Best Western and Marriott International are the global brands that will build the most new hotels in Kenya, according to data detailing upcoming investments in the hospitality sector.
Best Western has seven hotels lined up, five of which will be in Nairobi, one in Naivasha and another in Kisumu while Marriott has three hotels in its pipeline, all located Nairobi.
“Best Western- seven hotels with 644 rooms. Second is Marriott with three hotels with 768 rooms,” said Trevor J Ward, the Principal of advisory firm W Hospitality Group and Hotel Partners Africa which tracks investments in hotels.
Increased supply of rooms is expected to raise competition in the industry and potentially reduce margins as establishments find it difficult to raise prices significantly.
Marriott took the slot previously held by Hilton, after the latter successfully opened two of its hotels last year. CityBlue, Hyatt and Rotana have two hotels each in the pipeline as Swiss International, Accor, Radisson, and Sarovar each have one.
New signings last year spurred the growth of the number of hotels in Kenya’s pipeline with the Hotel Chain Development Pipelines in Africa 2019 report showing that Kenya had 27 hotels in the various stages of development compared to 20 in 2018.
The new signings included Hyatt Place Nairobi, Hyatt House Nairobi, Protea Hotel Nairobi, Sankara Nairobi, An Autograph Collection Hotel, Best Western Plus, Nairobi Rotana and Nairobi Arjaan last year.
Source: Business Daily Newspaper.
