Connected to customers and their families, he began his love affair with the hospitality industry. Without knowing it and without realizing it. At that age, what interested him was music «and having a good time, I wasn’t interested in the hotel business».

He sold CDs: Space, Café del Mar and one of a certain Hôtel Costes. It wasn’t until he finished his university career that he was able to satisfy his curiosity to know that place on Rue Saint-Honoré, in Paris.

«When I saw it, it was love at first sight. It was a boutique hotel from the late 19th century, with a lot of red, a lot of velvet, very Moulin Rouge. It was a place to be, half of Paris was there for any kind of meeting and it hosted artistic events, musical events… they had a DJ in the middle of the hotel, we are talking about the ’80s, ’90s. It’s iconoclastic,» he says.

He adds: «I fell in love. I saw this urban piece that offered more than just rooms to clients. It was the kind of tourism I wanted to do. It was inspiring.

Thus, from love with the , Marc Rahola goes from a young telephone operator in the family business that provides him with an affluent life dreaming of music, to opening up and becoming founder and CEO of the successful OD Group (Ocean Drive, Ryans Hotels, Concept Hotel Group and more).

-Didn’t you consider whether this hotel idea you were handling was a line you could propose at Palladium Hotel Group before making the leap?

-I didn’t even think about it. I was very happy there, I have several friends from that time. But I needed to answer a question: whether I knew how to do something on my own, or not. It was a vital question that had to do with myself: do I know how to do something or was I born into a family that had already done everything? Circumstances combined: those questions, discovering the hotel business in a different way… you think about being able to express yourself in some way.

-With the Ocean Drive in Marina Botafoch did you already envision a chain?

-No, I only thought of expressing what I had inside, I did not imagine a chain. We took a hotel that was small and especially for the time, when it was said that a hotel had to have at least 150 rooms to be profitable. It was also said that it had to be close to the beach, and Talamanca is in the back and was not highly valued at that time. It also does not have a swimming pool.

-Is that why Palladium Hotel Group didn’t want to exploit it?

-Neither Palladium nor many others, including its owner, who sold it to us. I took a risk: I bet on opening all year round. It worked and we kept incorporating elements until we reached what today nobody doubts what it is, the concept of a boutique hotel. It was 2005, at that time there was not even the Ibiza Gran Hotel, it was a casino. The big hotels were 4-star hotels, there were no 5-star hotels. Moreover, I estimate that 80% of the hotels at that time did not have air conditioning. We were pioneers in that concept in Spain: there were only a handful of boutique hotels in Palma, Barcelona, Madrid. It was a more international process: from London, New York, Paris, the places I visited for inspiration, which I still visit today.

-How much of that Parisian hotel that you fell in love with is currently in your hotels?

-I’m not a copier. But it was very inspiring. There are many elements in our hotels that you obviously take from concepts that you like, that you see operationally how to apply. My hotel was in Ibiza, it didn’t have 100 rooms, it didn’t have those prices, in fact Ibiza was light years away from those prices. It was a suggestion of a model and it was to see how to implement it.

OD Group, Concept Hotel Group and Palladium

-Is there a conflict of interest in sitting on the Board of Directors of your investee, Palladium Hotel Group?

-Palladium is not an investee. I am a historical partner, my uncle Abel (Matutes Juan) took part of the family heritage and developed it, which led to my mother having a stake in the company. I spent part of my career there and today I am a director and will continue to be a director. The company is doing very well, everything works fantastic and the relationship is unbeatable. When things are discussed, conflicts are avoided. And things are discussed in private, not in public.

-As if you didn’t have enough with OD Group, Ryans and Palladium, Concept Hotel Group.

-Concept Hotel Group is not an investee either, it is a purchase. We see it as part of the OD Group ecosystem, a brand within a structure in which there is an investment platform and a management platform, a financial, administrative, IT, reporting, investment and modeling model.

By implementing this model, we have been able to carry out projects such as Mongibello or Los Felices. We were in smaller hotels and now we have been able to move to large format. Mongibello has 168 rooms and is owned by an investment fund.

Without professionalization work, it is difficult to compete. The same happens with Los Felices, a project of the Ocean Group Capital fund. It is within this scheme. What happens is that there is a part that is the front-office that we want to promote with a figure who is the father of the product, who watches over it, who is my partner and friend Diego (Calvo). We should not think of it in terms of black and white: it is gray.

