Blvd Suites' Shelly Bishop Named to DRRC Board of Directors

Oak Park, Mich. (Nov. 11, 2009) –- Shelly Bishop. Director of Sales for Blvd Suites Corporate Housing, a provider of fully furnished temporary housing, has been elected to the Board of Directors for the Detroit Regional Relocation Council (DRRC).

As a member of the board, Bishop will assert her vast experience in the hospitality industry toward the DRRC’s mission of providing corporate human resources and service managers the tools to effectively address the complex issue of domestic and international relocations. In addition, the council strives to facilitate a forum for council members to share best practices.

"I am honored and excited at the opportunity to serve on the DRRC board for this upcoming term,” says Bishop. “The organization has provided me some wonderful friendships and opportunities and I look forward to making a contribution to Detroit's mobile workforce."

David Foess, VP Sales of Relocation America has known Bishop for many years. “Shelly is a tireless worker and has served on many of the DRRC committees. Her industry knowledge, along with her problem solving skills will help us tremendously,” says Foess.

Bishop will serve a one-year term on the board.

About Blvd Suites, Inc.
Blvd Suites, Inc. is a national provider of fully furnished temporary housing. Established in 2003, the company is based in Metro Detroit, with satellite offices in Grand Rapids, Mich., northern Indiana and central Ohio.

The company was named Company Member of the Year (less than 300 units) by the Corporate Housing Providers Association in 2009, and was a finalist for the award in both 2007 and 2008.

About the Detroit Regional Relocation Council
Recognized as a regional group by Worldwide ERC (Employee Relocation Council), Detroit Regional Relocation Council (DRRC) is a professional organization providing a forum for sharing the latest information and resources available in the corporate mobility arena. Focusing on the needs of its members, DRRC's goal is to give corporate human resource managers and service providers the tools to effectively address the complex issue of domestic and international relocations.

Blvd Suites Nationwide Corporate Housing Introduces Sales Executive Shannon McMahon

-- Industry veteran to help grow Metro Detroit market --

Oak Park, Mich. (August 26, 2009) – Blvd Suites Nationwide Corporate Housing, one of the largest providers of fully furnished, temporary apartments in Michigan, is pleased to announce the addition of Shannon McMahon as the newest sales executive on the team.

McMahon brings experience both deep and broad to Blvd Suites, having spent more than a decade working in relocation and furniture rental, two business lines that heavily intersect with and support the corporate housing industry.

“We know Shannon will be an effective member of our team because of her extensive background in the various facets of temporary and corporate housing,” says Jeff Hurley, CEO of Blvd Suites, Inc. “McMahon has a thorough understanding of how the business works and has already begun making contributions.”

“I’m excited to be a part of a growing company and look forward to contributing to that growth,” says McMahon.

McMahon will be responsible for increasing corporate relocation and short-term housing accounts in the Metro Detroit market while maintaining rapport with current clients and partners.

She remains active in the Detroit Regional Relocation Council, having previously sat on the Board of Directors for the Detroit Regional Relocation Council, including serving as a vice president.

About Blvd Suites
Blvd Suites, Inc. is a national provider of fully furnished temporary housing. Established in 2003, the company is based in Metro Detroit, with satellite offices in Grand Rapids and Petoskey, Mich., as well as northwest Indiana.

The company was named Company Member of the Year (less than 300 units) by the Corporate Housing Providers Association in 2009, and was a finalist for the award in both 2007 and 2008.

Blvd Suites can be found online at www.BlvdSuites.com.

Blvd Suites Nationwide Corporate Housing named 2009 Company Member of the Year

-- Tower of Excellence Award recognizes leadership, hard work and professionalism that has strengthened the association and the corporate housing industry –-

March 2, 2009 (Oak Park, Mich.) – Blvd Suites Nationwide Corporate Housing, a Metro Detroit-based company, has been named the Company Member of the Year, the most prestigious award given by the Corporate Housing Providers Association (CHPA). The award was presented on Feb. 26 at the association’s Tower of Excellence Awards Dinner, held during its annual conference.

