Holiday Inn Express’ free hot breakfast is legendary in ANZ. Now it has become a sleep aid. Holiday Inn Express and earned-first agency, Enthral, have launched the world’s first Breakfast Pillow – a custom pillow with hidden speakers that lets guests fall asleep to real breakfast sounds, from sizzling bacon to coffee being poured. The pillow idea is built from the question, “If breakfast can help guests wake up happier, could it also help them fall asleep?” It transforms the sounds of a Holiday Inn Express breakfast service into calming white noise.

The full campaign covers earned, influencer, owned, and paid media across Australia and New Zealand, supported by a campaign landing page, brand creative video, and the limited-edition Breakfast Pillow itself as the hero experience.

Phase one kicked off with research commissioned by Holiday Inn Express found that 72% of Aussies find breakfast sounds comforting or relaxing when travelling, while 80% say familiar breakfast sounds help them feel calm when away from home. It also showed that 87% of Aussies rely on something to help them sleep in hotels, while 26% use background noise.

The pillow features four breakfast-inspired soundtracks, created using real recordings from a Holiday Inn Express breakfast service, including coffee beans being poured, sizzling bacon, juice being poured and breakfast buffet ambience. Guests can select their preferred soundtrack and playback duration using controls built into the pillow.

The Breakfast Pillow builds on the success of Holiday Inn Express’ Breakfast Alarm Clock, launched in 2025, another unexpected way to bring the brand’s free breakfast proposition to life by helping guests wake up to the scents of breakfast. The innovation generated global attention, including an appearance for the scented alarm clocks on The Drew Barrymore Show.

Dean Jones, vice president of commercial, East Asia & Pacific at IHG Hotels & Resorts, stated, “Breakfast is an incredibly valuable brand asset for Holiday Inn Express, but the challenge is keeping something so familiar feeling fresh. The Breakfast Pillow was designed to do exactly that – take an experience our guests already associate with the brand and turn it into something surprising, playful and inherently talkable. By grounding the idea in a culturally relevant consumer insight, PR gave us a way to turn an everyday brand strength into a story that could travel well beyond our hotels.”

Cameron Smith, Enthral founder and managing director, added, “This really was the dream brief, and for someone who travels frequently, a free breakfast really is the ultimate perk. Holiday Inn Express and IHG have been great partners who have embraced our creative thinking with ideas that captivate and drive earned attention. And let’s be honest, who doesn’t love bacon?”

Since launching, the pillow has generated coverage across Today, News.com.au, Yahoo! Life, TVNZ Breakfast, New Zealand Herald and more, with the campaign using the unexpected nature of the product and its consumer insight to create a story designed to travel across media.

The Breakfast Pillow Experience is available until November 30 2026 at Holiday Inn Express hotels across Australia and New Zealand, including accommodation, use of a Breakfast Pillow for the duration of the stay and the brand’s free hot breakfast.