Business is up at the Holiday Inn in Lakewood since the hotel completed a relaunch under the chain’s new image a year ago.
The relaunch was the capstone of a major renovation that Granite Hospitality started when it bought the property in 2006. All told, Granite has spent $4.5 million on improvements to the hotel.
“We’ve had greater trial use from people seeing the new signs,” said Shawn Doyle, president and chief executive of Granite Hospitality, which owns and operates the hotel as a franchisee for InterContinental Hotels Group. “We’ve had more corporate accounts taking a look, the staff has much greater pride, and guests have much higher satisfaction as a result of the relaunch and renovation.”
InterContinental Hotels Group, or IHG, estimates the worldwide relaunch of the 58-year-old Holiday Inn brand will cost $1 billion, with IHG paying about $60 million of the cost, said Gina LaBarre, an IHG vice president. The cost ranges from $150,000 to $250,000 per hotel.
About 75 percent of the company’s 3,300 properties worldwide have completed the relaunch. The rest are required to finish the work by the end of the year or leave the Holiday Inn system.
The rebranded hotels have new bedding, upgraded bathrooms, a new logo and signage and an upgraded exterior lighting package.
“We are doing it because our customers are telling us we needed to do it,” LaBarre said. “The brand had not stayed relevant.”
Hotel analyst Bob Benton said the relaunch is needed for Holiday Inn to compete with brands such as Courtyard by Marriott and Hilton Garden Inn.
“The new concept with new style and upgraded amenities is what business travelers are looking for,” Benton said. “Holiday Inn is one of the older established brands that has gone through a time where they have a lot of older hotels at the same time when Courtyards and Hilton Garden Inn were coming out.”
The Lakewood hotel is one of six Holiday Inns in Colorado that have relaunched. So far, seven of the state’s 11 Holiday Inn Express properties have completed the relaunch and two are in the process. The remaining two, which technically were the now-defunct Holiday Inn Select brand, have left the system.
IHG has removed 1,200 hotels from the Holiday Inn system and added 1,500 newer properties. When the relaunch is completed this year, 40 percent of IHG’s Holiday Inn portfolio will be less than 10 years old, LaBarre said.
“Some of those hotels were not going to be able to make the journey with us, and we wanted to make sure we got the lower quality out,” she said. “We want it to be a completely new experience for our guests.”
Margaret Jackson: 303-954-1473 or mjackson@denverpost.com
