Dive Brief:
- Wyndham Hotels & Resorts opened its second Echo Suites extended stay hotel in the Dallas suburb of Plano, Texas, the company shared with Hotel Dive.
- The hotel is owned by Ian McClure, CEO of Topeka, Kansas-based Gulf Coast Hotel Management and a member of the Echo Suites developer’s council. The property marks one of 25 Echo Suites hotels that Gulf Coast Hotel Management plans to open in the coming years, Wyndham told Hotel Dive.
- The first Echo Suites hotel opened last month in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and the brand has a pipeline of nearly 270 hotels. Wyndham is among several major hotel players expanding in extended stay as the product type sees increased demand bolstered by domestic infrastructure spending.
Dive Insight:
Echo Suites Dallas Plano/Frisco is only the second hotel to open under Wyndham’s extended stay brand, which launched in 2022. The company told Hotel Dive that “a slew” of additional openings are expected in the coming months, following the brand’s inaugural opening last month.
With a pipeline of more than 33,000 rooms, Echo Suites is Wyndham’s “fastest-growing brand,” the company’s President and CEO, Geoff Ballotti, said during an earnings call last month.
Approximately 14% of Wyndham’s pipeline in the second quarter of this year comprised hotels under the Echo Suites brand.
Growth of the brand, as well as a “multi-year boom” in extended stay demand, has been driven in part by “historic infrastructure and microchip spend,” according to Wyndham. This spending is the result of the Biden Administration’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill, which passed in 2021.
Infrastructure projects are creating a $3.3 billion opportunity in additional room revenue for Wyndham franchisees nationwide, the hotel company noted.
“These projects are creating a tailwind for the everyday business traveler, particularly construction and other trade workers, many of whom are in need of long-term accommodations as they travel to job sites across the country,” according to Wyndham in a July release.
Other hotel brands have capitalized on demand from nationwide infrastructure starts as well, including LivAway Suites. The extended stay chain is targeting markets like Phoenix, where Taiwanese semiconductor manufacturing company TSMC is working on a $40 billion infrastructure project.
Marriott International and Hilton, meanwhile, are growing their newly launched extended stay brands, StudioRes and LivSmart Studios, respectively. And Choice Hotels International continues expansion of its Everhome Suites brand, this week breaking ground on properties in San Antonio, Texas; Bowling Green, Kentucky; and Wichita, Kansas.
Extended stay properties accounted for 36% of the total U.S. hotel projects under construction in the second quarter of 2024, according to Lodging Econometrics.