We are in a moment as I said, with an unbeatable relationship, we are living a moment like all relationships, very romantic, very good, and at the same time we are in crisis, in a remodeling crisis. It is like the shell of a lobster: as they grow, they have to mutate. That is to say: as you grow, the shell you had before is no longer valid.

The 2024 season, full of satisfactions for OD Group

-From 1 to 10, how do you evaluate the 2024 season?

-It went well. I give it a 9. Better than last year in all the hotels. In some, under budget, but still better than last year.

-You have received, in the Nit del Turisme 2024, the award for tourism innovation, modernization and innovation of the hotel offer of Ibiza with a new concept of accommodation that promotes artistic creation as a differentiator, inclusive buildings and an inclusive design that is committed to sustainability and helps the recovery of degraded environments and revalues disused buildings. What did this recognition bring you?

-I am very happy and what you say is true. I have taken many hotels here that were closed. The Ryans Lolas and Los Felices were closed. Some of the proposals we have made have been proposals to generate value. When we took the OD Port Portals (Mallorca) it was an abandoned hotel after a fire.

We look for processes that have a second life, a second chapter with inclusive processes. Inclusive means that all the spaces are designed for the neighbor to enter, such as the Ryans with the 666 hamburger restaurant whose 50% of the production is made by people from Ibiza, with prices for the people of Ibiza.

All this allows artistic performances of all kinds, and to promote and make a platform for very local artistic proposals. With that we have made our OD Art Awards. Our own magazine, Ibiza Art Guide and Fiesta Bullshit Magazine. We have managed to get Ibiza Art Guide to be present in Urbanity. We are trying to get it also in Arco, but it is already in CAN (Contemporary Art Now). We have helped people from Urbanity, who were doing the Contemporary Art fair in Madrid, to come here and do CAN.

All the hotels are designed to generate that life again, to generate things. And then Ibiza Art Guide takes care of Ibizan artists or artists based in Ibiza, who are Ibicencos at heart. We do this whole process from the hotels. Hotels have that possibility to generate a positive impact. I am one of those who want to do it. It is enough to see the spaces of our hotels: there are no walls, everything is open, it invites you to be there. It’s not sectioned off, it’s not like you can’t go in and if you go somewhere they’re going to tell you something. They are open, it is an open living room. All this generates this proposal, they are not exclusive. The idea is: «Come, generate wealth in the space for yourself».

With that we participate in a multitude of proposals. This implies the design of the spaces, suitable for all kinds of exhibitions, it implies that the materials we use have a low impact in terms of sustainability, that we have recycling systems and elements in line with this value proposition. That is the basis of what is happening. It’s something we’ve been doing forever, since I started with Ocean Drive. That’s what made me fall in love with the Hotel Costes, I liked that people from Paris went to a hotel. And not only that, but in the end it comes to you in Ibiza through selling a CD of something that is in Paris. This in the early 90’s was a shock. There was no Internet, or it existed for four people. That’s the kind of tourism I believe in for me. I’m not saying that all the others are not valid. A destination is made up of hotels of all kinds and that is valid and necessary, from the 5-star to the hostel. All that confers an interest in a destination. I am simply one more link in the tourist chain.

La entrada Rahola Matutes, from well-off child to being awarded by the Govern after 20 years flying solo: «All our hotels are designed to make things happen». se publicó primero en La Voz De Ibiza.

What is your opinion on the increase of the eco-tax announced by the Government?

-We have not really seen the impact yet, but when the tax was first put in place there were many complaints and in the end it has been normalized. The problem with a tax is not its implementation, but what you want to do with it. This tax is about the tourist impact and the clients that come to the hotels and that, in some way, deteriorate the territory. So, 100% should be invested in the territory. It is logical. What I would not agree with is that if you are collecting money in Ibiza, that money should go to Menorca, or that of Menorca to Mallorca. And that there really is a plan. More money for what? Every summer, for example, we have broken sewage pipes. If it is being collected, let that be fixed. We pay enough taxes, but I don’t know if they go to Madrid or the Balearics. If it’s to fix that kind of thing, that’s fine. I have always believed that the closer the collection is to the action, the better. We see it in smaller countries. But if we have to politicize those revenues, well….

So to really have an opinion, I have to see what it applies to, but historically, Spain has not been known for being tax efficient. So my position is skepticism. In Barcelona it has been done well, you pay a tax that is actually invested in tourism processes.

