MVC not taking Hyatt/Welk under its umbrella

[Tenga]

CEO Stephen Weisz of MVC announced on conference call last week in July under the merger he's not going to integrate Hyatt into MVC! No surprise there! What is new news, is the long term licensing agreement he got bent over the barrel with and now he has to choke on it by bringing the Welk properties up to Hyatt standards in order to brand former Welk resorts and place a Hyatt reregistered name on it! If Hyatt says xzy resort does not meet its standards then MVC is going to open its wallet and spend the money to bring it up to Hyatts requirement's!

This is not only going to be painful for MVC, but its not going to happen over night either. FYI was able to ascertain that the platform is complete. It has been developed that will allow club use between Hyatt and New Hyatt "Welk" resorts those that "meet" Hyatt standards. Their keeping it tight lipped on which resort's made the cut and which did not! Only thing left to assign is point value for nightly stay. Set to begin reservations come Jan 1, 2022 all according to MVC owner services.

Best,
Tenga

 

[dioxide45]

CEO Stephen Weisz of MVC announced on conference call last week in July under the merger he's not going to integrate Hyatt into MVC! No surprise there! What is of news is the long term licensing agreement he got bent over the barrel and now has to choke on it by bringing the Welk properties up to Hyatt standards in order to brand former Welk resorts and place a Hyatt reregistered name on it! If Hyatt says xzy resort does not meet its standards then MVC is going to open its wallet at spend the money to bring it up to Hyatts requirement's!

This is not only going to be painful for MVC, but its not going got happen over night either. FYI was able to ascertain that the platform is complete. It has been developed that will allow club use between Hyatt and New Hyatt "Welk" resorts those that "meet" Hyatt standards. Their keeping it tight lipped on which resort's made the cut and which did not! Only thing left to assign is point value for nightly stay. Set to begin reservations come Jan 1, 2022 all according to MVC owner services.

Best,
Tenga

I suspect it will mostly be the owners paying to bring certain resorts up to standards. They will pressure the boards to spend the money or they will drop them from Welk resorts and they will simply become independants. Marriott has done this in the past with several of their resorts. The boards and owners didn't want to pay to bring them up to standard, so they were dropped. It is possible that VAC does work out some kind of cost sharing arrangement with the individual properties, but most of the costs will be paid for by the owners in higher reserve funding.

 

[bizaro86]

CEO Stephen Weisz of MVC announced on conference call last week in July under the merger he's not going to integrate Hyatt into MVC! No surprise there! What is of news is the long term licensing agreement he got bent over the barrel and now has to choke on it by bringing the Welk properties up to Hyatt standards in order to brand former Welk resorts and place a Hyatt reregistered name on it! If Hyatt says xzy resort does not meet its standards then MVC is going to open its wallet at spend the money to bring it up to Hyatts requirement's!

This is not only going to be painful for MVC, but its not going got happen over night either. FYI was able to ascertain that the platform is complete. It has been developed that will allow club use between Hyatt and New Hyatt "Welk" resorts those that "meet" Hyatt standards. Their keeping it tight lipped on which resort's made the cut and which did not! Only thing left to assign is point value for nightly stay. Set to begin reservations come Jan 1, 2022 all according to MVC owner services.

Best,
Tenga

They'll open owner's wallets to pay for it. With them voting the trust points it won't be hard to get the HOAs to go along.

 

[dsmrp]

Hyatt will let the Portfolio owners intermingle with Welk. Interesting to see
when they'll let Welk owners reserve non portfolio HRC units.

 

[CPNY]

@travelhacker would love to hear your thoughts on this.

 

[TravelTime]

I am so bummed that MVC is not integrating Hyatt/Welk into the combined new program. I still can‘t believe MVC can’t find a way to re-brand Hyatt and bring all the properties into MVC. If MVC is focusing on selling points, they will be much more successful with one mega program than with two or three separate programs.

 

[dioxide45]

I am so bummed that MVC is not integrating Hyatt/Welk into the combined new program. I still can‘t believe MVC can’t find a way to re-brand Hyatt and bring all the properties into MVC. If MVC is focusing on selling points, they will be much more successful with one mega program than with two or three separate programs.

From what I understand the licence agreement that ILG made with Hyatt is pretty long term. I suspect backing out could cost a bundle. Hyatt also makes money from the affiliation in both licencing fees and selling points out of its World of Hyatt program to VAC to offer to owners in the way of tour incentives. I am not sure if Hyatt owners can convert weeks to WOrld of Hyatt points, but that would be another source of revenue for Hyatt.

