A&O Hotels & Hostels

a&o Hotels and Hostels, founded in 1999, has been operating 34 hostels in 22 cities and six countries (Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Denmark and Italy) since 2000. a&o Hotels and Hostels is currently Europe's largest independent hostel chain. The a&o Group offers travellers around 24,000 beds, recording more than 4 million overnight stays and generated a turnover of around EUR 117 million in 2017. The chain is currently experiencing growth of over 15 percent p.a., and plans to open more establishments. a&o is a combination of hostel (Book Orange) and hotel (Book Blue) under one roof. Meeting rooms, breakfast buffet, lobby and bars are available in both categories. Around 17,500 school trips per year use the chain's hostels and 52 percent of guests book their accommodation online. a&s's target audience includes leisure/urban tourism (40 percent), groups/school trips (37 percent), family vacations (15 percent) and business tourism (8 percent).The company offers vocational training at all its locations. a&o has been awarded 4 stars by QMJ and 2 stars by DEHOGA (the German Hotel & Catering Association), meets the TÜV "Youth Hostel Quality Standard"​, and has been awarded the youth travel quality label by Germany's Reisenetz (Association of Youth Travel). For the second year in a row, the a&o Group received the Double A rating by TREUGAST Solutions Group.The chain is actively committed to sports and education, and has been supporting SOS Children's Villages since 2004, the youth teams of 1st FC Union Berlin since 2010, and the youth teams of SK Sturm Graz since 2014.