At least four new hotels to be opened on prime real estate in Helsinki this year
The Omena hotel chain challenges luxury hotels with low prices
At least four new hotels will be opened in and around the centre of Helsinki within a year.
The fifth hotel of the Palace chain will open in March 2007 on the corner of Aleksanterinkatu and Kluuvikatu. The former Katajanokka prison building will be turned into a business hotel and will be opened in May next year. The renovation project for the prison is expected to receive a construction permit in June.
A hotel of the Turku-based Omena chain will open in the Kamppi area on Eerikinkatu 24 by next year, and another one in the centre of Helsinki next March.
The new projects will increase the number of hotel rooms in Helsinki by 400. Currently Helsinki's hotel room capacity is about 7000.
The new Palace Hotel is the largest of the new hotels. It will have 144 rooms.
According to Mikko Heinonen, the CEO of the Palace Kämp Group, the chain's parent company, rates at the new hotel will be "on the same level as other hotels in the centre of Helsinki".
The prison hotel in Katajanokka will also be an expensive place to spend the night. It will try to attract mainly business travellers as customers. "We will be among the first-class hotels. The price level will be well above average", CEO Heimo Käyhty says.
The strategy of the hotels in the Omena chain is quite the opposite. The concept is based on the customers' independent initiative. The hotels have no reception or personnel, and reservations are made online.
A room in any Omena hotel costs EUR 55 a night.
Bill Anckar, the CEO of the Omena chain, believes that there is demand for cheap lodging in the Finnish capital.
"The price level of hotels in the city centre is getting out of hand. Everything points to a need for cheap hotels. There are plenty of them in Europe, but not in Helsinki. It is either four stars or nothing."
The Helsinki City Tourist and Convention Bureau is worried about the rise of hotel prices.
Last year, the average price for a hotel room was EUR 102,82 a night. In five years the price has risen by about ten percent.
The bureau's head of communications,Tuulikki Becker, hopes that the new hotels might bring the rise in prices under control.
"Soon there will be no more moderately-priced lodging if the capacity does not increase. I think that it is a good time to increase it now. We have the understanding that there is need for more reasonably-priced lodging."
Heinonen is not worried about the rising price level. According to him, Helsinki is a "developing country", when comparing hotel prices to those in other European capital cities. "Helsinki is an interesting travel destination in that it is still adequately cheap in terms of lodging as well."
Helsingin Sanomat
|
| 1.6.2006 - TODAY |
 At least four new hotels to be opened on prime real estate in Helsinki this year |
|
