tl;dr – Hilton plans to deepen its investment in the proximity-to-educational-institutional space.
While it hasn’t been officially confirmed, word is that Hilton Hotels will introduce another line of hotels focused on college towns, titled Undergraduate by Hilton, as first reported by Skift.
As a refresher, back in 2024, Hilton acquired the Graduate Hotels brand for upwards of $200 million. The Graduate Hotels model was simple – mid-tier hotels in bustling college towns where there was always a game/graduate/performance/family visiting, to keep business coming in the door.
Undergraduate by Hilton would focus on secondary and tertiary college towns, spots that maybe weren’t the Ann Arbors or Auburns of the world but would nonetheless benefit from a property with consistent brand standards, with an approachable price point.
Though I’ve never stayed at a Graduate Hotels property (and don’t have any imminent plans to do so), I always thought Hilton’s pick-up of Graduate Hotels was a savvy move. Hilton has both the pockets and distribution to grow that brand significantly over the coming years, and by the nature of its model, there’s likely more consistent and predictable revenues from the Graduate line than other mid-tier entries in the Hilton portfolio.
Undergraduate by Hilton seems to be a natural offshoot gleaned from Hilton’s learnings in the space – while a full-on Graduate property might be ‘a bit too much’ in some of the smaller college towns, a tapered-down version of the product proves to be just the right fit.
‘Undergraduate’ would be Hilton’s 26th brand, and the chain has been notably active in launching new segments as of late. It welcomed the Outset Collection late last year, and launched the Apartment Collection just a few weeks ago.
