Strategic acquisitions, the expansion of new brands focused on conversion - the current driving force behind hotel development - but also, and above all, the constantly renewed appeal of their historic brands: the world's hotel leaders have played on all these ranges to expand their hotel portfolios and feed their pipelines with new projects. " 2024 was a great year for our development team. We signed a record number of new contracts, and our pipeline reached over 577,000 rooms at the end of the year." said Anthony Capuano, CEO of Marriott.
Without looking that far ahead to all the hotels to come in the next few years, Marriott has consolidated its world leadership in 2024 with net growth of 6.8 1TP3Q, for a total of nearly 1.7 million rooms and more than 9,200 hotels. This new bingo can be explained, among other things, by the American group's expansion in Las Vegas through a partnership with MGM, which saw it gain 38,000 rooms in a single bet, helping it pass the the symbolic 9,000 hotel mark. While Marriott has taken detours into the flat rental sector with its acquisition of Sonder, and into nature lodges with its investment in US players Postcard Cabins and Trailborn, the traditional hotel sector remains its main focus. Luxury hotels in particular, a segment that the American group has dominated for a long time, but also, and this is more new, the mid-range.
The group has given itself new spearheads to fuel its present and future development. These include two mid-range brands in the Americas, City Express by Marriott, acquired from a Mexican group, and StudioRes, a new long-stay concept. conquering the EMEA and Asia-Pacific regions Four Points Flex. A year and a half after their respective launches, these three brands have reached a total of 300 hotels open or in the pipeline. This should offer new options to the 228 million members of its Marriott Bonvoy programme and support the group's growth in 2025, which it forecasts to be in the region of 4% to 5%.
In the company of the Chinese group JinJiang, which is playing on the depth of its market to position itself as a solid number two in the global hotel industry, the Hilton group closes the top three of millionaire hoteliers in terms of number of rooms. Like its major American competitor Marriott, Hilton has opened up to new worlds by attacking the 'premium' budget segment with its Spark brand, which already has around a hundred hotels in just a few months of existence. In the same way, it will soon be tackling a fast-growing sector in the United States, the mid-range long stay, with the opening of the first LivSmart Studios establishment.
Add to this the attractiveness of its flagship brands such as Hilton DoubleTree and Garden Inn, and the group has opened a record number of hotels this year, 973 in all. This is the highest figure in the group's history, and the total number of hotels opened rose by 7.3 1TP3Q. All this is part of a good momentum according to its CEO Christopher Nassetta: " with a development pipeline of almost half a million rooms, we are convinced that we are well placed to generate net growth of between 6.0% and 7.0% in 2025" .
However, the Group has focused on expanding its offering in the following areas the luxury and lifestyle segmentswhich accounted for almost half of the 973 openings this year. In addition to the organic growth of its Waldorf Astoria and Conrad brands, Hilton has entered into a strategic distribution partnership with Small Luxury Hotelsadding almost 400 boutique hotels and 20,000 rooms to its offering. At the same time, the group has reached into its pocket to buy two lifestyle brands, Graduate and NoMad. More than a direct contribution to the current portfolio - NoMad has just one hotel and Graduate around thirty - these acquisitions open up prospects for expansion in a segment where Hilton was not the main player.
Acquisitions and new brands, key partnerships and conversions This is also the recipe applied by IHG, the world's fourth-largest hotel operator, which is approaching the one million room mark this year. This milestone should not be a glass ceiling for the British group, given its net growth of 4.3% last year and its pipeline of more than 2,200 hotels. Among the developments of the past year, IHG has benefited from a key agreement with Novum Hospitality to densify its offer in Germany by converting some 120 establishments to its Holiday Inn or Candlewood Suites brands. But this partnership will also support the expansion of the new mid-range brand Garner which will have around twenty hotels when it debuts at the end of 2023, and for which IHG is planning 500 establishments over the next ten years.
At the same time, the British group has just acquired a new weapon to consolidate its position in the luxury goods sector, having already done so with the purchase of the Regent, Six Senses and Kimpton brands. boost its lifestyle segment with the acquisition of Ruby Hotels in February. With around twenty hotels in Germany's major cities, as well as in London and Vienna, and with Marseille still to come, this brand of relaxed luxury is set to discover new horizons, with the United States coming soon and Asia no doubt a little later.
