Travelodge to increase hotels to 62 in major expansion drive north of Border

BUDGET hotel chain Travelodge is planning to increase its number of Scottish outlets by more than half to 62 in the "near future", according to its chief executive Guy Parsons.

The firm, which is Britain's original budget hotel brand, having launched in 1985, is on a major expansion drive and last week announced that it would open its 13th Edinburgh outlet on Princes Street in a deal with Sir Philip Green's Arcadia Group.

Parsons told Scotland on Sunday he has much bigger intentions for the Scottish market and he is looking to grow Travelodge's estate north of the Border from 40 to 62 in the next five to ten years, which is likely to amount to an investment well in excess of 100 million.

This year the firm, which is owned by the sovereign wealth fund Dubai International Capital, is opening 22 branches across the UK with a combined investment value of 165m.

Longer term, Parsons said he would like to see 80 Scottish outposts of the brand.

"We're looking to open at least another 22 hotels across Scotland in the near future and a lot of those will be in city centres. Glasgow is a particular area of focus for us, central Inverness as well as the more traditional tourist centres such as Aviemore," Parsons said.

Despite already holding the crown of Edinburgh's biggest hotel brand, Parsons said there was still plenty of room for growth in the Scottish capital.

"In proportion to virtually every other city in the UK - with the exception of London - Edinburgh has fewer budget hotel rooms as a proportion of the total hotel stock. Even with our latest openings, it's under-represented."

Travelodge's growth will be fuelled in part by the opening of a number of smaller sites that house just 20 rooms.

The company has recently reviewed its strategy on hotel size after trialling a more compact format on Edinburgh's Rose Street.

It plans to open 100 of these smaller "Metro" sites across the UK by 2020.

Parsons is pressing ahead with his ambitious targets despite tough trading conditions in the hospitality industry at the beginning of this year.

He said bookings and occupancy had picked up since the royal wedding but admitted 2011 has proved much more difficult than expected.

He added: "Without doubt, the beginning of this year has been a much tougher trading environment than people thought. The consumer has been under some financial pressure because of VAT going up, fuel bills and rising food costs and they have been absolutely watching every penny."