Is This the End of the Beverly Hills Hotel?

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The entrance to the Beverly Hills Hotel, known as the Pink Palace and in a maelstrom of controversy. (Courtesy: Beverly Hills Hotel)

The hotel lobby of The Beverly Hills Hotel is quiet.

I walk downstairs and grab a seat inside the Fountain Room, a 1950s style diner with an S-shaped counter that’s usually packed with an hour-long wait time, but it’s quiet, too.

Denise—behind the counter, late-forties—pours my coffee and chats with the regular beside me, a mid-fifties woman who’s reading the Los Angeles Times.

“I bet Mother’s Day was crazy at The Polo Lounge?” the regular asks and flips the page. The Polo Lounge is the hotel’s upscale dining room, where celebs and Hollywood power players come for brunch and dinner.

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The Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel—which is usually packed. (Courtesy: Beverly Hills Hotel)

Denise shakes her head with a pursed-lipped look that says, “Not even close.”

“No?”

“We had six tables all day,” she says.

“Six?” the woman asks incredulous. “What happened?”

Denise looks around, over both shoulders, blocks her mouth with the back of her hand, and exaggeratedly mouths the words: “the boycott!”

The boycott in question began in late April after the hotel’s owner, the Sultan of Brunei, Hassanal Bolkiah, said he planned to implement Sharia law for his 280,000 of his near half-million subjects, a law enacted with strict punishments of death by stoning for gays and adulterers.

The comments led to a celebrity boycott started by a tweet from Ellen Degeneres that resulted in a nosedive for business, cancelled reservations, bookings, and events, costing the hotel upwards of $1.5 million. The Beverly Hills City Council also voted unanimously to urge for new ownership of the hotel.

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The hotel, hidden away in Beverly Hills. (Photo: Thinkstock)

Upstairs, The Polo Lounge dining room is empty for lunch, though their outdoor patio had half-a-dozen tables filled, further proof the hotel is still feeling the impact.

“His statements have definitely affected business,” said the concierge, who asked to not be named before one of her colleagues nudged her to stop talking.

The tight-lipped employees have become the unsuspecting victims of the Hollywood boycott, many of them aspiring actors and models themselves. The paisley-polo wearing valets, the hostesses, the waitress—they all depend on big-tippers to make due, and these last few weeks have taken their toll.

One valet who said he could make up to $300 a day in tips said he’s feeling the punitive effects of stalled business.

“While we recognize people’s concerns, we believe this boycott should not be directed to our hotels and dedicated employees,” the Dorchester Collection’s CEO, Christopher Cowdray, said in a statement. “The economic impact of this not only affects our loyal team members but extends to the local community, our valued partners and suppliers.

Back down at the diner, the conversation continued to be about the boycott.

“A lot of the guys working here are gay,” Denis tells me. “But nobody wants to say anything. They want to keep their jobs. Nobody’s quit yet over this.”

At a Town Hall meeting for employees, Cowdray said the jobs of employees of The Beverly Hills Hotel and the Hotel Bel-Air (both part of the Dorchester Collection) are secure, and that their wages, including service charges, gratuities, and benefits, would be maintained despite the decline in business.

Just three miles west, the Dorchester Group’s sister hotel, the Hotel Bel-Air, has also been seeing reverberations from the recent controversy, but the Beverly Hills Hotel has taken the brunt due to its ubiquitous high-profile events and pre-Oscar soirees.

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Poolside at the hotel—usually a favorite of celebrities. (Courtesy: Beverly Hills Hotel)

However, as we’ve seen before, hospitality disasters don’t always spell the end of a business—though it often depends on how their public relations team handles the fallout.

Sydney Neuhaus, a partner at RLM Finsbury, a global strategic communications firm, said she thinks the hotel’s reputation is salvageable but they’ll need a clear communications plan to turn things around.

“They really need to be sensitive to the situation and reach out to community leaders and those they may have offended,” she said.

“Communicating openly and consistently will be key to helping them rebuild their reputation."

Leslie Lefkowitz, the hotel’s publicist, said hotel rates would not change due to slower business, though Denise joked the loyal patrons still showing up are receiving grateful, five-star service from an appreciative staff.

Kenny Porpora has been a writer for The New York Times, New York Daily News, Newsday, and has been an editor for The Huffington Post. He joined Man About World as an editor in 2012.

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