Who owns Wyndham Hotels? Start Here
Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, the hotel brand originally founded by Trammell Crow in 1981, is now a global franchise with a portfolio of over 20 well-known hotel brands and 9000 hotels in 80 countries spread across six continents.
Among others, the company is home to distinguished hotel chains that include Ramada Hotels, Days Inn, AmericInn, and La Quinta. Within 12 years, Wyndham Hotels went from being a subsidiary of Wyndham Worldwide Corporation to a standalone company.
Wyndham Hotels & Resorts is a spin-off of its parent company Travel + Leisure Co., formerly known as Wyndham Worldwide
Wyndham Hotels & Resorts was originally a subsidiary of the timeshare company, Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (later known as Travel + Leisure Co.). At the time, it operated under the name Wyndham Hotel Group and was owned by the shareholders of Wyndham Worldwide.
On June 1, 2018, Wyndham Hotels & Resorts officially became an independent public company after a successful spin-off – referring to a corporate strategy where a parent organization creates an independent company by distributing shares of the would-be company to its existing shareholders – from Wyndham Worldwide Corporation.
The shares of Wyndham Hotels & Resorts were distributed to the stockholders of Wyndham Worldwide on May 18, 2018. At the time of its spin-off, the newly branched-out company had 100 million shares outstanding.
The Chief Executive of Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, Geoffrey “Geoff” Ballotti, described the company as the “world’s largest hotel franchisor with a proven ability to create value through acquisitions and organic growth”.
“We are thrilled to begin a new era in which we will continue to build upon our powerful asset-light and fee-based business model that is driven by an exceptional portfolio of the market-leading economy and midscale brands,” Ballotti said in the press release announcing the company’s debut as a public company.
Geoff Ballotti has been serving as the CEO and President of Wyndham Hotels since 2014
Before Wyndham Hotels & Resorts became an independent company in 2018, Geoff Ballotti served as the CEO and President of its precursor Wyndham Hotels Group since 2014. He held the same position after the spin-off.
Ballotti was optimistic about the company’s path following the spin-off. He told Skift that Wyndham Hotels & Resorts had the potential to create additional value for the shareholders and “unlock the value” of the franchise. He explained:
“Think about the value that we’ve created for shareholders. When you think about the multiples that we’ll be trading at and when you think about how that will allow us to grow and do, as we’ve done, creative deals like AmericInn, and like La Quinta – it’s incredible.”
Under his management, the company looked forward to growing as an autonomous hotel business and focusing on improving the quality of the services to its consumers.
Wyndham Destinations rebranded itself as Travel + Leisure Co. after it acquired the brand from Meredith Corporation in 2021
The origin of the Wyndham Hotels franchise goes all the way back to 1990 with the founding of the Hospitality Franchise Systems, a company that specialized in acquiring hotel franchises.
Over the next 15 years, the company underwent a number of acquisitions, mergers and separations that eventually led to the formation of Wyndham Worldwide Corporation in 2006. The corporation housed the Wyndham hotel series and other timeshare business ventures.
By mid-2018, Wyndham Worldwide changed its name to Wyndham Destinations shortly after announcing its plans of separating the Wyndham Hotel Group from the company.
On January 5, 2021, Wyndham Destinations acquired the Travel + Leisure brand from Meredith Corporation for $100 million. This gave the company access to the brand’s 60,000 club members and 35 million global followers spread over numerous media sites.
Michael D. Brown, the President and Chief Executive Officer of Wyndham Destinations, said of the acquisition:
“This iconic [Travel + Leisure] brand, along with its authoritative content and wide audience, will help accelerate and amplify the growth of new capital-light travel businesses and services, as we take the next step in expanding our reach within the global leisure travel industry.”
Wyndham Destinations formally rebranded itself as Travel + Leisure Co. on February 17, 2021, and also changed its ticker symbol from WYND to TNL on the New York Stock Exchange.