 

[sjsharkie]

I am so bummed that MVC is not integrating Hyatt/Welk into the combined new program. I still can‘t believe MVC can’t find a way to re-brand Hyatt and bring all the properties into MVC. If MVC is focusing on selling points, they will be much more successful with one mega program than with two or three separate programs.

I love it. I'm not interested in Hyatt being folded into Marriott's program as a Hyatt owner. As an HRC owner, the program works well for me, and I don't need any changes that would introduce more demand from other programs.

That being said, it will be interesting to see how Welk is integrated. I'm not really interested in their properties, except for Northstar -- but the maintenance fees for that property are crazy high so not sure if this will have an impact on the point structure in the future.

 

[TravelTime]

Does anyone know why Hyatt bought Welk if Welk is not up to standards?

 

[dioxide45]

Does anyone know why Hyatt bought Welk if Welk is not up to standards?

I think some of the properties are up to standard. Some may just need a little work. Others may need more. I think they deemed it a decent fit to integrate.

 

[Mongoose]

I suspect it will mostly be the owners paying to bring certain resorts up to standards. They will pressure the boards to spend the money or they will drop them from Welk resorts and they will simply become independants. Marriott has done this in the past with several of their resorts. The boards and owners didn't want to pay to bring them up to standard, so they were dropped. It is possible that VAC does work out some kind of cost sharing arrangement with the individual properties, but most of the costs will be paid for by the owners in higher reserve funding.

It would be the Welk owners that would have to pay the price to join Hyatt. I have heard that there are some nice Welk locations out there.

 

[Mongoose]

Does anyone know why Hyatt bought Welk if Welk is not up to standards?

Hyatt didn't buy them MVC did. They probably got it at a fire sale price. I hope they are picky. I don't want to see happen to Hyatt what happened to HICV when they bought Silverleaf.

 

[Mongoose]

I am so bummed that MVC is not integrating Hyatt/Welk into the combined new program. I still can‘t believe MVC can’t find a way to re-brand Hyatt and bring all the properties into MVC. If MVC is focusing on selling points, they will be much more successful with one mega program than with two or three separate programs.

I'm thrilled. I would hate to have Hyatt be gobbled up by MVC. Its still possible that at some point it may be spun off. I have no knowledge of it, but it might be easier for MVC to get rid of Hyatt than deal with all the potential turf wars.

 

[Mongoose]

Marriott Vacations Worldwide Corp (VAC) Q2 2021 Earnings Call Transcript (msn.com)

 

[sjsharkie]

Does anyone know why Hyatt bought Welk if Welk is not up to standards?

Northstar is definitely up to standards as of the last time I visited -- 2 years ago. Rooms are huge and upscale -- nicer than High Sierra as a property in a similar location (they are ~20 mins apart).

But that was originally a Hyatt developed property. So, not sure about other locations.

-ryan

 

[dioxide45]

It wouldn't be hard to get many of the properties up to the standard of the lowest level Hyatt Residence Club resorts. We went to Windward Pointe and it was no better than a Marriott. I would even say a notch below.

 

[travelhacker]

@travelhacker would love to hear your thoughts on this.

I was disappointed by this. There isn't a whole lot of overlap between Marriott locations and Hyatt and I think all of the Hyatt locations would be of interest to Marriott so they would have complemented the MVC portfolio pretty well.

However, it wasn't unexpected. As others have pointed out, it's a tricky situation given that Hyatt Hotels and Marriott Hotels are competitors. Now that Marriott Hotels owns Starwood, it was a no brainer for MVC to purchase Interval and get their own exchange company and integrate Starwood / Vistana. Hyatt had to have been an afterthought, and since the Timeshare industry's lifeblood is new sales, I think it made sense to purchase Welk to expand the footprint and increase their sales capacity for it as a standalone product.

 

[Mongoose]

So I just checked the resorts out on Tripadvisor. The guest pics often create a more accurate representation of the resorts. Very unscientific.... I see 4 that could easily be Hyatt RC's, 1 very close to a Hyatt and 3 that will need a lot of work. Overall I'm impressed. I might see if I can pick up a deal somewhere. Below are my estimates and links to Tripadvisor for reference.

