W Retreat & Spa Maldives named 2014 Best Beach & Island Retreat

Starwood Preferred Guest, the award-winning loyalty program from Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc., has unveiled the Starwood hotels and resorts voted the best beyond compare by SPG members from around the globe with the release of its 2014 SPG Member Favourite Hotels & Resorts list. W Maldives was named to the list of Best Beach & Island Retreats.
The choice list is known to have featured 67 of Starwood’s close to 1,200 hotels and resorts ranging from the cobalt waters of Greece to the golf tees in Arizona. The following are the categories that members selected as their favourite hotels worldwide: Best Small Luxuries, Best Beach & Island Retreats, Best Winter Escapes, Best Family Adventures, Best City Experiences, Best Exotic Excursions, Best Golf Getaways, Top 10 USA Resorts, Top 10 China, New & Noteworthy and the last Top 10.
“We are thrilled to be named the Best Beach & Island Resort,” said Jean-Marc Ma-Poon, General Manager at W Maldives. “With its white sand beaches, turquoise lagoons, breathtaking reefs, 3 restaurants, 78 over-water and beachside retreats; W Maldives is a luxury playground, offering exceptional services to guests and truly memorable experiences.”
“Each of Starwood’s hotels around the world offers our guests an experience like no other, whether their stay is for business or pleasure,” says Chris Holdren, Senior Vice President of Starwood Preferred Guest. “Member Favourites allows our most frequent travelers to share their personal experiences at these elite hotels and truly celebrate the best of the best. Using our new methodology, this year’s list was generated from feedback from more than 1.1 million members worldwide who contributed SPG Ratings & Reviews and hotel surveys.”

In a survey of all 9 Starwood brands across 11 different categories, SPG members have voted for their favourite Starwood hotels and resorts, finding “the best” Starwood needs to offer. This year SPG renewed its style by adding new categories including: The Ultimate 10, Top 10 USA Resorts, Top 10 China, New & Noteworthy and Best City Experiences, in consideration of its members and current travel trends
The 2014 SPG Member Favourite Hotels & Resorts were known to have been chosen using a brand new methodology allowing feedback from more members and measured hotels on several data points that are significant to making a better overall experience for Starwood guests.
The winners were chosen using a special combination of guest survey results and SPG Ratings and Reviews scores.
The approach allows input from more members and more detail concerning each hotel and resort provides a better experience resulting with surveys of over 1.1 million members.
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. is one of the renowned leading hotel and leisure companies in the world with almost 1,200 properties in 100 countries and 181,400 staff.
Starwood is a fully incorporated owner, operator and franchisor of resorts, hotels and residences with internationally prominent brands such as Le Méridien, St. Regis, The Luxury Collection, Sheraton, Westin, Aloft, W, Four Points by Sheraton and Element.
The Company asserts themselves to be one of the industry’s leading loyalty programs – Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG), letting members to earn and redeem points, do room and flight upgrades. Starwood also owns Starwood Vacation Ownership, Inc., a leading provider of world-class vacation experiences through villa-type resorts and privileged access to Starwood brands.