Trump Organization Comes to Middle America
Joe Cortez June 07, 2017
Company to open “American Idea” Hotels focused on three-star audience.
Less than a year after the presidential election, the Trump name will once again headline small towns across the United States. The New York Times reports the Trump Organization will begin opening a chain of budget targeted towards business and family travelers, named “American Idea” and “Scion.”
The idea to introduce the hotel brand to smaller markets comes from the current heads of The Trump Organization, Eric and Donald Trump, Jr. At a launch party, the two eldest sons of President Donald Trump told supporters that they received a “crash course in America” while campaigning for their father.
The trademark for the name “American Idea” was filed in April 2016, with the first hotels in the brand will appear in Mississippi – a state Trump won by 18 points. While the brothers claim politics have nothing to do with the decision to open four hotels in The Magnolia State – three American Idea hotels and one Scion hotel – political scientists claim that the move is directly inspired by the Electoral College map.
“They’re cashing in on the red states,” professor Kathleen Clark of Washington University in St. Louis told CBS News. “I’m not surprised that the Trump family would look to opportunities to commercially exploit his political success.”
In a twist on Trump’s hard-line stance on immigration during the 2016 campaign, the first hotels will be opened by a family of immigrants who came to North America as war refugees. Chawla Hotels will own the properties, run by an Indian-American family. The three American Idea hotels will be remodels of current hotels in the Chawla portfolio, while Scion will be a new build in Cleveland, Miss.
Trump Organization has not announced when the three-star American Idea or four-star Scion will open.
[Photo: Shutterstock]
