TRU Hotels & Resorts is the successor to The Prairie Group, founded in 1995 to steward a portfolio of hospitality assets for an international investment firm — and to pursue the world’s most extraordinary places.
Since then, the company and its founders have been deeply involved in the development, acquisition and management of luxury hotels, resorts, restaurants and spas — earning AAA’s coveted Five Diamond award, Condé Nast Traveler’s Gold List, Travel + Leisure’s World’s Best, and Gourmet’s Top Fifty Restaurants.
That discipline met its fullest test in 2015, when TRU and its investment partners acquired Northern Ireland’s Lough Erne Resort out of administration. A decade of TRU stewardship later — and a multi-million-pound restoration on — the five-star flagship has been named Hotel of the Year twice running and the best-rated hotel in the United Kingdom.
More importantly, that recognition was earned while delivering above-market returns for clients and investors in virtually every case. Our success rests on three disciplines: hiring and keeping uniquely hospitable people, marketing their service through state-of-the-art public relations, and applying financial rigor to everything we touch.
Our proudest measures aren’t the awards on the following pages — they are our low employee turnover, the loyalty of our staff, and the returns we deliver to those who invest alongside us.
30+ yrs
Of stewardship, since 1995
20–40%
Annualized returns, realized investments
75+ yrs
Combined leadership experience
Inn of the Anasazi · Santa Fe, New Mexico
The Approach
Three disciplines, one standard.
Beyond management, acquisition and development, we advise on every part of the real-estate and hospitality spectrum — a proven track record of both financial and critical success.
01
Management, Development & Acquisition
A proven record operating hospitality assets for third-party owners and developers — delivering premium financial results without ever compromising the guest experience.
02
International Feasibility Studies
Leadership roles on projects across the U.S., Europe, Japan and Russia. We evaluate existing and potential investments in most international markets, fluent in their customs and practice.
03
Management-Agreement Negotiation
For owners with a preferred operator, behind-the-scenes counsel on the negotiation of management contracts — current, candid insight on prevailing industry practice.
Signature Portfolio
Places our principals have shaped.
A unique approach, evidenced by the properties for which our principals have played a commanding role.
01
Lough Erne · Enniskillen, N. Ireland
Lough Erne Resort
Acquired out of administration in 2015 and stewarded by TRU ever since: a baronial resort on a 600-acre Fermanagh peninsula, home to Sir Nick Faldo’s championship parkland course and the Catalina dining room — named for the flying boats once stationed on the lough.
Best-Rated UK Hotel · Which? 2026
02
Encantado · Tesuque, New Mexico
Encantado Resort & Spa
A high-desert sanctuary that earned New Mexico’s first — and still its only — AAA Five Diamond, one of just 113 hotels in North America then holding AAA’s highest rating. Today it welcomes guests as Four Seasons Resort Rancho Encantado.
AAA Five Diamond
03
Inn of the Anasazi · Santa Fe
Inn of the Anasazi
Intimate adobe luxury in the heart of Santa Fe, opened by our principals in 1991 — long the only New Mexico property to hold both Mobil Four-Star and AAA Four-Diamond ratings. Today, as Rosewood Inn of the Anasazi, it still ranks among America’s very best hotels.
Departures · Best Boutique Hotel
04
Hotel Crescent Court · Dallas, Texas
Hotel Crescent Court
The hotel, club and spa at the heart of The Crescent — the Philip Johnson–designed, $400-million Dallas landmark of office, hotel and retail our principals helped develop at Rosewood.
Condé Nast · Gold List
Stillness
Where light meets water.
A jewel-teal pool, a lotus in mosaic — the quiet center of every place we keep.
05
Seaside Amelia Inn · Amelia Island, FL
Seaside Amelia Inn
Beachfront calm on Florida’s Atlantic coast — an oceanfront inn once in the firm’s care, where the clouds and sky-blue of the TRU palette meet the sea at golden hour.
Oceanfront
Lough Erne · County Fermanagh
Host to the 2013 G8 Summit. In TRU’s care since 2015.
Recognition
Acclaim, quietly earned.
AAA
FIVEDIAMOND
AAA Five Diamond Encantado — the first, and still the only, in New Mexico2009
Which? Best-Rated Hotel in the UK Lough Erne Resort, under TRU stewardship2026
Hotel of the Year Lough Erne — LCN Awards, back-to-back · Tourism NI 20142024–25
AAA Four Diamond Inn of the Anasazi, hotel & restaurant1994–2005
Condé Nast Traveler Gold List · Top 25 U.S. Resorts · Readers’ Poll—
Travel + Leisure World’s Best Awards · The T+L 500 — Inn of the Anasazi—
Gourmet Magazine Top Fifty Restaurants in America—
Departures #1 Best Boutique City Hotel, U.S. & Canada2003
Mobil Four-Star Inn of the Anasazi — New Mexico’s only1995–2005
Wine Spectator Award of Excellence1993–96 · 1998–2005
Leadership
Two principals. Seventy-five years of judgment.
The founders of TRU have combined more than seventy-five years across nearly every facet of hotel and resort management, investment and development.
Mark Ward
Co-Founder · Managing Partner
A long, stable record — as both developer and operator.
Mark Ward’s career in finance and real-estate development spans more than four decades, producing high-quality investments and annualized returns consistently in the range of 20–40%. A Certified Public Accountant, he was Rosewood’s Vice President for Development — helping develop The Crescent and expand the world-famous Hotel Hana-Maui — before founding TRU in 1995.
He began as a CPA, then spent years as a Controller with the Trammell Crow Company in Dallas and six years with Rosewood Property Company and Rosewood Hotels. In 1990 he became managing partner of the group that developed and operated the Inn of the Anasazi, achieving New Mexico’s only Mobil Four-Star and AAA Four-Diamond — and a fixture among Condé Nast Traveler’s top fifty U.S. hotels in its annual readers’ survey, ranking as high as 20th.
He also served as president of one of the first American companies to develop Class A office space in post-Soviet Moscow and Tallinn — among its projects the Tallinn Business Center, today home to three embassies. Since founding TRU, the firm has developed, owned or managed luxury resorts and restaurants around the globe, and since 2015 has stewarded Lough Erne Resort. Mr. Ward holds a degree in Accounting from The University of Texas at Dallas, serves on the board of the Interfaith Housing Coalition of Dallas, and lives in Plano, Texas.
Jeff Mahan
Co-Founder
Service that surpasses the competition — and keeps its people.
Jeff Mahan brings nearly four decades of executive experience launching and operating award-winning luxury hotels, resorts and spas — improving revenue, morale, service and reputation at every property in his care. He opened the world-renowned Inn of the Anasazi in 1991 and ran it for its first fourteen years.
In 2008 he opened Encantado Resort & Spa, which earned the AAA Five Diamond in its first full year of operation — to this day the only property in New Mexico ever to hold it — and now welcomes guests as Four Seasons Resort Rancho Encantado. Earlier he led El Monte Sagrado in Taos to AAA Four-Diamond status, and helped reposition the storied Hotel Hana-Maui and Hana Ranch as a world-class resort.
Mahan has served as President of the New Mexico Lodging Association, on the board of the American Hotel & Lodging Association, and as Chairman of Destination Taos. Named New Mexico’s Innkeeper of the Year in 2007, he was featured as a lodging mentor on Gordon Ramsay’s Hotel Hell, and sits on the advisory board of NMSU’s School of Hotel, Restaurant & Tourism Management. He holds a degree in Accounting from New Mexico State University and lives in Santa Fe.
Contact
Two offices. One standard of care.
We’d welcome a conversation about your property, your portfolio, or your next extraordinary place.
