InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), owner of the Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza brands, agreed to buy Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants for $430 million in cash, adding 62 U.S. hotels and an additional 16 under development.
Kimpton, established in 1981, is the largest independent boutique hotel and restaurant company in the U.S., with 11,300 hotel rooms in 28 cities, including Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, InterContinental said today in a statement. Kimpton, based in San Francisco, also operates 71 hotel restaurants, bars and lounges.
“Adding Kimpton to our portfolio of preferred brands creates the world’s largest boutique hotel business,” Richard Solomons, chief executive officer of Denham, England-based InterContinental, said in the statement. “We will use our scale, network of owner relationships and powerful digital platforms to accelerate Kimpton’s growth both within the U.S. and internationally.”
Boutique hotels have been the fastest-growing portion of the lodging industry in the past four years, with revenue per available room, a measure of occupancy and rates, outperforming competing properties, InterContinental said.
