Heidi

2. The Albany Marriott is a business hotel located in the heart of Albany, NY. Albany was discovered by Henry Hudson in 1609. Albany is New York State's capital along the Hudson River. It is a city in which is filled with contemporary government buildings, colonial mansions as well as 19th-century townhouses. This hotel has 359 guest rooms with luxurious bedding, spacious bathrooms, and a separate sitting area. The Albany Marriott was bought by Columbia Sussex Corporation a few years ago. Even though the hotel is owned by Columbia Sussex, the hotel keeps the name Marriott. Not only is the name the same but the hotel follows all of the Marriott standards and benefits. The objective in which this hospitality business is going to take is to maintain current levels of business and to identify additional opportunities for promotion.

3. External Analysis:

4. The Market:

5. Potential market segments are a wide range of people. Including business people throughout the State and even Country, and also people State wide for personal or company events.

6. Albany, NY is doing exceptionally well on sales, the economy has not affected rooms sales as much as numerous other hospitality businesses in other areas has been effected.

7. Trends:

8. Political trends remarkably affect the Albany Marriott because the local of the hotel are within miles of the Capitol building and Capitol affairs. Many politicians stay at the Albany Marriott and some attend conventions in which the Albany Marriott holds.

9. Social trends affect the Albany Marriott as well. Many auctions are held at the Albany Marriott as well as fundraisers, holiday parties, ceremonies, weddings and much more. These social events bring many people throughout the state to the Albany Marriott.

10. Technological meeting equipment is all inclusive for planned events at the Albany Marriott. Such equipment includes, AV equipment, Film projector, LCD Panel, LCD projector, Overhead projector, Rear screen projection, and a stage in which is installed and portable.

11. The competition: The Desmond: on Albany Shaker Road, Albany NY. This hotel is about the same size as the Albany Marriott with the guest rooms and banquet rooms approximately the same size. This hotel brings in a lot of business people and social events in the banquet department. It’s a very popular place for particularly romantic weddings of usually large numbers. The custom work throughout the hotel and antiqued style attracts people with a certain taste for either the weekend getaway or their stay.

12. Crown Plaza: In Downtown Albany, NY. This hotel is very popular for business people who come to Albany for business. A lot of politicians stay here because of the convenient location just a few blocks from the capitol buildings where important conferences are held. Also a very popular place for people who are either performing or attending events at the Times Union Center, whether it be a concert, hockey game or dirt bike race.

13. Holiday Inn: Located on Wolf Road in Albany, NY. This hotel is about one minute away from the Albany Marriott. This hotel attracts the same exact people the Albany Marriott attracts, business people and social events. The only difference that a guest may prefer the Albany Marriott over the Holiday Inn is that either a built relationship with the Marriott, reputation of the Albany Marriott, or the cost of the Marriott is slightly more that the Holiday Inn.

