Travelodge has outlined plans to develop ‘Metro’ style hotels in prestigious locations and in office blocks across the UK in a bid to meet the growing demands of its customers.

The properties - which will be between 20 to 40 rooms in size - will allow the brand to build small hotels in highly priced, much sought after locations and occupied office buildings across the UK.

The ‘Metro’ hotel model will allow the hotel chain to open properties near to existing popular Travelodge’s in locations where larger development sites are either not available or have unrealistic price expectations.

In addition to enabling the budget hotelier to open in suburban locations where larger sites may not be deemed desirable by local authorities and development land is at a premium. 

Early Success

The desire to build smaller Travelodge hotels has been inspired by two successful development ventures the company invested in during 2010.

The first initiative was opening a ‘Metro’ style prototype hotel in one of Edinburgh’s busiest tourist areas (Rose Street which is just off Princes Street).

Travelodge built a hotel in a Georgian listed building - pictured - which also houses two bars and a restaurant. The 43-room hotel sits above the three properties and has a small entrance sandwiched between the bar and restaurant.

The hotel has become one of the company’s top performing hotels due to its key location.

The second venture to support the ‘Metro’ style Travelodge concept is the successful conversion of 52 Innkeeper’s Lodge’s into the Travelodge estate following their purchase from Mitchells & Butlers in July 2010.

The majority of these acquired hotels are under 40 rooms and have proven to be highly profitable additions for Travelodge.

Guy Parsons, chief executive of Travelodge said: “To accelerate our growth strategy we are going to start building ‘Metro’ style hotels across the UK.

“We are looking to open 100 ‘Metro’ Travelodge’s in prime spots where are customers need us, by 2020.”

This new building approach will run alongside Travelodge’s existing growth strategy to expand to 1,100 hotels and 100,000 rooms by 2025.

The ‘Metro’ style properties will still be called Travelodge hotels and the room size will be based on a standard double Travelodge room (15sqft)         

The ‘Metro’ Travelodge’s will be run by existing managers of nearby larger Travelodge hotels and will provide the perfect training ground for trainee managers, recruited via Travelodge’s new Apprenticeship programme – JuMP (Junior Management Programme).