Skift Take
Premier Inn says it has gained pricing power as 10% of all UK independent hotels have closed in the past few years. More remarkably, it says repeat guests made 86% of its bookings this year. It's a direct booking champ other hoteliers could learn from.
Premier Inn’s owner Whitbread said on Wednesday that a shrinking supply of budget hotels in the UK will strengthen its pricing power for years to come.
Premier Inn, with 84,000 rooms, is the budget hotel leader in the UK. It said in a financial update that Britain's independent budget hotel sector shrunk 10% between 2019 and 2022. A majority of these won't reopen as hotels, executives forecasted.
"We now think that the number of U.K. hotel rooms won't return to pre-pandemic levels for at least 5 years," said Dominic Paul, director and CEO. "Thi