While they have a lot in common, I've found a few major differences:
- Econo Lodges seem to be moving to a semi-standard bedding setup (there's a couple of variants, though.) Rodeways seem to have whatever the hotel owner decided to buy, without any requirement from Choice on what that looks like. On a similar vein, almost every Econo Lodge room seems to have that wall art of the 50 state plates on the wall in each room.
- Econo Lodges have at least some breakfast available, at least pre-pandemic. Rodeways may only have coffee available, but not even a muffin or snack bar for breakfast.
- Rodeway seems to be purely a conversion brand, and aimed at property owners who don't want to have to worry about particular brand standards but want to be part of a chain. Econo Lodges are mainly conversion as well, but some work eventually has to go into the property to "convert" it to Econo Lodge, from what I've seen.