Hyatt Hotels Corporation and Mr & Mrs Smith have announced an agreement for a Hyatt affiliate to acquire the London-based Mr & Mrs Smith, a platform offering direct booking access to a collection of over 1,500 boutique and luxury properties. Hyatt will acquire 100 percent of the asset-light Mr & Mrs Smith platform for an enterprise value of £53 million (approximately $66 million) in cash consideration.
Said Mark Vondrasek, chief commercial officer, Hyatt: “Founders Tamara and James Lohan alongside their impressive team have built the ultimate global direct booking collection of truly unique stay experiences, including rooms located in treehouses, within caves and underwater suites. Importantly, we see a lot of synergy between our collective ethos of care, and we look forward to working together to bring our shared focus to new, memorable stay experiences for guests and World of Hyatt members—and introduce new guests to Hyatt hotels around the world.”
The planned acquisition of Mr & Mrs Smith is expected to build on Hyatt’s position in the luxury sector and further strengthen its distribution capabilities, especially across Europe—where there are more than 1 million Mr & Mrs Smith members. This acquisition builds on a prolonged growth period for Hyatt, which included the recently completed acquisition of Dream Hotel Group’s lifestyle brand and management portfolio and the conversion of a portfolio of over 30 franchise agreements with Lindner Hotels & Resorts and me and all hotels. Hyatt previously acquired Apple Leisure Group for $2.7 billion in cash, which significantly expanded its all-inclusive offering. In 2018, the company bought lifestyle hotel company Two Roads Hospitality, which included Alila Hotels & Resorts, Destination Hotels, Joie de Vivre Hotels, Thompson Hotels and tommie.
The transaction is anticipated to close in the second quarter of this year, subject to customary closing conditions. At a later date following the closing, Hyatt plans to unveil direct booking access to properties within the Mr & Mrs Smith platform through Hyatt’s distribution channels, including Hyatt.com and the World of Hyatt app. The anticipated move will have the potential to unlock access to more than twice the number of global boutique and luxury properties within Hyatt direct booking channels, and Hyatt is exploring ways to enable World of Hyatt members to earn and redeem points across eligible hotels in the Mr & Mrs Smith collection.
Tamara Lohan, co-founder and chief executive officer, Mr & Mrs Smith, said, “Our vision has always been for Mr & Mrs Smith to be the world’s definitive travel club for hotel lovers. Thanks to Hyatt, that vision has become much closer to reality. With Hyatt’s support, Mr & Mrs Smith will be able to offer our community of members, hoteliers and partners so much more.”
Following the planned acquisition close, over 100 Mr & Mrs Smith employees are expected to join Hyatt’s Commercial Services team, including Tamara who will serve as Mr & Mrs Smith CEO, reporting to Mark Vondrasek, Hyatt’s chief commercial officer, and James, who will serve as Mr & Mrs Smith chief creative officer.
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