Motel 6

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The first Motel 6 in Santa Barbara, still in operation to this day

Motel 6 is major chain of budget motels in the United States and Canada, operated by Accor Hotels.

It was founded in 1962 in Santa Barbara, California, when all rooms cost $6 a night—hence the company name. During the chain's early years, Motel 6 emphasized itself as a "no-frills" lodging chain with rooms featuring coin-operated black-and-white TVs instead of the free color TVs found in more expensive motels along with shower-only bathrooms and functional interior decor. In the 1970s, the coin-operated black-and-white TVs were replaced by free color TVs that received local over the air channels included plus HBO and later ESPN and CNN at no extra cost. Rooms also have telephones (with free local and toll free calls, and long distance calls charged to a major credit card), towels, soap, and cabinets. Full baths have been added to some recent Motel 6 properties. However, unlike most motel chains today, most rooms do not have hair dryers, shampoo, facial tissues, or clock radios. Free coffee is served in the morning in the motel lobby. Some branches have continental breakfasts. Some locations have a major restaurant chain adjacent to them. By the 1980s these rooms cost 25 dollars a night nationwide. In most locations, an outdoor pool is also offered.

In the 1990s rates for rooms rose with inflation. Depending on particular location and season, rooms now cost from $30 to $100 a night on average due to inflation through the years - but Motel 6 is still considered one of the nation's lowest-priced lodging chain. Prices are typically advertised on a brightly-lit sign visible from nearby highways. Most of its locations are located near major interstate highways. In 1990, the company was bought by the French-based Accor. In 1991 Motel 6 purchased the Regal 8 Motel chain.

Unlike the majority of motel chains, Motel 6 allows pets, and directly owns and operates most of its locations. However, the chain did start franchising in 1994. They also took over motels that had previously been franchised by other chains. The original Motel 6 locations, rooms were accessed from outside. Newer locations, as well as acquisitions, have hallways and access to rooms from the inside.

Motel 6 also operates Studio 6, a chain of extended stay hotels that offer more amenities and weekly rates.

Motel 6 may be best known for a series of light humored radio and television ads featuring the voice of writer Tom Bodett with the quote "We'll leave the light on for you".

[edit] Popular culture

The band Yo La Tengo wrote and perform a song called From A Motel 6 that is set inside a Motel 6 room. It's evidently a parody--though in title only--of the Bob Dylan song From a Buick 6.

In the 1992 Chevy Chase film Memoirs of an Invisible Man, the characters played by Chase and co-star Darryl Hannah stay in a San Francisco area Motel 6 while awaiting a train.

In the Simpsons episode "Sideshow Bob Roberts", when the family's house faces demolition for the construction of the Matlock Expressway, Lisa despairs that they will be forced to live in a Motel 6 which Bart counters with the lament that Homer wouldn't be able to afford $6 a night.

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor made a mention of Motel 6 in her dissent regarding private property rights in the U.S. Supreme Court's Kelo v. City of New London decision. Justice O'Connor stated "The specter of condemnation hangs over all property. Nothing is to prevent the State from replacing any Motel 6 with a Ritz-Carlton, any home with a shopping mall, or any farm with a factory."

At Camp Nama, a secret detention, interrogation, and torture facility run by an Army commando unit known as Task Force 6-26, some detainees were held in an area known as Motel 6, consisting of crudely built plywood shacks reeking of urine and excrement.^[1]