The Tower of Excellence award for Company Member of the Year recognizes corporate housing providers that demonstrate commitment to excellence in the industry through their hard work, leadership and professionalism. Blvd Suites received the annual award for companies that average less than 300 rented apartments per month.

“All of us at Blvd Suites are amazed, humbled and honored by this incredible recognition,” said Jeff Hurley, who founded the company in 2003 and serves as chief executive officer. “But this award is really all about our people. Our team works extremely hard every day to place an unwavering focus on customer service and quality. I am so proud of them. Our people earned this award and I cannot thank them enough.”

CHPA also awards annual Tower of Excellence awards for Company Member
of the Year (more than 300 units division), as well as Individual Member of the Year, Most Creative Marketing, Best Community/Philanthropic Program and CHPA Volunteer of the Year.

“Every company in our industry offers roughly the same furnished apartments with similar furnishings. Ultimately it comes down to providing unsurpassed quality and service, which are key components of our culture. We have rigorous systems in place that measure more than 200 points of quality control from the moment we initially make
contact with a client until after they move out of one of our furnished apartments,” said Hurley.

“It’s not just about systems and checklists though. Our people take tremendous pride in the caliber of service and quality our clients associate with our brand. We believe that’s what sets us apart,” he added.

Companies nominated for a Tower of Excellence award are evaluated by a panel of judges consisting of executives not connected professionally with CHPA. Judges look at criteria such as contributions to the corporate housing industry (locally, nationally or internationally), participation in CHPA, philanthropic efforts, examples of collaborative relationships with other member companies, and a history of strengths and successes (i.e. financial and/or volume growth).

Blvd Suites participates in local CHPA events and has lead roundtable discussions at the organization’s annual conference. In 2008, Hurley was asked to join the CHPA Board of Directors, and has since participated in various panel discussions.

Economic difficulties have required many companies to make budget cutbacks. In response, Blvd Suites made nominal contributions to some of its vendor partners in order to enhance their annual holiday parties. The company has also expanded its philanthropic efforts by contributing previously rented furniture to the Salvation Army.

Blvd Suites has not been immune to a slowing economy, however. Being based in Michigan, which has been in a recession for nearly a decade, the company utilized prudent forecasting and cost disciplines in 2008 with the goal of maintaining revenue levels reached in 2007. As a result, the company grew year-over-year revenues by one percent, continuing its trend of annual growth since it was established in 2003.

“It sounds insignificant, but considering everything going on in the economy, we celebrated that one percent with great enthusiasm when we announced it at our annual holiday party,” Hurley said. “That success has to be attributed to the commitment to excellence our people continually demonstrate.”

Training is another element of the Blvd Suites culture. The entire sales and leadership team meet every other week with a nationally respected coach in the industry to discuss challenges, share ideas and work toward always improving the value and delivery of the services the company provides.

“We’re a team of professionals who share a commitment to our culture of service, quality and communication,” says Hurley. “Every day, in every thing we do, we are asking ourselves what else we could be doing to not only grow our business, but raise the level of respect our clients and our partners in the industry have for us, and strengthen
our relationships with them.”

“This recognition validates everything we have done and will continue to do to meet those goals,” Hurley added.

About Blvd Suites, Inc.
Blvd Suites, Inc. is a national provider of fully furnished temporary housing. Established in 2003, the company is based in Metro Detroit, with satellite offices in Grand Rapids and northern Indiana.

The company was named Company Member of the Year (less than 300 units) by the Corporate Housing Providers Association in 2009, and was a finalist for the award in both 2007 and 2008.

CORPORATE HOUSING PROVIDERS ASSOCIATION PRESENTS 2009 INDUSTRY AWARDS

INDIANAPOLIS, IN – March 9, 2009 – The Corporate Housing Providers Association (CHPA), an international organization representing corporate housing companies around the globe, presented their eighth annual industry awards to nine outstanding individuals and companies on February 26, 2009. The awards event capped a two and a half day conference featuring education sessions, networking opportunities and an exhibition hall.