But takeovers between hotel groups do not always see the big take over the small. The battle between two members of the top 10, franchise pure players Wyndham and Choice, had enlivened the end of 2023 until Choice's hostile takeover bid for its great rival was abandoned. Could this explain it? In any case, this breath of fresh air enabled Wyndham to beat its all-time record with a net addition of nearly 69,000 rooms in 2024, for a portfolio of hotels expanded by 4%. At the same time, Choice recorded net growth of 3.3% in its hotel portfolio.
The two American franchisors are following an almost identical development strategy. In addition to greater internationalisation, both are concentrating on upgrading their portfolios, focusing more on mid-range and top-of-the-range or long-stay brands than on economy brands. This offers the prospect of higher revenues. Choice Hotels, for example, recorded growth of 4.31TP3Q for this type of brand in the United States. As for Wyndham, they also accounted for a large proportion of its openings last year, and represent 70% of its pipeline.
Higher charges per room : more than just the race for sizeThis is Accor CEO Sébastien Bazin's main hobbyhorse: " Net growth per room is a key indicator, but let's stop making it the alpha and omega. Priority should be given to contribution, to better fees per room, rather than to volume." . This commitment is reflected in the 90% growth in fees per room since 2019, while at the same time the hotel portfolio has grown by "only" 12%.
Last year, the world's seventh largest group recorded net growth of +3.5%. But this trend conceals some differences: in 2024, its Luxury and Lifestyle division grew by +7.5% and its Premium, Mid-range and Economy (PME) division by +2.8%. The 'Pure' project, which aims to show detractors the way out of hotels - if not to bring them up to date - contributed to this slower pace. Now largely complete, this cleaning the offer should continue to have an impact this year, alongside the planned sale of the super-cheap HotelF1 brand.
But this slowdown is in preparation for " stronger growth towards 2026-2027 "According to Sébastien Bazin, but also on higher bases. The same trend is also underway in the luxury division, with a number of major renovations under way at Sofitel and Fairmont, the renovation of the Sofitel New York and others. This is in line with Accor's dynamic lifestyle offering, developed through its subsidiary Ennismore and its Mama Shelter, 25Hours, The Hoxton and Mondrian brands.
While Accor, through the acquisition of a number of lifestyle players over the last decade, has established itself as a key player in this segment, Hyatt has followed suit with two major acquisitions this year: the Me&Allacquired from its German partner Lindner, then the International Standardfounded around the renowned hotel The Standard High Line in New York, launched in 2009 by André Balazs. Since 2017, when it embarked on an 'asset light' strategy and put its real estate assets up for sale, the American group has simultaneously embarked on a series of strategic acquisitions that have accelerated its growth rate, which is among the highest of the major hotel groups. This was particularly true in 2024, with net growth of 7.81TP3Q, putting it in last place in the world's Top 10, just ahead of Best Western.
While strengthening its position in luxury and lifestyle, for example with the acquisition of Two Roads in 2018 and its Alila, Thompson and JdV brands, or more recently of Standard, Hyatt is also giving itself a leading position in the all-inclusive segment. After acquiring the Apple Leisure group, one of the sector's leaders in 2021, the American group continues its shopping spree in 2024 with the Bahia Principe resorts through a joint venture with Grupo Pinero, then at the beginning of 2025 with the purchase of Playa Hotels & Resorts.
And yet, while all the major Western groups are in a growth phase, year after year the ranking is driven by the continued rise of Chinese groups. That of JinJiang, which also owns the Radisson and Louvre Hotels groups and is a shareholder in Accor, as well as H World, formerly known as Huazhu, which has recorded growth in its portfolio of over 17%, thereby flirting with the million-room mark. With Accor in its capital for a time, this group remains one of the French group's key partners for its development in China, with nearly 600 Novotel, Mercure and Ibis hotels in its portfolio under a master franchise agreement.
However, the expansion of what is now the world's fourth-largest group is above all driven by its own brands, with the opening last year of 1000 mid-range hotelsThe Huazhu group is also expanding internationally, notably under the JI, Crystal Orange and InterCityHotels banners. Unlike JinJiang, which is expanding only in China, the former Huazhu group has gone international, taking over the German Steigenberger group in 2023. This move was reflected in its name change to H World. While this acquisition has enabled H World to gain a foothold in the European hotel industry, it has also opened up prospects for the development of Steigenberger brands in China, with around a hundred hotels in the pipeline, most of them InterCity hotels.
