Kristi Kastrounis has been promoted to Senior Vice President of Digital Marketing at Crescent Hotels & Resorts, where she will direct the company's corporate marketing team and set strategy across more than 120 properties. Her expanded mandate covers digital marketing, eCommerce, brand positioning, and commercial marketing initiatives — all ultimately aimed at driving revenue performance for the management company's owners and hotel assets.
A Deep Commercial Pedigree
Before joining Crescent, Kastrounis spent close to two decades working at the intersection of digital marketing and hospitality eCommerce. Her résumé includes leadership roles at Interstate Hotels & Resorts, Aimbridge Hospitality, and Hilton, where she partnered with the brand's largest management companies and ownership groups on commercial performance and digital strategy while also advising on brand-level initiatives. That cross-sector experience — spanning brands, owners, and operators — is precisely the background Crescent cited as a differentiator for the role.
"Kristi has an incredible competitive spirit. She understands marketing at a deep level, knows how owners think, understands the top hotel brands, and most importantly, knows how to turn that knowledge into results for our hotels and our owners," said Dawn Gallagher, President of Crescent Hotels & Resorts. "This promotion is well earned and reflects the impact she has made across our organization."
What It Means for Operators
For the broader hospitality industry, the move signals how upper-upscale and luxury management companies are increasingly treating digital marketing as a core commercial discipline rather than a support function. Crescent is one of a small group of elite operators approved to manage hotels under the brand families of Marriott, Hilton, Hyatt, and IHG — meaning Kastrounis will be navigating complex, multi-brand digital ecosystems at scale. Operators watching hospitality commercial strategy trends will recognize this as part of a wider push by major management companies to centralize digital and eCommerce capabilities at the corporate level, giving individual properties access to expertise that would be difficult to build property by property.
Kastrounis also brings community standing to the role. She currently serves on HSMAI's Marketing Advisory Board and volunteers with HSMAI's Rising Leaders Council, mentoring emerging hospitality marketing professionals. That external engagement positions Crescent to stay plugged into industry best practices as hotel digital marketing continues to evolve alongside shifting guest acquisition channels and direct-booking strategies.
The promotion is framed internally as a reflection of Crescent's commitment to developing talent from within — a retention and culture signal that carries weight in a competitive labor market for hospitality commercial talent.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
