Did you read the news this morning? Hilton, Hyatt, InterContinental, Marriott and Starwood just announced that they are reinvesting in their core brands by folding all the new names in their respective houses and transforming all of their hotels into lifestyle brands. Hilton’s Canopy is no longer; Hyatt has sent Andaz packing; InterContinental is giving Hotel Indigo the heave-ho; Edition has been excised by Marriott; and Aloft and Element are no longer elements of the Starwood family.

United these corporations stand with a ‘one brand, one name’ policy. As a house of brands, Starwood’s position on this is a tad more complex, but that’s nothing a few Chinese investors can’t fix!

Gone are the days of niche sub-brands with cool yet ambiguous names (and less than ten properties worldwide). Every hotel will now experience the benefits of having ‘lifestyle’ features no matter if they appeal to millennials demanding perfection for bargain basement prices or boomers craving the inky touch of a physical, environmentally unfriendly magazine.

Oh, and if you haven’t guessed it by now, this is an April Fool’s joke.

As I pondered what to write about for this notorious month-opener, nothing was dearer to the anger centers of my brain than what the major chains are currently doing to further dilute their core brands through successive new product announcements. All these sub-brand launches, no matter the target demographic that market researchers have found to be ‘underserved’, only work in grand scheme of things to complicate the travel research phase for the average consumer.

When you give people too many options, they will look for ways to simplify the decision-making process. Make a restaurant menu too long and patrons will spend more time perusing the options to ultimately end by asking the server for his or her recommendation. Give prospective car buyers too many colors to choose from and they won’t make purchase from your dealership. Present customers with an armada of flavors to try and they’ll buy the competitor’s brand of soda with only a few options that are clearly labeled and easily differentiated. Other examples abound in any industry that cares about actually selling to its consumers.

In the realm of hospitality, the OTAs help alleviate this pain point as all you need to know is the location you want to visit and your budget, brands be damned. Ditto for Airbnb. Despite all the official rationales from the major chains for why all of these new sub-brand creations are justified, not one comes close to solving this ‘paradox of choice’ problem. So, if you are contemplating about spinning off a product with a new name, do so at your own risk and know that human genetics are not on your side.

My second gripe for this Fool’s Day comes via the lazy usage of the already vague ‘lifestyle’ modifier – what’s meant to denote forward-thinking hotels with an eye for contemporary, ergonomic and intimate design as well as health and wellness. Creating a new sub-brand to fit this trend shouldn’t be a crutch to resuscitate the parent company.

Instead, lifestyle attributes should be applied across the board. Give all your hotels a modern makeover. Transform every lobby into a functional third space with grab-and-go dining options. Upgrade your health and wellness amenities regardless of whether the average customer is a millennial, Gen Xer or baby boomer. After all, just because a brand is old and established doesn’t mean it is immune to change. Brand evolution should be holistically embraced as, in this case, I’m sure most customers would love to experience some of the features that demarcate such lifestyle brands without having to try an entirely new product.

Yes, there is the argument to be made that people want to try new things. And this point is spot on. People do indeed try new hotels…by traveling to different locales around the world!

But maybe, just maybe, if you let them know that your hotel brand is a singular entity with many different properties in many different locations, such travelers may decide to check out where your other constituent hotels are situated and let that grouping determine whether to visit next (instead of first deciding upon the region or city then querying an OTA for where to stay).

(Article by Larry Mogelonsky, published by HotelsMag April 1,2016).