Marriott’s Multisensory VR Escapes: Why Hotels Are Abandoning Traditional Travel

Launching an unprecedented virtual reality initiative in the hospitality sector, Marriott Hotels introduced “VRoom Service” in partnership with Samsung Electronics America, enabling guests at select properties to order Samsung Gear VR headsets directly to their rooms through the Marriott Mobile Request app or a dedicated in-room extension for 24-hour rental periods.

The program, initially tested at New York Marriott Marquis and London Marriott Park Lane, delivers content through “VR Postcards,” a virtual travel platform featuring 360-degree destination videos narrated by real travelers exploring locations including the Andes Mountains in Chile, Beijing’s streets, and an ice cream shop in Rwanda.

Samsung described VRoom Service as one of the first business applications of Gear VR technology in hospitality, utilizing the Milk VR premium video service to provide story-driven destination sampling designed to inspire real-world travel to Marriott properties. The initiative followed Marriott’s positioning of VRoom Service as a first in the travel industry, demonstrating the brand’s commitment to technological innovation in guest experiences.

Complementing the in-room service, Marriott developed “The Teleporter,” a phone booth-style VR pod using Oculus Rift DK2 headsets and wireless headphones to deliver 3-minute multisensory journeys to destinations like a black sand beach in Maui and a London skyscraper.

Created in collaboration with experiential marketing agency Relevent and Oscar-winning VFX studio Framestore, the experience integrates 4D sensory elements including simulated heat, wind, mist, ground vibrations, and scent diffusion featuring ocean, coconut, and palm tree aromatics. Similar to how Alexa+ enhances everyday tasks through personalized assistance, Marriott’s VR experiences are designed to remember guest preferences and tailor virtual journeys to individual interests. The broader Travel Brilliantly program attracted >1.5 million visitors to its platform while generating approximately 2,000 contributed ideas and over 10,000 votes from engaged participants.

Users begin in a virtual Marriott Great Room lobby before “teleporting” through a tunnel-of-light passage to global destinations, positioning the brand as the first hotel company to enter the VR travel space under the #GetTeleported campaign.

The technical infrastructure combines live-action 360 video and photo-realistic CGI to create immersive environments, with Marriott subsequently expanding VR integration into corporate event planning through VPViewer, a mobile VR solution developed by Zebra Design for event space visualization.

The strategic deployment represents a fundamental shift in hospitality marketing methodology, transforming passive promotional content into interactive destination experiences that provide tangible value while simultaneously functioning as sophisticated sales tools for Marriott’s global property portfolio.