Matthew Avril Takes the Reins at Starwood

When Matthew Avril took the helm of president of the hotel group of Starwood Hotel & Resorts Worldwide last week, after Matthew Ouimet was terminated by the company after two years, who knew that chief executive Fritz van Paasschen could come up with so much hackneyed praise to heap upon the new boss. Let’s count them! From the release:

“Matt is a true team player with a passion around guest experience and we believe this appointment will ensure that Starwood continues to achieve our strategic goals and initiatives across all of our brands. I also look forward to working with Sergio Rivera in his new role as sole head of SVO as we continue to grow our global footprint within this very important segment of our business. … As discussed on our last earnings call, in light of current economic conditions and as a result of our organic growth over the years, we are also working to streamline our organization, reduce costs, improve efficiency and ensure we are properly structured for long-term growth.”

Hmm, so a bit shake-up of the top hotel management and everyone’s happy, right? Of course! Continues van Paasschen, “On behalf of the Board and Senior Leadership Team, I would also like to thank Matt Ouimet for his contributions to Starwood over the past two years. We wish him well in his future endeavors.”

The 47-year-old Avril used to be co-head of Starwood’s vacation ownership unit. And what’s most interesting about this announcement is that when I looked at Starwood’s last 10-Q released in August, I saw that it was the “Vacation Ownership and Residential” segment of the company that lost revenue in the last year, not the hotel segment. In the second quarter, the vacation ownership moolah dropped from $304 million to $229 million year-over-year. In that same time, hotel revenue rose a modest 6 percent.