The surge in overseas visitors coupled with the booming Irish economy made for a busy and prosperous year for Dublin's hotels and pubs. In the last 12 months, some 40 new hotels have opened for business in the Dublin region bringing the total number of hotels to 142. The number of new bedrooms available in the city swelled by 1,700, with existing operators also expanding.
The biggest new hotel, with 240 bedrooms, was the Camden Court. Owned by the McEniff family, it is now the third largest in Dublin. Other new names include the 135-bedroom Fitzwilliam Hotel on St Stephen's Green, the five-star 147-bedroom Great Southern-owned hotel at Dublin Airport and the 152-bedroom Westpark at Citywest, in west Dublin.
Paul Collins, associate director at Hamilton Osborne King's licensing and leisure department, estimates the total value of transactions in the hotel sector this year at between £45 million and £50 million. Record prices in the hotel sector were achieved in the Munster region, whereas as in the Dublin area, it was prices paid for pubs which set records, soaring to new highs in prime locations.
In Killarney, Co Kerry, the 60-bedroom Aghadoe Heights Hotel set the pace, selling for £4.5 million. This was later topped by the sale of the Imperial Hotel in Cork to the Flynn family for an estimated £5 million. In Waterford, the new Marina Hotel was purchased by the Lyne family for £6 million.
Mr Collins predicts continuing strong activity in the sector in 1999, but suggests that the pace will eventually begin to slow down. "There has been a continuous flow of new hotels opening in Dublin this year, and this cannot be sustained long-term."
Measures such as the changes in capital allowances for hotel investment announced in the previous Budget will make an impact in the coming months, he suggests. Soaring land values, which mean that it is sometimes more valuable to develop a proposed hotel site for residential use, will also be a determining factor in hotel development next year, as will concerns that Dublin may be reaching the point where hotel rooms are in over-supply.
1999 will herald the arrival of major international hotel chains in Ireland, following the opening of Radisson SAS-owned St Helen's on the Stillorgan Road. The international five-star Four Season Hotel in Ballsbridge is due to open next year with 250 bedrooms. Others gaining a foothold include the American Westin hotel group, which is to operate the new five-star hotel at College Street in Dublin. It is also understood to be in discussions to run one of the two hotels planned for the National Conference Centre.
The Ibis Hotel group, which has three hotels in the Republic, is also planning major expansion, as is its parent company, Accor. Choice Hotels Ireland, a joint venture between the international hotel group Friendly Hotels and Premier Hotels, is also aggressively expanding, announcing plans to open between 25 and 30 hotels in Ireland over the next five years. It is starting with 15 existing hotels, which have 1,204 bedrooms and 10 hotels owned by the Court Hotel Group, which has already agreed a franchising deal with Choice.
The merger between the Doyle Hotel Group and Jurys in a deal worth an estimated£200 million is also likely to be formally agreed next year, making it Ireland's biggest hotel group. This will firmly put a question mark over the future ownership of the three other large hotel groups in the State, Ryans, Fitzpatricks and the Great Southern.
A merger between Ryans and Fitzpatricks is considered to be a realistic possibility or either one may bid separately for the Great Southern Group, which is likely to be sold in 1999 as part of a restructuring of its parent company, Aer Rianta. Despite the huge increase in competition, hotel profit margins have been maintained. In 1998, pre-tax profits per room across the sector rose by an average of 8.5 per cent.
