• Wall Street Journal, Friday, November 13, 2009 10:40 AM

InterContinental Hotels Group may bar as many as 300 of the 2,700 Holiday Inn hotels owned by franchisees in North America from using the brand name if they don't undertake specified renovations by Feb. 1, Kris Hudson reports.

The $1 billion overhaul of Holiday Inns -- an effort to "contemporize" the 57-year-old brand and weed out laggards -- began two years ago, and about 1,400 outlets have already completed the process. About 300 of the remaining 1,300 have yet to begin the renovations, according to Kevin Kowalski, IHG's svp of brand management for Holiday Inn.

Speaking to franchisees in Washington, D.C., yesterday, Kowalski was adamant that the company would stick to its timetable and standards. "We're not changing the components of this process, and we're not changing the timing," he said, adding that hotels that don't meet the deadline "will get a failure letter and so will their banks."

Read the whole story at Wall Street Journal »