InterContinental Hotels Group was the largest hotel chain in the world in 2015 by the hotel industry’s standard measurement of room count. IHG had 5,070 hotels with 750,000 rooms globally in its ten hotel brands July 2016, including Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn and Holiday Inn Express as the key brand players by volume of hotels.
Holiday Inn Krakow, Poland
IHG earns the 2016 bronze medal in hotel chain size by room count. Marriott is in rapid expansion, adding 237 hotels worldwide from mid-2015 to mid-2016 without counting Starwood Hotels brands. These hotel additions pushed Marriott’s room count to first place in mid-2016 with 777,402 rooms, slightly more than Hilton’s 775,866 rooms in the 2016 half-year investor reports. Still, Hilton passed up IHG too in room count by opening about 150 new hotels in the 2015-2016 year.Â
Marriott added nearly 35,000 rooms to its global portfolio from July 2015 to June 2016. Hilton added 12,200 rooms just from April-June 2016. In contrast, IHG only opened 5,350 rooms during first half-year 2016.
IHG added 49 hotels globally in the first half-year 2016 with 31 Holiday Inn Express openings, 6 Staybridge Suites and 6 Candlewood Suites. On the upscale side were 5 Hotel Indigo openings and 1 Kimpton Hotel.
On the downside was the loss of 6 Holiday Inn hotels, 1 Crowne Plaza and InterContinental Tampa rebranding to Marriott-Starwood Tribute Portfolio.
The Paramount Tribute Portfolio opens November 1.
Cross-branding is truly crossover rewards for these loyalty programs.
Here are a couple of charts. One chart shows number of hotels in each of IHG’s ten brands and global region distribution. The other chart shows the average daily rate for each brand in each region. Data is from IHG 2016 Half-Year report and IHG 2015 annual report.
InterContinental Hotels Group Brand Size and Global Distribution
InterContinental Hotels Group Brand Average Daily Rate by global region
Observations:
Kimpton Hotels are firmly in the luxury segment hotel brand with ADR at $232 surpassing InterContinental Hotels $202 in Americas.
Crowne Plaza (235 hotels) and InterContinental (135 hotels) represent the IHG chain in the upscale and luxury market segments. Kimpton will open in Amsterdam in 2017 and a Kimpton Hotel is planned for Paris.
Holiday Inn is the biggest presence for IHG internationally with 454 hotels outside the Americas, 37% of the brand portfolio.
With 1,200 international hotels outside the Americas in Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Crowne Plaza and InterContinental, the presence if IHG as a brand eclipsed the other chains. Hilton Worldwide had only 790 hotels outside the USA and Marriott brands without Starwood had 744 hotels June 30, 2016. The combination of Starwood’s 589 hotels outside Americas and Marriott’s 744 hotels puts the combined hotel chain at 1,333 international hotels outside the Americas to take another first from IHG.
Holiday Inn Express commands a high price in the USA compared to the rate differential between Holiday Inn and Holiday Inn Express in other regions. This is the largest upper midscale brand in the USA with 2,456 hotels in the Americas. So far, only 326 international hotels in other regions for 13% of the brand total properties.
Candlewood Suites, an extended stay brand, along with Staybridge Suites is the low market room rate in the hotel chain at an average $82 per night compared to $110 for HI/HIX in the Americas. The layout of Candlewood Suites is nice in my opinion with a kitchen and one bedroom suite arrangement in a small apartment.
Hotel Indigo is one of the more vibrant brand developments. There is a Hotel Indigo opening in Krakow, Poland for 2016.
Loyalty Traveler 2016 Mid-Year Hotel Chain By the Numbers Data Series
Top 11 Hotel Chains Worldwide – rise of the megabrands
Marriott and Starwood 2016 Room Rates and Hotel Brand Size
Hilton Worldwide Brand Size and Average Room Rates in 2016
