What we remember the most...

As I write this, Willie Nelson's "On the Road Again", is playing in the background of my brain. Sitting in a hotel room thinking of the events of a simple transaction yesterday creates a slight upward thought that encourages the corner of my lips to go in the same upward direction.

Last night, I arrived at my hotel destination. The hotel has been in this city for 25 years. It is my preferred spot to sleep in this town. It's a huge multinational chain and it's not the cheapest hotel out there. It doesn't have complimentary breakfasts. I've never seen its pool.  This is the type of hotel I wouldn't bring my kids. Yet, the first time I stayed here, when I was 23, we had a wild and crazy night. A wedding shindig that ended up with all our friends dancing on the roof of the foyer. I looked down from my room tonight to see that very same roof and wondered if the hotel management ever welded shut those windows on the 3rd floor. We can't be the only ones to ever do that...

Nostalgia out of the way, the hotel had a facelift since my last visit. It's beautiful as far as hotel lobbies go. I remember a hotel lobby once in Manhattan that had all the treasures of richness only to misrepresent my expectations of the hotel rooms. From that one experience, I learned to never judge a hotel book from its lobby cover.  

The employee at the front desk answers my questions about the facelift by saying, "We went through a massive renovation in 2011. That year was an extremely tough year as we worked through the discomfort of change. But thanks to that trying time, you and I can both enjoy our time here today."

How philosophical that statement is for both this hotel and people in general. Thanks nameless hotel guy for this wonderful line that I will now use unapologetically for the rest of my life.

Before he hands over the room key, he delights me with another gift. With my room comes a complimentary "premium" beer at the bar. 

What??? I've never been given a free beer before in a hotel. 

A free beer. 

A gift.

No strings attached.

It wasn't advertised on Expedia when I booked the room. And it never will be. 

The beer price is built into the price. It's not going to show up on an expense claim. It's such a small gift that most competitors don't think it has value. The value is massive. It created a moment of delight. It's different and it's remarkable enough to share. And share ability is what any good business should be striving for.

After enjoying my free beer, I went to the room to witness that the cover of this hotel book was well representative of its contents. The room was great! Yet, it was the toiletries that brought another smile across my increasingly impressed face.  The hotel took the simple and made it impressionable. A simple message usually reserved for the social mechanisms of Facebook or Pinterest. And now I'm sharing it.

I know. It's just soap. But for me, this simple message could have been easily left off the bottles like every other hotel chain does. And it wouldn't have changed my overall experience. But this little message becomes a layer of increasing positiveness that warms my heart, encourages my fingers to type, intrigues my brain and moves my wallet.

It's not enough to attain average. Good is the enemy of great. No one remembers the average. No one cares about the mediocre.

In football we cheer for the star quarterback, not the faceless centre.

In business, we remember the shareable experiences, not the ones that are like everyone else.

In life, we remember the crazy moments, not the everyday ones where we just live and put in time.