Sam Fox outside of The Global Ambassador hotel in Phoenix
FOX IN THE PENTHOUSE
How the Valley's foremost restaurateur broke into the luxury hotel business
By: Brandon Brown
Hotels have been on Sam Fox’s mind for a long time.
So when plans for the Global Ambassador started coming together in 2019, he had spent a lifetime preparing for the moment. The 141-room hotel is set to open Dec. 6 next to The Grove mixed-use project on the northwest corner of 44th Street and Camelback Road in Phoenix.
“The idea of having my hotel is probably 10-plus years,” Fox said. “I just thought it was the evolution of an entrepreneur as a businessman.”
Fox, who founded Fox Restaurant Concepts in 2004 – think popular establishments such as The Henry, Flower Child and Culinary Dropout – has been nominated for 12 James Beard Awards. He is known as a master restaurateur, but he wanted to dive deeper into the hospitality world and have people not only trust him to serve up a great breakfast, lunch or dinner, but also spend the night at his establishment.
“At one time I tried to buy an old motel, which didn't work out, and there was a property in Tucson that I had my eye on that I tried to acquire, that didn't work. These were all existing properties,” Fox said. “And then this land became available.”
Fox, who has worked with Phoenix-based RED Development in the past, said he wanted to build his own hotel from the ground up inside the $300 million Grove project. Fox, along with business partner and friend Brian Frakes, the CEO of Common Bond Development, acquired three acres from RED for just over $11 million at a site for the hotel.
Sam Fox and Brian Frakes go over plans for the Global Ambassador inside the hotel's restaurant during its construction.
“At first I thought it was going to be a little bit smaller and on one acre,” Fox said, “But now it's a lot grander than I ever thought it was going to be from the beginning. But I'm really happy at the place we wound up. I'm at a good place in my life where it makes sense for it to be like this.”
Fox is now four years removed from the day-to-day operations of his Fox Restaurant Concepts, which was acquired by the Cheesecake Factory in a deal valued at more than $350 million.
Fox remained the head of FRC under the Cheesecake Factory umbrella. But Fox has been able to start another company – Author & Edit Hospitality – and focus on passion projects including the Global Ambassador and the Twelve Thirty Club in Nashville, which Fox said is one of the top 10 grossing restaurants in the country.
Fox is the first to admit that he is new to the hotel business, but through years of travel and taking notes on what he has liked or would like at various hotels around the world, he came up with a vision for the Global Ambassador.
“Over the past 15 or 20 years that Sam and I and our wives have been friends, we've traveled a lot together and it's become one of those things where our previous experiences are helping our situation now,” Frakes said. “We’ll remember the hotels we stayed at in France or Italy or New York and try to recreate the vibe of the lobby or the room.”
With the Global Ambassador, Fox took what he is really good at – food and beverage – and made it central to the project.
The Global Ambassador has multiple restaurants inside – Le Âme, a Parisian steakhouse that Fox called “the heart of the hotel;” Pink Dolphin, the restaurant and bar connected to the pool that serves Mexican and Peruvian-inspired dishes and drinks; the Mediterranean Rooftop, which is located on top of the hotel with views of Camelback Mountain; Le Market, a breakfast, lunch and coffee spot; Lobby Bar, which Fox wants to be full and raucous with live music on a regular basis; and The Grill, which is the restaurant for the Global Ambassador’s members club.
“I always tell people that I'm building this hotel, but it's really about restaurants and the pool and the market and the gym and sometimes I forget we even have hotel rooms here,” Fox said.
Fox has personally and meticulously gone over and chosen every aspect of the hotel — from light fixtures and pitchers in the restaurant to the architecture and structure of the building.
Part of Valley's new luxury properties
There are 26 hotels under construction in the Valley that will add 4,527 new rooms to the metro's inventory, according to data from CoStar Group, which tracks real estate and hospitality projects. Another 40 projects and 4,748 rooms are in the final planning stage while 46 projects and 5,298 rooms are earlier in the development process, according to CoStar data.
The total 14,573 rooms under construction or being planned would increase the Valley’s hotel room count by roughly 20%. High-end and luxury hotels are making up a large chuck of the rooms being built in Phoenix.
“Between December 2023 and December 2024, we could see six new high-end, full-service properties open. This includes the Global Ambassador, Caesars' first nongaming hotel with Caesar’s Republic Scottsdale, the Ritz-Carlton Paradise Valley and Vai Resort,” said Eric Kerr, the vice president of insights and development at Visit Phoenix. “These huge projects will generate tons of media exposure for the destination and bring new, high-spending visitors to the city.”
