HotelChatter - Tag: Accor Hotels

Is This the End of Ugly Bedspreads? Motel 6 To Get Euro-Sleek Look

Tim L. — 2008-03-13T12:02:05-05:00

<![CDATA[<img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/admin/motel6newdesign2.jpg" class="imgborder">People don't normally mention Motel 6 and "sleek design" in the same sentence. After all, the chain is known as the prototypical bare-bones roadside motel, with every material and piece of furniture in one seemingly the cheapest available in order to keep the nightly room rate below the competition's. French parent company Accor is trying to change all that though, with "a modern, European boutique-style flair" according to the <a href="http://www.motel6.com/about/press_room/release.aspx?Document=375">official press release</a>. Spin or no spin, the new room design, dubbed the Phoenix design, does sound like a major improvement: <blockquote>The room includes ambient lighting, wood-effect flooring rather than carpet, and a 32-inch flat-screen TV. The flat screen TV is displayed on the entertainment unit which conceals

Sydney: Hoopla Happenings at Sydney's Darling Harbour

amandak — 2008-03-07T09:25:41-05:00

Easter's coming early this year, and in Sydney as well as hunting for chocolate Easter eggs or greeting the Easter bilby (the Australian animal version of the Easter bunny), they'll be celebrating the Darling Harbour Hoopla Festival as well.

Hoopla is a circus and acrobatic festival that will see performers juggling, busking, abseiling and doing aerial stunts and slapstick comedy routines at many locations around the Darling Harbour precinct, all for free, and it sounds like a good laugh and a lot of fun.

Ho Chi Minh City: French Hotel Chain Invades Vietnam

Tim L. — 2008-03-06T11:01:00-05:00

<![CDATA[<img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/admin/sofitel_hanoi.jpg" class="imgborder"> French hotel operator Accor announced this week that they would be ramping up their presence in Vietnam, <a href="http://english.vietnamnet.vn/travel/2008/03/772124/">adding 12 hotels to their current 8 by the end of 2010</a>. Forget any visions of unspoiled hill tribe regions in the far north: the 150-room Pullman Sapa Resort and the 200-room Pullman Lao Cai Hotel are on the way. Heavily touristed Ha Long Bay will get its first international hotel: Novotel Ha Long Bay, opening this summer. Two new Mercure brand hotels will open in Hanoi, scheduled for 2009 and 2010--the first Mercure hotels in the country. More Novotels are on the way, including one in the beach resort area of Nha Trang. Surprisingly, there were no high-end

Sofitel Hotels Going Green with Wind Power

mytwocents — 2008-03-04T14:02:33-05:00

Sofitels are going green or should we say "vert"?

Accor North America and its French-style Sofitel Hotels have signed a new landmark agreement with Community Energy, Inc. to purchase clean, renewable wind energy to power all nine of its U.S. Sofitel locations.

This new eco-friendly agreement gives Sofitel Hotels the distinction of being the first hotel chain to be an EPA Green Power Partner.

Sofitel Hotels To Get New Looks

juliana — 2007-10-31T13:55:55-05:00

<![CDATA[<img src="http://www.hotelchatter.com/files/admin/sofitella_review.jpg" class="imgborder"><a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21516722/">The Financial Times</a> reports that Accor Hotels will be upgrading its <a href="http://www.hotelchatter.com/tag/sofitel%20hotels">Sofitel Hotel</a> brand to accommodate more luxury and business travellers.Gilles Pélisson, chief executive of Accor, is hoping to tap into the luxury brand market first. Afterall Accor is French and so is Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Hermes, and Cartier, all luxury exports. Using these fashion brands as models, Accor will bring a new structure to the Sofitel brand.<blockquote>Mr Pélisson believes that some less inspiring venues have compromised the brand's image. Accor plans to hive off 35 such hotels into a new chain aimed mainly at business travellers, where they will trade under the Pullman name, a brand from the golden age of luxury train travel that