How W+K Reimagined Travel With the World's Largest Hotel Brand

The greatest travel souvenir ... is you

Early in 2024, Marriott Bonvoy came to W+K to completely reinvent the perception of their brand and push it to places it’s never been before. Tall order. And we had some questions ourselves:

Is Marriott Bonvoy a hotel? A lot of hotels? A loyalty program? A Cowboy Carter VIP experience? A Michelin-star restaurant? A yurt? A yacht??

The answer, we found, was all of the above. Which made for a super exciting creative opportunity and challenge.

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But we needed an idea that could create a singular voice for a portfolio of so many hotel brands. One that not only made people feel differently about the venue, but travel itself.

So, first, we tapped into our own experiences. When so much of the world can be seen in a photo, and a beautiful one at that, why is being there still so special? The tastes? The smells? Learning you like hiking? And what drives each of us to explore the way we do? So many times travel ads show San Francisco with the Golden Gate Bridge, but there are millions of ways to experience the city.

We wanted to stand up for people exploring on their own terms, and savoring what they learn along the way.

And sure, a souvenir can be the T-shirt you grab at the hotel gift shop. But it’s also the eucalyptus memory that will forever remind you of a 5-star spa experience. It’s a love language you didn’t know you spoke. It’s finally getting to call yourself a “safari person.” And a dumpling so good, it’ll ruin you for all future dumplings.

We thought: If a souvenir is something you take home with you after every trip, it doesn’t need to be a thing. It can be you.

We landed on celebrating how travel shapes us. We knew this could be an interesting POV for a hotel brand to take. (Not to mention the world’s largest group of hotel brands). But the more we explored and strategized with our global Wieden+Kennedy network, the more we knew this was universal.

Because the hotel experience is so much more than just the hotel. It’s a part of your life story. And we wanted to capture Marriott Bonvoy’s evolution by focusing on the deep, identity-shaping moments that travel offers across three of the portfolio’s most defining experiences: outdoor lodging, dining and boutique hotels.

What became so creatively exciting about this campaign for us was the chance to show off Marriott Bonvoy’s incredible global roster and develop compelling human stories within them.

This odyssey took us to stunning properties in Hong Kong, Thailand and Kenya. We leaned into the myriad ways that travel can shape you—in big, anthemic experiences and small, sensorial moments.

It was a wild production adventure led by the fantastic vision of Fleur Fortuné at Iconoclast U.S and lensed by Matias Boucard. Her team worked with VFX house Parliament to craft a visual world that bordered on the surreal. After all, travel is nothing if not immersive. And that feeling is what we aim to bring to our audience with every piece of communication.

At the core of the new global campaign, “You Are the Greatest Souvenir,” is the idea that if you see enough of this world, the greatest memento you take home at the end of every stay … is you.

As an agency, we’ll never forget the dim sum shaped like goldfish, rushing to catch a Hong Kong boat tour earlier and the incomparable Masai Mara.

Which just might just be the answer to our anthem’s opening question: “What will you bring back from your next trip with Marriott Bonvoy?”