Demand from groups and business travel helped trading at InterContinental Hotels Group in the three peak summer months despite a “broadly flat” level of leisure stays.
The parent company of 19 brands including Holiday Inn and Regent reported a 1.5% rise in the key metric of revenue per available room (revpar) in the quarter to September 30.
Groups demand was up by six per cent, business by two per cent while leisure was “broadly flat” over the same period last year.
Year-on-year capacity growth on 4.1% saw the number of rooms worldwide rise to 968,000 across 6,505 hotels.
A total of 19,200 new rooms – 129 hotels – were signed in IHG’s third quarter, up 14%. The company reported a pipeline of 327,000 rooms in 2,218 hotels.
The growth projections come ahead of a 15-year agreement to affiliate The Venetian Resort Las Vegas and The Palazzo at The Venetian Resort with InterContinental Hotels & Resorts ending on January 1.
“Although the end of this agreement will remove 7,092 rooms or approximately 0.7% from IHG’s overall system size in 2025, the unique nature of the fee structure under this particular licensing agreement means it contributed less than $1 million or 0.1% of IHG’s revenue from fee business in 2023 and a net nil contribution to operating profit from reportable segments,” the company said.
Chief executive Elie Maalouf said: ”We are pleased with the latest trading performance and another strong period of development activity, and we are on track to finish 2024 in line with market expectations.
“Revpar grew 1.5% in the third quarter of 2024, reflecting the strength of our globally diverse footprint, healthy business demand and a record period for groups bookings.
“Our EMEAA region again performed strongly, up 4.9%, and the Americas increased by 1.7%, driven by continued growth in the US. In Greater China, revpar was down 10.3% as we came up against strong comparatives of resurgent domestic travel this time last year, and the quarter was still broadly in line with 2019 levels.”
He added: “Our development performance was particularly notable. We opened 17.500 rooms across 98 hotels, well over double the same period last year, which was in part due to the next 6,200 rooms of the Novum Hospitality agreement joining IHG’s system.
“A strong signings performance of 19,200 rooms across 129 properties was 14% more than 2023 and led to a 12% year-on-year increase in our pipeline.”