3/8/2009 Whitbread hotels still expanding

The current economic climate has been particularly difficult for Architects as well as many of our colleagues in the construction industry; a lot of architectural companies have folded altogether . . . .

.... or have been forced to shed a significant part of their staff. However, Whitbread appears to have fought the general downward ‘construction´ trend by continuing to expand its portfolio of sites and by making the most of the opportunities that have come about as a result of the ‘softening of the property sector´.

"We opened 55 hotels in total last year, 54 of which were in the UK," explains Mark Anderson, Commercial & Property Director in a recent press release. "This is the highest number of hotels we've ever opened and is actually the highest number that any hotel operator has ever opened in the UK. We have also not been neglecting our pub restaurant operation and have opened a further 14 new pub restaurants in the past year."

Mr Anderson also confirmed that Whitbread is committed to further expansion although it has not been completely immune to the worst that the recession can throw at it and this has been reflected in a slightly less ambitious building programme going forward.

"We will be continuing to follow the same expansionist strategy that we had last year but at a rather reduced level," added Mr Anderson. "We will carry on buying sites and completing agreements for the lease of new hotels where we feel there's an opportunity to do so at a reduced price.

"We will continue to build and I'd envisage that we'd develop between 15 and 20 new hotels this year and several new pub restaurants. This is lower than last year as we have looked to reign in our spending just a little to reflect the fact that we want to be slightly more conservative and conserve our cash for the remainder of this year and next as our operating businesses come under more pressure as a consequence of the current economic climate."

Mr Anderson further confirmed that last year Whitbread set out to reduce the cost of its construction by five per cent, but has far exceeded this target: “The construction and procurement teams have been working together very well and I would just like to emphasise that the cost savings we have seen haven't been achieved by hammering our supply chain so that they don't make a profit. We have no intention of driving anyone out of business as this doesn't help anyone, least of all us."

“Technological advances will also come to the fore and it's possible that modular building could be the way forward. We've also got to keep driving forward with sustainability and we've kicked off a big piece of work to look at more sustainable construction. We opened a green hotel in Tamworth last year that implemented a number of R&D ideas including several aimed at reducing utility consumption and we're now exploring ways in which we can roll these out to our new build developments and existing estate. There were a whole range of sustainable initiatives that we rolled together into one hotel and by trying them all out we should be able to gauge which ones are worth persevering with."

"Specific examples of the initiatives we're looking at include ground source heat pumps to heat and cool the rooms and provide hot water. We're recycling water from the shower trays and hand basins to flush the toilets, all the insulation in the building is sustainable sheep's wool, all lighting is LED, there are solar panels on the roof - there's a full range of about ten different concepts that we've introduced and many are working very well and we're now just in the process of evaluating which elements have worked to the extent that we'll roll them out into forthcoming new build sites."

So despite what appears to be an extremely uncertain period in the present ‘economic doom and gloom´ that has swept through many business sectors, Whitbread looks in no mood to curtail its expansion plans and, while it may be easing off to a certain degree, there may well be many other companies looking on jealously as it continues strengthen its position within the hotel and pub restaurant marketplace.