Looks like a 1 week 2 BR will be about 240,000 points (Platinum Weeks) and MFs of $1600. Probably on par with many Hyatt Gold or Platinum weeks. So maybe an exchange rate of 120-133 Welk to 1 HRC. Some of the resorts appear to be Platinum weeks only. Northstar can go up to 900,000 points for week for a 5 BR about 7500 HRC points (WOW!).

Branson Hotel - Midscale Property - Think Wyndham/WM
WELK RESORTS BRANSON HOTEL $62 ($̶9̶6̶) - Updated 2021 Prices & Resort Reviews - MO - Tripadvisor

Branson Lodges - Upper Midscale - Think HICV
LODGES AT TIMBER RIDGE BY WELK RESORTS $90 ($̶9̶6̶) - Updated 2021 Prices & Lodge Reviews - Branson, MO - Tripadvisor

San Diego - Upper Midscale - Maybe Hyatt RC
WELK RESORTS SAN DIEGO $99 ($̶2̶4̶2̶) - Updated 2021 Prices & Resort Reviews - Escondido, CA - Tripadvisor

Northstar - Upsacle - Think... Hyatt RC
NORTHSTAR LODGE BY WELK RESORTS $155 ($̶1̶9̶4̶) - Updated 2021 Prices & Hotel Reviews - Truckee, CA - Tripadvisor

Palm Springs - Midscale - Think older Sheraton
WELK RESORTS PALM SPRINGS $104 ($̶1̶3̶4̶) - Updated 2021 Prices & Resort Reviews - Cathedral City, California Desert, CA - Tripadvisor

Cabo - Upper Upscale - Think JW or Ritz
WELK RESORTS SIRENA DEL MAR $129 ($̶1̶6̶1̶) - Updated 2021 Prices & Resort Reviews - Cabo San Lucas, Los Cabos - Tripadvisor

Tahoe - Upper Upsacle - Think.... Hyatt RC
ONE VILLAGE PLACE BY WELK RESORTS - Prices & Hotel Reviews (Truckee, CA) - Tripadvisor

Breckinridge - Upper Upscale - Hyatt RC
WELK RESORTS THE RANAHAN, BRECKENRIDGE $109 ($̶2̶6̶7̶) - Updated 2021 Prices & Hotel Reviews - CO - Tripadvisor

 

[mjm1]

We used to own at Welk in Escondido, converted to their points program, and eventually sold them when we decided to focus on MVC, Vistana and most recently HGVC and Hyatt.

My experience with Welk is dated, but the resorts that could fit well are Welk in Escondido (especially the Mountain Villas section), Sirena Del Mar in Cabo (on the corridor), Northstar (the original units built by Hyatt are outstanding and Welk built additional units/buildings), and Branson. I don’t see how the Palm Springs (actually in Cathedral City) could be brought up to Hyatt standards. I am not sure of any other resorts in their system. Their sales team would also need retraining as they are terrible (even compared to other systems.)

That said, we bought into Hyatt (Sedona) to use it and trade within the Hyatt system. I don’t see us leveraging the Welk resorts even if available to us.

Best regards.

Mike

 

[cfabar1]

Glad to hear Hyatt will not be integrated into MVC. That would be the end of the program in my opinion.

 

[Sugarcubesea]

Glad to hear Hyatt will not be integrated into MVC. That would be the end of the program in my opinion.

I'm also glad Hyatt will not be integrated into MVC. I have really enjoyed my ownership of this brand and have used it to internally exchange to other Hyatt's.

 

[bogey21]

My guess is that the good stuff will be folded into MVC somewhere down the line. It may be years from now but I can see it happening...

George

 

[GetawaysRus]

So will the Marriott timeshare salespeople stop talking about a Hyatt integration into MVC now? And that MVC, through its purchase of Interval International, is simply going to take over the timeshare world?

That's been one of the top whoppers I have heard for the past few years when I have agreed to attend a Marriott presentation. And now it turns out that I didn't need to buy more Marriott DC points so that I could more easily trade into Hyatt resorts! What a surprise!

 

[remowidget]

I am so bummed that MVC is not integrating Hyatt/Welk into the combined new program. I still can‘t believe MVC can’t find a way to re-brand Hyatt and bring all the properties into MVC. If MVC is focusing on selling points, they will be much more successful with one mega program than with two or three separate programs.

IMHO I think it is doable with Vistana and MVC because each already has reciprocal agreements with Marriott Hotels. Hyatt is a separate system. The combination could happen if Marriott Hotels purchases Hyatt.

 

[CPNY]

Lucky for the Hyatt owners. Those of us on the Vistana side are not that lucky.