How Sunday Dinners Built the Legacy of Holiday Inn

On this episode of Our American Stories, before Holiday Inn became part of the InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), it began with a simple ritual at the Wilsons’ home in Memphis. Each Sunday, Kemmons Wilson gathered his family for dinner and conversation that shaped ideas which would later change the hotel industry. His goal was clear: clean rooms, fair prices, and a warm welcome for every traveler. His son, Kemmons Wilson Jr., shares how those lessons in consistency and care grew into one of the world’s most trusted hotel chains, including Holiday Inn Express and Holiday Inn Resorts.

Support the show (https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate)

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
And we continue with our American stories and with the
story of a large and extraordinary family. Kemmens Wilson Junior
is one of the second generation leaders of their third
Generation family investment company, with the first generation being his dad,
the founder of Holiday Inn. Here's Kemmens on their whole

(00:30):
family story.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
One of the hallmarks I think of our family and
our closeness is the fact that my mother hosted Sunday
night dinners for all the family and every Sunday night
for as long as I can ever remember. We went
over to my parents house and my mother and I

(00:54):
think she had a rotation of spaghetti, ham and hamburgers.
We knew exactly what we were getting. That bonded the siblings,
but it also bonded our spouses. And my father absolutely
loved Jen Rummy, and he'd been known to be in
a Jen Rummy game and an airplane on the losing

(01:18):
side and he tell the pilot just keep flying around
like to like when and don't land. And so he
would spend all the time playing Jim Rummy with my
two brother in laws. It was that staple that I mean,
nothing got in the way of Sunday night dinner. I
mean you know, you may your friends might say, hey,
you know, now we got and after a while people

(01:40):
didn't even ask you because they knew we had Sunday
night dinners. You know, you look back and you treasure
those times. So I literally credit my mother with that
exercise that she would done. He know, it's a lot
of work, I mean, feeding twenty four people every Sunday,

(02:01):
and I think I give her credit for keeping the
family unit tight.

Speaker 3 (02:10):
Maybe the royal should have done something like that.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
My wife, Norma, got some encouragement from our middle daughter Catherine,
to continue the Sunday night dinner tradition, and she has
and we've been doing it for years and we've got
thirty one just in my immediate family. So it really
is a chore. I mean, my wife is working on Saturdays.

(02:39):
I tell paper's got a big old boat paddle trying to,
you know, stir the stew up.

Speaker 3 (02:46):
But I can't tell you. It's just like a flashback.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
I mean, I'm seeing my grandkids get with their cousins
and absolutely loving one another. I mean they're the first
person they were asked to spend the night out when
they got old enough to spend the night out. And
I look back to when my kids were doing it.

Speaker 3 (03:16):
So fast forward.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
Today my two sons and my brother's two sons are
now taking over operation of our company. And you know,
you've heard all the statistics about the family secession, and
again I attribute that to my boys, Kim and McLean

(03:40):
and Spence and Webb growing up knowing one another, building
that trust up. You know, they all went off to
school everywhere, and now they're back. They're back here running
the company, and they're running it as a group. There's
no resident or you know, it's a collaborative council that

(04:04):
they run off of. And you know, I just don't
know that that would necessarily have happened if they didn't
spend that time together. You know, time is everything to
a relationship and hurry is the death of a relationship.
And they spend enough time together that they built a
trust up that you know, now that they're in business,

(04:29):
they it's flowing. And I was not a advocate necessarily
of this collaborative leadership model. I just feel like somebody
needs to be president of the you know, and they've
made it work, so kudos to them. But again, I

(04:50):
think it all stem the core came from those early
days of just building that bond that never left. I mean,
family is a strong bond to begin with, and you
add every Sunday night to it and it just gets stronger.
So you know, we're now into our third generation and

(05:14):
we have worked at this, so it's not like it
just didn't happen.

Speaker 3 (05:20):
My mother, I think, was a core and foundation of it.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
But you know it, I mean, it's a rare, rare
case where you can see this without some fallout statistics
prove that.

Speaker 3 (05:36):
It still amazes me. Let me knock on wood.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
Out of eighty four or eighty five paper whatever total lives,
we have just not had any really hiccup of any
you know, child or grandchild having an issue or problem
or I mean, they've all been.

Speaker 3 (06:03):
Almost like model children.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
And I can only attribute that to luck in prayer. Well,
I would say every adult in the family has a
devout Christian background and they have been able to grow
up their children and raise them up in that environment.

(06:30):
But I know people that have been better parents and
the kids have turned out worse. And so that's why
I say, you can only attribute it to God's grace prayer.
And you know, I think everybody in our family has
been really an exceptional role model in life. And I

(06:56):
tell people, you know, sometimes your kids won't listen to you,
but they'll never failed to imitate you. And oh gosh,
I mean this has been recent, about three or four
years ago.

Speaker 3 (07:10):
I get the nicest.

Speaker 2 (07:13):
Father's Day card I could ever imagine from my daughter Catherine.
I mean, it's it is, Oh my god, I read it.
I just love this. Uh and her ps was I've
been watching you all my life and uh, is that

(07:34):
not a scary thing?

Speaker 3 (07:36):
You know? And and and.

Speaker 2 (07:38):
That's why I tell people that, man, you with your kids,
you better be home. I mean, they're gonna see every
smirk you give to your wife. They're gonna see every
flip you give to a waitress, you know. I mean,
you just gotta be on. But I'm just grateful that

(08:02):
I always said, you know, you can two people three
people who can't fool was God, your wife and your kids,
you know, and you just you got to live that life,
you know, because they see every crack in you. And
you know, what you teach your kids, they're going to
teach their kids.

Speaker 3 (08:23):
You know.

Speaker 2 (08:23):
I tell people, as you know, as parents, you know,
we go from coach to counselor consultant to colleague. And
you know, all of us now are in the colleague mode,
which I love. I mean, I'm no longer the drill
sergeant at my house. I'm saying, hey, you won't have
a bear, Let's have a beer and talk about things.

(08:45):
And if they ask for some advice find I'll be
happy to give it. But they don't have to ask
for any.

Speaker 1 (08:53):
In a special thanks to Kemmns Wilson Junior, we're telling
the story of his three generation family, growing family, a
loving family that ps from his daughter. I've been watching
you all my life. They are watching us all our lives.
We're grateful, he said, and of course to the mom
who started this tradition and all the hard work we

(09:16):
have worked at this, he said. We love telling stories
about faith and family. Emmens Wilson Junior's family story here
on our American Story