Bass leads industry in global expansion

By Russell Kett

Hoteliers must think globally and act locally to succeed in the international hotel industry. That was the message for delegates at the Hospitality Industry Investment Conference, held at the Waldorf-Astoria, New York, earlier this month.

And the world's biggest hotel chains are already becoming more international, according to Paul Slattery of Kleinwort Benson, who introduced a session showing the progress 10 leading chains had made in the past year.

The table uses an index of internationalisation, calculated by multiplying the number of countries in which the hotel chain is represented by the proportion of bedrooms operated outside the chain's home country.

This index shows Bass is the most international company, and since 1994 it has become 3.5% more international. The best performance of the 10 hotel chains in 1995, however, was by Manor Care (the parent of Choice Hotels International, which has the Quality and Choice brand names).

Manor Care showed an impressive 21.4% increase in its internationalisation, although this was from a low base - it remains a predominately US operation.

Gavin Simonds, joint managing director of Japanese-owned Inter-Continental told the conference the benefits available to a large company enable local aspects of international expansion to be addressed in an efficient manner.

Russell Kett is a director of consultancy HVS International