It's hard to stay healthy on the road, as many of you who do the annual healthcare marketing conference circuit know. Between the stagnant plane air, the chilly hotel room, and the sugar-laden breakfast spread, it's a wonder we make it to our meetings at all.
And let's face it, who among us doesn't expense one too many Starbucks drinks. It's all too easy for our regular healthy habits to go out the rental car window.
But the next time you're in Vegas you don't necessarily have to trade travel for health. The MGM Grand Hotel & Casino has partnered with a New York real estate firm, Columbia University Medical Center, and Cleveland Clinic to create "Stay Well Rooms" – a new venture in healthy hotel rooms.
The 41 rooms, a sliver of the hotel's 5,044 rooms, include several features that aim to improve sleep, reduce allergens, promote healthy eating, and reduce stress.
For example, the rooms' lighting is designed to improve the production of melatonin, which can help a guest sleep better and adjust from jet lag more quickly. Dawn-simulating alarm clocks gently wake guests with light, rather than jolt them from slumber with a typical alarm buzzer or music.
And HEPA-standard air purification system are said to reduce ambient allergens and toxins. A water filtration system reduces disinfectant byproducts, chlorine, and pesticides. And shower water is infused with Vitamin C to neutralized chlorine.
Even the food options are better – mini bars are stocked with healthy snacks, such as coconut water and almonds. And a special room service menu includes healthful options such as steel-cut oats for breakfast and tofu-and-veggie sandwiches for lunch or dinner.
All this comes for just $30 more than the MGM's standard room rates.
What's more, guests can access three of Cleveland Clinic's online wellness programs for free during their stay and for a fee for 60 days following, so their healthy habits don't evaporate once they check out.
Michael Roizen, MD, chief wellness officer and chair of the Wellness Institute at Cleveland Clinic, explains his decision to focus on hotel guest's sleep, stress, and eating habits.
"The goal was to choose what is the best fit for traveling individuals," he says. "Most people understand the importance of not smoking and tobacco cessation, so we didn't feel that was necessary [to include]." As for exercise, "most people understand that as well and there are a lot of other programs available to help with that."
So Cleveland Clinic made three of its wellness programs available to MGM Grand guests: "GO! To Sleep" for insomnia, "GO! Foods for You," for healthy eating habits in line with the Mediterranean diet, and "Stress-Free Now," for stress management.
"We wanted to work on areas that would be easily done in your [hotel] room or they could be easily available at home," he says. "And that they would help you long-term managing stress, managing sleep—especially when you're traveling in different time zones—and improve your food choices. These are things that are important to the traveler, who may have a hectic life."
After the first sixty days, guests can decide to continue with the programs for a fee of $50 each.
The Stay Well Rooms launched on October 1 so Cleveland Clinic isn't analyzing guests usage of the online programs yet, but it is tracking several metrics.
"In the best of all perfect worlds, when you offer something valuable, but free where someone else has to put effort into looking at it, about 10% usage would be considered a great success," Roizen says.
Regardless of those results, this effort is already a great branding success. Infusing your organization's expertise and mission into other industries and organizations is what separates the good brands from the great.
To get hotel guests thinking about their health, in Sin City, of all places, is a feat that these rooms are sure to accomplish. And hotel guests will most likely remember the healthful messages they learned—and the organizations who taught them.
Marianne Aiello is a contributing writer at HealthLeaders Media.