This beer brand's 'hotel' is a night under the stars

There's a growing trend for food and drink advertisers to offer branded travel experiences; in the past few years we've seen Corona open a private island, and Taco Bell offered rooms at the Taco Bell Motel.  The latest comes from AB InBev brand Cerveza Patagonia, which is giving people the chance to sleep in a "5 billion star hotel." 

That hotel is not a hotel exactly. Rather, it's five two-person tents under the stars, in the mountains above Sao Paulo. The location was selected after looking at more than 30 different places, on the basis that it's far enough from light pollution to be a "true planetarium."

The campaign is by Brazil-based Beta Collective, which was founded by Bernardo Tavares, a senior creative at Havas Lisbon. The idea stemmed from the insight that consumers want more outdoor experiences and to connect with nature; research from Cerveza Patagonia and Pinterest showed an increase in searches for images of nature, sunsets, an 81% rise in searches for cabins and and a seven-fold jump in searches for "ground fire barbecue."

The "hotel" will be open for the 10 first days of September during the end of the winter season in the mountains in Brazil. To win a stay in one of the tents, consumers can apply through a contest; they need to post a photo on Twitter or Instagram showing their own version of a "5 billion star hotel," mentioning the brand and with the hashtag "#HotelPatagonia."

"Everyone can create their own 5 Billion Star Hotel and so our promotion invites the public to participate in this way, showing their version of a hotel," said the brand's head of marketing for Brazil,Thiago Leitão, in a statement. "We hope that our hotel will serve as the beginning of a movement, to show the public that everyone can enjoy a transformative experience in contact with nature, without even having to spend a lot of money."