If that hotel room you just checked into looks a lot like your place back home, there could be a very good reason: Home furnishings brands are increasingly entering the hotel business.
Call it the logical extension of the experiential movement, a way to promote and advertise products outside of conventional marketing vehicles or just a clever way to increase revenue. Whatever the reasoning behind the trend, it’s for real and it could be a big business.Home brands like Baccarat, Armani/Casa and even Muji have all stepped into the hospitality business, and the list keeps growing. RH, the retailer once known as Restoration Hardware, will open its first Guesthouse hotel near its new store in New York City’s trendy Meatpacking District this month.
In 2020, West Elm will join the ranks with its first hotel, to be located in Indianapolis.
Hotels from home brands are part of a larger effort that has seen all kinds of consumer product brands moving into the business. The list includes Bulgari, Shinola, Versace and, from the restaurant world, Nobu, which now operates eight hotels and plans to open 12 more within the next two years.
For all these companies and brands, hotels represent the next level of engagement with customers who, the theory goes, will be so enamored of these properties and the furnishings within them that they will decorate their own homes similarly.
As such, this marketing move builds upon something hotels have been doing for more than ten years: selling furnishings from their properties to guests, either through catalogs or third parties.
Starwood’s Westin and W Hotels chains are generally recognized as the first to pursue this strategy, even selling some products in the hotel gift shop. Today, many upscale chains offer a variety of merchandise, from furniture and decorative accessories to soaps, beauty products and even lighting.
Add it all up, and the phrase “home away from home” takes on a whole new meaning.