Company Analysis

According to Forbes.com, in 2011 Marriott International generated $12.3 billion. Comparatively, Hilton Worldwide only brought in $8 billion. MARSHA has been Marriott International’s reservation system since it was first developed in 1997. Since then it has undergone several improvements but to this day it is the only system that Marriott trusts to link more than 3,000 properties as well as their partners, suppliers and customers. 

Marriott International has more than 2,500 associates trained to assist customers in booking reservations in more than 12 languages including English, Spanish, German, Italian, Arabic, French, Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese, Hindi, Dutch and Portuguese. On some days, Marriott generates up to $3,500 per second through their automated system online. This adds up to $100 million per day. 

Marriott booked over 52 million room nights across the globe, using Intel based computers with a Windows 7 operating system. All of these systems are connected through any one of Marriott’s fourteen reservation centers located around the globe. They utilize T1 networks in most of their facilities and 100-Mbps Ethernet in their larger facilities. They also use Cisco Systems PIX firewall as their primary firewall system. In the past, Marriott utilized Lotus Notes for their email system, but now use Microsoft Exchange within the United States and still use Lotus Notes for their worldwide database storage. Marriott has its own intranet which allows employees to download documents and training modules within Marriott’s networks to the local hard drives at the properties.

Marriott accounted for 1 in every 5 reservations done online in 2009. Marriott.com is currently the world's largest online hotel booking site. Producing nearly $23 billion in revenue during 2009, Marriot is ranked at #8 in terms of gross revenue for website retail revenue. 

Marriott customers spend nearly 3 million hours per month on Marriott.com booking rooms at many Marriott hotels across the globe. Marriott believes that by providing customers with an easy-to-use interface where customer preferences can be saved, Marriott will be able to increase their eCommerce sales while reducing their costs. 

Marriott's website also utilizes a Guest Satisfaction Survey to fill in their Balanced Scorecard. These surveys are designed to allow customers the opportunity to help Marriott International with maintaining service in terms of their strengths and improving the areas which need development. Once this information has been collected, the Balanced Scorecard utilizes this data to set the company’s goals. 

MARSHA is not only responsible for taking reservations and transferring them to the accurate locations, MARSHA is also in charge of placing supply orders based on the needs of each property either automatically, based on incoming reservations, or manually by hotel staff. MARSHA is tied into the revenue management system, the ecommerce site (Marriott.com), customer loyalty programs (Balanced Scorecard and Marriott Rewards), and the property management aspects of Marriott International.

Marriott Rewards is the award-winning loyalty program of Marriott International. According to Forbes, it is one of the largest loyalty programs in the world with more than 28 million members.

Marriott Rewards serves two purposes. The first is to provide customers the ability to track visits and earn points for stays which can be turned into free nights or other rewards through Marriott’s partners. Other hotels use rewards programs as merely an incentive to stay with their hotel on a more frequent basis. Marriott also uses their program as an RFM system. Based on how often a customer visits the hotels, how long their usual visits are, and the level of hotel they stay at; Marriott will market to each customer appropriately either through email or text. This allows Marriott to find the best properties for the right customers, giving them a huge advantage in terms of marketing, but also giving their customers what they’re looking for before they even look for it.

Customers who use Marriott Rewards are said to nearly double the number of trips they book with Marriott hotels as opposed to when they were booking without the rewards program. These loyal customers also contribute nearly 50% of Marriott’s booked room nights.

Marriott’s focus has been geared towards retaining their most valued customers while appropriately marketing to them. This shows that Marriott utilizes a low cost and focused business strategy.

By utilizing MARSHA’s built in ordering system Marriott is able to make sure that they reuse whatever assets they have before reordering products and buying anything new.

Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects of MARSHA is that it connects to non-hotel related partners, such as Boston Market and up until 2008 Steak and Ale; the two biggest food product suppliers to Marriott within the United States.

Overall, MARSHA has proven to be an amazing system that holds the entire company together on all levels, from how orders are placed within the company to how reservations are made with the customers. By using this uniform system to handle all aspects of business, there is almost no risk of miscommunication; customer information is always current, and hotels are always stocked with supplies. As Jim Rinaldi, Marriott’s Vice President states, MARSHA is “the glue the holds the properties together.”