Europe’s hotel construction pipeline remains steady in Q2

The second quarter of 2022 saw a steady growth in new hotels opening in Europe, with 188 new hotels with 28,350 rooms opening in the first half of the year, according to the latest Hotel Construction Pipeline Trend Report from Lodging Econometrics (LE), The report saw a continuation of the upward trend in year-end total opens seen in 2020 and 2021, the region is forecast to open another 259 hotels with 36,548 rooms in the next two quarters, for a 2022 year-end forecast total of 447 new hotels and 64,898 rooms. The LE forecast for new hotel openings for the next couple of years anticipates a total of 421 new hotels/62,281 rooms to open by the end of 2023 and 419 new hotels and 64,016 rooms are forecast to open in 2024. Meanwhile, Europe’s hotel construction pipeline currently stands at 1,706 projects and 265,818 rooms. There are 817 projects and 131,772 rooms currently under construction in Europe’s hotel construction pipeline and 413 projects and 60,397 rooms planning to start construction in the next 12 months. Projects and rooms in the early planning stage are also up 8% and 4% year-over-year respectively. According to the report, despite timeline delays, continued pandemic management and containment, the ongoing Russia- Ukraine war, labour shortages, and high inflation, Europe’s hotel construction pipeline is slowly improving. The countries leading Europe’s construction pipeline with the most project and room counts at Q2 are the United Kingdom with 309 projects/46,296 rooms, Germany with 258 projects/44,692 rooms, France with 152 projects/17,338 rooms, Portugal with 123 projects/14,811 rooms, and Poland with 85 projects/12,205 rooms. These five countries account for 54% of the projects and 51% of the rooms in Europe’s total construction pipeline for Q2 2022. Franchise companies with the largest construction pipelines at the end of Q2 are led by Accor with 262 projects/35,694 rooms and Marriott International with 201 projects/31,560 rooms. Next is Hilton Worldwide with 192 projects/28,550 rooms, InterContinental Hotels Group with 151 projects/20,644 rooms, and then Radisson Hotel Group with 45 projects/8,266 rooms. These five global franchise companies at Q2 account for 50% of projects and 47% of rooms in Europe’s total pipeline. The largest brands for each of these top companies are Accor’s Ibis brand with 92 projects/10,998 rooms; Marriott’s Moxy brand with 51 projects/8,769 rooms; Hilton’s Hampton by Hilton brands with 69 projects/10,583 rooms; IHG’s Holiday Inn Express with 60 projects/8,723 rooms; and Radisson’s Blu brand with 13 projects/2,199 rooms.