Every day, probably like many people working in service sector companies, I see clients doing things that are against their best interests. Some are incredibly ridiculous and my staff are used to hearing me cursing some of them because of the influence their relationship to us has on our obtaining future clients (or keeping current clients). So I will point out something that I need to get off my chest without naming names: the use of the definite article "The" at the beginning of hotel names.

My company has a couple of Chinese-language print magazines and four websites devoted to the China travel sector. We deal with a few dozen hotel hotel clients each week. Quite a lot. I've seen a rising trend to place "The" as a prefix to many of these international hotel names, as if giving the name more gravitas. You can bet there was some advertising wonk paid hundreds of thousands (millions?) of dollars to come up with the rationale behind adding the "The" in front of the "The Name".

And can I add the definite article prior to a brand name that already contains the definite article as part of it's name? Can I say "the The Hotel"? Common sense dictates this is not necessary.

But what about using the indefinite article "a" prior to a hotel name using the definite article? Is it fine to say "a The Hotel Brand" if I want to talk about an indefinite outlet of that brand name? It might seem silly, but some hotels do get very silly about this, especially in China where the public relations manager is most likely not a native English speaker but is doing her/his best to adhere to international corporate standards. Quite often they misinterpret these standards.

Yes, the reason I am writing this piece today is because a public relations manager at a five-star international hotel chain recently (very) strongly insisted that it should both be an indefinite and a definite article in the hotel brand name when indefinitely referring to the chain. Perhaps it is the will of the head office of this hotel to have it this way, but I'm sure their naming conventions could allow for disposal of the definite in this special case. The sentence would read awkward otherwise. Unfortunately one of our staff in another office is dealing with one of the hotel's staff beneath this pr manager, and there probably won't be an elevation of this matter on their side.

So that means we're stuck with issuing a potentially poor quality product. Sound familiar?

My colleague is fond of retelling me the story behind Hilton's re-brand a few years ago where they switched the name from, for example, "New York Hilton" to "Hilton New York". Apparently cost them millions to make that change. I would have done it for half-price.

But back to the "The". Some of the hotels prefixed with "The" now have rules about when it's fine to keep "The" lowercase. But their rules are not clear and seem ever-changing. And more importantly, some Chinese hoteliers have also noticed this trend and are now re-branding their English names to include the definite article "The". I'll bet they probably wouldn't mind being alphabetized under "T", either, rather than the first name of their true name. But then what is "true" now?

Perhaps in some deep advertising philosophy there is merit to adding "The" to the beginning of hotel names. And I don't really mind it unless the rules surrounding that advertising decision don't easily blend with English grammar edicts. But then again, as a professor once said, English rules are sometimes fine to be broken. Making this all the more confusing and leading to more awkward English sentences in China.