Holiday Inn
InterContinental Hotels Group is a multinational company which operates several hotel brands. It is the largest hotel company by number of rooms (556,000 as of March 2007), the company has more than 3700 hotels across nearly 100 countries. The chain manages such well-known brands as InterContinental® , Crowne Plaza® , Holiday Inn® , Holiday Inn Express®, Staybridge Suites®, Candlewood Suites® and Hotel Indigo®. IHG has its own loyalty program for guests — Priority Club, which has become the world’s largest with over 31 million members.
The original Holiday Inn chain of hotels was founded in 1952 in Memphis, Tennessee, by Kemmons Wilson to provide inexpensive family accommodation for travelers within the USA. By June 1972, when Wilson was featured on the cover of Time magazine, there were over 1,400 Holiday Inn hotels worldwide. The brand name Holiday Inn is now owned by IHG which franchises to the third parties and operates hotels under management agreements.
Interesting facts about Holiday Inn
- The name Holiday Inn was given to the original hotel by his architect Eddie Bluestein as a joke, in reference to the Bing Crosby movie.
- Holiday Inn was the first hotel chain to introduce a frequent stayer reward program. It debuted in 1977 as Holiday Inn Inner Circle, but was quickly reorganized into Priority Club Worldwide and later Priority Club Rewards.