Imagine if, instead of schlepping back to a faraway hotel after the 2018 World Cup, you could just sleep in a ready-made hotel in the parking lot. Snoozebox, a pop-up hotel that takes under 48 hours to assemble, may be the ideal lodging for you.
The UK-based company owns 800 units and plans to roll out another 150 this year.
"We can create a hotel anywhere a guest wants one," says Snoozebox chief executive Lorcán Ó Murchú.
Snoozeboxes are meant for large-scale events with a huge numbers of attendees. If people know an event will offer Snoozeboxes on-site, they can book a unit online. Depending on the event, a night can cost as little as $110 — not bad for big events where nearby hotel and Airbnb prices can be through the roof.
The hotel staff checks guests in with tablets in front of the Snoozebox containers. Each container set sits on a metal framework and includes six units stacked on top of each other.
Guests climb a set of stairs to access the units, which are each about 12 feet long and 6 and a half feet wide. The units are barely tall enough to stand in, measuring just 6 feet high.
Each room features up to four flatbeds in twin or queen sizes, bunked on top of each other. To design the rooms, Snoozebox worked with Tangerine, a London-based industrial design agency that created British Airway's first business class beds.
Every box also has a kitchenette, a bathroom, a mounted TV, a small sofa and desk, and Wi-Fi.
The original prototype included 3,000 parts, but Murchú says the newest design has only 600, making it easier and faster to assemble. The ground beneath it doesn't need to be even either, since every Snoozebox set is equipped with hydraulics to even it out.
Once the event is over, Snoozebox packs up its units and transports them to the next location.
Snoozebox was founded by the late entrepreneur Robert Breare and retired Formula 1 driver David Coulthard. The company originally designed the shipping containers for car-racing events, and currently has units parked long-term at Silverstone race track in England.
Snoozebox has since supplied its pop-up hotels for other big-ticket events, including last year's Glastonbury Arts Festival in England. Murchú says Snoozeboxes will also appear at the World Expo 2020, an international tech conference in Dubai, and the World Cup in Russia in 2018.
Beyond music festivals and soccer games, Murchú says Snoozebox will be offered as a housing option for emergency use anbd for workers that commute long distances. About 300 units are now available on a semi-permanent basis for displaced families and oil workers in the Falkland Islands.
The company is also currently working with London officials to create new housing options for low-income residents, Murchú says. Snoozebox could serve as a temporary solution for families awaiting more permanent public housing. Currently, councils in the UK accommodate these families in regular hotels or bed and breakfasts.
Is this future of hotels and housing? Maybe not entirely, but you can bet on more pop-up hotels going up in the future.
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