Mindshare wins £55m InterContinental Hotels account

WPP's Mindshare has won the consolidated £55-million InterContinental Hotels Group media account. 

Last year, the hotels group had appointed McCann Erickson to handle its integrated creative business across Europe.

InterContinental Hotels claims to have more guest rooms than any other hotel company in the world, with more than 600,000 rooms in 4,100 hotels.

The account for the global media planning and buying business includes £5.5 million spend in the UK for the group's Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza and InterContinental.

The process has been led from the US and marks the first time the business has been consolidated into one account.

One of the main incumbents, Carat, which handled the Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn and Express by Holiday Inn accounts, was knocked out at an earlier stage, while another incumbent, Havas Media's MPG withdrew, citing client conflict with Choice Hotels in the US.