Greetings from The Bell
Let’s just get one thing straight.
I love Taco Bell. My husband and I, together, love Taco Bell.
I know you’re probably thinking, “OMG, I love Taco Bell too” (and if you don’t love or at least LIKE Taco Bell too, then…idk we probably don’t have a lot to talk about. Kidding. Kinda.) But no, I’m actually 100% sure we love Taco Bell more than you.
I’ll give you a (semi) quick rundown of how our world collides with Taco Bell.
My husband, Cody, and I - we had our second date at Taco Bell. Second date.
After we got engaged down in Coronado Island in San Diego, we drove home to Taco Bell to celebrate. When we got our mild sauce packets with our order, one of the packets said “Will you marry me?” No joke.
When we got married, we thought it’d be cool to have the Taco Bell food truck (yeah, I bet you didn’t even know that was a thing) come to our wedding for “late night munchies” but long story short, we didn’t, and instead, we went to Taco Bell after we left our wedding venue that night. Picture of that, here. Oh yeah, we also did a blinded first look with Taco Bell tacos before our wedding too.
After all that, I mean…Taco Bell started delivering with DoorDash and Cody romantically got TB breakfast delivered to me at work. One Valentine’s Day we were given a tour of Taco Bell’s HQ in Irvine. A couple months after that, we got in for their Test Kitchen at the headquarters as well. I was about 7 months pregnant, and the chefs told us we should name our baby Nacho (Nacho Friend, get it?)
I’m starting to think all of these things deserve their own blog post. Might have to work on that soon.
OKAY ANYWAYS!
All those things have happened for us, and we are so lucky that it did. And yeah as dorky as that probably sounds to you, it’s actually been some of the coolest things we’ve done! Until…
We got in for reservations at The Bell Hotel.
YEAH.
Most of you might not even know, but Taco Bell took over the V Palm Springs hotel, and completely decked it out top to bottom in Taco Bell amazingness. It was just a pop up, so it was only there for 5 days, unfortunately. Otherwise yes, we’d probably go every month. The reservations sold out in 30 seconds, and WE got a room.
You guys, we were legit like little kids in a candy store. We were so giddy and fully geeked out once we got there.
We pulled in to the hotel valet, and all you see is this awesome entrance with hanging garlands in Taco Bell’s colors, “The Bell Hotel & Resort” painted onto the building, and 10+ beach cruisers decked out in Taco Bell branding.
Once you walked into the lobby, you were given a Baja Blast pour in a Taco Bell wine glass, with a watermelon popsicle dipped in. We also received “goodie bags” which were Taco Bell tote bags filled with Taco Bell chips, sunscreen, hot sauce packet beach towels, I MEAN COME ON. So rad.
From there, we went to the room to drop our stuff off before heading into the pool. I couldn’t even believe what they did to all of these rooms, they were totally transformed with wallpaper, and everything. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t consider going home and making our master bedroom Taco Bell themed, that’s how cool it was!
After drooling over our room for a hot minute, it was go time. I went to get my hair done at the braid bar, where they fixed up everyone with these amazing braids, creatively named after Taco Bell items. I was so obsessed I actually got my hair done twice. Cody even got his hair done with a Taco Bell fade. They basically buzzed their logo right into the side of his head and it was legit. He rocked that thing for a solid 2 weeks, back at work and everything. Right next to the braid bar was the nail salon. Color Camp came out from LA and did everyone’s nails with taco art, and Taco Bell logos, the whole nine. It was literally insane and the best gel manicure I’ve ever received.
At the pool, we enjoyed all things Taco Bell, including the hot sauce packet pool floats. The cocktails, the food, everything was curated around Taco Bell’s culture and menu. At 12:00, they started their Happier Hour at the pool, and they’d start ringing these bells and everyone would scream and dance and get so excited, then the waiters/waitresses would come out with trays full of Taco Bell and just started handing it out to everyone. It was amazing.
I keep telling everyone that it felt like we were at a summer camp, because everyone there was just having so much fun, and no one ever left the hotel. Everything you needed was right there. I think the only time we left the pool that day, was to go up to this hotel room that they transformed into a freeze room. You went in and the whole room was covered in this metallic foil looking stuff, and you got to serve yourself two different flavors of Freezes. Non-alcoholic, but we were pretty tight with the bartenders at that point, so we just took ours down to the bar and they topped our freezes off with tequila ;)
Later in the evening, they got everyone to play poolside BINGO and hangout for a dive-in movie watching Demolition Man. Like I said, summer camp. It was so friggin’ fun you guys.
The whole experience at The Bell Hotel was honestly one of the coolest things ever. If you’re a branding/marketing nerd like me - you probably get it, and would totally appreciate something like this. If you love Taco Bell - you definitely get it too. And if you don’t fall under either of those categories and you just read this whole post on our obsession over a Taco Bell branded hotel, well…I appreciate you for reading my blog! LiVE MAS, friends.
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