Premier Inn: Nine hotels and 1,000 rooms opened since turn of the year

Whitbread, the owner of the Premier Inn and hub by Premier Inn hotel chains, has revealed it has “bounded” into 2020 by opening more than 1,000 new hotel bedrooms and nine hotels in the first two months of the year.

The new rooms, which add to Whitbread’s national network of over 76,000 Premier Inn and hub by Premier Inn bedrooms across the UK and Ireland, were delivered through the nine new hotel openings and extensions to several strongly performing existing hotels.

During the period, Whitbread has opened its first hub by Premier Inn hotel outside of Central London at West Brompton and opened the first Premier Inn hotel at the ski-resort of Aviemore in Scotland.

It has also opened new Premier Inn sites at popular market towns including Berwick-upon-Tweed, Buckingham and Haywards Heath and delivered the first Premier Inn at Oxford Airport (Kidlington) adjacent to the expanding Oxford Science Park.

Whitbread’s extensions team contributed to the milestone by adding more than 300 rooms at established Premier Inn hotels across the UK including at Glastonbury, Rugby, Nottingham, Inverness, Edinburgh and Norwich.

Whitbread added it sees the potential for 110,000 Premier Inn and hub by Premier Inn bedrooms in the UK and Ireland. The business expects to open approximately 2,500 net new hotel rooms across the UK in its 2019/20 financial year and has 12,000 rooms in its UK committed development pipeline.

Alex Flach, UK development director at Whitbread, said: “We’re continuing to invest in towns and cities across the UK and Ireland as we aim to increase our market share and deliver new Premier Inn bedrooms in the best locations for our customers.

“Opening more than 1,000 Premier Inn and hub by Premier Inn bedrooms in the first two months of 2020 is an outstanding achievement and builds on our track record of delivering 6,000 new hotel bedrooms over the last two years whilst maintaining high-occupancy levels of around 80%.”