Tourexpi
Ruby
is a premium urban lifestyle brand for modern travellers in must-visit city
destinations and provides hotel owners with space-efficient designs and an
attractive, flexible concept that IHG expects to rapidly expand globally.
Established
in 2013, the Ruby brand currently operates 20 hotels (3,483 rooms) in major
cities across Europe and has another 10 pipeline hotels (2,235 rooms). There
are 9 hotels open in Germany (across Cologne, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg,
Munich and Stuttgart), 3 in the UK in London, 3 in Austria (Vienna), 2 in
Switzerland (Geneva and Zurich), and 1 in each of Italy, Ireland and the
Netherlands. The pipeline hotels are set to open over the next three years
across more European cities including Edinburgh, Marseille, Rome and Stockholm.
Ruby
hotels offer a stylish yet relaxed charm, blending soulful design and authentic
stories rooted in the cities they call home. The brand’s ‘Lean Luxury’ approach
includes signature touches ranging from a great bed and shower in guest rooms
created with restoration and relaxation in mind, to unique cocktails in
destination 24/7 bars, all coming together to connect guests with sought-after
cities at the right price.
As
our 20th brand, Ruby will extend IHG’s appeal to modern, lifestyle-focused
travellers, and offers hotel owners a cost-efficient and highly adaptable
premium hotel concept, in an industry segment characterised by high barriers to
entry and space constraints, often referred to in the industry as ‘urban
micro’. Efficiencies for owners are delivered through space-saving designs and
a high degree of operational standardisation and automation, including
self-service kiosks for speedy check-in.
Ruby
is already well-established in Europe and has proven to be successful for both
new build locations as well as being highly conversion-friendly, including for
adaptive re-use across a range of commercial property types, with several
successful office conversions. Reflecting this, the Ruby brand has achieved a
net system size compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 26% over the last five
years. The seller of the brand anticipates growing their portfolio of
Ruby-branded hotels substantially further, and IHG expects to grow the brand
with other hotel owners in Europe and globally. This builds upon IHG’s proven
track record of successfully internationalising brands that it has organically
developed and acquired. IHG expects to have the Ruby brand ready for development
in the US by the end of the year.
Joining
forces with IHG allows Ruby hotels to draw on a powerful enterprise platform of
distribution and technology systems, as well as one of the world’s biggest and
most powerful hotel loyalty programmes, IHG One Rewards. IHG expects the urban
micro sub-segment to continue experiencing strong demand from travellers around
the world, and this in turn would support ongoing rooms supply growth at higher
rates than the global hotel industry. IHG is targeting the Ruby brand to grow
to more than 120 hotels over the next 10 years and accelerate to more than 250
over 20 years across owners globally.
Image
Credit: © IHG Hotels & Resorts
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