EXCLUSIVE: Wyndham signs first ME Wyndham Garden

Wyndham has revealed that it will open its first Wyndham Garden hotel in the Middle East, the Wyndham Garden Doha, following the signing of a management agreement with Nasser Al Siddiqi, managing director and board member of Siddiqi Holding.

The four-star 153 room hotel is due to open in 2017 and will be Wyndham’s second property in Qatar after the Wyndham Grand Regency Doha, which opened in 2011. It also marks the entry of the seventh Wyndham brand into the region.

Speaking exclusively to HotelierMiddleEast.com at Arabian Hotel Investment Conference (AHIC), Wyndham Group’s regional vice president Middle East & Africa Bani Haddad said: “We already have a Wyndham Grand in Doha and we’ll be able to capitalise on the image of this five star Wyndham hotel already present in the local market to launch this product.

“It sits really very well for the Doha market which is really corporate-driven and the location is amazing, it’s close to the airport, it’s close to the tourist attractions so we’ll be able to capitalise on the business from the new airport. We’re really very excited because that marks a new brand in the region.”

Wyndham group senior vice president and managing director, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Indian Ocean for Wyndham Hotel Group, Rui Barros told HotelierMiddleEast.com: “Now that we’ve introduced that one there will be other opportunities for the brand so we’ll be looking to see where we can introduce other Wyndham Gardens so it could be that between now and then 2017, we’ll have another deal that will surface.”

Wyndham Garden Doha will be situated in the business district of downtown Doha near tourist attractions such as Souq Waqif, Doha’s open air market and the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha. The hotel will offer meeting spaces, a fitness centre and pool facilities.

Describing the Wyndham Garden Brand, Barros said: “It’s essentially a Wyndham with fewer facilities so typically a bit smaller, the F&B outlets aren’t as extensive, but it’s a scaled down version of what you’d see at a full sized Wyndham.”

The hotel will join several Wyndham properties under development in the region including Wyndham Dubai Marina and Wyndham Grand Manama, which are anticipated to open in 2015, and Wyndham Riyadh Grand Riyadh, expected to open the following year.