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At Your Service: Scott Young

Jul 10, 2008  •  Post A Comment

The player: Scott Young, chief marketing officer at LodgeNet Interactive
The play: Mr. Young is helping to boost sales at what the company says is the largest U.S. interactive-media systems provider for hotels. Its products, which allow guests to use their televisions to perform services ranging from checkout to video-on-demand to room-service orders, are found in about 10,000 hotels with a total of about 2 million rooms. LodgeNet, whose systems are found in Marriott, Starwood and Hilton hotels, last month inked an agreement to install its products in high-definition TVs made by LG Electronics, Philips and Panasonic that are earmarked for hotels. First-quarter revenue jumped 86% to $139.8 million as the company boosted its rooms served 73% from a year earlier, LodgeNet said in April. The company has had “thousands” of orders from the three TV makers, says Mr. Young, who declined to disclose specific figures. “It’s really a validation of our technology that these companies would include us,” he says. “TV makers are more technology partners with us. The hoteliers are really our customers.”
The pitch: Mr. Young says LodgeNet is poised for continued growth through the expansion of its HD Advance product—which was launched last year but is in less than 10% of the rooms the company serves—because more guests own HDTVs and expect them when they’re traveling. Last year, North American HDTV unit sales jumped 56% to more than 28 million, according to DisplaySearch. “Consumer expectations have now had a big impact on the hotel industry,” Mr. Young says. “Pretty much everything we’re installing is HD Advance.”
Backstory: Mr. Young, 46, joined LodgeNet in 2006 after working for seven years at Best Buy, where he helped launch the U.S. electronics leader’s Web site in 2000. He’d previously worked in the music industry for Bertelsmann. Mr. Young, who grew up near Boston, received his undergraduate degree from Yale and a business degree from UCLA’s Anderson School.

7 Comments

  1. Very misleading. Their increase in rooms served and revenue is due to acquiring their biggest competitor for $380M. Meanwhile, their combined market cap has dropped below $80M. The picture is hardly rosey, even in HD.

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