| Industry | Hotel |
|---|---|
| Founded | 23 January 1986 |
| Founder(s) | Norimasa Nishida |
| Headquarters | Kamata, Ōta, Tokyo, Japan |
| Number of locations | 205 hotels (as of March 31, 2008)[1] |
| Area served | Japan, South Korea, People's Republic of China |
| Revenue | 49,683,000,000 yen (March, 2008)[1] |
| Employees | 6,926 (including part-time employees) as of end of Feb 2009[1] |
| Website | http://www.toyoko-inn.com |
Toyoko Inn Co., Ltd. (株式会社東横イン Kabushiki Kaisha Tōyoko In) is a chain of no-frills business hotels in Japan, founded in 1986 and expanding rapidly from the 1990s.[2]
The company is headquartered in the Kamata section of Ōta, Tokyo,[1][3] about halfway between the central wards of Tokyo and Yokohama; its name is a portmanteau of the names of Tokyo and Yokohama. It aims for uniformity in its hotels, using as many prefabricated and bulk-purchased components as possible to reduce costs.[4] The chain is also known for almost exclusively hiring women: as of 2001, 95% of the company's workforce was female, and nearly all of its hotel managers were married women.[5]
The company has grown rapidly, more than doubling its number of hotels from 61 in December 2002 to 126 in May 2006, with typical rates (as of May 2006) between 4800 and 6800 yen per night for a single room.[6] Nearly all its hotels are in Japan; the exceptions are two in Busan and one in Seoul, South Korea.[7]
In early 2006, a scandal surfaced in which Toyoko Inn was found to have illegally altered 77 of its hotels after the buildings had been approved by building inspectors; of these, 60 were found to violate building codes, and 18 to violate regulations on access for disabled people.[8]