Before joining Dream Hotel Group six years ago, Katie Fontana had already supported the team several times. From North Carolina to New York City, she learned the PR ropes in the field, leaving behind her business degree in favor of the buzzing worlds of jewelry, PR and eventually hotels. Her career thus far has truly come full circle, and she credits relationship-building skills for where she is today. Read on to learn how she became Dream Hotel Group's Vice President of Communications and PR, and get a glimpse at the group's exciting new hotel openings planned for this year.
What attracted you to the PR and hospitality industries and how did you get your start?
I grew up in North Carolina, so University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill was my number one (and only) choice for college. At the time, I didn’t know that the journalism and media fields were what I wanted to do, so I went with the traditional business route. Later I found out that economics and statistics were not my jam (though I was good at math), and I realized that writing was something that I was better at. I decided that I wanted to move to New York the summer of my junior year, and when I graduated in 2002, it was the first spring graduating class since 9/11. I moved to New York with a few friends but without a job, as post-9/11 was a really hard time to find jobs.
My first job was as a receptionist at H.Stern Jewellers, right on Fifth Avenue at the flagship store. I remember going to the interview and thinking, I could do a lot more than just answer the phone and buzz people into the corporate office. I became an assistant project manager, and they gave me the project of launching their online magazine and writing all the content for it. A year later I joined their in-house PR team (I was tasked with picking out jewelry and bringing it to celebrities at their homes and hotel rooms – and it was amazing), and that’s how I got my start in the industry.
After two years at H.Stern, a woman I had interned with at an advertising agency in North Carolina asked me to work for her in her new role at what was then LaForce + Stevens (now LaForce) heading up the consumer division. I worked there for about three years across brands like Krispy Kreme and Belvedere Vodka, and eventually the agency got into hotels and restaurants – and Dream Hotels was one of their clients. Part of my job was staying at these hotels and experiencing the lifestyle and I just fell in love with it.
I later worked at another agency on events and PR for hospitality clients. After that, I landed at Magrino and stayed for eight years, focusing mostly on travel. I learned so much from leadership as well as my teams and colleagues, and I ended up as VP of travel and real estate team, at which point I had ironically started working with Dream Hotels again.
After I left Magrino I worked at an agency that had turned from traditional PR to more of a content marketing firm. I got a call from the EVP of marketing and communications from Dream Hotel Group asking if I knew anyone to fill the role of director of communications. A month after I recommended someone, I realized that I wanted that job and started meeting with the team. Before I knew it, they had offered it to me.
The moral of my story is that things really do come full circle, and the best possible skill you could ever have is the ability to foster relationships with people.
What does your current role as Vice President of Communications & PR at Dream Hotel Group entail?
About a year before I joined, the group (which had a different name) had decided to switch from its real estate-heavy business to more of a brand and management arm. That meant bringing in independent developers and owners to develop properties under one of the brand names, and Dream Hotel Group became solely the management company. When I started, the group had four brands under its portfolio that no one really knew were part of Dream (like The Chatwal and Unscripted).
At that point I was VP of communications, and about six months in we added PR to my title. My job’s main function became overseeing internal and external corporate communications for Dream Hotel Group, and also managing the PR efforts for all the hotels over all the brands (managing the agencies that represent these hotels). A lot of my work is around establishing our CEO as a thought leader and fostering media relationships. It’s really exciting to work on key themes around growth and development, talent and new thinking, food and beverage.
The reason I got into hospitality, the reason I wanted to do hotel PR, is truly because of all the stories. Our CEO says “all hotels are lifestyle hotels” - life happens in hotels. All the great hotels invite you to be part of something, have an experience and feel like you’re part of the community.
Please share a few career highlights with us.
In 2017, we opened two hotels: Dream Hollywood, which is our West Coast flagship, and we opened a hotel in North Carolina, the first Unscripted flagship in Durham. Two weeks before I got married, I went out to LA to be a part of the opening of all the food and beverage in and around the Dream complex, and that was an amazing experience. The North Carolina property was both a career and a personal highlight. I had been working in hotels forever, and I never worked on one in my home state. My entire family came out to the events, so it was a really cool launch. Every opening is amazing, but when it’s somewhere that is personal to you, that means a lot.
The people that make up the travel industry – journalists, the editors – are phenomenal. It’s cool to see other journalists grow with you too. I have also always found that people inherently want to help other people, and I love managing other people and helping team members to learn and grow.
What are a couple of current projects you’re excited about?
We have three hotels opening up this year. We’re working fast to finish Dream Doha, Qatar, ahead of the World Cup there in November. It’s uptown, sophisticated and will have nine restaurants and bars. Then we have the Chatwal Lodge in the Catskills, which is going to be this beautiful extension of our Chatwal New York flagship. It’s a gorgeous haven in Bethel, NY surrounded by untouched wilderness. We’re also opening Your Nature, an Unscripted Eco Resort, in Belgium later this year.
The US alone footprint for the Dream Hotels brand continues to grow, with properties opening in Louisville, Miami, Cleveland, Memphis and more by 2025. We believe very much that you don’t have to be in a huge city (or pay $5,000 a night) to have a really cool hotel; everyone deserves to have a cool place to be and enjoy a lifestyle experience. We care a lot about our communities.
Any future goals and/or plans you’re working towards?
Right now, I’m really looking forward to the travel industry getting a little bit more stable, and getting these hotels open and getting more people back into our hotels. People want to travel so badly, and they just haven’t felt comfortable doing it. It’s challenging and no one could have seen this coming, but like most publicists, we do a little bit of everything and we enjoy it.
