Rosewood Hotels & Resorts Case Study

Background
The Rosewood Hotels & Resorts has been in business for close to 25 years. It operates in the luxury hotel segment, with a focus on one-of-a-kind hotels. Each hotel reflects the local culture and character of its location. Up to this point it has allowed properties to thrive on their own with very little corporate identity. However, management feels there is an opportunity for growth in the market and is considering a new brand strategy; one that would establish the Rosewood brand and incorporate it into the name of each property as well as introduce more Rosewood branded items in the hotels. It needs to present its strategy to the Board of Directors and is questioning how far it can push the branding without hurting the individual identities of the properties. Industry
There are two distinct groups in the luxury hotel industry, the “Collections” of individual properties such as Auberge, RockResorts, and Orient-Express, and the Corporate Branded hotels such as the Ritz-Carlton and Four Seasons.
Rosewood operates in the “Collections” group. It built its concept around “A Sense of Place®”, which is meant to reflect how each property captures what is unique about its location. This is fairly typical of the “Collections” brand model, where companies focus branding and marketing on individual properties, with the overall corporate brand relatively muted in the background.
The Corporate Branded hotels focus heavily on their brand name and offer a very similar experience from property to property. An approach one Rosewood executive referred to as “canned and cookie cutter”.
One advantage that the Corporate Branded hotels hold is a higher cross-selling rate. . Corporate Branded hotels have typical cross-selling rates around 10%-15%, while “Collections” typical rates are around 5%-10%. Rosewood has