Tourism phobia, insane prices in Ibiza and housing crisis

All this, in a tourism-phobic context.

-Since we are talking about Barcelona, they have realized that what helps to regulate tourism are the hotels. In a hotel, those who stay there have to identify themselves. In addition, they are in places that are urbanistically suitable. The tourist apartments have atomized that and given rise to the legal and the illegal. In Ibiza, practically 45% of accommodation is not in hotels. This is also happening in Ibiza, in Venice, in Madrid, in many cities. That makes housing more expensive. The hotel was like an embassy, where travelers met. That is what a hotel can do and a tourist apartment cannot. The regulation must be there. Today, in the Balearic Islands, no new hotels can be built. Then, how is it that more people come? The ally is the hotelier: before we were the bad guys and now, little by little, it is being seen that we can help.

-Do you think that the ecotax is rewarding illegality and punishing legality?

Totally and not only with the increase of the eco-tax but also with the previous taxes. Nothing pays the illegal part.

-In addition, it leads to an increase in costs and this is reflected in prices, at a time of much criticism of Ibiza’s prices.

-I cannot pass it on to the customer because if I could I would already be doing so, as is logical. In the end there is a deflation of that tax.

–Meliá’sCEO said that hotels in Spain had the capacity to grow, in terms of prices. Among them, he gave Ibiza as an example, compared to Santorini or the Amalfi Coast. Do you agree with that statement?

-Yes. Now: it is one thing to agree that we can increase the price, because it is a fact, and it is another thing to agree that taxes should be raised. The infrastructures that Spain has are not in Greece. How many hotels are there in Santorini? In Mykonos? And it is very atomized with islands. Spain has a very powerful continental part, from Catalonia to the Costa del Sol. It has a great inland tourism, just to mention Madrid and Barcelona. Spain is a world power.

-What does that have to do with price growth capacity?

-When you have infrastructure, you have climate, you have a good health position, and the ease of access to all of this as a European, that is an advantage. We, when we retire, are hardly going to go and live in Norway, however fantastic the country may be. But a Norwegian, when he retires, will want to retire in Spain. Spain is still the Florida or California of Europe. A guy from Milwaukee, if he can, will go to Tampa or San Diego. There is no need to go to Los Angeles or Miami.

-So, if we have the capacity to raise prices, why don’t we raise them?

-It’s a travel issue. The different destinations compete. Fifteen years ago there was hardly the technology that we have today in Spain. And we have also had a lesson in hygiene from our major Spanish operators, who have been able to compete with the world’s major operators. Meliá, Barceló, Riu, Palladium, and so on. They have brought a lot of things that can be learned by competing overseas. This has given us a privileged situation and more and more. Now it is a hub of constant learning. We constantly produce very good human capital, very good technology and we put it into practice, and we compete more and more and better. That leads to a continuous improvement and that translates into a price improvement. But a very large part of the Spanish hotel and catering business is still in the process of professionalization: because, for example, it has been in the hands of families and now they are selling.

-In a recent interview with José Luis Benítez, manager of the Ibiza Leisure Association, I asked him that Ibiza is the only place in the world that doesn’t want to look like Ibiza. Agreed?

-Yes, it’s a classic. The instagrammable world we live in generates information and misinformation. The instagrammable world of show-off generates haters and lovers. Here it can’t be otherwise and that situation is generated. They say that more discos are being made and no, they are the ones that were there, they are transformed. It is not black and white. The housing problem is real and worries me, it generates an impoverishment of the destination. Hotels can solve part of that problem and they do. But because of the increase in prices, public services are deteriorating: it costs more to have policemen, teachers, doctors and more.

The problem we have is that we do not have comprehensive urban development plans. The Ibiza Town Hall has been with suspended projects for years. The city that we want is not planned: Can Misses is a dormitory, it has no life beyond when UD Ibiza plays. There has been a lack of political planning at a time when the private offer has specialized and the public one has not.

-You constantly see promotions with prices that are not for residents…

-Now we will see what happens. We have to start acting more forcefully against illegal tourism. We need to be more agile when it comes to shutting down illegal supply.

La entrada Rahola Matutes on the increase of the eco-tax: «The problem is not the tax but what is done with it and where»». se publicó primero en La Voz De Ibiza.