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Four Seasons Hotel in Toronto. The company has expanded by both picking up contracts to manage new properties and branching out into sectors such as providing high-end hospitality services.Fernando Morales/The Globe and Mail

At a stage in life when most executives are content to rest on their laurels, Four Seasons Hotels Ltd. founder and chairman Isadore (Issy) Sharp is pressing ahead with plans to double the size of the Toronto-based chain while maintaining its lofty service standards.

"We recently opened our 99th hotel … and we will become a company with 150, 200, 250 hotels," Mr. Sharp said during a speech Tuesday to the Canadian Club of Toronto, which gave the 84-year-old executive and philanthropist its annual lifetime achievement award. He said that as the chain expanded, hiring the right staff remains the top priority, and "we will never lose that drive to be best in class."

Mr. Sharp famously launched Four Seasons in 1961 with a small hotel in what was then Toronto's red-light district, going on to expand globally with mid-sized, upscale properties. An architect by training, he explained in his speech that he only entered the hospitality business because he designed an out-of-the-way motel for a friend in 1955, and was stunned by how much money the property made.

In 2006, Mr. Sharp took the Toronto Stock Exchange-listed Four Seasons private in a $3.7-billion (U.S.) buyout backed by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Saudi Prince al-Waleed bin Talal. At the time, the chain had 71 hotels.

Four Seasons has since expanded by both picking up contracts to manage new properties and branching out into sectors such as providing high-end hospitality services, such as spas and restaurants, for luxury condominiums. Recent innovations include a private jet tour of the globe, in a tricked-up, Four Seasons-branded Boeing 757. Mr. Sharp said the key to successful expansion is maintaining a client-first culture across the business, and said "as we got bigger, we got better."

Looking back, Mr. Sharp said the most difficult days at Four Seasons came early in the company's history, when the chain owned its real estate and ran up significant debts on projects that included its Vancouver hotel. At one stage, debt woes forced Mr. Sharp to pledge his personal holding in the company to appease lenders.

"I could write a book on what I've done that didn't work," said Mr. Sharp. "But I avoided a destructive mistake. I learned never to risk that which you cannot afford to lose."

Four Seasons subsequently sold its land and buildings and became a services company, a business model most other chains have also adopted.

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