What does the merger of Park & Suites and Appart'City represent?
Edouard Bon - On 4 April, Park& Suites acquired the Appart'City group. The Equistone investment fund has joined the project by recapitalising the new entity. Once the merger has been approved by the competition authorities, the new group will have 130 residences and over 15,000 flats under its management, making it a key player in apartment hotel management and the leader in urban tourist residences in France. The new group will benefit from very strong complementarity, both in terms of territorial coverage and product positioning.
Will the two brands coexist?
E. B. - We've commissioned a communications agency to work with us to define our future strategy. Our offer should be structured around a single brand, probably Appart'City. In fact, this entry-level brand, with two or three stars, is now more attractive to customers and is promising in terms of development. The Park & Suites name is therefore likely to disappear, but we will be introducing different versions of our offer, along the lines of what Park & Suites offered with its Confort, Elégance and Prestige residences.
Do the Appart'City and Park & Suites offers complement each other?
E. B. - When you superimpose the two maps of our locations, there's virtually no overlap. We couldn't have done better! Appart'City has expanded from the west of France and Brittany to the north-east and the Paris basin. For its part, Park & Suites has a strong presence throughout the South of France, as well as around Geneva. Thanks to this geographical network, we will be able to meet the expectations of our key account customers by offering a consistent price structure based on the standards we are going to introduce.
