Name: Javier Rosenberg
Title: Chief Operating Officer, Americas, and Executive Vice President, Managed Hotels
Company, city: Carlson Rezidor; Minnetonka, Minn.
Number of employees: 80,000 globally
Recent project: Opening the Radisson Blu in downtown Minneapolis
First job: I worked as a butler at the Claridge Hotel in Buenos Aires.
Little-known fact about you: I’ve lived in 11 cities across eight countries, and each of my three children was born in a different location.
Your Business
Essential business philosophy: Do your job with passion and work hard. Attention to detail matters.
Best way to keep a competitive edge: Be customer-focused, humble, nimble and accessible.
Yardstick of success: In hospitality, success is measured by customer satisfaction and sustainable business growth.
Javier Rosenberg as a Traveler
Most important item when traveling: All devices that keep me connected — especially my phone and noise-canceling headphones.
How I spend time on board: Working, catching up on emails and planning for upcoming projects.
Favorite restaurant in the world: Ard Bia at Nimmo’s in Galway, Ireland — a cozy, typical Irish house with excellent food.
Favorite destination in the world: Southern Argentina in the summertime.
About Carlson Rezidor
Radisson Red: a new brand for the Americas
Radisson Red is designed for the millennial traveler: guests who value connectivity, contemporary design, social spaces and art. The brand prioritizes food and beverage with lively bars and dining outlets while incorporating technology and customer-centric services — everything available at guests’ fingertips. Social spaces are intentionally designed to be welcoming and open, encouraging mingling and conversation among travelers. Positioned as an upscale select brand, Radisson Red blends upscale product features with streamlined, flexible service. Our growth target is to operate 60 hotels by 2020, and new openings in Europe and the Americas are planned in the coming year.
Where Radisson Blu is expanding
Radisson Blu currently includes 285 hotels, with strong concentrations across Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific. Expansion efforts are increasingly focused on the Americas. In Latin America, we have recently opened a property and announced another. As an upscale brand, Radisson Blu aims to add another 25 to 50 hotels in the near term.
Reimagining Radisson in North America
Over the past five years, we have concentrated on strengthening the brand by removing underperforming properties and renovating others — a program that is roughly 79 percent complete. The reimagined Radisson incorporates more technology, improved guestroom products and softer design elements, creating traditional hotels with contemporary flair. This initiative has supported record growth across the portfolio. Today there are more than 150 Radisson properties across North and South America. Notable reimagined properties include locations in Rio de Janeiro, Cartagena, New York (JFK area), Hartford, Conn.; Toledo, Ohio; Fresno, Calif.; and Calgary.