The 1,613-room SLS Las Vegas will join the Tribute Portfolio
by the end of the year, and will convert one of the hotel’s towers to the
city’s first W hotel next year. Starwood Hotels and Resorts owns the W and
Tribute Portfolio brands.
The SLS has been open for just 15 months. It had been
managed by SLS’s parent, SBE Entertainment, until that company sold its
minority share of the hotel in October. Also, the SLS Las Vegas had been part
of Hilton Worldwide’s Curio collection of independent properties, and that
relationship has ended with the hotel joining Tribute Portfolio.
The W Las Vegas will be converted from what’s currently the
289-room Lux Tower and will include the W Living Room lobby concept as well as
almost 14,500 feet of meeting space. Starwood will take over management of the
W, while the SLS, which will reduce its room count to 1,324, will continue to
be overseen by owner Stockbridge Capital Partners.
Stockbridge and SLS opened the hotel in August 2014 on the
footprint of the old Sahara, which was gutted and rebuilt. Stockbridge and SBE
spent $415 million rebuilding the Las Vegas Strip property.
The hotel has struggled at its location at the northern end
of the Las Vegas Strip. Through the first six months of the year, the hotel
took an $84 million net loss on $74.3 million in revenue, according to a
Securities and Exchange Commission filing, while its revenue per available room
(RevPAR) was about 20% less than the Strip’s.
Starwood has four other hotels in the area, but the W will
be the company’s only property on the Las Vegas Strip.
Starwood introduced its Tribute Portfolio for independent,
upper-upscale hotels in April.