Choice Hotels Holds Ribbon-Cutting For New HQ In North Bethesda

NORTH BETHESDA, MD — Choice Hotels International held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Tuesday to celebrate the opening of its new headquarters in North Bethesda.

The new office, at 915 Meeting St., will house about 400 employees in about 108,000 square feet of space.

“Welcome to the brand new headquarters of Choice Hotels International,” company President and CEO Patrick Pacious said at the ribbon-cutting ceremony. “We are really thrilled to call this our new home. It is a spectacular state-of-the-art building in a vibrant neighborhood called Pike & Rose.”

The company's previous headquarters was located at Rockville Metro Plaza, which they moved to in 2013. The company has been based in Maryland since 1968, MoCo 360 reported.

The event was attended by Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich and other state and local officials.

"By investing in this place, you have sent a very, very clear message to the state, you've sent a very clear message to the country, you've sent a very clear message to the world that when you're thinking about where to grow your businesses, you do not need to think any further than the state of Maryland," Moore said at the event.

Choice Hotels started with seven hotel owners forming a cooperative in 1939. "Today, it is 7,500 hotels across 45 countries in the world," Pacious said.

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Elrich said that having both Choice Hotels and Marriott International headquartered in Montgomery County is extremely important because of the number of jobs they create and the message it sends about companies wanting to stay in the county.

"Having a concentration of the hotel industry here is a big deal," Elrich told Montgomery Community Media. "You get to be thought of as one of the hospitality centers."

The state of Maryland gave Choice Hotels about $1.6 million in conditional loans, and Montgomery County added $250,000, according to Montgomery Community Media.

Food services management company Sodexo also is planning to move its U.S. headquarters from Gaithersburg to the same office building in North Bethesda, owned by Federal Realty Investment Trust. The Paris-based company’s U.S. division is scheduled to move into its 52,000-square-foot office at 915 Meeting St. in spring 2024.

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