Holiday Inn

Holiday Inn is a brand of hotels that is owned by the InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG). In 1952, the first hotel was opened in Memphis, and the chain expanded to more than 1,200 hotels worldwide. Holiday Inn was acquired by IHG in 2003.

The name of the hotel chain comes from the 1942 Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire movie of the same name. The founder of Holiday Inn, Kemmons Wilson, was watching the movie as he was reviewing drawings to pitch to investors and wrote the movie name as a placeholder that ended up becoming the name of his hotel chain. Wilson said he thought of the idea for the hotel chain after taking a road trip with his family and realizing that it was difficult to find accommodations that had transparent pricing or standard hotel rooms that were also kid-friendly.

A history of Holiday Inn

There are several types of Holiday Inn hotels, including the original Holiday Inns, Holiday Inn Express, Holiday Inn Resort, and Holiday Inn Club Vacations. All of the hotels have a pool and spaces that can be used for business purposes, such as rooms for meetings. Some of the hotels have restaurants and bars onsite, and Holiday Inn is known for allowing children to stay at the hotel and eat for free with specific terms and conditions.

In recent times, Holiday Inns have begun to be used in an attempt to alleviate the housing crisis that is prevalent in the United States and other countries. For example, in San Antonio, Texas, the city leased a Holiday Inn for two years to provide accommodations for unhoused people. In the northeastern part of the United States, Holiday Inns are being used as housing for unhoused migrants who are being kicked out of conservative states, such as Texas and Florida.