InterContinental Hotels Group

Bass Hotels

The origins of InterContinental Hotels Group can be traced back to 1777, when William Bass established the Bass Brewery in Burton-upon-Trent. In 1876, its red triangle logo was the first ever trademark registered in the United Kingdom.^[6]

In 1969, Bass Charrington as it was at the time launched the Crest Hotel chain, marking its first entry into the lodging sector.

In 1989, the British Government limited the number of pubs which brewers could directly own, resulting in Bass's further investing in the expansion of its hotel business. This led to it purchasing Holiday Inn International from shareholders.^[6]

InterContinental

Pan American Airways founder Juan Trippe established the Intercontinental Hotels chain as a division of Pan Am and opened the first hotel in Belém, Brazil in 1946. On August 19, 1981, Pan Am sold the holding company Inter-Continental Hotels Corporation (IHC) to UK-based Grand Metropolitan for $500 million.^[7] As GrandMet focused its core business and expanded into fast food through the purchase of Burger King, it sold IHC to the Japanese-based Saison Group in 1988.^[8]

In March 1998, Saison Group sold IHC to the British brewery Bass. In 2000, Bass sold its brewing assets (and the rights to the Bass name) to the Belgian brewer Interbrew for £2.3 billion and changed its name to Six Continents.^[6]

In 2003, the independent corporation InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) was created after Six Continents split into two companies: Mitchells & Butlers took control of the restaurant assets,^[9] while IHG focused on hotels and soft drinks.^[6] IHG retained Britvic, the soft drinks division, until December 2005 when it sold its interest in the company by an initial public offering.^[10] In April/May 2014, the company reportedly rejected a $10 billion takeover bid from an unknown suitor, believed to be Starwood.^[11]

In April 2017, the company announced that it been the subject of a malware attack and hackers had stolen credit card details.^[12]

International boycott

The InterContinental Hotels Group became the target of an international boycott campaign in May 2013, over their plan to operate an Intercontinental-brand luxury hotel in Lhasa, Tibet. According to campaigners from the Free Tibet campaign, the hotel was a "PR coup for the Chinese government".^[18]

Price fixing

In July 2012, the Office of Fair Trading alleged that IHG had broken competition law by preventing online travel agents from discounting the price of room-only hotel accommodation. In February 2014, IHG agreed to end the practice of price fixing.^[19]

Data breach

In February 2017, the hotel chain admitted to a data breach. They asserted that the compromise was rather minor, having only impacted 12 properties. However, in April 2017 it raised the number to 1200 hotels. The attackers had installed malware designed to access payment card data, which could be used to clone cards and make fraudulent payments.^[20]

VAT rules

In May 2012, the UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) warned IHG that it must not use adverts showing prices for hotel rooms excluding VAT. Because the ASA thought the adverts were likely to be viewed by consumers who must pay VAT, it had decided the adverts were misleading. It ordered IHG that the ads must not appear in their current form again. However, in August 2012, a report by Which? magazine showed that the hotel chain was still breaching VAT rules.^[21]

Living wage

In November 2017, the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, accused the hotel chain of reneging on a commitment to pay the living wage.^[22]