Team
Meet the LFPI Hotels management team. Find out all about their background and careers at LFPI Hotels here.
Philipp Bessler - Managing Director
Philipp Bessler became director of development for the LFPI Hotel Group's expansion and acquisition business back in 2013.
He began his career by training as a hotel administrator at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Cologne, the launch pad for his career in the international hotel industry. After his training, he studied business administration at Leuphana University of Lüneburg. Philipp Bessler was then instrumental in the European marketing and sales strategy at Hyatt International Hotels & Resorts.
Just a few years later, he was recruited by TREUGAST, a management consultancy specialised in hotel property, where he was latterly an authorised signatory and a member of the management team.
Mr Bessler has been in charge of LFPI Hotels in Germany and central Europe since 2015.
Philipp Bessler has more than 20 years' professional experience in the hotel and hospitality business.
Felix Herfurth - Managing Director
Felix Herfurth joined the management team at the Cologne headquarters of the LFPI Hotels Management Deutschland Group as commercial director in early November 2015.
Mr. Herfurth's career started with vocational training at Depfa Bank (now the Aareal Bank) in Wiesbaden. He went to study business administration at the University of Bayreuth.
Mr Herfurth then joined the auditing firm KPMG in Frankfurt, working in corporate finance / M&A. Other roles in finance at Bank of Scotland and WestLB followed, where he specialised in structured finance.
Latterly, Mr Herfurth was director of Wiesbaden-based advena Hotelgesellschaft. His role included managing and developing the hotel portfolio and setting the strategic direction for the individual sites. In short, Felix Herfurth has wide-ranging experience not just in the transactions and financing business but also in the operations side of the hotel and hospitality sector.
Björn Müller - Head of Accounting & Controlling
Björn Müller joined the LFPI Group in September 2016 as management accountant, with responsibility for accounting and management accounting.
Following his hotel training at the Hyatt Regency in Cologne, he worked at the Hyatt Regency in Cologne, the Grand Kameha in Bonn, the Hilton Düsseldorf and most recently the Hyatt Regency in Düsseldorf.
He has purchasing management, financial accounting and management accounting expertise as well as 10 years' experience in the operations side of the hotel business.
Since November 2022, Mr. Müller has been responsible for the management of accounting and controlling for the LFPI Hotel Group.
Stephanie Ley – Management Assistant & Development
Stephanie Ley has worked for LFPI Hotels Management Deutschland GmbH since 2016.
After a number of roles at reception at Maritim and Accor and in the bookings team at Dorint, the qualified hotel administrator became cluster reservation manager for the two LFPI hotels Hotel Indigo Düsseldorf-Victoriaplatz and Mercure Hotel Düsseldorf Zentrum in July 2016.
She then moved to the role of assistant to the management at Hotel Indigo Düsseldorf-Victoriaplatz in mid-2017, where she was the human resources contact person for staff and liaised between the management and the team.
Ms. Ley joined the head office in Cologne in April 2019 as assistant to the management focusing on development.
Reinier Franssen - General & Operational Manager
Reinier Franssen (business economist and hotelier) managed the first hotel of the German hotel portfolio of the LFPI Group Ibis Hotel Aachen Marschiertor. Currently he is responsible for the hotels in Berlin, Mainz, Aachen, Stuttgart, Augsburg, Karlsruhe, Speyer and Dortmund as Operational Manager. The seasoned hotelier began his hotel career in the Netherlands, where he successfully completed a 5-year apprenticeship as a chef and business administrator after commercial school. His stations during this time included the restaurant Le Patron in Epen, the Bloemendal Castle in Vaals and the restaurant Toine Hermsen in Maastricht. He gained many years of operational experience in the chain hotel industry during more than 16 years with the Accor Group. Before joining the LFPI Group, Mr. Franssen held management positions in several Accor hotels in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.
Katja Schnabel - Regionalmanager
Katja Schnabel has been part of the LFPI team since 2012. As general manager, she was in charge of rebranding the Lindner Hotel Rhein Residence, where she had previously worked for 15 years, as the Hotel Indigo Düsseldorf-Victoriaplatz, an IHG group lifestyle brand.
The trained hotel administrator has worked in the industry since 1995. Following an apprenticeship in Essen, Ms Schnabel left the Ruhr metropolis for Zurich, where she spent a year and a half at companies including Marriott before returning to North Rhine-Westphalia and continuing her career in the Rhineland.
She held roles including that of head of sales and deputy manager, resident manager and general manager. Alongside Hotel Indigo, Katja Schnabel is also responsible for the Mercure Hotel in Roßstraße, Düsseldorf.
She became regional manager at LFPI in summer 2019, which includes responsibility for the long-established Bielefelder Hof hotel in Bielefeld. Since 2023 she has been responsible as regional director for the Hopper Hotel St Josef in Cologne.
Sebastian Horn - Regional Director North - East Germany
Sebastian Horn has been with LFPI Hotels Management Deutschland GmbH since mid-2011.
After ten years of professional experience at Accor Hotels, Dorint and Azimuth Hotels, he joined LFPI in 2011 as an assistant manager.
After completing the Hotel Management Program in 2011, he took over the ibis Styles Hotel Hamburg Alster City as Hotel Director in 2012 and the Ibis Styles Speyer as Cluster Manager at the end of the year.
In the following years, he was responsible for the repositioning and rebranding of hotels from the German LFPI hotel portfolio as project manager at other locations.
Today, Sebastian Horn is Regional Director North-East Germany at the LFPI Hospitality Group and contact person for the locations Hamburg, Lübeck, Bremen, Erfurt and Dresden.
Since mid-2016, Sebastian Horn has also been a member of the LFPI Management Team in the head office and was the contact person for HR & Employer Branding until the end of 2022.
Today, he is primarily responsible for the topics of digitalization, tag stack and cross-platform software solutions as a central contact person.
Jacqueline Kromer - Regional Manager
Jacqueline Kromer has been with the Best Western Hotel Kantstrasse Berlin since 1996, except for a brief stint at the Hotel Palace Berlin during her training. Since 2011, she has been at the helm of the hotel as hotel manager. As a trained hotel manager, Jacqueline Kromer successfully passed through the stations of reception and reservation manager, assistant manager as well as deputy director and was jointly responsible for the Best Western branding in Kantstrasse. In addition, Jacqueline Kromer was mainly responsible for the transition of the Best Western Hotel Kantstrasse Berlin to the LFPI Group in 2011. Since 2013, in addition to the Best Western Hotel Kantstrasse Berlin, Jacqueline Kromer has also been Cluster Manager for the Mercure Hotel Berlin Zentrum, the second hotel of the LFPI Hotel Group in the Berlin market. Furthermore, she was the contact person and representative for all Accor franchise hotels in Berlin until the restructuring at Accor.
Gil Stantke - Technical Manager
Originally from the plant and electrical engineering sector, Mr. Stantke has been working in the real estate industry since 1992 and has since been responsible for major international clients from trade and industry, as well as for portfolios throughout Germany and Europe. In various management positions, he advised owners' associations and management boards on commercial property management and was responsible for the technical operation of large-volume locations.
Mr. Stantke has been working for LFPI as Technical Director since April 2023. The scope of his activities ranges from technical support for building services and management on specific issues, to communication with owners and authorities, to various projects and measures to standardize technical operations in the hotels.