PORTSMOUTH, N.H.—Lodging Econometrics (LE) recently released its United States Construction Pipeline Trend Report, which listed the hotel franchise companies with the largest construction pipelines at the end of Q1 2020. Marriott International had the largest construction pipeline (1,556 projects/204,244 rooms), followed by Hilton Worldwide (1,413 projects/161,743 rooms) and InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) (954 projects/97,547 rooms). Combined, these three companies comprised 69 percent of the hotel projects in the total U.S. pipeline at the end of the first quarter.
The leading brands by project count for these three companies continued to be Home2 Suites by Hilton with 421 projects/43,816 rooms, IHG’s Holiday Inn Express with 380 projects/36,329 rooms, and Marriott’s Fairfield Inn with 315 projects/30,336 rooms. These three brands dominated the total pipeline and, combined, represented 20 percent of projects at the end of Q1 2020.
Other notable brands in the pipeline for each of these franchise companies were Hampton by Hilton with 310 projects/32,146 rooms and Tru by Hilton with 302 projects/29,132 rooms; Marriott’s TownePlace Suites with 217 projects/21,834 rooms and Residence Inn with 214 projects/26,262 rooms; IHG’s avid Hotel with 195 projects/17,595 rooms and Staybridge Suites with 149 projects/15,564 rooms.
In the first quarter of 2020, 144 new hotels totaling 16,305 rooms opened across the United States. Of those openings, Marriott opened 42 hotels with 5,595 rooms, Hilton opened 37 hotels with 3,840 rooms, and IHG opened 23 hotels with 2,204 rooms. Collectively, these three franchise companies opened 71 percent of all the new hotels and rooms in the first quarter.
LE recorded conversion pipeline totals of 616 projects/69,258 rooms in the first quarter of 2020. Of these conversion totals, Marriott claimed 81 projects/14,242 rooms, Hilton claimed 67 projects/10,646 rooms, and IHG claimed 53 projects/5,553 rooms. These three franchise companies account for 44 percent of all the rooms in the conversion pipeline across the United States.
NOTE: COVID-19 did not have a full impact on the Q1 2020 U.S. results reported by LE—only the last 30 days of the quarter were affected.