The Global Ambassador will be part of this new class of luxury properties, but its ownership and management said it differs from anything else being offered here.
“I think we carve our own niche," said Fox. "We have an amazing building at one of the best intersections of the city."
What makes Global Ambassador different
Fox and crew also stand out because they are doing it all by themselves.
Most hotels either have a brand they are connected with – the Marriotts and Hiltons of the world – that have specific standards for how hotels need to look and how they are operated. But The Global Ambassador is based on exactly what Fox and his team want to do.
“The opportunity to be involved in something where one individual is making all the decisions from beginning to end, that's really powerful, that doesn't exist in our industry often,” said Geoff Gray, the managing director and general manager of the Global Ambassador.
Under the watchful eyes of his hotel staff, Sam Fox, right, taste tests some of The Global Ambassador's cuisine on Nov. 20, 2023 prior to its opening in the first week of December.
Gray joined up with Fox in August 2022 after a 12-year tenure with Hyatt Hotels. During the run-up to the opening of the Global Ambassador, Gray has worked with Fox on making his visions for his hotel become a reality.
“Sam is an incredible restaurateur, he’s built incredible organizations, but he's also very cognizant of what he hasn't done before and he finds people that are experts in that field to help make sure it's successful,” Gray said.
Fox brought on Judith Testani of Testani Design Troupe to be the interior designer for the hotel, Nelsen Partners as the architect and Berghoff Design Group as the landscape architect. Okland Construction was the general contractor. Fox spent one-on-one time with all these companies to make sure they could complete his vision.
“Sam knows what he likes and what he wants the guest to experience, and then we break it backwards and say, ‘OK, now how we are we going to accomplish that,’” Gray said.
During those conversations – which included all sorts of aspects of the hospitality business ranging from in-room dining to how employees should address guests – Gray said he would tell Fox how things are typically done in the industry, but then together they would add their own spin on typical hotel practices.
One thing that Fox said he was very passionate about was getting good water pressure in every room in the hotel. So a system was created that brings all the water up to the top floor of the building and goes down. Fox said having good water pressure adds to the feeling of being on vacation, as does a big TV.
“He knows how he wants people to feel,” Gray said.
Fox: 'It's a little sensory overload'
Knowing what experience he wants to create, and then finding ways to make that happen is what made Fox successful in the restaurant industry. People have flocked to Fox Restaurant Concept eateries for years not just for the food, but for the experience and ambience.
One of the first feelings Fox wants people to have when they come to the Global Ambassador is confusion – which is another way Fox is setting himself apart from the rest of the hospitality industry.
“It’s a little sensory overload,” Fox said. “Guests have to sort of look around, try to figure it out a little bit. It doesn't feel like a traditional hotel.”
The front of the Global Ambassador faces west into the Grove mixed-use development and has four entrances – the lobby, the pool, the café and the restaurant – which Fox said is to help lead guests to discover new elements of the property every time they come.
Even the main entrance doesn’t lead directly to the reception desk, but rather to the hotel's Lobby Bar.
“The Lobby Bar is going to have great energy. I want this to feel like a big city,” Fox said. “Phoenix is a big city, but it doesn't feel like London, it doesn’t feel like New York; but I wanted that energy when you walked into the building.”
Sam Fox looks over the progress that the Global Ambassador is making prior to its grand opening in the first week of December.
Like the historic hotels of Paris, London and New York, Fox wants this project to last and be something he is remembered for.
“This is a legacy project for me,” Fox said. “This is sort of the pinnacle of my career. I feel like it's going to be hard to top this.”
Don't let Fox fool you — the Global Ambassador won't be the swan song for either him or Frakes.
Fox is still involved with FRC, which recently announced it will be opening a second location of The Henry — a coffee shop and restaurant on East Camelback Road that has become a workday haunt for Phoenix’s business, political and cultural leaders.
Frakes said after developing a hotel on this scale, it will likely open more doors for him in the hospitality world.
“We're going to be actively looking for opportunities to create something special,” Frakes said. “We've learned a lot about creating hotels and hotel rooms and the hospitality side of that … we've learned a new discipline.”
And, by making their first hotel project very complex, Frakes said he and Fox will be able to do something on this scale — or bigger — more easily in the future.