Whitbread PLC, the owner of Premier Inn, has recently acquired a permitted hotel development site on the outskirts of Manchester's Northern Quarter from Premcor.
Located on Rochdale Road, the newly acquired site has planning permission for a ten-storey hotel with 229 bedrooms. This strategic acquisition is part of Whitbread's vision to optimise its network of hotels in Manchester city centre.
Having completed the purchase, Whitbread will now engage GMI Construction Group to build the hotel under its Premier Inn brand, with ground-breaking planned for summer 2024.
The planned hotel will comprise a mix of standard Premier Inn rooms and upgraded Premier Plus rooms, as well as ground floor space housing an integrated restaurant, bar and check-in area.
Whitbread's recent development in central Manchester has focused primarily on the south and west areas of the city. In May 2021, the company opened a 157-bedroom Premier Inn hotel on Princess Street, paving the way for the transformation of its nearby Manchester City Centre hotel (Deansgate Locks).
On the Deansgate Locks site, planning permission has been granted for the construction of student accommodation for more than 1,000 students, as well as a 13-storey office complex. Demolition of the former hotel is currently underway, marking the company's commitment to revitalising the city's urban landscape.
Paul Smith, Property Acquisition Manager for Whitbread, said:
“Whitbread is a long-standing investor in Manchester with six popular Premier Inn hotels across the city centre and many more across the city region. In line with our perfect portfolio investment strategy, we are in the process of reconfiguring our network of hotels across central Manchester to ensure we have the right number of bedrooms in the right parts of the city centre for our guests.
“Our investment in the Rochdale Road development site brings another 229-bedrooms into our secured development pipeline in a part of the city centre we wish to expand our presence. The location ticks all the boxes for our guests and with Whitbread’s direct involvement in the scheme, we can guarantee the development will now proceed at pace.”
