Tom White
Astor Lodges & Suites, Inc
Case Study
Marketing Strategy

Case Recap In the year of 2005 Astor Lodges Suites, Inc projected that it was the fifth consecutive unprofitable year. The company’s new president and CEO Joseph James set a goal in which the company HAD to achieve, that goal was to gain profit within two years. The company was formed in 1979 and has 250 properties in ten Midwestern states (200 Astor Lodge and 50 Astor Lodge & Suites). The net-loss of the company is $15.7 million so four senior vice presidents were bought in to present the effects of the last five years. Kelly Elizabeth who is very experienced in the marketing field was bought in to try and solve and help with a profitable year …show more content…

The “frontier strategy” has not yet to be rendered effective which could affect the company if not successful.

Alternatives The situation and plan needs to be put in place and worked on in the next couple of years. If the company can stick by this plan with limited changes then I believe they will see progress until the company is back making profit. The main aim is to decide what hotels will attract first time guests and increase occupants by location in the Midwestern states. The company should settle on either offering limited service hotels or full service. Also, a dramatic alternative could be for the company to only use hotels which are making profit each year and close the ones that are not making profit. These hotels can maybe be used for other opportunities. Guest profile should be decided instead of mixing between the vacation and business traveller.

Recommendations There are drastic ways for the company to profit from but a high risk such as closing underperforming hotels and using the profitable hotels only. Sometimes you have to go back to move forward and the company could even sell these in poor locations and look to build more in locations with a higher success rate. The introduction of a few hotels moving to other states is great for promoting the company and a good opportunity for the company to grow so I like the idea of that. Offers on hotel rooms should