Marriott International Inc.'s 'Sales Force One': New Sales Force Strategy for Competitive Advantage

Under the new model, each sales associate was to be a part of the Marriott global sales team and was to represent Marriott facilities situated in the US and in over 68 other territories the world over. Sales offices located in big cities would provide customers with a single-point contact for information on all Marriott brands, e.g., JW Marriott, Renaissance Hotels, Courtyard, Fairfield Inn, Ritz-Carlton, its flagship Marriott Hotels & Resorts, and Marriott Vacation Club International time-share properties. The first centralized sales office as part of SFO was opened in Gaithersburg, Maryland, in December 2007. According to John Williard "Bill" Marriott Jr., (J.W Marriott Jr.), Chairman and CEO, Marriott, this structure "...allows our salespeople to create a one-on-one customer relationship and represent all our brands with an individual customer.

Marriott operated, managed, and franchised lodging facilities throughout the world. The sales re-organization effort taken up by David was said to have been aimed at separating sales from service at each of these locations. While the sales associates were to concentrate on being the primary point of contact for key customers' requirements across the world, the service aspect would be looked into by event management teams placed in individual Marriot facilities. The company claimed to have put the customer at the forefront in making this paradigm shift from its earlier regional sales organization. "It's a very customer-centric approach...Whereas, in the past, many of our sales efforts were designed around individual hotels, now we're designing the efforts around the customer,"⁷ said David.