Whitbread invests £42m in Scottish hotels and restaurants
Whitbread is to spend more than £42m on building and opening nine hotels and restaurants in Scotland over the next two years.
The plans, which will create about 420 jobs, will increase the number of Premier Inns in Scotland from 53 to 62 by early 2012.
Whitbread's nine new Scottish sites, currently under construction or in the development pipeline, include a mix of different ownership and development models and will be opened between autumn 2010 and spring 2012.
The new sites are:
Dalkeith, 40-room Premier Inn and Table Table restaurant
Dumbarton, 60-room Premier Inn and Brewers Fayre restaurant
Princes Street, Edinburgh, 97-bed Premier Inn with an integrated restaurant
Edinburgh Park, West Edinburgh,120-bed Premier Inn with an integrated restaurant and Costa Coffee
Edinburgh Airport, Newbridge, 119-bed Premier Inn hotel with an integrated restaurant
Falkirk, 31-bed Premier Inn and Beefeater restaurant
West Nile Street, Glasgow, 210-bed Premier Inn hotel with an integrated restaurant
Huntley Street, Inverness, 100-bed Premier Inn hotel with an integrated restaurant
Loch Ness House, Inverness, 76-bed Premier Inn and Beefeater restaurant
Office block conversion.
Work is due to start soon on the West Nile Street site in Glasgow. It will be the budget hotel chain's first office-block-to-hotel conversion project in Scotland that will benefit from the Business Premises Renovation Allowances Scheme – a government initiative introduced to encourage the conversion and renovation of empty properties in key areas.
John Bates, head of acquisitions for Whitbread Hotels & Restaurants, said Whitbread was investing in 'key locations', West Nile Street being one of them.
"We have identified significant opportunities to bring the quality and value of the Premier Inn proposition to a number of new target locations across Scotland. This latest investment is an essential part of that programme," he said.
