – while being recognized and rewarded with SPG benefits unique to Design Hotels. Design Hotels exhibits a passion for genuine hospitality, cultural authenticity and thought-provoking design and architecture.
Benefits for SPG members
- 2 Starpoints per eligible US dollar spent (with a 50% bonus for SPG Gold and Platinum members, and 100% bonus for Platinum members with a minimum of 75 Eligible Nights)
- Night and stay credit toward elite status
- Free in-room internet access and bottled water in room for all members
- Gold Preferred and Platinum Preferred Members will automatically receive a Starpoints bonus as their Welcome Gift.
Other on-property benefits such as upgrades, late checkout, Your24 or Suite Night Awards will not be available at participating hotels. Free Night redemption is expected to be available early 2016. Here are some FAQs as well.
As of now, only these Design Hotels members are partner hotels of SPG. None of these are Indian hotels. However, it is expected that more hotels will be added soon to the partnership.
The India perspective
Design Hotels currently operates 9 hotels in India, being:
Conclusion
Directionally, I'm excited about this partnership, simply because it brings a larger number of hotels into the SPG members' purview - whether or not you view it as a partnership or a portfolio expansion. Once the Indian hotels are integrated into the SPG fold, it helps establish a wider presence of SPG properties in India. Also, some of the Indian members hotels of Design Hotels are fantastic properties, so to have SPG benefits for stays at those hotels will be amazing! Finally, given the relative prices of these hotels (and hopefully, they shouldn't drastically change), there's very good scope for some price arbitrage to gain status (read: mattress running!) for those who are interested.
What's your take on this partnership, and how would you strategise your SPG game once the Indian hotels become available?
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