14. Potential target markets include business people, politicians who are performing work at the capitol, businesses with a large spending budget, large convention groups. Usually Middle aged people stay at this hotel. 3. Internal Analysis:<br />A. Product or service: <br />1. Tangible assets include the location of the Albany Marriott, in the heart of Albany, NY, the great dimension of the business, and modern recently renovated space. With 359 guest rooms, 19 meeting rooms of different sizes, and 16,000 square feet of those meeting rooms. The grand ballroom alone is 9636 square feet which can hold up to 1400 guests. This hotel always has highly trained managers on staff while functions are going on.<br />2. Intangible assets include highly trained staff; each employee is required to attend a meeting every 3 months to retrain employee’s aspects of hotel, what needs improvement, and praise for accomplishments. <br />3. Quality of service is high end service. The Albany Marriott will, “do whatever it takes to take care of the Customer.quot;
<br />4. The representation is very sophisticated and elegant. This business takes the time to cover every aspect of the hotel and expand to greatness. <br />5. The Sprit to Serve Basics is guidelines as to how to keep each and every guest satisfied. Within the Basics include ways to solve problems or issues a guest may have. The Albany Marriott will make sure each guest is 100% satisfied and their stay.<br />6. The Albany Marriott is within just a few miles from Colonie Center Mall and Regal Cinemas, only five minutes from Albany Intel Airport, twenty minutes to downtown Albany, and only thirty minutes away from Saratoga Springs. The Desmond is just two quick minutes away from the Albany Marriott which means The Desmond is just about equal distance to the above destinations. The Holiday Inn express is only one minutes away from the Albany Marriott hence roughly the same amount to time to the above destinations. The Crown Plaza is located in downtown Albany which is within walking distance to the Plaza, Times Union Center, and many fine dining restaurants, including Jacks Oyster House. <br />B. Place<br />Only a few minutes from this Albany hotel, guests will find companies such as General Electric, Bank of America, Verizon Wireless, Colonie Center and Regal Cinemas and a broad variety of businesses in Tech Valley. Also close to local attractions Saratoga Race Track and Racino, Albany International Airport, The Plaza and Times Union Center located in Downtown Albany. <br />C. Promotion<br />1. Personal selling is a key to selling guest rooms at the Albany Marriott. Not door to door personal selling but personall selling in terms of up selling. For example a guest may say they want a standard room, a Front Desk Clerk may up sell by offering a more expensive guest room with more features and maybe reservations at the Market restaurant for dinner.<br />2. Media advertisement is the main promotional facet in which guests find out about events that may be going on at the Albany Marriott. Media advertisement plays a big role in people becoming interested in special promotions that may be going on at a given time. Media advertising including newspapers, TV commercials, and internet.<br />3. When this particular hotel is not making as much money as the demand on certain days/ times of the year, they consider promotions. For example two nights stay for a low rate at a certain time of month. Of course this time of month will be the slowest time so they obtain business. <br />4. One of the successful ways this hotel is effective with public relations is by sponsoring events. When the Albany Marriott sponsors events, the name is put out there. <br />5. The Albany Marriott doesn’t particular attend trade shows, however they host some trade shows at the hotel. For example the Baby Expo, this brings many mothers to the hotel with their babies or soon to be babies. This is very important that it runs smoothly because this is where people are observing the whole day and may recommend the Albany Marriott for a wedding, or even a weekend getaway. <br />6. Direct mail is a very common way to promote the business. However when direct mail goes out to guests whom have stayed at the Albany Marriott, it promotes the name Marriott, not particularly the Albany Marriott. When a guest checks into the hotel, one the questions that are asked is an e-mail address. This is how Marriott contacts the guests through direct mail.<br />7. Marriott has a corporate website which has every Marriott in the whole world on it, including the Albany Marriott. From that website, the Albany Marriott could be found.<br />D. Price<br />1. The pricing at the Albany Marriott is about the same at The Desmond, Crown Plaza, and Holiday Inn. However it costs more at the Albany Marriott during the week (Monday-Thursday) than the other competition hotels. Which is usually between $250-$300 a night. This is because the Albany Marriott is a business hotel and most people stay at the hotel during the week, rather than the weekends. Unless is there is a wedding, prom or a social event which is usually anytime between Friday and Sunday. The hotel will recognized that there may be an event and will rack the rates up for the rooms when those events are held. <br />2. The price perceived by guests before walking into the hotel is about $ 180 a night. However when a guest enters the hotel, and is informed of all the amenities available the perceived cost per night at the Albany Marriott will range between $200-$250. <br />3. Guests are willing to pay a range of $200- $350 depending on the time of year and week. <br />E. The human resources department are highly trained professionals. They all have a range of Associate degrees and Bachelors’ degrees and have been the in hospitality industry for a long time. Hunan resources include the front desk agents, managers on duty, concierge, banquet servers and restaurant servers, and bell men. Every three months every employee is required to attend a meeting to refresh the standards of the hotel and how to make the hotel a more successful place. Also each server who may serve alcohol is required to attend a TIPS meeting, which is training for serving alcohol, to recertify every six months. This course teaches and reminds employees how to serve alcohol safely and efficiently. <br />2. Financial resources department has about two people on the staff whom take care of all monetary aspects of the hotel. The hotel has a great money return on the throughout the departments. This means that the hotel is eligible to reinvest money into the hotel. <br />3. The only technological resource people whom work at the Albany Marriott are the Engineering department. Engineering staff are trained to fix anything and everything that may go wrong or that may need advancement throughout the hotel. There are computer that can calculate number of room’s rates and amount of people in hotel, the point of sales, and all aspects of property management and much more. There is no staff at the hotel that may fix them if something where to go wrong with them. However, the hotel has a relationship with a company that fixing the technological difficulties that may occur throughout the hotel. <br />4. The sales department and the General Manager usually create marketing plans for the hotel.<br />5. This business is willing to take a high risk for marketing the business. The Albany Marriott is confident and strong. <br />4. SWOT Analysis:<br />A. The Albany Marriott has had a great reputation for excellent service. This successful business was renovated in 2007 to a exceptionally modern and chic atmosphere. The lobby and restaurant was completely remodeled as well as the guest rooms. The Albany Marriott’s highly trained professionals in their field of study throughout the hotel creates a sense of confidence in the employees which shows the guests the high end service they are receiving. <br />B. Currently the biggest weakness the Albany Marriott holds is that they are without a sues chief. The sues chief was fired in March and hotel has been trying to hold up without one. There is a very experienced chief who is taking initiative in performing the “dutys” of a sues chief. <br />C. Creating a marketing plan with another business will help bring in a broad range of people into the hotel. It will also gain a relationship with another company which is great for contributing for a stronger and wealthier Albany. <br />D. The Desmond Hotel which is only within miles away is the greatest threat to the Albany Marriott. The Desmond is very similar to the Marriott and lately is taking some of the large conventions away from the Marriott. The biggest convention that was taken from the Marriott was the Baby Expo, this hurts the Marriott so bad because the Baby expo brings in so many different people and those people may look at the hotel while at the event and think maybe it would be a great place for a personal event. That’s where future weddings, proms, and other social events come from. <br />5. Action Plan:<br />A. Review all business that has left, and where that business went. Inform all previous business about marketing plan or what may interest them to come back again. Also put add in the Times Union to inform new businesses or people.<br />B. Put add in Sunday paper this week so everyone can see about two weeks in advance of when the marketing plan will begin. <br />C,D. I, Heidi Bendick will make the add submit it to the Times Union. I will also make create an add to send in the mail to all previous businesses, including the business lost in the past. <br />E. Sending out all mail to past business will cost about $500 and putting the add in the Times Union will cost about $500 too. All together this marketing plan will cost $1000. <br />F. Tracking the success of this plan will include the following: documenting when known business who have left the hotel for another for a different hotel returns to the Albany Marriott, asking guests how they heard of the business and why are they are attending.<br />G. The contingency plan is to put another add in the Times Union if the first add falls through. <br />