New Prototypes Squeeze More Rooms Into Embassy, La Quinta
Two established hotel brands, Embassy Suites and La Quinta, last month launched new design prototypes that cater to business travelers and allow designers to fit more rooms into a single hotel property.
Embassy Suites in May announced the launch of its first major room design change in the brand's 25-year history: a one-room suite that brand leaders said is designed to appeal to business travelers. The new room design preserves the features and amenities of Embassy's traditional two-room suite design but consolidates them in one room that is about 20 percent smaller than the full two-room suite.
"The individual business traveler has told us that they would probably stay at Embassy more but just don't need all that room," said Jim Holthouser, global head of full service brands for Embassy parent company Hilton Hotels Corp.
"It's not that radical of a change for a very successful brand like Embassy," according to Holthouser. "You have all the elements that make it the Embassy Suites room: the wet bar, the sleeper sofa, the king-standard room."
The rooms will first appear in the soon-to-open Embassy Suites in downtown Buffalo, N.Y., a hotel that developers are converting out of a federal office building. The company expects newly constructed Embassy Suites properties to begin incorporating the room later this year.
The smaller room means that developers will be able to fit more rooms and hence drive more revenue from their projects.
Developers are allowed to use the one-room suite design for no more than 20 percent of the rooms in a project. "This brand is so established and well-known that if people show up and want to have a two-room suite, you still have to have them to sell," Holthouser said.
La Quinta, meanwhile, in May released its first design change since 2001, a new prototype hotel designed to fit urban locations, said Julie Cary, executive vice president and chief marketing officer for La Quinta. "It gives developers more revenue per square foot without shrinking the size of the room," she said.
The Urban Design prototype allows builders to meet height restrictions where imposed and squeeze in two extra guest rooms to the property with the same floor plans as La Quinta's traditional design. Other elements commonly associated with La Quinta also remain: the bell tower, the decorative balcony and the standard colors. The design also incorporates such elements as rooftop solar panels for energy management purposes.
As of mid-June, there were about 15 projects incorporating the new design under construction, Cary said. The first one is slated to open next month near Dallas, in Forest Hills, Texas.