Not your grandpa’s Hilton: Part of the public area in a Tru by Hilton hotel. (Image: Hilton)
Several major hotel companies have come out with new brands in recent years that target the growing market of millennials and their high-tech, social media lifestyles, like Starwood’s Aloft, Marriott’s AC Hotels, InterContinental Hotels Group’s EVEN Hotels and Best Western’s Vib. And now Hilton is doing the same with a new brand called Tru by Hilton.
Hilton said the brand will fill what it calls “a massive void” in the midscale lodging category in the U.S. and Canada. (In the amorphous world of hotel branding, “midscale” falls in between “economy” and “upper midscale;” in any case, Hilton’s announcement of Tru emphasizes terms like “value” and “affordability”.)
The brand’s new website (www.trubyhilton.com) says Tru properties will appeal to leisure and business guests of all generations as long as they have “a Millennial mindset,” which Hilton defines as “a youthful energy and a zest for life.”
(Image: Hilton)
All the Tru by Hilton properties will be newly-built (no conversions of existing hotels), and all will be franchised. The company says it already has signed contracts for 102 new Tru hotels, with 30 more in the approval pipeline. Locations mentioned include Atlanta, Dallas, Chicago, Houston, Denver, Nashville and Portland.
The Tru properties will all include guest rooms with all-white platform beds, 55-inch TVs, eight-foot-wide windows, lots of power outlets and spacious bathrooms, Hilton said. The lobby area (designated “The Hive”) will have four zones, for “lounging, working, eating or playing.” (The Play Zone will offer table games and a big TV with DIRECTV service and tiered seating.)
Just sayin’: Tru looks a LOT like the EVEN hotel we just reviewed in NYC
The Command Center (read: front desk area) serves up a “social media wall with real-time content to foster engagement among guests” and a 24/7 market with snacks, single-serving wine and beer, and “healthy light meal options.”
Of course there will be a fitness center, along with free Wi-Fi as well as mobile check-in, room selection and Digital Key (available via the HHonors app). The first one is expected to open by year’s end.
Readers: Have you stayed in any of the new hotel brands designed for Millennials? (Would you?) If so, what did you think?
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The issue with these hip new trendy hotels is the look so stale so quick and the rooms tend not to be comfortable. I generally avoid them and stick to the HIE, HAMPTON inn, FAIRFIELD and such as the are comfortable and WORK
So Hilton basically doesn’t have any fresh ideas? First they “came up” with Denizen, which is a copycat of W Hotel and eventually got sued for it. Now they have Tru, which is basically another version of aLoft.