Birmingham hotel trading strongly since opening says operator

Trading at its new Birmingham hotel has been exceptionally strong since opening last month, budget operator easyHotel has said.

The site of the new hotel, in John Bright Street, was deliberately chosen by the company due to its close proximity to Grand Central and New Street Station.

The company has opened three new-look hotels in the first five months of its current financial year – Brussels, Amsterdam Arena and Birmingham.

In a trading update covering the five-month period, easyHotel said all three had traded exceptionally strongly and were expected to reach maturity ahead of budget.

Overall, the company said trading for the five months ended February 28 had been slightly above the board’s expectations.

“This performance was mainly driven by strong owned hotel like-for-like revenue growth of 19% for the five months compared with the same period last year, as the group continues to benefit from the revenue strategy announced in December 2015,” it said.

easyHotel currently has 1,748 rooms under development, 716 of which are owned and 1,032 which are being developed by franchise partners.

New hotel projects under construction are: Barcelona (204 rooms) and Ipswich (94 rooms). Both are said to be progressing well.

Hotels in Manchester (115 rooms) and Liverpool (78 rooms) are expected to open during the summer, with the company saying it intended to take advantage of the extension to the construction programme to improve on the layout and design of the new venues.

It has also obtained planning permission for a 131-room facility in Sheffield, with a 94-room outlet in Leeds also awaiting consent for conversion.

Both Sheffield and Leeds are expected to open in 2018.

Guy Parsons, Chief Executive Officer, easyHotel, said: “Trading in the first five months of financial year 2016/17 was slightly ahead of the board’s expectations, with like for like revenue growth of 19%, as owned hotels continued to benefit from our revenue management strategy.

“We remain on track to open eight new hotels, four owned and four franchised, in the current year. We are actively evaluating a number of interesting opportunities which potentially meet our site criteria of location and returns.”

He said the board remained confident of expanding its presence in major UK cities as well as key European gateway cities.