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1. Remington Hotels Acquires Chesapeake Hospitality
Ashford Inc. announced its hotel management division, Remington Hotels, has acquired third-party hotel management company Chesapeake Hospitality, HNN's Sean McCracken reports. The deal would increase Remington’s mix of third-party hotels from about 20% to about 40%. The rest of the company's 121 managed hotels are owned by Ashford-advised hotel real estate investment trusts, Ashford Hospitality Trust and Braemar Hotels & Resorts.
According to a news release, Ashford Inc. is buying the company for an initial consideration of $15.75 million, payable with $6.3 million in cash and $9.45 million of a new Series CHP convertible preferred units that will pay a 7.28% annual dividend and a $117.50 conversion price per share. Chesapeake could earn up to $10.25 million of additional consideration based on base management fee contribution for the trailing 12-month periods ending March 2024 and 2025 for a total potential consideration of $26 million.
“Though the hospitality space has faced massive challenges over the past few years, Remington has remained steadfast in its commitment to being the best hotel manager in the industry,” Remington President and CEO Sloan Dean said in the release. “By melding Chesapeake's culture and know-how with ours, we believe we are well-positioned to cultivate even stronger relationships with our properties' owners by providing them with more resources, better economies of scale, and a more satisfying guest experience.”
2. Benchmark Pyramid To Acquire Provenance Hotels
Hotel and resort management company Benchmark Pyramid will acquire independent hotel developer and operator Provenance Hotels, HNN's Bryan Wroten reports. The deal will add 12 hotels to Benchmark Pyramid’s portfolio of more than 240 properties across the U.S., Europe and Caribbean.
"The decades of highly successful management from the Provenance team is something we look forward to building upon as we continue to create the most owner-focused, experiential company in the industry," said Warren Fields, Benchmark Pyramid's chief executive officer.
Once the deal closes, Provenance Hotels founder and chairman Gordon Sondland will join Benchmark Pyramid’s board of directors.
3. Aimbridge Hospitality Sees Growth Through Broader Scope of Owners
The scale of Aimbridge Hospitality gives the company a number of benefits in operating hotels, but its size is also a reason why some hotel owners think the company is too big to provide the personalized management they need at their properties. That’s a mindset the executives at Aimbridge intend to change, reports HNN’s Bryan Wroten
Along with the resources Aimbridge has to offer, executives are putting a renewed focus on the company’s employees who run and support the hotels.
“Everything is really much more focused on our people,” Chief Marketing Officer Andrew Jordan said. “We realized that the true differentiator for Aimbridge is going to be about our people.”
4. Small Business Owners Oppose Proposal To Redirect Unspent COVID-19 Funds
Owners of small businesses are upset over a proposal going through Congress that would redirect unspent COVID-19 funding to provide $10 billion for the federal government’s latest pandemic health response, the Wall Street Journal reports.
There is about $5 billion in unspent funds that Congress had allocated for three small business aid programs, the article states. The Biden administration is attempting to address ongoing pandemic needs, such as vaccines and therapeutics, and some lawmakers want to repurpose those funds to avoid having to allocate new money.
“People say ‘business is back open, why would you need money now?’ We were shut for 16 months, and those of us that are still left are carrying phenomenal debt,” said Michael Strickland, founder of Bandit Lites, a Knoxville, Tenn., lighting company.
5. Experts Warn of Summer Travel Chaos
Travel experts are warning that as more people are looking to take trips this summer than the last two years, airlines, airports, rental car companies, overall travel demand and other factors are going to create some turbulence, CNN reports.
"We're seeing mass cancellations again, and airlines are reducing schedules. Fares are through the roof, and people like to talk about [the price of] oil, but that's not why. The problem is we have more people wanting to fly than we have seats," said Courtney Miller, managing director of analysis at The Air Current.