Holiday Inn® Brand Wants to Give One Small Business the Ulitmate Holiday Gift - $25,000 and Face Time with Small Business Experts from MBAs Across America

This holiday season, the Holiday Inn® brand is giving one visionary the gift of possibility. The iconic brand, part of InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), today announced the “Small Business in a Box” contest, which will equip one creative thinker with the tools they need to grow their dream company, including $25,000 in seed money. The challenge launches today, in celebration of last night’s finale of the  Holiday Inn brand and HLN co-created series Growing America: A Journey to Success during which entrepreneurs Jack Sundell and Corri Bristow Sundell of The Root Café in Little Rock, Arkansas, were named as the most inspirational featured business and received $25,000 from the Holiday Inn brand.

To enter, participants should follow @HolidayInn on Twitter and send a tweet demonstrating how their small business positively impacts their local community using the hashtag #SmallBizWishContest. Entries will be accepted through 11:59 p.m. EST on December 25, 2014. The top 10 finalists will be notified in early January 2015 and asked to submit a two minute video statement highlighting highlighting the positive social impact their business has in its local community, their business vision and what the prize would mean to them. The winner will be notified by January 23, 2015.

The Holiday Inn “Small Business in a Box” winner will receive:

·         $25,000 in seed money to jumpstart their small business;

·         The opportunity to work hand-in-hand for one week with Casey Gerald and Michael Baker, co-founders of MBAs Across America (MBAxAmerica), an innovative program that takes MBA students from some of America’s most prestigious universities and challenges them to take a journey across the U.S., learning from and working with visionary entrepreneurs who are making a difference in their communities;

·         And 140,000 IHG® Rewards Club points to be applied towards future stays at a Holiday Inn property.

“We are thrilled to offer the opportunity of a lifetime to an aspiring entrepreneur so they can make their dreams a reality with the support of the Holiday Inn brand and our ‘Small Business in a Box’ prizes,” said Maurice Cooper, vice president, Holiday Inn® brand, the Americas, IHG. “The entrepreneurial spirit and focus on the communities in which our hotels do business is the foundation on which the Holiday Inn brand was built, and our partnership with MBAxAmerica and the relationship we plan to build with our winning entrepreneur are just two examples of how we are keeping that spirit alive today.”

“Small Business in a Box” is the culmination of the Holiday Inn / HLN (a Turner Broadcasting network) co-created series, Growing America: A Journey to Success. The six-episode original series has followed teams of MBA students from the MBAxAmerica program who are given one week to use their expertise to transform small businesses and positively affect communities in cities across the U.S.

Throughout the series, the Holiday Inn brand provided hotel accommodations for the MBA teams, giving them a place to relax, refresh and collaborate, and enable their journeys across the country. The brand also documented and shared the extraordinary journeys of these MBA teams and the entrepreneurs through a “Signature Stories” series as part of the Holiday Inn brand’s Journey to Extraordinary campaign.

For full contest rules, please visit goo.gl/xEgV3i.

About the Holiday Inn® brand
With over 1,149 hotels worldwide, the Holiday Inn® brand is the most widely recognized lodging brand in the world. In fact, the Holiday Inn brand was one of the first international hotel brands to establish a presence in China in 1984. The Holiday Inn brand provides the services that business travelers need, while also offering a comfortable atmosphere where all people can relax and enjoy amenities such as restaurants and room service, swimming pools, fitness centers and comfortable lounges. The casual atmosphere and amenities such as meeting and on-site business facilities, and Kids Stay and Eat Free programs, demonstrates the long-standing commitment of the Holiday Inn brand to serving travelers and have helped to establish the brand as “America’s Favorite Hotel.” For more information about the Holiday Inn brand, visit www.holidayinn.com or call 1-800-HOLIDAY. Find us on Twitter http://www.twitter.com/holidayinn or Facebook www.Facebook.com/holidayinnhotels.

Visit www.ihg.com for hotel information and reservations and www.ihgrewardsclub.com for more on IHG Rewards Club. For our latest news, visit: www.ihg.com/media, www.twitter.com/ihg, www.facebook.com/ihg or www.youtube.com/ihgplc.

About MBAs Across America (MBAxAmerica)
MBAs Across America (MBAxAmerica), is a national movement to revitalize America by mobilizing the nation’s top business school students to support startups and small businesses in emerging markets across the country. The program challenges MBAs to take a journey across America to work with visionary entrepreneurs who are making a difference every day in their communities. Breaking the mold of traditional business school internships, MBAxAmerica believes the future of business school is hands-on; on the ground; and must prepare a new generation to drive real progress. The MBA students are able to apply their education and skills in the real world while helping hard working entrepreneurs in America--in the process creating a new generation of business leaders who can be a central force for good in the world.

IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group) [LON:IHG, NYSE:IHG (ADRs)] is a global organization with a broad portfolio of nine hotel brands, including InterContinental® Hotels & Resorts, Hotel Indigo®, Crowne Plaza® Hotels & Resorts, Holiday Inn® Hotels & Resorts, Holiday Inn Express®, Staybridge Suites®, Candlewood Suites®, EVEN™ Hotels and HUALUXE® Hotels and Resorts.

IHG manages IHG® Rewards Club, the world’s first and largest hotel loyalty program with over 82 million members worldwide. The program was relaunched in July 2013, offering enhanced benefits for members including free internet across all hotels, globally.

IHG franchises, leases, manages or owns over 4,700 hotels and 697,000 guest rooms in nearly 100 countries, with almost 1,200 hotels in its development pipeline.

InterContinental Hotels Group PLC is the Group’s holding company and is incorporated in Great Britain and registered in England and Wales.