Travelodge opens its 600th hotel at London Oval Cricket Ground
Travelodge, the UK’s first budget hotel chain, has opened its 600th hotel – located at London Oval Cricket Ground. The milestone was celebrated at a ribbon-cutting ceremony with Travelodge Chairman, Martin Robinson, CEO Jo Boydell, ex-England Cricket Captain and Surrey County Cricket Club Director, Alec Stewart OBE, and Surrey County Cricket Club CEO, Steve Elworthy.
London Oval Cricket Ground Travelodge is a 95-room hotel, developed in partnership with Surrey County Cricket Club. The hotel is ideally located for both business and leisure travellers, and is just a minute’s walk from Oval Underground Station. As well as being Travelodge’s 600th hotel, it’s also the group’s 81st hotel in London and has created over 30 new jobs.
London Oval Cricket Ground Travelodge features the group’s new, premium look and feel design which includes a redesigned reception area, next generation rooms and its new restaurant concept, 85 Bar Café, offering everything a business or leisure guest (or cricket fan) needs for a comfortable and relaxing stay.
Sustainability has been an important factor when designing the hotel, which has a BREEAM Excellent rating, an Energy Performance Certificate rating of A and a number of sustainable features including; Air Source Heat Pumps for heating water; EV car charging; roof mounted solar PVs to convert the sun’s energy into electricity; green roofs to regulate temperatures and save energy, as well as encouraging biodiversity; low energy lighting throughout the hotel, with motion sensing controls; and aerated showers and taps in the bathrooms to reduce water usage.
This hotel is the first new opening for Travelodge in the UK this year, with a further six hotels currently under construction in Rotherham, Colchester and Bristol, as well as three more in London; Bermondsey, Beckenham and Chiswick. The group also recently announced it is due to start construction on a new hotel in Stratford, London later this year.
Travelodge is continuing to develop its UK pipeline and is committed to expanding its hotel network to offer more choice to its customers and support local economies. The group has over 300 target locations for hotel sites across the UK, including over 100 sites across London – which will drive investment and create local jobs.
London Oval Cricket Ground Travelodge is managed by Darren Bennett, who joined Travelodge seven years ago as Assistant Hotel Manager at London Stratford Hotel and has worked in several other Travelodge hotels across London including Waterloo, Covent Garden and most recently as Hotel Manager in London Mile End Travelodge.
Jo Boydell, Chief Executive, Travelodge, commented: “London Oval Cricket Ground Travelodge is a special opening for us, as our 600th hotel. Since opening our first hotel in the UK in 1985, Travelodge has grown across the UK, Ireland and Spain, and we now operate over 46,000 rooms, employ 13,000 colleagues and welcome over 22 million business and leisure customers to our hotels each year.
“We are very proud to open this hotel at the iconic Oval Cricket Ground, in partnership with Surrey County Cricket Club. This hotel has been built to high standards, with sustainability an important factor of the design. It features our new premium look and feel design with our redesigned reception area and next generation rooms, as well as our brand new restaurant concept, 85 Bar Café. We are already receiving great feedback from guests, and we look forward to welcoming lots of new guests through a busy cricket season this year.
“We are focused on continuing to grow our portfolio, with over 300 locations identified for new hotels across the UK as well as 20 target locations in Spain – which would create even more jobs and provide further choice and great value to more business and leisure travellers.”
Steve Elworthy, CEO at Surrey CCC said: “It’s great news that the brand new London Oval Cricket Ground Travelodge has opened its doors to the public. The partnership between ourselves and Travelodge will provide cricket fans and visitors to the area with a quality option to stay in the area that is minimising its impact on the environment.”
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About Travelodge
Founded in 1985, Travelodge is Britain’s very first budget hotel chain and today is one of the largest budget hotel chains in the UK, with a portfolio of over 600 hotels and over 46,000 bedrooms across the UK, Ireland and Spain.
In Spain, Travelodge has an established profitable presence and as of April 2024 its portfolio doubled to 12 hotels, having recently acquired a further six properties. Travelodge has ambitious growth plans within this market and has identified the top 20 key locations where it would like to open a hotel in Spain.
Welcoming over 22 million guests annually, the majority of Travelodge hotels are located in major cities, towns and holiday hotspots as well as by airports and key business hubs. With 90% of its hotels rated 4* or above on TripAdvisor, Travelodge is proud to offer guests across its diverse customer base a good value experience – whether they are travelling for business or leisure. In 2023 approximately 50% of rooms were sold for less than £60.
With a focus on helping people to go and do their thing by Being the Brilliant Base for all of life’s occasions, whether that’sfrom celebrating a birthday, and visiting the kids at university, going to a concert or sports event, to taking a business trip or working away from home or going to a concert or sports event, Travelodge concentrates on the essentials; a stay that is well-priced, and well-located that you can trust.
Travelodge continues to invest in its ongoing hotel refit programme which is expected to see 50% of the Travelodge room estate upgraded to its new design by the end of 2024. The brand is also continually evolving its quality offering to deliver a better experience for its diverse mix of business and leisure guests such as its new look Bar Café design, 85 Bar Café which has been rolled out to selected UK hotels as part of the refit programme.
Travelodge is focused on its impact on the environment and its social responsibilities, with sustainability integral to its business strategy. Its Better Future Sustainability Plan aims to help build a more sustainable future for its customers, colleagues, and the planet and this is underpinned by 3 core pillars; Inclusive; ensuring we are accessible, inclusive and well-priced to our customers and colleagues. Caring; creating a caring and healthy environment for our colleagues and customers and ensuring their wellbeing. Conscious; Travelodge is actively conscious of its impact on the planet, taking into account the waste it produces, the energy and resources it consumes and carbon emissions.
For further information visit travelodge.co.uk or the Travelodge Hotels Limited LinkedIn page.