Bridget Bilinski
Bridget Bilinski
Bridget graduated with a degree in Hotel and Restaurant Management from California Polytechnic University at Pomona in 1979. She began her career with Marriott International as a Manager Trainee at the Los Angeles Airport Marriott Hotel. She subsequently held positions in Front Office, Housekeeping, Catering, and Sales and also worked at the Anaheim Marriott and Torrance Marriott.
In 1988, she became the General Manager at the Phoenix Metrocenter Courtyard Hotel and opened three other Courtyard properties. Bridget was one of the first Area Managers for the Courtyard Hotel Division on the West Coast and was the first female Area Manager in the country.
Her next career step in 1994 took her to Arizona as the General Manager of the Scottsdale Marriott Suites. During her time as General Manager the hotel achieved the highest Customer Satisfaction scores in the country and was the first hotel in the world to receive Motorola's Service Excellence Award.
In 1996, Bridget returned to a Regional Manager position for Courtyard and Fairfield Inn. While overseeing 45 hotels in 4 states she became the recipient of the Regional Manager Leadership Award for both Courtyard and Fairfield Inn, her region received the Region of the Year award three years in a row as well as the Hotel of the Year and General Manager of the Year awards.
Bridget’s next move took her to Marriott Corporate Headquarters in Washington D.C. as Vice-President Franchising for Courtyard by Marriott. As the first female Vice-President in Franchising she was responsible for acting as the primary liaison with Courtyard franchisees and owners, and internally with the Courtyard Brand team, Development, A&C, Finance and Accounting and Information Resources. In this position she was responsible for the opening of over 100 Courtyard hotels in the US and Canada.
In 2001, Bridget returned to Southern California as the first female Regional Vice-President for Marriott’s 175 Select Service Hotels (Courtyard, Fairfield Inn, and Springhill Suites) in the eight Western states. Once again, her region received back to back Region of the Year awards (2002 and 2003)
Life came full circle for Bridget as she returned to her Full Service roots as the Regional Vice-President of Operations for the Western Region, overseeing and supporting 65 Marriott Hotels and Resorts.
She was promoted to the role of Area General Manager for the Anaheim Marriott in 2004, a 1000 room convention hotel. Not only was she the first female General Manager at this hotel but she was also quickly nominated into the role of Chairman of the Board for the Anaheim Convention and Visitors Bureau which was also the first time for a female leader.
After three successful years in Anaheim, Bridget was promoted to Area Vice-President for Northern California and the Pacific Northwest. This change involved oversight of 13 full service hotels and over $400 million in annual sales.
She was responsible for $1.4 Billion in sales, generated by 36 full service hotels in the Southern California, Arizona and Nevada including Marriott, Renaissance, JW Marriott, Westin, Sheraton and Autograph Brands.
Other roles for Bridget have included Emcee for the National General Managers and Owners conferences, guest speaker at Women’s Leadership conferences, Chair for Hospitality Uncorked Fundraiser and Board of Advisor for The Collins College.
Originally from San Diego, she and her husband, Kaz, live in Laguna Beach, California, with their two rescue dogs and the chunkiest cat from the pound.