The Tower of Excellence Company of the Year Award honors companies that excel in the corporate housing business, demonstrate outstanding financial results, exceed guest service standards, and make significant contributions to the corporate housing industry in the national, regional and local areas. BLVD Suites, Inc. was announced the winner for the company with less than 300 units. Located in an area with a decade-old recession, the company experienced growth in 2008, despite all economic challenges. BLVD Suites, Inc. is located in a suburb of Detroit, Michigan. SuiteAmerica won the Company of the Year Award for a company with more than 300 units. SuiteAmerica saw improvements in 2008 such as energy efficient equipment and processes in two major warehouses, consolidated reservations and customer service centers, and a new inventory management position. SuiteAmerica serves nationwide and is headquartered in El Dorado Hills, California.

The Associate Partner Member of the Year award recognizes an outstanding associate member company who has shown commitment and excellence in the corporate housing business as a partner to providers and to CHPA. This year’s honoree, AFR Furniture Rental has won for the second consecutive year and is known for their commitment to customer service. They provide rental furnishings to the corporate housing industry and service the east coast from New England to North Carolina.

CHPA’s Individual Member of the Year Award recognizes an outstanding employee, executive or owner demonstrating commitment and excellence within their company and to the entire corporate housing industry. Melissa Baker, CCHP of Priority Corporate Housing was named Individual of the Year for a company with less than 300 units. Baker is known for treating customers fairly and working as a partner with associate members. Marelyn Krueger of BridgeStreet Worldwide received the award for Individual of the Year for a company with more than 300 units. Krueger ensures that BridgeStreet Worldwide’s largest clients receive the highest level of service across the globe. An important part of the company’s expansion, she was involved in the opening of their Global Solution Center in Singapore.

The Tower of Excellence Award for Most Creative Marketing recognizes an outstanding marketing concept that greatly impacted corporate housing in the past year. The award recognizing a company with less than 300 units was awarded to ExecNet Properties. Redesigning their website resulted in increasing their traffic by 23% in just one month. CitiSuites was honored with the award for more than 300 units because the company is launching its own guest magazine for the industry in their market, called Suite Life 101.

To honor the companies that dedicate their time to serving their communities, CHPA awards a company with the Best Community Philanthropic Award. The 2009 winner was CWS Corporate Housing. Their company goal is for every employee to dedicate at least 12 hours of community service annually, for which the associate earns $10 per hour toward the charity of their choice. They have achieved a 98% company-wide participation rate. A wide variety of communities have benefited from the company’s generosity -- from improving a school and treatment facility for troubled children in Denton, TX to providing food for more than 14,000 people per month in their Canadian market.

CHPA also honors an individual who has given generously of their time and efforts to CHPA. The Volunteer of the Year Award honors their professionalism, commitment and hours of volunteer time to make a difference in the Association. Marilyn Kempter, CCHP, of ABODA was award the Volunteer of the Year Award because she has been instrumental as part of the team that created CHPA’s Certified Corporate Housing Professional (CCHP) Certification and has served as the Education Committee Chair for the past two years. She has also helped develop the Association’s webinar educational series and advised on curriculum.









The Corporate Housing Providers Association (CHPA) is the only trade association dedicated to the corporate housing industry. As the industry continually evolves, members gain insight and resources on how to stay competitive through their involvement with CHPA. CHPA, as the voice of the corporate housing industry, offers networking, educational and informational opportunities to corporate housing providers around the world. At its annual meeting, CHPA recognized nine corporate housing companies and individuals for their outstanding contributions to the industry.

USA Today: Employers increasingly using corporate housing to relocate employees

USA Today

Employers pay more to relocate workers

January 21, 2008

By Stephanie Armour

In what some analysts are calling the worst housing slump since the Great Depression, employers are paying more to get reluctant employees and new hires to sell their homes and relocate for work.

Employees are more reluctant to move because they worry about their ability to sell their homes without taking a loss.

Fourteen percent of employers say they're more willing to pay to relocate new employees from another area to their company's location this year compared with last year, according to a joint survey by CareerBuilder.com and Apartments.com, and conducted by Harris Interactive.

