“Fantastic recovery” of hotel industry creating more jobs

• IHG praises German hotel owners & "imaginative" public policy
• 19 more hotels set to open in Germany
• 2,000 more jobs predicted in Germany over next few years

Berlin, 9 March, 2011 -

Kirk Kinsell, IHG President for Europe, Middle East & Africa, today praised the "fantastic" recovery of the German hotel industry over the past 12 months and told analysts he is "confident" in the prospects for the industry over the next few years. Kinsell also revealed that confidence in the growth prospects mean many more hotels will be opened over the next few years, leading to the creation of around 2,000 more jobs across Germany.

IHG - the world's largest hotel company by number of rooms - saw its hotels in Germany outperform all its other markets except China in 2010, according to the key industry metric of revenue per available room (RevPAR). Compared to 2009, the RevPAR in 2010 increased 18.4% over the year, led by Munich (29.5%) and Leipzig (29%). This compares to 6.1% RevPAR for IHG hotels across Europe, the Middle East & Africa over the same period.

Customer demand was also highlighted by growth in occupancy. This figure was also up in 2010 compared to 2011 in 12 of the 13 cities IHG operates in, led by Frankfurt (7.4%) and Munich (7.3%). That helped IHG to achieve average daily rate growth of 11%, a rate which exceeds its market equivalent in Greater China.

The January 2011 RevPAR figures have also been encouraging for the company with Munich hotels reporting RevPAR figures up 52% on last year, Heidelberg up 63%, Hamburg up 33% and Leipzig up 28%. Heidelberg is also showing double digit occupancy growth (13.2%) against January last year.

The excellent performance and strength of IHG's brands - which include
InterContinental, Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Crowne Plaza and Hotel Indigo in Germany - mean an increasing number of hotel owners are partnering with IHG. The company today confirmed it will be opening 19 more hotels across the country in the next few years, in cities such as Berlin and Hamburg. The brands will be a mixture of Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express and Hotel Indigo hotels.

IHG believes the performance globally reflects the recent return of the business traveller, sustained popularity of leisure travel and attractions of IHG's brands and system. However, IHG also believes praise should also go to the German government for its proactive campaign to stimulate the industry and create jobs.

Kinsell said: "The past twelve months have seen a fantastic recovery by the hotel industry in Germany. Some analysts had been forecasting falling revenues across the industry but Germany attracted guests from around the world. We are confidently predicting hotel growth over the next few years which will lead to more hotels and thousands of new jobs for German people".

Kinsell added: "Huge credit must go to our partners, the hotel owners, and our IHG people for the recovery. But we have also been impressed by the German government's imaginative approach, including cutting VAT (Mehrwertsteuer) on hotel stays. Cutting taxes in difficult economic times might appear counter-intuitive to some people. But it's clear to everyone in our industry that this has helped stimulate the sector, creating thousands of new jobs and many knock-on benefits to other parts of the economy. We call on other governments to look very carefully at the numbers, be bold and adopt a similar approach."

Notes to Editors:

IHG in Germany
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) [LON:IHG, NYSE:IHG (ADRs)] is the world's largest hotel group by number of rooms and owns the InterContinental, Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express and Crowne Plaza brands in Germany. It currently offers 69 hotels in 12 cities - Berlin, Cologne, Dortmund, Dusseldorf, Essen, Frankfurt. Hamburg, Hannover, Heidelberg, Leipzig, Munich, Stuttgart.

IHG
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) [LON:IHG, NYSE:IHG (ADRs)] is the world’s largest hotel group by number of rooms. IHG franchises, leases, manages or owns, through various subsidiaries, over 4,400 hotels and more than 640,000 guest rooms in 100 countries and territories around the world. The Group owns a portfolio of well recognised and respected hotel brands including InterContinental® Hotels & Resorts, Hotel Indigo®, Crowne Plaza® Hotels & Resorts, Holiday Inn® Hotels and Resorts, Holiday Inn Express®, Staybridge Suites® and Candlewood Suites® and also manages the world’s largest hotel loyalty programme, Priority Club® Rewards with 56 million members worldwide.

IHG has almost 1,300 hotels in its development pipeline, which is expected to create 160,000 jobs worldwide over the next few years.

InterContinental Hotels Group PLC is the Group’s holding company and is incorporated in Great Britain and registered in England and Wales.

IHG offers information and online reservations for all its hotel brands at www.ihg.com and information for the Priority Club Rewards programme at www.priorityclub.com. For our latest news visit www.ihg.com/media, Twitter www.twitter.com/ihgplc or YouTube www.youtube.com/ihgplc.