After the pandemic shut down the Meet the Money National Hotel Finance and Investment Conference, it is making its return to the Hyatt Regency LAX in Los Angeles, May 1-3, for its 30th edition.
“Hotel industry colleagues kept saying how much they missed Meet the Money as one of the best conferences for substantive content, networking and deal access,” said Jim Butler, partner, chairman, global hospitality group, JMBM, and conference organizer of Meet the Money. “From our experience at other events, it just seemed that everyone was ready for a restart of our national hotel finance conference. And it is very exciting to bring it back.”
Butler said the first Meet the Money was a grass roots event born of the times. “It was 1990 and we were in the middle of the S&L crisis, record bank failures, FDIC and RTC conservatorships and fire sales of distressed assets,” he said. “Some of the biggest troubled assets were in financial institution portfolios going through bankruptcies, receiverships and restructurings. At one point, some iconic assets were sold at 10% of their construction costs, and some buyers thought that might be too dear a price.”
He worked with PKF’s Bruce Baltin on the original conference formatting and content. “We thought the industry needed a new venue to deal with the problems and the opportunities—boot camp-type briefings and a special networking environment to connect all the stakeholders with top industry advisors, and resources to resolve distressed assets and finance what turned out to be chance-of-a-lifetime acquisitions,” he said. “Larry Shupnick (then of CapStar, which eventually became Interstate Hotels and then Aimbridge) and Stacy Silver and Jerry Cohen of Hotel Business provided invaluable support. It really caught on right away and grew by popular demand, evolving to respond to new challenges in succeeding recovery and decline cycles.”
The 2023 conference will not stray too far from that original formula. “First, it is the quality of the speakers and delegates,” said Butler. “Second, it’s bringing them together in an environment big enough to attract industry leaders, but small enough for meaningful and more productive in-person meetings, where everyone comes prepared to do business.”
He sees the current state of the industry, after the upheavals of the last few years, as a real chance for companies and executives in all facets of the hotel industry to reset. “There’s room and opportunity for new players, new capital and new deals,” he said. “We want to make sure people are ready to make the most of this turning point, where both distress and opportunity are looking for one or two of the right encounters.”
When asked to choose some of the highlights of the upcoming conference, Butler compared it to a father being asked to name his favorite child. Some of the speakers this year include Greg Friedman of Peachtree Hotel Group, Greg Kennealey of Mission Hill Hospitality, Francis Lively of The LCP Group, Matt Marquis of Pacifica Hotels and Mehul Patel of NewcrestImage.
“Of course, a key element so many come to hear about is what all the lenders, investors and other capital providers are talking about and the specific situations they are looking for,” he said. “We have many of the most active capital sources in the business speaking this year.”
He is excited to bring the conference back. “It really feels good to provide this service to our friends in the industry,” he said. “We want to continue giving them resources to further their careers, spot opportunities and optimize the situations they find.”
