When Peggy Fang Roe moved to Hong Kong six years ago, she was ready for a new challenge, but couldn’t have realised just how extensive it would become.
As Marriot International’s chief sales and marketing officer, Asia-Pacific, her arrival coincided with a period of rapid growth for the group spurred by corporate acquisitions, new hotel openings, China’s luxury and middle-class segments, and an evolution in the types of experience guests expect from different brands.
“I’m responsible for the front end of the business,” says Fang Roe who, in building the customer base, oversees a US$60 million marketing budget, drives pricing strategy, and guides a 5,000-strong sales force. “My team’s job is to take global brands and localise them for source and destination markets, which involves loyalty programmes, revenue management, digital and communications. I absolutely love working in this market; the platform is always changing and there is tremendous opportunity for growth. Ideas can thrive and you can think in a very entrepreneurial way.”
In dealing with 20 countries and territories plus 30 separate brands, ranging from Ritz-Carlton and St Regis to Sheraton, Westin and Le Meridien, the key is to understand what customers want. That starts with considering things at the macro level — GDP, population growth, average incomes, and how that changes aspirations to travel. Then it means identifying what experiences to provide in different places and at different price points, depending on whether customers are travelling for business or leisure, domestically or overseas, with family and friends, or to enjoy home comforts in an international destination.
“Our brands are positioned based on psychographic and behavioural data,” Fang Roe says. “Some are simple, no frills, which get the job done for business travellers who are in and out — and we will open more like this in Japan, Indonesia and India. But you can also go upscale, and we are always thinking of ways to involve and engage consumers by learning from trends in high-end dining, weddings, fitness and member services.”
For instance, the design team is making fitness rooms larger, “staycation” locations are being promoted for families in China, and kids clubs are offering opportunities for basketball, soccer, table tennis and swimming sessions taught by international stars or former Olympic champions. In addition, the latest loyalty programme offers access to everything from classes with Michelin-star chefs to concert tickets, Formula 1 races, and all manner of arts, cultural and retail events.
“We’ve got a team of 40 looking at data and consumer behaviour to understand segments where travellers are younger, more family oriented, or where there are more females,” she says. “We have to understand the changing patterns of demand. What we sell and what we deliver has to go hand in hand to create compelling experiences for consumers.”
Fang Roe started out in Atlanta, Georgia, where her early experience included a stint as a Ruby Tuesday waitress and a couple of summers working at a Six Flags amusement park. Her father was a chemical engineer and entrepreneur who started a phosphoric acid business, while her mother, a homemaker, also helped family contacts set up a local restaurant.
Inclined towards a career in business, Fang Roe studied organisational behaviour at the University of Michigan, a relatively new option, meaning she also contributed to the design of the course. From there, she joined GE’s graduate development programme, which gave the opportunity to train in multiple divisions before settling in GE Capital to run teams and investment projects.
“I found it interesting and liked the structure and discipline,” she says of a period which included assignments in Connecticut, Atlanta and Texas. “GE gave me great hands-on experience managing people and teams, but I wanted a wider context and to have a ‘bigger picture’ understanding of the business world.”
Accordingly, she left in 1998 for a two-year course at Harvard Business School at the time of the internet boom when many of the case studies featured young companies still figuring out how to charge for their services. There was, though, a real sense of innovation and dynamism, something Fang Roe saw close up during a summer internship which the then fledgling Amazon.com.
That experience convinced her to head to Silicon Valley after business school and with nine good job offers she picked Homestead.com, a venture developing an internet product centred on creating websites.
“I loved being in a start-up, but also did some soul-searching and explored other areas of interest,” she says. “I realised the time I’d had most fun was as social chair, planning events and trips for friends in my sorority. So, I thought about what industries would let me create memories and experiences for people.”
She looked at airlines and then hotels and soon realised the latter is all about planning and experiences, but also involves customer service, design and architecture, food and beverage, and much more.
“I thought this feels like a good playground for me,” says Fang Roe, who started talking to Marriott right after 9/11, hardly an auspicious time. “However, the industry is cyclical, and an opportunity came up in the brand marketing team where I could transfer my process-oriented GE skills.”
She joined the corporate head office in Bethesda, Maryland to focus on operations-based marketing and spent the next 10 years there leading key initiatives, while also getting married and having two children.
“I took a leap of faith when agreeing to lead Asia-Pacific sales and marketing,” she says. “At the time, there were under 200 hotels, but we have grown tremendously and now have 750-plus. Expansion in China and the scope of change brought by digital mean this region will be a big part of the company’s future growth and revenue streams.”
Away from the office, her focus is family, along with serving on school and university committees.
“I also practise yoga and love entertaining friends for dinner and planning holiday trips to destinations like Rwanda.”
