HOW IT STARTED

Fresh off a successful Build-A-Bear shoot, creatives Matt Spett and Chris Dutton at Ogilvy in Atlanta reached out with an open invitation: they were developing work for Holiday Inn and wanted to hear pitches. The campaign's core idea was about how the brand's reliability takes the unpredictability out of travel for frequent guests. The format was web video for the Holiday Inn website.

THE IDEA

The pitch was a story called New Parents — drawn directly from a personal experience adopting a son, traveling to an unfamiliar city, needing to stay for several days during one of the most anxious and momentous times imaginable. A hotel that felt dependable and familiar wasn't a luxury — it was an anchor.

THE UPGRADE

The creative team brought the concept to their client. The response exceeded expectations — Holiday Inn liked the idea so much they decided to elevate it from a web video to a full national commercial. More visibility, a larger audience, but the challenge of a shorter story to tell.

PRODUCTION

The entire spot was shot in a single day at a Holiday Inn near Atlanta. What started as a personal memory became a tight, efficient, high-stakes production — delivered on time and on brief.

RESULT

The spot tested higher than any Holiday Inn commercial to that date — validating the emotional truth of the original idea, the power of personal experience as a creative foundation, and a director who thrives as a collaborator and true creative partner.

HOLIDAY INN

Obviously, this was a very personal story to me — but it captured exactly what the brand stood for.