Suite Dreams

With the Trump opening and more luxury spots on the way, the competition in the city among high-end hotels for big-spending travelers—VIPs, celebrities, the garden-variety rich—is hotter than ever. And the secret to victory? Give the guests what they want

By Noah Isackson

(page 6 of 6)

From left: at the Four Seasons; a Peninsula dessert of a white-chocolate-covered strawberry; high tea in the Four Seasons Lounge

Then again, to hear some entertainment columnists tell it, Chicago hotels leak information as well as any well-schooled Washington politician. "In every case, when I have found out where somebody is staying, it has always come from a person who works for the hotel," says Bill Zwecker, the Chicago Sun-Times columnist and CBS–Channel 2 entertainment reporter. "Trust me—they are ranking people within the hotel who clearly know what they are doing."

High-end hotel executives admit they have a dedicated marketing staff to target the entertainment industry in New York and Los Angeles: agents, personal assistants, production companies, and Hollywood studios. "They're out there consistently building that rapport and that reputation with the celebrity market," Prohaska says. The entertainment industry is crucial, he adds, because it's filled with business travelers who book entire floors, meeting rooms, and also big suites for its stars.

When The Peninsula opened in Chicago, for example, it relied in part on the celebrity connections cultivated at The Peninsula Beverly Hills to create badly needed buzz and business during the dramatic downturn following September 11th, says Zwecker. "They aggressively went after the movie-studio business," he explains. The exposure burnished the hotel's reputation among celebrities and eventually helped The Peninsula edge out its competitors in the celebrity game of who stays where. Rooms like the $7,500 Peninsula Suite, at 3,100 square feet, help, too. The suite has a foyer as big as a New York hotel room, a 2,000-square-foot balcony, a grand piano, a workout room, and, perhaps most important, entryways and exits that allow stars to come and go without being seen by the paparazzi.

But what if all the good efforts aren't enough? No matter how optimistically hotels describe the new market, the numbers are hard to spin and history suggests that even the most firmly established luxury hotel is vulnerable. Chicago has seen luxury hotels compete before. The Blackstone held sway, only to be surpassed by The Drake, which itself was overtaken by The Ritz-Carlton. "The Drake is the classic example," says Ted Mandigo, the hotel industry consultant. "It used to be the property in the city."

Still, 19 years ago, the Four Seasons joined a market that "everyone said was already saturated," recalls Willimann, who has been the hotel's general manager since it opened here. Back then, travelers with money to spend stayed at the Ritz, the former Park Hyatt on Chicago Avenue, the Ambassador East, and the Nikko, which eventually became The Westin Chicago River North. "Everybody predicted that this hotel would go belly up," Willimann says. That didn't happen, of course, and now the general manager finds that the roles have been reversed. Sitting in his ErgoChair, not long after another SAG meeting, Willimann finishes the thought by taking a shot at the competition: "Probably some will close or be converted into condominiums or apartment buildings."