Nice shot! InterContinental Hotels Group's display piece is Picture Perfect

Cheers, April, 2007 by Ellie Van Savage

The "Polaroid" look of InterContinental Hotels Group's Picture Perfect Pleasures drink display grabbed guest attention, increased drink sales for the hotel group and garnered the Atlanta, Ga.-based hotel operator the 2007 Cheers Best Chain Beverage Merchandising Award.

"The idea for the 'Polaroid' photo look for the promotion featuring [drinks made with] Gran Centenario Tequila and Campari was the result of a brainstorming session between myself and Pamela Tweedell and Sherri Nadeau of iMi, [a Chicago-based marketing agency specializing in beverages]. Wendy Dunlap of Skyy Spirits' national accounts was there too," says Rene van Camp, corporate beverage director, the Americas, for InterContinental Hotels Group.

"We all collaborated and decided the 'Polaroid' look was different and eye-catching," he explains. The Polaroid-style photos of the specialty drinks were perched on a unique display involving four metallic spirals; each held one photo. Although the promotion was created for the company's Crowne Plaza brand locations, the InterContinental brand hotels and resorts facilities and the Holiday Inn and Hotel Indigo brands got involved, too. In all, more than 100 hotels featured the merchandiser.

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The promotion, which began in August and ended in October, featured four cocktails--the Gran Peach Margarita, the Campari Orange Sparkler, the Campari Cooler and the Gran Paloma, a cocktail containing Gran Centenario Tequila, a bit of honey, grapefruit juice and lime.

The two cocktails containing Campari, a very mixable, but slightly bitter spirit, "made for a lot of buzz, and created a vibe as people started to talk about the drinks. That was very positive for us," says van Camp, who adds, "Campari is consumed a lot in Europe, and it's still a new taste to many Americans." Since Americans are well-acquainted with tequila, the cocktails containing that spirit achieved the highest sales, he says.

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The merchandiser was also well-received by the hotel operators. "I think the pictures and items sent were very well done. They were creative and eye-catching," was one comment from a beverage pro at the Crowne Plaza Redondo Beach in California. Another from the Crowne Plaza Times Square in New York stated, "We loved the stands and the colorful photos with easy-to-follow drink recipes."