The survey included 2,417 hiring managers and 5,727 employees, and had a sampling error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

"What's going on in the housing market is causing an increasing reluctance for candidates to consider relocating," says Sally Stetson, co-founder of Salveson Stetson Group, a Philadelphia executive search firm. "Employers are much more willing to extend corporate housing on a month-to-month basis."

When asked how much they'd be willing to spend to relocate an employee, 40% say more than $1,000. One-third is willing to spend more than $2,500, and one in 10 is willing to spend more than $10,000.

What employers are doing:

•Extending temporary housing. Employers are extending temporary housing allowances from two to three months to up to eight months, an indicator of how hard it is today for relocating employees to sell their homes.

•Purchasing employees' homes. Larger companies in some cases will buy the new employee's home as a buyer of last resort. Home Depot (HD), for example, will buy a relocating employee's residence once it's been on the market for 90 days.

In a different approach, some companies offer to subsidize part of a relocating employee's cost of renting a home in a new location.

"Companies know it's a tough time, and they're willing to make it attractive" to relocating employees, says Karen McRae, a vice president at Jenny Pruitt & Associates, an Atlanta real estate firm.

•Letting employees long-distance commute. Some companies will let a new hire or employee who can't relocate work remotely, or let them commute long distances, going to the main office less frequently.

IBM (IBM) has a large virtual workforce, which helps employees in today's market because they can often have the flexibility to work where and when they want. Forty percent of IBM's global population of 355,000 works from a remote location — about 50,000 in the USA, up from 10,000 in 1995.

Employees with families "can hit the ground running if they don't have to relocate," says Dan Pelino, IBM's general manager of global health care and life sciences. "You can find the best talent, independent of where they live."

Chicago Tribune: Corporate housing finding favor with business travelers

Chicago Tribune

Temporary nests; Economical and low-key, corporate housing is finding favor with business travelers

By Chuck Green

October 21, 2007

Don't tell business traveler Mike Napoli there's no place like home.

He has found a way wants to re-create that feeling as closely as possible even on long trips.

When Napoli and his colleagues spent several days in Chicago last year for a trade show, they chose corporate housing over a hotel.

"It's certainly more relaxing than a hotel and allows me to get up in the morning and make a cup of coffee and get some breakfast," he said.

When they stayed in a hotel on another visit, "we bought a bunch of pizza and kept it in the refrigerator when we worked at night and wanted a snack. Corporate housing is easier," said Napoli, who works for a company that sells floor coverings.

According to the Corporate Housing Report 2007, published by the Highland Group, a management consultant, there were an estimated 3,618 units dedicated to corporate housing in the Chicago area in 2006, a 14 percent increase from a year earlier. The report defines corporate housing as furnished apartments that include utilities, linens, utensils and other necessities, typically rented 30 days at a time.

The 2007 inventory of these units is projected to increase by 6 percent, while the occupancy rate in Chicago in 2006 was 88 percent. On average, states the report, corporate housing occupancy is considerably higher than that of hotels. The average length of stay in corporate housing in Chicago in 2006 was 68 days at an average rate of $99 a day.

In contrast, the average daily rate for a hotel room in the Chicago area was $122 at year-end 2006, but rates were "significantly different" when looking at just downtown hotels, which were as high as $180 for year-end 2006, according Duane Vinson, vice present at Smith Travel Research.

"In general, customers have become more sophisticated about their travel options and preferences. This has been particularly true in the last 10 years," said Peggy Berg, president of the Highland Group. She added that the product has improved accordingly.

Thomas Golden, who spent several months in Chicago on an assignment for the U.S. Postal Service, had such a "turnkey operation" in mind when he chose corporate housing downtown. "I have a full kitchen, utensils, everything."

Golden, who had a one-bedroom unit, said he'd have felt more constricted in a hotel room. "Because I was going to be living here for six months, I wanted to be able to stretch out, walk around, have some room," said Golden, of Pennsylvania.

