Gilda Perez-Alvarado has transformation on her mind.
The former global CEO of JLL's Hotels and Hospitality Group joined French hotel giant Accor at the end of 2023, where she holds two major roles that are all about strategy and bold thinking around venerable travel brands that span not just hotels, but luxury trains and yachts as well.
Now, 15 months into her career change, Accor's chief strategy officer and CEO of Orient Express says it is the company's boldness, transformational nature, accomplished leadership and fascinating brand and cross-hospitality makeup that excite her the most.
"We are in the Golden Age of Travel," she told Hotel News Now.
Luxury and lifestyle lead the way
Perez-Alvarado said that when it comes to the company's overall strategy, it's clear that lifestyle and luxury brands "were outpacing growth relative to premium, midscale and economy, and that was both lifestyle and luxury.”
“If you look back the results have been absolutely extraordinary in that here we have three luxury brands, three of the biggest centenarian brands worldwide,” she said, referring to Fairmont, Orient Express and Raffles.
She said those three brands focus on different parts of the entire Northern Hemisphere—Fairmont in the Americas, Orient Express in Europe and Raffles in Asia.
“Just the fact that over the last decade [these three hotel brands] were acquired and became part of the Accor portfolio … I do not know anyone else who could do it,” she said. Yes, we have the heritage, the beautiful archives of Raffles, Fairmont, Orient Express, but on the lifestyle side we have the founders still working with us to ensure that that DNA gets preserved.”
Accor acquired FRHI Hotels & Resorts in 2016. Today Fairmont has 88 hotels open and in the pipeline in 30 countries. Raffles has 24 hotels in 18 countries. The company picked up a stake in Orient Express in 2017 with the goal of adding hotels to the legacy train brand. Three hotels are in the Orient Express pipeline — two in Italy and one in Saudi Arabia.
Perez-Alvarado said Accor's entrepreneurial focus is another big success factor. The company has placed a lot of strategy emphasis in recent years on food and beverage, wellness, co-working and branded residential.
These strategies combine to spearhead future growth, relevance and share of wallet that goes beyond "just" hotel stays, she said.
"Now from an investment perspective we can look at a piece of real estate and say, okay, this is how we are going to optimize the hotel component of it, but this also is how we are going to operate F&B, this is how we are going to operate wellness, this is how we are going to operate residential."
The model now is, "How we can optimize every foot of the building, as opposed to the old model that it is rooms and every other department is ancillary,” she said.
“Every department now for us is its own business, and that is very, very important,” she added.
Golden Age of Travel
Perez-Alvarado said that even the most luxury brands within Accor, notably her own Orient Express brand, “are taking a page out of the lifestyle playbook."
The lifestyle playbook also talks about sheer luxury, and Orient Express’ hotels and soon-to-arrive trains and yachts unabashedly but demurely shout luxury.
In summer 2024, Accor began a search for a financial partner for Orient Express’ ambitious train-service rollout.
It found one with one of France’s most august firms, LVMH.
“Orient Express is a joint venture between Accor and [LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE] at the parent company level," she said. "What is so extraordinary about it is the fact that we have two French giants redeveloping the most iconic ultra-luxury travel brand that exists,” she said.
She reiterated that LVMH’s wholly owned brand, Belmond, which in addition to hotels owns the Venice-Simplon-Orient-Express luxury train, is separate from Accor and Orient Express’ upcoming trains offerings.
She said Orient Express was founded in 1883, and its new hospitality offerings are very much part of a dream to return some of the wonder to travel.
“We are in the Golden Age of Travel. It is an ideal marriage for Accor and LVMH to be reintroducing the Orient Express travel-asset collection, if you will, that is what they are. … We are in the business of experiences. Our dream at the end of the day is to be able to sell journeys, and journeys can be comprised of perhaps just a hotel stay, maybe just a train or a yacht, or maybe a combination thereof,” Perez-Alvarado said.
“What is so interesting and so rich about this experience is the fact that his is a brand that has a tremendous amount of history. It was a very innovative brand when it started 140 years ago. The founder, Georges Nagelmackers, basically revolutionized travel. He was obsessed with connecting cities and cultures. He spent time in the U.S. perfecting train travel. It was very futuristic, and engineering was a very big part of it," she said.
“We are doing the same now with the trains. We’re in the process of restoring historical trains, of bring them back to life, and we are also redefining some of the trains, for example, the La Dolce Vita train opening in the second quarter of 2025, an ode to the 1950s, celebrating Italy that way,” she said.
