BWH Hotels’ chief marketing officer Joelle Park understands that personalized experiences are key to travel. That is why the company launched the Life’s a Trip campaign, to highlight the unique and real travel that customers experience across its hotel chain.
“There is a rich legacy and a heritage with Best Western. People don’t know that it’s part of a full portfolio of 18 brands, 4,000 hotels around the globe,” says Park. “Telling that story is unlocking this gem of potential.”
“People have never needed connection more and so my purpose is to nurture potential in brands and people. The vision is to inspire travel through unique experiences. When we help brands realize their ability to inspire people to travel, we’re encouraging meaningful connection – and, in turn, making the world a better place.”
Best Western is more than just hotels off of the interstate. It’s part of BWH Hotels, which has more than 4,000 properties spanning from economy all the way through luxury. In 2019, the company acquired WorldHotels that has luxury and upscale brands and has also been expanding its own Best Western portfolio with the Best Western Plus, which has an elevated experience. Each is designed to attract its own niche audience.
“Our hotels create small but meaningful moments – whether it’s engaging with the local community or recognizing something special about the guests who are there,” says Park. “Each property does it in its own unique way, and together they form a diverse, connected collection of hotels.”
Brand Innovators caught up with Park from her office in Phoenix to talk about building brand, loyalty and the Life’s a Trip campaign. This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Best Western Plus Tin Wis Resort in Tofino, British Columbia
How are you bringing the brand to life in marketing?
It starts with tapping into the heritage. We listen first and then leap forward. Listening means grounding in consumer research. It means reading the history books of Best Western. We started with a printed travel guide and, in many ways, helped pioneer the hospitality industry. In the early days, our hotels in the West would even make reservations for travelers at their next destination. Unlike every other hotel out there, where it was just one reservation and you’re off, they helped you get to the next place. When you unearth that history and insight, it’s a goldmine for a marketer. We’ve been enabling travel, not just for a stay, but from one hotel to the next. How do we tell that story at a broader scale with hotels around the world? We realized travelers want to be helped along the way.
Travel can be complicated and hard, but they also said in research, keep it real, be authentic. We brought that to life through the Life’s a Trip campaign. It is about enabling travelers to have these experiences. It doesn’t have to be the grandiose trip to Europe or the two-week outward bound. We can help with that, but we can also help with a quick overnight stay because you just need to get away from the house. Our campaign highlights these small moments within travel, whether it’s a couple escaping and just sitting in quiet and staring at their dog to get a selfie.
We provide a comfortable stay and a place to go hiking that can make that moment special. At the beach, we highlight the family and not just the picture-perfect family, but dropping all the stuff and schlepping it to the beach and the moment when you collapse in the beach chair, there is just joy and richness in these small moments. We’re proud to humbly play a part in the travel experience with our hotels.
Royal Garden Hotel (WorldHotels) in London
How are you telling the story about local properties?
We tell the local story better than anybody else out there. Our hotel leaders, our general managers, our front desk agents live in the communities where they work. They know the local neighborhood. They can give those insider tips. It’s not just the top 10 tips on Tripadvisor, it’s the best diner that’s open till 1 a.m. when you arrive late and you want to make sure to order the brisket with extra juice on the side. When we talk about hyperlocal, it’s about bringing that experience, whether it’s in the form of insider tips or local artwork or our team members wearing the jersey of a local team, we actually bring it into the hotel experience.
You mentioned teams, can you talk about how you are leaning into how you are leaning into sports and entertainment tourism?
We saw that there was a high affinity for sports among those most likely to stay at our hotels, so we really leaned into that. We found a great partner in the United Soccer League. They have 24 teams and three leagues including a women’s league and a youth league. They really are embedded in the communities where they have these teams. There’s the fandom for the teams, and then there’s the way that they lean into supporting these programs, to develop youth and to support them in their journey, whether it’s for fun or to be professional soccer players.
We partner with them through sponsored content, on-site presence, and ongoing support of their initiatives. Beyond that, we just launched an activation called Hometown Heroes, which celebrates local sports figures who make a difference in their communities – from coaches and players to volunteers supporting youth sports. With the rise of soccer and the World Cup coming next year, it’s just a great time to be affiliated with such an impactful organization.
Can you talk about how you’re building loyalty across your brands?
We believe that a stay with us is a series of moments and any moment in that stay is an opportunity to garner loyalty. Loyalty is often earned when nothing is asked in return. Loyalty is embedded in the guest experience. Our loyalty program members deserve an elevated experience.
We have WorldHotels Rewards, because WorldHotels is our upscale and luxury collection that has these beautiful hotels. There’s a rewards program for them, and then we have Best Western Rewards that spans the rest of the portfolio – 64 million members and going strong. One thing that sets us apart is our points that loyalty members earn never expire. You’ve worked hard for those points, you deserve to keep them and use them when you want. It’s a combination of how we take care of guests in the customer experience and the richness of the program that provides value to their everyday lives.
Best Western Plus Concordville Hotel in Glen Mills, Pennsylvania
Can you talk about your past experiences and how that’s kind of helped you in your current role?
I took a windy road to get here. It’s kind of unconventional. I started in sales and then fell in love with marketing. I worked at ad agencies for nine years. I worked in different verticals from retail, technology, CPG. What I learned from that was the power of investing in your agency partner and a strong brief. Being a strong business partner, providing that additional context of what’s happening in the business so that the agency can produce ideas and work. It’s more than a campaign, it really is helping them help you shape the brand in the best way.
When I was on that side of the business, I was constantly curiously asking questions, grounding in data. I was working at Choice Hotels as a client and jumped over, spent 13 years at Hilton and then arrived at the last two here at BWH Hotels. That data seeking curiosity is important. I really believe an idea can come from anywhere. So if we want to share the thread now over to the agency, who knows, it might spark something. Setting them up for success is a part of what’s contributed to the success that we have seen in our efforts to date, specifically in the Life’s a Trip campaign.
You have mentioned FIFA. Are you doing any special activations for the World Cup next year?
We have some things brewing. The real investment right now is just being part of the soccer fandom, but we’ve got some exciting things on the horizon that we’ll be announcing soon.
What are the key trends you’re looking at for both marketing and travel for 2026?
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention AI in an interview about predictions. It is really changing how people search. One guiding principle that I use is not jumping to black and white so quickly. It’s not from this to all artificial intelligence. We are at a pivotal time of evolution. We can’t forget all the ways people are discovering, whether it’s social, which really is a new search tool and influencers. When we think about search, it’s not that consumers are abandoning it. Artificial intelligence is a new way to search where you have longer search queries. Our partners at Google share that they’re seeing longer queries that result in more detailed responses through AI. That’s one trend that we can capitalize on with those types of local recommendations.
