Hotel companies are embracing the tourism boom to restart their expansion

With varying intensities and sensitivities, major Spanish hotel companies are embracing the optimism that the robust recovery in the industry will continue and are relaunching their expansion plans inside and outside Spain in the coming years. Giants like Meliá, NH Hotel Group, Barceló or Riu rearrange their growth strategies and has concrete plans to add 120 new hotels to its chain in the coming years.

melia, The largest Spanish hotel company with more than 400 properties has already signed 33 projects in its portfolio to add new hotels with 8,200 rooms over the next two years. Escarrer family group, which once again reached the annual opening rate before the pandemic by incorporating a total of 32 new businesses last year, plans to open at least 25 businesses in 14 countries in 2023.

“Our goal is to maintain an average of 30 new signed projects and 30 to 35 openings in the coming years,” said Gabriel Escarrer, Vice President, and the CEO of Meliá told the press at Fitur that he predicts a full recovery in 2023 with occupations similar to pre-pandemic levels and the upward trend will continue. at the meeting.

First among this year’s openings Organizations established with the new ZEL brand created by Meliá together with the tennis player Raphael Nadal. The launch of the new brand will take place in Mallorca, but the aim of both partners is to seek opportunities to add at least 20 establishments in both Spain and Southeast Asian countries over the next four years.

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Group Barcelona it will also continue to grow by opening at least 12 hotels this year, surpassing a total of 280 businesses. The group will add five new hotels in Spain and seven more in the Maldives, Sri Lanka, Cape Verde Islands, Portugal, Slovenia, Poland and Turkey.

The Barceló family group plans to invest at least 150 to 200 million in reforms and new additions to businesses already in the portfolio. “This is the minimum investment that has already been completed, but new investments can be added if we find growth opportunities,” said Raúl González, CEO of the Barceló hotel division.

In fact, the chain calculates that the annual level of investment in the cash flow generated is 350 million (about 100 million for reforms and 250 million for investments in new hotel additions). Boasting its financial strength and liquidity, the group is therefore open to rapid growth through corporate operations.

NH’s momentum

“2023 will be the best year in the company’s history,” said CEO Ramón Aragonés. NH Hotel Group. After reaching pre-covid sales levels last year and clearing 500 million debts incurred during the worst of the pandemic (including full repayment of 250 million ICO loans), the group now plans to boost its growth strongly.

NH and its parent company, Thai group Minor International, will intensify the expansion of its eight brands over the next two years by opening 50 new hotels worldwide and adding 10,106 additional rooms. NH Hotel Group will open 27 properties in Europe and the Americas, and 23 more hotels in Asia, including more than a dozen with the Minor, NH Collection and NH Hotels & Resorts brands.

Group riu It has taken advantage of the slowdown caused by the pandemic to support the reform of many of its international properties and, with 96 hotels in its operational network, is now preparing for new extensive relocations (in Spain, the Caribbean and Africa) and for new additions.

The Mallorcan company, which rebounded pre-pandemic sales with more than 2,900 million sales last year but warned of a possible slowdown in the industry this year, plans to open four hotels in the UK, United States, Canada and the Caribbean next year. Led by brothers Carmen and Luis Riu for two years, the group will add three city resorts in London, Toronto and Chicago, as well as a resort in Jamaica.