She added many of the Italian train’s guests would already have been to Italy many times, but Accor wanted to show them yet another side to the country.
That might be out into Italian waters.
The yacht Orient Express is developing, the Orient Express Corinthian, is set to sail in 2026. Perez-Alvarado called it "very special."
“It is the biggest sailing yacht in the world, 120 meters. It is a sailing yacht, not a motor yacht, which makes it even more special. The mast of it is the height of [Accor’s] headquarters in Paris, so it will be quite something,” she said, adding it will have eight F&B outlets, 54 suites and a cabaret theater.
“It is celebrating the art de vivre that the French know very well, and it is the perfect amalgamation of best in class, the latest engineering technology from the sails to how it is powered to incredible craftsmanship and artisanship,” she said.
For Orient Express’ forthcoming hotels, she said, the portfolio’s individual properties also must tell a story.
The 93-room Orient Express La Minerva in Rome is a building that started life in the 1600s and has been a hotel since the 1800s, she said.
“It is one of the longest-serving hotels in Rome. It is in a beautiful location,” she said of the property, adding it is to open this spring.
“In Venice, we’re going to open in the second half of the year,” she said, referring to the Orient Express Palazzo Donà Giovannelli that was built in the 1400s.
“It is being restored hand in hand with the Italian state,” she added.
Everyone at Orient Express is very aware of its unique history.
“We have our Orient Express historian. His name is Arthur Mettetal. He is absolutely brilliant. He is a walking encyclopedia. He has a Ph.D. in Orient Express,” she said. “We have 140 years of archives.”
She said looking at these archives and reading them firsthand is a thrill.
“Having a front-row seat underlined what a responsibility Accor has in being custodians of the brand so that it lives for another 100 or 200 years," she said.
"To see all the love and care that has gone into Orient Express and know that we have the weight on our shoulders … you also appreciate we have the privilege of working on this brand for a very small period of time within its long history, we have a duty of fiduciary to ensure its going concern,” she said.
She added that LVMH’s involvement is so important.
“LVMH is the world’s biggest collector of heritage brands. … Just recently we had a meeting with another one of their holdings, and we went into their vaults, and they were pulling out the archives wearing white gloves, items that were 200 years old. The way it made you feel when you are hearing these stories, it was these a-ha moments, we were educated, we were cultured. … It is this that we want you to feel and share when you stay or you experience Orient Express,” Perez-Alvarado said.
Other upcoming Orient Express hotels must follow suit in that they have a tale to tell, she added.
“It would be best, optimal for them to be complimentary to the trains and the yachts or whatever else the brand decides to have down the road. There also might be extraordinary, heritage buildings that are not need the trains’ routes but would make wonderful Orient Express hotels with their own wonderful stories,” she said.
Many are the grand buildings in Europe that deserve to be protected and would fit perfectly into the Orient Express portfolio.
“We want to make sure these assets are bespoke, and I know that term is overused, but all these places are places that could be privatized. Trains can be privatized, yachts can be privatized, and now we are not just looking at the traditional hospitality set … you now have to pay attention to yacht chartering. On the trains, it would be nice to see special events, social events, board meetings, incentives.”
She said the brand needs three types of traveler.
“We need the people who generate enough income to go on one of these every day. There’s also those who will save a lifetime and make it a special occasion, a bucket-list item, and we also need our followers, our dreamers who keep the brand alive.
“That is a great page out of the luxury, consumer-goods play book,” she added.
Transformational phases
Perez-Alvarado said phase one of Accor’s overall transformation is complete.
“Phase one was to make sure we had a very well-diversified portfolio, therefore more solutions for the investor market who wanted to go into real estate. Twenty years ago, 70% of hotel owners were niche hotels investors, and 30% were generalists. Now 70% are generalists,” she said.
“This portfolio diversification is not just helpful from our perspective in terms of ensuring we meet our financial targets we promised to our shareholders, from an earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization perspective, from a network growth perspective, from a revenue per available room perspective, et cetera, but it is also very important to the biggest investors worldwide, who are the ones who fuel growth. We depend on them. In a certain way, hotel companies have become asset managers as well,” she added.
Phase two is about growth, and that's continuing, Perez-Alvarado said.
Phase three now is underway.
"Now that every swim lane has been met ... I would say phase three is now how do we leverage?"
"The next step is focusing on asset management, focusing on managing the portfolio, optimizing the portfolio and, most importantly, leveraging the portfolio in and of itself … in the short and medium term,” she said.