Originally Posted by
Will Stonehocker
Why compared Quality to Clarion? Isn't Clarion the closest thing to a high-end brand from Choice?
In Santa Ana CA, the Comfort Suites reflagged to Clarion when they were remodeling their lobby building and got rid of the breakfast buffet, and then reflagged to Comfort Inn & Suites when they got a breakfast room (in a different building).
Originally Posted by
jebr
Cambria and Ascend are the two brands that Choice considers its highest-end ones, at least based on their website.
In nearby Costa Mesa CA, a two-story no-elevator motel rebranded from Comfort Inn to indie Blvd Hotel several years ago, did a bunch of room & lobby building upgrades as a result, and then came back a year or so ago as Blvd Hotel, an Ascend Collection property.
So a Clarion can be a reflagged external corridor Comfort, and an Ascend can be a two-story motel with nicely remodeled rooms. But that doesn't make either of them consistently "high-end" in my book.
But something to keep in mind is that this new category of "boutique" hotels (that Ascend claims to be in) is not anywhere on the "low-to-high-end" scale; it's off to the side on its own. So you can't use the categories from 25 years ago to explain all hotel brands today.