The new hotel Aloft Cool Springs, adjacent to the Cool Springs Galleria, is well underway and should be completed by September.  This trendy concept by the W hotel chain is a welcome addition to the Cool Springs hotels landscape.  We know a couple people working at working at Nissan and they are looking forward to the hotel opening.  It is very conveniently located just across the highway from the new Cool Springs Nissan headquarters.  Here is the story reported by Jenny Burns with the Nashville Business Journal:

“Aloft Nashville, other national brands taking aim at younger travelers

Nashville’s growing young professional population is helping draw trendy hotels to the market to attract Generation X and Y travelers.

Chicago-based John Buck Co. will give Nashville its first aloft hotel in Cool Springs, a modern brand that’s styled after the loft condo look.

Hotel Indigo, which opened in West End in the fall, represented the emergence of hip hotels in Nashville. Another Hotel Indigo is planned for downtown Nashville, but construction has been delayed because of financing snags.

An aloft hotel had been planned for downtown as part of the minor-league baseball stadium project by Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse Inc., but that plan for Metro’s land is off the table, says Butch Spyridon, president of the Nashville Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Construction on the 143-room aloft hotel next to the Cool Springs Galleria will be complete in September, says Paul Novak, managing director of the hospitality division for the John Buck Co.

The John Buck Co. opened its first aloft hotel in Rancho Cucuamonga, Calif., last week. Novak declined to give the project’s investment cost, but aloft hotels typically cost between $17 million and $25 million to build.

Nashville fit the bill for this new trendy concept, he says.

“Nashville is clearly a growth city,” Novak says. “It’s getting a lot of attention as an outstanding place to live. It’s been very successful in drawing companies to it and drawing younger generation business people and certainly Cool Springs is one of those premier markets in Nashville.”

“All the reasons why Nissan selected Nashville (for their headquarters) and selected Cool Springs says it all,” he adds.

Many large hotel companies are launching brands aimed at a younger target market.

Aloft is part of Starwood’s W brand which has hotels starting to open around the nation. Hotel Indigo is an InterContinental Hotels Group brand started to give travelers a sense of renewal with an environment that changes seasonally amid hip design elements.

“It basically has to do with changing demographics,” Novak says. “The upper-tier select-service product such as the Courtyard and Hilton Garden were originally conceived for the baby boomer generation. That generation is gradually working itself out of the business and pleasure market.

“The future is clearly in the X and Y generations and they look for different product and style than typically does the baby boomer generation,” Novak says.

Spyridon says travelers are looking for unique experiences like the aloft concept offers.

Two other new hotels are being built in Cool Springs at the Meridian development, a Marriot Courtyard and Residence Inn by Chartwell Hospitality LLC.

Growth in the number of booked rooms in Cool Springs, downtown and at Opryland has been flat this year, but the overall market is down 3 percent in booked rooms, Spyridon says.

Nissan’s move to Cool Springs will bring new business to the area, he adds, noting aloft’s rates and travelers’ loyalty to their rewards programs will play into their decisions about where to stay.

Novak says aloft will be the first new hotel built in Cool Springs in a couple years.

Some of aloft’s twists on the conventional hotel include serving all food in Chinese take-out boxes with chopsticks — no matter what kind of food it is and allowing guests to check in and out using kiosks.

Pets get gifts at the hotel and bathrooms are stocked with four magazines: The New Yorker, Spin, Dwell and Wired.

Rates will run around $150 a night, says Kristen McBryde, director of sales for aloft Nashville-Cool Springs.

The John Buck Co. is looking for more locations to build aloft hotels, but isn’t planning another for Nashville.”