I REALLY detest that Courtyard hotel commercial--you know the one

[Skidmore]

that pays homage to the "kings and potentates of the road". We kiss the feet of the corporate emporer and live only to make sure he has 6 diet Sprites and the teevees set to Fox News.

Gack!

[MadMaddie]

1. Yea...it bugs me too....

[maxsolomon]

2. then don't watch tv

irony is inescapable on commercial TV. they simply don't get why what they say offends people, or they think its funny.

[Iris]

3. but isn't it as perfectly crafted as the Republican message?

Presented in a way to suggest that this could be ANYONE?

[mattclearing]

There are tons of legitimate business travelers out there.

Not everyone with a briefcase and a laptop is the fucking devil.

Give me a break.

[Career Prole]

4. I thought I was being childish

because I change the channel whenever it starts. Hate it!

[C_U_L8R]

5. I'd like to de-potentate that copywriter

along with the voiceover actor.

Ick.. tiresome dreck

Whatever happened to funny surprising advertising ??

[LSK]

6. i feel the same way

Like business people really work hard flying from meeting to meeting. Give me a break.

[mattclearing]

7. You have no idea.

I work for people who do heavy business travel for liberal causes. They work 12+ hour days, deal with travel hang-ups and spend ungodly amounts of time away from their families.

It's really saddening to think that people hate business travelers unconditionally. A great deal of them are on our side.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

9. but the ad has nothing to do with the personal toil of anyone.

the ad itself is irritating, almost as much as the BOB one. You know, you too can have a bigger penis so you can expose yourself to your neighbors in their pool.

[mattclearing]

10. Perhaps...it didn't really bother me the time or two that I saw it, but

like I said, when I saw it, it reminded me more of like-minded co-workers, not Dick Cheney, as the OP was implying.

[xultar]

16. Sure it does. Too bad you don't get it.

[LSK]

12. try being a union electrician for 40 years

My dad can hardly walk now. Hes only 60.

Sitting in temperature controled meetings sipping ice water watching presentations is not physically demanding.

[mattclearing]

19. It's a different kind of work, to be sure.

My grandfather was a union electrician, by the way.

But running around the country with a laptop and LCD projector giving powerpoint presentations in front of various audiences both hostile and friendly is not easy.

[xultar]

20. Dude just cuz it is different doesn't make it any less tough. We don't

sit in meetings sipping ice water. Lots of times we are getting cussed out. Blamed for everything and you can't say shit and have to sit there and take it. Then go back to a hotel after being beat up on all day with no one to talk to but a Jack and Coke wishing you could leave but knowing you have to go back and take it up the ass again.

PULEEZE We work with NO representation. How about that.

This DU thing against Corporate America and the people who work in it will be the down fall of liberals everywhere.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

27. corporate america will have to change if it wants to survive.

period.

[mattclearing]

28. Yeah, but we better be willing to work with them to do it.

If you haven't seen the Corporation, I highly recommend it. It shows that corporations are greedy and destructive by design. The people who work for them are required by law and shareholders to maximize profit at any cost. It's a bad system that needs to be changed.

And Dems need to be aware of that, not just treat them like the enemy.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

31. not arguing. But the mindset took a major downturn when

MBAs began populating the top ranks of companies, and not experienced people who came up the ranks. Then, under their control, short-term profits became more important than longterm security, development, growth and reasonable profit. I grew up and took myself through school in the corporate world and the changes were stunning, harmful and very predictable.

MBAism also pushed the growth of off-shore and foreign investment and cutting back and closing domestic plants. It was though Stalin had handed corporate america a bunch of hemp and watched them build off-shore companies to braid it into rope - the better to hang themselves with.

[mattclearing]

33. It's really sad.

There used to be such a thing as corporate responsibility, but that has been sacrificed to bow to pressure for growth/profit/stock price.

Most companies don't even offer dividends anymore.

And don't get me started on the offshore tax shelters.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

34. I am very familiar with a huge financial institution (insurance) which

throughout its history had one ironclad rule - hire young, train heavily, promote from within.

Then, the board procured a new operating officer from outside, an AIG guy who changed everything. Pensions began changing. (guess how) older workers were "forced" to accept scut assignments or leave. (guess how the company saved billions on retirement and pension costs) and in order to improve service they cut staff and cut locations.

The top brass are all multi millionaires, the normal worker is now overstressed, underpaid and fearful - come to think it, just like most americans nationally about this terra-crap. Of course, their service is now in the toilet - they

[xultar]

29. So, Liberals are gonna kill it? Then I revoke my Liberal card.

Lots of good people work within those coroporations.
We do lots of good things for our communities and families.
Putting relatives through college paying for family members heatlth bills who have no coverage.
Donating to college funds.

PLEASE.

Who say Liberals care?

[ChairmanAgnostic]

37. methinks you misunderstood the point of my post.

Although I will be the first to admit that I hate much of what corpseration do, and how they treat loyal employees, the idea of having a viable business mechanism which employs people, provides services and products, remains self-sufficient and profitable, and provides health and life insurance is absolutely necessary.

I just disagree with how many of the larger ones are being run these days, except for the highly overpaid very top 5-10 people. (for a comparison, note that US execs on top are paid 10-15 times the rate as execs in comparable companies in Europe or elsewhere in the world. Of course they outsource. They cannot afford hiring any more americans.

[DBoon]

39. "Sitting in temperature controled meetings sipping ice water "

heeheehee haw haw haw

How about "getting to your hotel at 3AM and finding out they gave your room away so tough shit"

[TomInTib]

24. I flew over a quarter million miles on domestic business last year

No offense, but if you haven't done it, you have little room to speak.