Young Hill, general manager of Marriott ExecuStay, said while the basics are key, amenities have become more meaningful. "Does it have a fitness center, swimming pool and business center? I think before, people didn't care as much about building amenities because they weren't using all of them; it was really about location."

However, she said as people are staying in corporate housing longer, they want these things. "They want to be able to mirror their life at home to what they're doing when they're out traveling for business." That includes proximity to shopping and a grocery store.

Besides easy access to a laundry room, a swimming pool and fitness weren't that important to Golden. But they were to his colleagues, who stayed at another downtown location that had them. "I didn't care, only because I'm overseeing the project and just don't have time [to use them]."

Barbara van Rekom, who will be staying in a corporate apartment downtown until the end of the year, also doesn't ask for much.

"It's more cost effective. I have free Internet ... and I have my own kitchen and don't have to eat out every night. I can actually make a peanut butter sandwich if I want to," she said.

Most important, said van Rekom, a Nashville-based project manager for Hewlett-Packard Co., "I don't have to drag my stuff back and forth. Every week, I fly in on Mondays and home on Fridays, so it's my home away from home, and I don't have to change rooms every week."

Hotels have the edge in certain areas, such as daily maid service, said Elaine Quiroz, president of Corporate Housing Strategies, a Virginia-based training and development firm in the corporate housing. "But because guests [in corporate housing] stay so much longer than those at a hotel, they don't always want someone coming into their private space daily. Although some ask for weekly maid service, others prefer to opt out of maid service completely, and just settle in."

It's not that Napoli, an Idaho native who stayed in a brownstone in Lincoln Park, doesn't see any downside to the arrangement. "You don't have maid service every day; you don't have a restaurant where if you're involved in something, you can just call down and get room service.

"But for us, the drawbacks are insignificant compared to the convenience and cost savings," noted Napoli, who said two colleagues stayed in a one-bedroom unit on one floor, while he and an associate occupied a two-bedroom unit on another floor.

"We wanted to save on expenses. We found the cost of us in three hotel rooms would have been about $800 a night. We were able to do that for much less, maybe about half."

Quiroz also noted the high level of furnishings, bedding and amenities now offered in corporate housing. "It's becoming more aligned with the better hotels. The nice touches such as high-thread count sheets, for example. You expect to find these in hotels, but guests using corporate housing for the first time are often surprised at the superior quality of the interiors, furnishings and amenities."

She says that business travelers today are more sophisticated in their accommodation choices, and that includes corporate housing.

"Corporate housing is still relatively new to many travelers, having evolved in the last 40 years. Yet once travelers stay in these spacious apartments, they quickly develop a preference for them over hotels, for their longer-term stays. There is nothing that compares to having your own 'home' while on the road. And as corporate apartment services and amenities continue to move higher, this will become an even stronger choice for travelers."

Steve Cuskey, who visited Chicago last year for a trade show, is sold. "I pretty much rent places wherever I go because, to me, a hotel room has become jail with drapes and a television after about two days. [With corporate housing] everything's there, like a full-blown kitchen, an office with Internet access, a board room," said Cuskey, who also stayed in the Lincoln Park area.

Like Napoli, Cuskey emphasized the importance of establishing a "home" on the road. "What was important to me was having something that looks like my house and not a hotel room. I mean, how common has the word 'suite' become? I'm an old guy. Now a suite is just this word that means you have two rooms and a microwave sitting on top of a refrigerator. So I always try to zero in on something a little better."

Jim Haring, owner of China Doll Guest House in Chicago, agreed. "Business travelers are sick of sterile hotel rooms or even suites. They are discovering the option of self-catered apartments where they get a complete home and each apartment is unique. A Wi-Fi connection is a must, but many also offer completely equipped offices in the apartment."

"I want to have everything I need when I want it in the morning," added Cuskey. "I suppose I'm an old curmudgeon; I like to have coffee put ready right there and I don't want to wait for room service. And I sure don't want to have to tip the guy on top of that. And heaven help you if you open up mini-bar and take anything out," he said with a laugh.

"It has to feel like home."