Iberostar Group

Iberostar Group Profile and History

Iberostar Group is a global tourism company and hotel group. The company has four areas of business: the hotel division, the core business of the company; the holiday club, called The Club; the inbound tourism and travel brands Almundo.com, World 2 Meet (W2M) and Iberoservice; and the property business. The company's trademark is "first line" hotels (meaning directly on the beach), surrounded by g ardens. Iberostar Group is owned by Spanish billionaire Miguel Fluxà Rosselló, the third generation heir to a shoe-making business. Iberostar's head office is in Mallorca, Spain, and hotels that operate under their brand name are located in the continents of Europe, North America, Latin America, and Africa. The company temporarily closed the Rose Hall Beach Hotel (but not the adjoining Rose Hall Suites Hotel or Rose Hall Grand Hotel), one of its resorts in Jamaica. It reopened in May 2010. Travel Trade Gazette, a UK-based travel industry publication, named the company "Best Hotel Chain of the Year" in 2009. In 2004, the Iberostar Group purchased a large area of land in Praia do Forte in the municipality of Mata de São João in Bahia, state of Brazil, to build a resort. In 2006, Iberostar Bahia was inaugurated, which quickly fell in favor of Brazilian and South American tourists, in particular Argentine tourists, frequent visitors to the resort since then. 2 years later in 2008 the second resort was opened in the same place, Iberostar Praia do Forte, which recently came to be called Iberostar Selection. In April 2010, Iberostar announced that the actor Antonio Banderas would be the new face of a global campaign to promote the company's hotels and resorts. Iberostar has received negative press related to resorts in Mexico suspected of drugging tourists. There have been... "numerous reports from others who have told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel they experienced sickness, blackouts and injuries after drinking at Iberostar, and other resorts around Cancun and Playa del Carmen in recent months.".