WASHINGTON - July 9, 2002 - Marriott International, Inc. (NYSE:MAR) announced today that the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has ranked Marriott number one in the organization’s annual lodging industry report card. Marriott out-scored 10 other lodging chains and is the only hotel company to top the list more than once. Marriott is an industry leader in several diversity-related areas, including board membership, supplier diversity, franchising and the hiring, retention and promotion of minorities.

“We are very excited to be number one for the third time,” said J.W. Marriott, Jr., chairman and CEO, Marriott International, Inc. “We have made an ongoing commitment to diversity, and our goal is to set the industry standard.”

In 2001, Marriott’s Supplier Diversity program reported that the company spent a total of $157 million, or 5.5 percent of their total procurement, with minority and women business entrepreneurs. Spending with African-American-owned companies has risen 30 percent to $26 million since 2000. As of March 2002, the Marriott International Franchise Network included 160 minority-owned franchised properties, of which 16 are African-American owned. The company more than doubled the number of women- and minority-owned franchisees in the past four years.

Marriott has the largest number of African-Americans and other minorities in senior management positions in the hospitality industry. Marriott also continues to partner with a variety of minority business organizations, including the National Minority Supplier Development Council and local minority chambers of commerce nationwide, to identify new talent and minority owned businesses. This year, Marriott International was named to two of Fortune’s top lists: “Best Companies To Work For” and “Best Companies for Minorities.” Marriott was also presented with the 2002 Catalyst Award for the advancement of women in the workplace and was named by Latina Style as one of the “Best Places For Latinas To Work For in the United States.”

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