The additional funding was announced by Cook chief executive Peter Fankhauser and chief of hotels and resorts Enric Noguer at the launch of its newest Cook’s Club hotel in Palma Beach, Majorca, on Tuesday (4 June).
Cook’s Club Palma Beach is the latest addition to Cook’s own-brand portfolio, one of 20 it intends to open this year. It follows the launch of Casa Cook Chania in Crete last month, the operator’s first family-focused Casa Cook property.
Cook says the launch of Cook’s Club Palma Beach underlines a "renewed commitment" to the operator’s long-standing number one holiday destination Spain, where it sends around four million holidaymakers a year.
“Spain has long been a favourite with our customers," said Fankhauser. "In a competitive market, we’re proud to be working with our valued hotel partners to upgrade and modernise our portfolio to help keep Spain at the top of the list for the next generation of holidaymakers.”
Cook’s Club Palma Beach opened last month following significant investment renovating and transform the former smartline Lancaster hotel into a 318-room design hotel, aimed at what Cook describes as a "new generation" of holidaymakers.
Ten of Cook’s own-brand hotels in Spain have, or will, undergo "significant refurbishment works", including the forthcoming Casa Cook Ibiza, Sunwing Arguineguin in Gran Canaria, Sunwing Fanabe in Tenerife and smartline Cala’n Bosch in Menorca, as well as five others in Majorca.
Cook now has more than 50 hotels in Spain, offering 12,000 rooms across its eight hotel brands, seven of which operate in Majorca. Cook will debut its Casa Cook brand in Majorca next year.
The operator’s hotels and resorts division, meanwhile, is based in Palma, with a new office on the island employing around 650 of Cook’s 2,500 staff across Spain. Its hotels and resorts business employs around 1,600 staff in total.
Noguer added Cook would continue to grow its hotel and resorts division "over the next couple of years".
“We want to continue bringing our new hotel innovations to Spain and support the continued growth of the tourism industry by investing in great brands and ensuring well-established destinations are attractive to a new generation of travellers," he said.
In 2017, Cook announced a partnership with Swiss investment and hotel development firm LMEY to set up Thomas Cook Hotel Investments, a fund set aside to support the growth of its managed own-brand hotel portfolio, which grew from five to nine properties in its first year.
The fund last year secured €40 million from Greece’s Piraeus Bank and a further €51 million from CaixaBank in Spain.
Three acquisitions were then announced in March this year, the 252-room Sunwing Arguineguin in Gran Canaria, the hotel that has become Casa Cook Kos and and an additional greenfield plot on Kos which has been designated for a 250-room new-build Cook’s Club hotel.
