Ramada Jarvis was a chain of 4 star and 5 star hotels mostly located throughout the mainland of the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

, with a few managed internationally. The group's 42 hotels in the UK and five overseas went into liquidation in 2011 after experiencing cash flow problems.

History

The business was founded by John Jarvis who floated it on the

London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pa ...

in 1996 when it was valued at about £495 million. The company was taken private in 2003 in a

management buyout A management buyout (MBO) is a form of acquisition in which a company's existing managers acquire a large part, or all, of the company, whether from a parent company or individual. Management-, and/or leveraged buyout became noted phenomena of ...

for £159 million. Many of the Ramada Jarvis hotels in Britain had Sebastian Coe Health clubs. The clubs were also open to private members. The clubs had full gyms and pools with steam rooms, saunas, spa and massage rooms and hairdressers. Ramada Jarvis went into liquidation on 30 September 2011 as a result of a severely restricted cash flow caused by the Group's principal bankers calling in loans before their term. 26 hotels were acquired by Jupiter Hotels Limited, a 50:50

joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint ventures for one of four reasons: to acce ...

between Patron capital and West Register, part of the Global Restructuring Group of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group. Those hotels have been re-branded Mercure under a franchise agreement with

Accor Accor S.A. is a French multinational hospitality company that owns, manages and franchises hotels, resorts and vacation properties. It is the largest hospitality company in Europe, and the sixth largest hospitality company worldwide. Accor op ...

. The joint venture investors are injecting £40m, with debt financing of £71m provided by RBS, HSBC and Bank of Ireland, which were the original lenders to Jarvis. Not all the Ramada Jarvis hotels were included in the Jupiter Hotels deal, so the Ramada Heathrow and the Ramada Glasgow Airport continue to trade as

Ramada Ramada is a large American multinational hotel chain owned by Wyndham Hotels and Resorts. As of December 31, 2018, it operates 811 hotels with 114,614 rooms across 63 countries under the Ramada brand. Name The ''Ramada'' name derives from ...

hotels, each as a franchise. In August 2012 the Ramada Heathrow property was re-branded as the DoubleTree by Hilton London Heathrow Airport. In September 2016 the Ramada Glasgow Airport was rebranded as Courtyard by Marriott Glasgow Airport. The Ramada Jarvis at Junction 25 of the M1 was privately bought and now operates under the Best Western banner.

References

Hotel chains in the United Kingdom Hotel and leisure companies of the United Kingdom Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange Defunct hotel chains Ramada {{UK-hotel-stub