Low costs and green creds at budget modular hotel

We’ve seen plenty of “no-frills chic” hotels emerge over the years, including Dutch Qbic and citizenM, which both take a modular approach to building hotels. Borrowing a page from each of those concepts, Spanish Lookotels is gearing up to build an energy-efficient budget hotel with 100 modular rooms in less than six months. For its “lowxurious” hotel, Lookotel envisions a structure in which every room is a separate, prefabricated module. Rooms will range in size from just 9.7 square metres up to 12.10 square metres, each one of them self-sufficient structurally, architecturally and functionally with a sofa bed, TV, desk, chair, telephone, individual air conditioning, bathroom, automated controls and wifi. Self-service check-in and -out will be enabled by automatic dispensers and control-card access, while a built-in safety system and 24-hour telephone customer service will keep guests comfortable. Building costs will be minimized through reduced construction time and raw material costs, the hotel says, while operational costs will take advantage of reduced staff costs, an energy-efficient and low-maintenance design, and supply-chain solutions including services outsourcing. Staff wage costs, for instance, will be 70 percent lower than those in equivalent Spanish hotels, according to City-of-Hotels.com, while energy expenses will be 40 percent lower. With initial financing of EUR 60 million, Lookhotel hopes to build 10 such hotels in Spain before expanding around the world, the site reported, noting that early interest has been shown by several budget airlines. Meanwhile, the hotel seeks franchisees for its concept; one to get in on early…?