SAN FRANCISCO—When Mike Depatie describes the typical Kimpton customer, he sounds like he wants to resurrect the yuppie. But the president and CEO of Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants speaks of that customer not with irony, but with affection.
Depatie is a moneyman. He also is adventurous, health-conscious and contemporary.
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Mike Depatie |
He holds a bachelor’s degree in marketing from Michigan State University and a master’s degree from Harvard Business School. He became the third head of Kimpton in 2006. “I came in as co-CEO with Tom LaTour with the idea that Tom was going to retire in a couple of years,” Depatie said during a recent telephone interview. “He did.”
He added: “What got me into the business is I was on my way to Harvard Business School and saw this prospectus for a Residence Inn in Grand Rapids Jack DeBoer from Kalamazoo was trying to raise money for.”
Depatie arranged to meet fellow skiing enthusiast and father of the extended-stay segment DeBoer in Depatie’s favorite city, Aspen. But before signing on with Residence, he detoured to Dallas to work in finance for legendary developer Trammell Crow.
Long and winding road
In 1984, Depatie became senior VP of finance and development for Residence Inn, helping grow the original extended-stay brand from seven hotels to 100 by 1987, when DeBoer sold it to Marriott for US$268 million. He and several partners from Residence Inn founded Summerfield Suites in 1989; in 1992, he became CFO of La Quinta and in 1996, CFO of Signature Resorts (soon to become resort hotel vacation ownership company Sunterra).
When Sunterra moved to Orlando, Depatie chose to stay in the San Francisco area, but the hotel industry was “kind of in a stall,” so for the next several years he worked with Internet startups and telecommunications concerns that went “way up and way down.” In 2002, he realized he missed hotels—badly.
Depatie tracked Kimpton since the late 1980s and when a banker friend told him Kimpton could use him, he contacted LaTour, got an interview, thought he’d blown it, did an about-face when LaTour suggested he meet members of Kimpton’s board—and was offered the job he’d always wanted.
Since 2006, Kimpton has raised more than US$350 million in dedicated discretionary funds, primarily from college endowments (the Trammell Crow interests also are a major investor). Kimpton employs more than 7,000 people in 50 hotels in 22 U.S. cities in 16 states. It is known for environmental sensitivity, its alliance with distinctive restaurants, a strong sense of locale and appeal to women.
Kimpton character
“We ran 80% occupancy in 2008 across our system,” Depatie said. “We’re down, like everybody else; I don’t know what we’re going to run this year, but probably 74(%). It’s because we attract both the business guy and the leisure guy.”
In addition, Kimpton has “taken risks that other people wouldn’t take in location,” he said, noting the recent opening of a Kimpton (the Ink48) in the Hell’s Kitchen section of New York City and the Washington, D.C. Monaco, a conversion of an old Post Office building in Penn Quarter, an area “which at the time was considered transitional.” The Monaco recently was acquired by Pebblebrook Hotel Trust for US$74 million.
The typical Kimpton customer is “a diverse group like our employees; they tend to like great food and wine, and generally, they’re better educated,” Depatie said. “They tend to be more health-conscious; we have a dedicated channel on our TV with Pilates and Yoga meditation … They’re technologically savvy.”
Women are particularly attracted to Kimpton, Depatie said, partially because the properties incorporate restaurants and boast cutting-edge design. Its customers are “probably more socially conscious,” and many stay at Kimpton because of the ecological programs. The Kimpton Philadelphia Palomar opened last October as its first Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design-certified hotel (it’s Gold), and Green Seal, a nonprofit environmental standards group, has certified 46 Kimpton properties.
“What we want to do is build an iconic brand like Southwest Airlines, Apple Computer, REI and Whole Foods,” he said. “We want a product customers love so much, they rave about it. We want to reinvent the hotel experience. Because we manage everything, we’ve got a chance to do that, where the big franchise companies have all kinds of disparate managers and it’s kind of hard for them to do that.”
Depatie favors U.S. Park Service hotels like the Ahwanee in Yosemite Park and the Old Faithful Lodge in Yellowstone National Park. He and wife Holly just celebrated their wedding anniversary at Le Taha’a Island Resort & Spa in Bora Bora, French Polynesia. He also enjoys golfing with his 12-year-old son Max and recently returned from a fly-fishing trip in Montana.
His favorite city? “I like to go to Aspen as much as anywhere,” he said. Could that be because he contracted the hotel bug there from DeBoer, another hospitality figure with perspective—and vision?