Freeman launches Entrepreneurial Hospitality program

The A. B. Freeman School of Business at Tulane University, located in New Orleans, has announced new offerings in Entrepreneurial Hospitality. New Orleans’ long history of hospitality and Freeman’s strength in entrepreneurship come together to create a living, learning laboratory where students will develop distinctive, market-relevant and high-value capabilities.

The program will include intensive seminar courses featuring national thought leaders in the hospitality industry and options for graduate students and working professionals to earn a specialization or concentration in Entrepreneurial Hospitality within the MBA, Professional MBA and Master of Management programs.

“In today’s economy, hospitality is a mechanism for all companies to engage consumers and create meaningful experiences. It transcends all industries,” says Ti Adelaide Martin, Co-Proprietor of New Orleans’ legendary restaurant Commander’s Palace.

Hospitality is one of the largest and fastest growing industries in the world. Worldwide, travel and tourism generate more than $7.6 trillion annually, outpacing the global economy for seven consecutive years and supporting one in ten jobs on the planet. In New Orleans alone, the tourism industry employs more than 90,000 people.

Located in a top tourist destination with a new reputation as an entrepreneurial hub, the Freeman School is committed to giving students an exceptional, immersive education in a hotbed of hospitality. The programs in Entrepreneurial Hospitality prepare students to address the new emphasis on customer service in traditional hospitality industries and beyond. Courses will show the critical role that hospitality is playing in industries as diverse as health care, banking and retail.

Freeman will launch one of the program’s first five-day intensive seminars in January at the Stewart Center CBD in the New Orleans Culinary & Hospitality Institute, where students will conceptualize, plan and present a new and innovative hospitality venture to a panel of industry professionals.

“Freeman is proud to have an extensive network of notable and successful hospitality alumni who will support these new program offerings with first-hand knowledge and current industry insights,” says Doug Hertz, president and CEO of United Distributors Inc. and the chairman of the board of Tulane University. “There's no better way to teach this subject than to engage students directly with successful hospitality entrepreneurs - and there's no better place than New Orleans.”

“Teaching hospitality in a business school provides students a broad grounding in business principles, allowing them to address critical challenges in a variety of functional and industry settings,” says Ira Solomon, dean of the Freeman School. “Students will develop critical thinking and problem solving skills through hands-on, course-based projects set in a wide range of hospitality and non-hospitality contexts.”