Gabriel Escarrer Juliá, founder of Meliá Hotels International and a key figure in the transformation of world tourism, died Tuesday at the age of 89, company sources confirmed to Europa Press. A visionary in the sector, for nearly seven decades he led the chain’s expansion from a small hotel in Mallorca to a global giant, promoting the group’s leadership in Spain, the cradle of European vacation tourism, and then extending it to the American Caribbean and Southeast Asia. Today, Meliá Hotels International has more than 400 hotels open or in the process of opening in more than 40 countries and a portfolio of nine brands: Gran Meliá Hotels & Resorts, ME by Meliá, The Meliá Collection, Paradisus by Meliá, Meliá Hotels & Resorts, ZEL, INNSiDE by Meliá, Sol by Meliá and Affiliated by Meliá. Gabriel Escarrer Juliá was 21 years old when in 1956 he founded what is today the Meliá Hotels International group, acquiring and managing a 60-room hotel on the island of Mallorca, where he was born and where one of the world’s most successful hotel companies is still based. Prior to that, and for six years, he was trained in the tour operating business, where he came into contact with the incipient tourism industry, of which he would become a visionary entrepreneur, pioneer and transformer. For six decades, under his presidency, Escarrer forged strategic alliances that strengthened the group’s position in destinations such as Cuba and Indonesia. In the 1990s, he expanded his strategy to urban hotels in Spain, Europe, Asia and America, a vision that has earned him recognition as one of the driving forces behind the internationalization of the Spanish company. A transcendental leap in the company’s history was the acquisition in the 1980s by the group founded by Escarrer of two of the largest hotel chains in Europe at the time, Hotasa and Meliá, which represented the incorporation of almost 70 hotels in just one year, giving the group an important national and international dimension, as well as valuable brand recognition. In 1996, the Company’s IPO signaled a new stage of growth that was strengthened by the group’s successive strategic plans, and the entry of the second generation of the family into management marked the beginning of a profound cultural transformation of the group to face the new business environment of the 21st century.
Change of presidency
After emerging stronger from the great financial crisis that shook the sector between 2008 and 2013 and ensuring that the company was in the best hands, Gabriel Escarrer Juliá resigned in December 2016 to his executive powers, which he transferred to his son Gabriel Escarrer Jaume as Vice Chairman and CEO, with the founder becoming the non-executive Chairman, chairing the Board of Directors and the General Shareholders’ Meeting of the group. As a result of his extensive experience in the tourism industry, Gabriel Escarrer Juliá has received numerous awards that highlight his important contribution to the world of national and international hospitality. One of the most emotional for the founder of Meliá Hotels International was the awarding of an Honorary Doctorate Degree by the University of the Balearic Islands (UIB) in December 1988. In 1998 he received the ‘Tourism Personality of the Century‘ award, granted by a large majority in a survey of 300 managers and professionals in the sector. A year later he received three other prestigious awards that distinguished him as the Best Businessman in Construction and Real Estate Promotion, awarded by the Master in Management of Construction and Real Estate Companies and the magazine Actualidad Económica; as Hotelier of the Year, awarded by the well-known North American publication Hotels; and various recognitions for his career or Lifetime Achievement Awards given by organizations such as the International Hotel Investment Forum, the World Tourism Organization, or the European Hospitality Awards. In May 2001 Escarrer was elected member of the exclusive ‘Hall of Fame’ of the British Travel Industry. His candidacy was proposed and endorsed by some of the most important international tourism leaders, as well as by relevant members of the ‘Hall of Fame’ such as Martin Brackenbury (Richard Branson (Virgin), Michael Bishop (British Midland) and David Crossland (Airtours). That same year, the president of Meliá Hotels International was inducted into the Hall of Honor of the Conrad N. Hilton of Hotel Management at the University of Houston (USA), sharing honors with Lynn & Ed Hogan (Pleasant Holidays), Alice Sheets Marriott (Marriott Corporation) and Marilyn Carlson Nelson (Carlson Companies). In 2002 Meliá Hotels International signed an agreement with the University of the Balearic Islands (UIB) for the constitution of the ‘Meliá Chair of Tourism Studies’, which since then has held an annual competition for the ‘Gabriel Escarrer Tourism Studies Award’. Gabriel Escarrer Juliá received recognition for his professional career awarded by CIMET (Ibero-American Conference of Tourism Ministers and Entrepreneurs) and in 2006, coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the company, he was awarded the Medal of the Balearic Islands, the highest distinction of the Autonomous Community in recognition of his work, and the Medal of the Chamber of Commerce of Mallorca, Ibiza and Formentera. In 2011, Escarrer received the ‘Lifetime Achievement’ award at the European Hospitality Awards in London, also in recognition of his long career as founder and promoter of the largest hotel company in Spain, and the third largest in Europe. In 2012, MKG also awarded him the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Worldwide Hospitality Awards in Paris, and he received the prestigious UNWTO ‘Ulysses Award’ for his entire career (Lifetime Achievement Award).
Already in 2016, Gabriel Escarrer received the Hall of Fame of the ‘Hotel-E Investment Conference’ one of the most important hotel investment forums at an international level, and was named Honorary Ambassador of the Spain Brand. Recognized as one of the key figures in the history of international tourism, Gabriel Escarrer continued to work in recent years as non-executive chairman of Meliá Hotels International, and as chairman of the Group’s board and general meeting. In his words, tourism is an industry that “brings countries together, overcomes borders, and boosts the social and economic well-being of peoples”.
