Holiday Inn Warms Up Its Brand, You

Holiday Inn hotels have been tasked by the brand's parent corporation to contemporize or get out of the business. These upgrades include "minimum quality specifications" such as better exterior lighting, redecorated lobbies, new bedding, and new signs with the updated Holiday Inn logo. However, three Holiday Inns are going beyond any minimum whatsoever with a new service to deliver warm bodies directly to customers' beds. No, the three locations are not in Amsterdam.

"The new Holiday Inn bed warmers service is a bit like having a giant hot water bottle in your bed."

That is how a Holiday Inn spokeswoman explained the brand's new service to Reuters. At select Holiday Inn hotels in Manchester and London, management will send a staff member in a fleece sleeper suit -- upon request -- to warm a guest's before they go to sleep.

Promotional efforts for the human bed warmer service is accompanied by a sleep expert from the Edinburgh Sleep Center; it is part of a larger campaign designed to create publicity for the launch of more than 3,000 new Holiday Inns worldwide. As an attention-grabbing stunt, the plan is not that crazy. The announcement has been picked up by numerous publications worldwide (like us!). As a brand building campaign though, it's cold.

Presumably, very few guests are ever going to take advantage of this service and it will probably be phased out quickly. In the meantime, what has Holiday Inn bought for itself besides a few laughs? Solid brands are built on values, not tricks and antics. However, it is great to see a brand with a sense of humor and as long as Holiday Inn finds a way to leverage the publicity to highlight one of its real differentiators, it's a success.