Jurys Inn boss John Brennan talks to Felicity Cousins about expansion plans, the success of the mid-market hotel sector and how to approach the Olympics
Get off a train in the centre of a major city in the UK and you are more than likely to find yourself only steps away from a Jurys Inn hotel. The brand sits proudly in the mid-market three star category and currently has 31 hotels in the UK, Ireland and the Czech Republic, with plans to spend £6 million on renovations and extensions this year, and £20m over the next three years.
Buying Business Travel met Jurys Inn CEO, John Brennan, at Brown's Hotel in London for a chat just before he flew back to head office in Dublin. Brennan is enthusiastic about the future as the group's Newcastle Gateshead property is due to open ahead of schedule this summer (August 25), and a Portsmouth property opens later this year, but he admits the recession hasn't made business easy for the sector. "It's been the toughest couple of years on record for the industry but things are actually recovering. Corporate travellers are back and buying in a savvy way, and we are benefiting from that. We are also seeing demand in the UK provinces return to growth."
Jurys Inn perhaps hasn't suffered as badly as some of the top-end hotels in the downturn. As a three-star brand, in some ways it only had to scoop up the business from travellers who usually stay in top-end hotels but have been downgraded by a change in their companies' travel policies.
And it seems as if the mentality of being frugal may be sticking around. "Many companies who previously booked their travellers into four- or five-star hotels had to reappraise what was responsible and I don't think it is going to go back [to how it was]. I think the excesses that were evident during that period [of the last two years] have really changed the inward philosophy of how these companies were run - so we have seen an increase in the number of companies who are traditionally five-star users staying with us."
Jurys Inns are full-service offerings located in city centres, close to transport hubs. Brennan and Edinburgh, but development is a difficult game - you need to have the right location in the right market, with the right development partner and at the right price. Getting all those [elements] to work together is difficult. There is an awful lot to do with all our hotels in the portfolio without even looking at the development side of things."
Buying Business Travel then pressed Brennan about the Jurys Inn in Prague - considering it is the describes them as "exceptional everyday city hotels". He explains where they stand within the industry: "There are a huge number of three- and four-star properties in provincial UK, so it depends on the location, but nationally we are on a par with Novotel and Holiday Inn."
The brand is undergoing some changes, and there are refurbishment programmes and extensions across the portfolio. For example, the Islington hotel in London is currently being extended, and renovations have begun on the Croydon and Birmingham properties. Brennan says development and expansion is also on the cards but it has been tricky: "Of course we want to be in prime city centre locations, so we look at [cities such as] London company's only property outside the British Isles, the story was bound to be an intriguing one. He explained that at the time the hotel was built, there were plans for other properties in the Czech Republic and central Europe: "We got a great location in Prague and the hotel is doing extremely well. We were intending to expand into central Europe, with Prague as the platform for that, but things in central Europe began to deteriorate rapidly and they are only now beginning to recover. In due course we will develop additional hotels in that part of the world."
What does Brennan think of City Inn changing its name to Mint Hotel - does the word 'Inn' have negative connotations, perhaps suggesting a budget offering? "They are trying to sell the company at the moment so it is probably part and parcel of the 'story' [they need to create], plus City Inn were actually upmarket hotels and I think in that context 'inn' was probably hampering them," he says. "With Holiday Inn being one of our main competitors, I think there is an understanding that this is an appropriate name for a mid-market hotel, and so we don't see ourselves changing that. Plus, I think because we now have rapid expansion in cities like Aberdeen and Swindon, where we didn't have hotels previously, the name is beginning to gain recognition and traction."
But can a mid-market hotel keep corporates, who are used to the five-star offering, happy? Brennan was regional vice-president at Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts prior to joining Jurys Inn and says it helps to know how the top hotels operate: "I am bringing elements of the five-star service from [my] experience with Four Seasons. At Jurys Inn, we are not aspiring to be luxury or have the costs which Fours Seasons has, but when you look at the Four Seasons model there are two things at the core: first is how you treat your customers, and second is the team which delivers the service, so all our 2,000 employees will go on a customer care training programme to make Jurys Inn a proposition which works not only for the corporate purchasing manager, but also for the actual users, because if there is a backlash from them, the travel manager will hear about it."
The brand is aimed at the corporate traveller as well as the leisure traveller but, as with most hotels, Jurys Inn still charges for internet access, something which is now often seen as a need rather than a luxury. Brennan concedes that eventually this will have to change: "I am sure that in due course it will become free, or, at least, it will become free in some fashion or another - there's an increasing demand for more bandwidth and I suspect we will have to invest in bandwidth capabilities in the hotels. It may be that the basic service is offered for free, but if you want higher-speed download capability, you will have to pay for it."
In an effort to woo the corporate traveller, in June the group introduced the Superior Room Package across all its hotels after successful trials at 10 properties over the last five months. For a £20 supplement guests are offered early check-in from noon, best room allocation, complimentary wired internet access in rooms (usually charged at £10 for 24 hours), refreshments, an iron and ironing board, a newspaper and a 10 per cent lunch or dinner discount.
The group is also making an effort for bookers, upgrading both the online booking tool and the bookers' loyalty scheme, but it is Jurys Inn's mobile element that has really taken off - since its launch in February last year, the company's iPhone app has been downloaded 2,897 times, while the mobile website has been visited 158,805 times, with 431,966 page views, resulting in 4,691 bookings. "Using mobile devices to search and book is a huge trend - I can book flights and hotels using my BlackBerry, and I would never have thought I could do that," says Brennan.
On the subject of Boris Johnson's comments about hotels making a killing during the Olympics, Brennan is forthright in his opinions: "Boris jumped the gun a little bit on that one. The background to the Olympics is that most of the hotel companies who subscribed to the Olympic bid gave a significant amount of their rooms at a contracted price, which actually, given what has happened over the last couple of years, is probably a lower price than we are achieving now - so any comment [like that] is way off the mark."
He concludes: "The way I look at it is that the Olympics are a three-week period. I am not as much focused on the three weeks of the Olympics as I am on the opportunity to showcase London and Britain, and to drive demand into London and the UK over the next couple of years - that is where the real opportunity lies."
JOHN BRENNAN is CEO of Jurys Inn
He has worked in the hotel business all his adult life, following in the footsteps of his father, who was previously group general manager of the Doyle hotel group.
At 34, Brennan became the youngest hotel manager for Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts and went on to become regional vice-president for the luxury hotel group, looking after the company's hotels spread across four countries. Brennan is also a member of the Irish Hospitality Institute.
He's a keen sports fan and rugby follower, and loves travelling particularly to Hong Kong, Bali and New York.