Article Excerpt:
TWST: Can we start out with an overview of Arlington Hospitality, Inc., and how you see the company today?Mr. Miller: Arlington Hospitality is an industry leader in the mid- market limited service hotel business. We build, operate and own hotels that are typically between 60-100 rooms in size and offer accommodations that are three-star in nature. Our hotels offer upscale rooms, complimentary continental breakfast and free Internet service necessary for our business clientele. Our properties typically have indoor pools, sundry shops and business centers. Our hotels do not offer a traditional food and beverage outlet within the hotel, although frequently you'll have a freestanding restaurant nearby owned by a third-party operator. When I say Arlington is a leader, at one point we owned and operated over 90 locations nationwide. Right now we're in the process of selling some of our mature assets located in smaller towns and putting them in the hands of what we call owner-operators. Currently we have 50 hotels under ownership and management across the US, two under or near construction and several more in the construction pipeline. Arlington is in the process of developing a growth plan where we will be building eight to 10 limited service hotels a year by 2006. The latest generation of limited service hotels are expected to be 80-90 rooms in size, have larger breakfast rooms, higher quality room decor and offer more modern amenities than the hotels built five or 10 years ago. We're building these hotels in larger markets versus the small town locations. Preferred locations will be on the outskirts of the top 100 metropolitan areas in emerging neighborhoods where growth is taking place. These are not planned as urban center hotels. Our goal is to shift the company portfolio over the next two to three years from 90 plus locations with an average size of 60 units and an average age of eight plus years to, a portfolio with 35-40 hotels with an average size of 85 units. This shift will also reduce the average age of the portfolio to three to five years.
Tickers included in this excerpt: HOST
TWST Newsletter
For more information call (212) 952 7433. The Wall Street Transcript does not endorse any of the comments made by interviewees, and does not make stock recommendations.