Waking up at 3:30 AM to get to the airport so I can deal with the idiot TSA, sitting next to sick people on the plane, waiting for luggage which may or may not arrive on time, eating in a different place every meal, filthy taxis, dropped reservations, screaming snotty kids, amateurs at every turn, cancelled flights, arriving at a hotel at 2AM so I cannot get enough rest for a 9AM meeting that turns out to be cancelled. I was on about one hundred flights last year and only about twenty were connecting flights. That means I had to go through the airport nightmare over seventy five times.
Think about it.

People I know say they wish they could travel like I do, stay in great hotels and eat in wonderful restaurants.

Well, they can just try it.

Traveling like that wore me out to the point that I am taking this entire year off.

By the way, I cannot stand that commercial either.

[DBoon]

8. as a business traveler

I consider an homage to "kings and potentates of the road" as supremely ironic.

Nothing sucks harder than business travel.

[Scout1071]

11. I actually kind of like the spot. I travel a lot for work and

the content of the spot hits "home" for me. All the things they mention are a new trend at "business hotels", softer beds, nicer comforters and pillows, etc. I can't tell you how much it sucks to sleep in hotel beds unless it is a very nice hotel. Even then it's hit or miss.

So, I think Courtyard has hit the nail on the head. Everything they mention in the commercial is appealing to the business traveler.

Having said all that, I generally don't like any commercials!

[izzie]

21. What about the ones on jumping in to sewage and the bed bugs?

I almost fainted when I saw those two. I was so glad I did not travel any more after those two. I would even take the de-mag-a-fites(how ever you spell it) jump under my toenail.:silly: :silly: :silly:

[xultar]

13. I love the commercial. I been traveling every week since 96 full time.

I want them to kiss my ass. Being on the road SUX BIG ELEPHANT BALLS. It is sad, depressing and lonely. I'm glad that there are some hotels that cater to business travellers and some to families. When I travel with my family I stay @ comfy family oriented hotels.

When I travel on business I wante to stay @ a hotel that caters to my business needs. I don't want kids running up and down the hall and such. I want to be able to raid a store in my pjs for ice cream. I want to be able to log in and get online in the lobby lounge while I get my free drink for the night.

I LOVE THE COMMERCIALS I LOVE THE COMMERCIALS I LOVE THE COMMERCIALS I LOVE THE COMMERCIALS

[mattclearing]

23. Always on point. n/t

[UTUSN]

14. Yip, the "my liege" crap brownnosing is really creepy. n/t

[Skidmore]

22. Yes, it is. And that is why I detest it. It would be one thing if they

were just making a sell for good service, but the worshipful royal crap really just irks me.

[redwitch]

15. as a potentate of the road, it pisses me off too!

Because I can't afford to stay in nice hotels when I'm on the road (all too often). I stay in the motels where the air conditioning unit is just outside the window and it makes this funny whining sound all night, turning on and off and waking me up each time. Where the free continental breakfast is donuts, cheerios from a spigot attached to a large plastic thingie, and coffee with cream substitute. The kind of motel with melted holes in the polyester bedspread from cigarette burns.

I DO lead a glamorous life! :P


In NY and Boston and non work situations I stay in nicer hotels, just can't afford to do it in my workaday world. drat!

[MADem]

17. They use the word FEET in that ad too much! n/t

[liveoaktx]

18. Is that the one with the woman asleep on the bed with a phone in her hand?

If so, I like that one. I can FEEL how comfortable the bed is, she's all sunk down and out of it. I used to do business travel and I don't care what anyone says, it is wearing to do it, you're away from your family, the food sucks, and sometimes the rooms.

[hedda_foil]

25. Business travel is hideous after the first few trips.

I've travelled for years for business and now for the nonprofit I run. It's mostly exhausting, frustrating, lonely and uncomfortable -- and that's when the hotel doesn't totally suck. The whole potentates of the road business is ironic. Nobody who travels a lot feels like a king. They feel wrung out and invisible most of the time.

[xultar]

26. wrung out and invisible---TRUE.. I almost cried @ a security checkpoint

because I was too tired to take off my shoes. I nearly had a breakdown.

[BiggJawn]

30. You said it!

I enjoy seeing the new technology and toys at NAB every year, but after a day or two, Las Vegas sucks if you don't gamble, drink or fuck hired women.

The place gets damn lonely after about 5 days.

"potentate of the road"... What a laff...

[CTyankee]

32. My sister in law has this life

She travels around the midwest, living out of her suitcase, eating bad food and sitting in meeting after meeting. She now has diabetes, is about 100 lbs. overweight and has back problems.

Thank god she is retiring this summer. I am certain that all this business travel has wrecked her health. I feel so sorry for her, even tho she is a Repub.

[EC]

35. I hate the financial institutions using In A Gadda Da Vida

and other flower power songs....

[mattclearing]

36. And Paul McCartney.

:eyes:

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

38. Ok. Hey, Ya Know What? I REALLY Detest The Smell Of Lysol.

I mean, I don't think anyone on DU really cares, and I'm not gonna start a thread on it, but to each their own. :rofl:

[Sydnie]

40. I hate the DoubleTree one where it starts out with a falling leaf

that is so far in the distance and the back drop is tall buildings. Everytime I see that, it brings back the memories of seeing the people that jumped from the towers. It creeps me out and I wish they would cease showing it.

[Neil Lisst]

41. The motel is just kissing the asses of SALESMEN.

Just working men and women who go on the road to sell whatever.

They're hardly the robber barons of corporate excess.

[threadkillaz]

42. Rest well my liege, rest well.

Hey, is that a new sports drink?