According to its chief executive, Pat McCann, hotel group Dalata anticipates that the majority of its deals and announcements in 2018 will come from the UK as the company positions itself to grow its market share in Britain.
McCann told The Irish Times that "there's a lot of things bubbling for 2018", particularly in the UK.
Dalata's annual results for 2017 revealed that the company's revenue per available room (RevPAR) increased 10.3% across its 35 hotels in the UK and Ireland. Meanwhile, profit before tax rose more than 75% to €77.3 million and revenue rose to €348.5 million.
McCann predicted that growth levels will be similar in 2018 and said that the group foresees a much slower pace of new property and rooms coming on stream in Dublin than CBRE and Savills. Commenting on the next three years in the capital, he said, "We reckon there's probably about 1,000 rooms net each year."
Speaking about the company's performance in the UK, McCann said Dalata has "outperformed in every city we're in."
He continued, "We’re very confident in the model but also the way and where we’re located in those cities and the type of business mix we have."
Dalata told investors this week that it will begin paying dividends from 2018 onwards, expected to be in the area of 20 - 30% of profit after tax.
The group spent €129 million on hotel acquisition during 2017, increasing its total assets to close to €1 billion. Furthermore, Dalata spent €22.2 million on capital refurbishment expenditure, €7.6 million of which was related to the upgrade of recently acquired hotels.
Dalata stated that its trading is marginally ahead of expectations in the first quarter of 2018 and its outlook for the year ahead remains positive.
