I’ve found that Motel 6 off the freeway in the middle of nowhere is good, but avoid the ones in major cities.
I’m a night auditor. It is a real job.
Good point.
That’s probably true of most budget chains, and the more budget-ful the more true.
Out along the rural Interstate, lots of middle class folks are wanting a cheap basic place to sleep for 6 hours. In the scruffy part of a big city, the clientele is a different demographic with different goals. And in the fancier parts of the big cities you won’t find the most budget-ful chains.
Possibly a rule of thumb, but again, the one in Anaheim by Disneyland was pretty impressive. Disclaimer: This was 25 years ago. No idea what it’s like now.
More real than clerk I’d think. Anyhow, she had just gotten a Masters in Biology from an Ivy League university, and the job she took was director of quality control at a major cannery in our town, so relatively speaking it wasn’t a real job. Pay or conditions.
Good point. With her hours she didn’t see many of the travelers, and saw mostly people from town. It wasn’t a bad place, no crime while she was there, but a bit scruffy. But necessary, I suppose.
AS far as being a guest goes- I’ll say in an independent hotel/motel if I know people who have stayed there and liked it. Or if I see really good reviews somewhere.
But most of the independents I see on a daily basis make me tend to stay away from unknown independents. For the most part, they used to be branded, have decided not to pay the franchise fee anymore in part because they don’t need the 800 number for reservations since the city is using them to shelter homeless people, Or they are in locations where I wouldn’t stay but a tourist wouldn’t know not to stay (although that happens with branded locations too)
Well, it appears chains like the Hyatt are weathering the economic devastation of COVID-19 much better than single entities because they have a much bigger economic base. I also believe that chains known as being upscale garner a loyal customer base that seeks them out. When I went to Las Vegas, I fell in love with the Mandarin Oriental and the suite in which I stayed. If i go back, I won’t even look at any other hotel, and I will search them out when traveling to other cities.
One of my major clients is a global hotel group (won’t name them here, just think Big 3), so it’s been interesting understanding their business model and the appeal for hotel owners to adopt one of their brands.
The power of a chain brand is marketing and consistency - they have huge reach, and can, to a great extent, control the experience you’re going to get. Tripadvisor and the like can’t really do any of this for them. If you’re a loyal name that brand guest, then you will seek out that brand wherever you go. Makes life very simple for the hotel owner.
One thing about motels/hotels going from chain to independent can be the choice of the brand. They are quite ruthless - if they can’t control consistency then their brands stand for nothing, so they do often boot hotels/motels out that fail to comply with their strict standards.
Quite often, also, a hotel my change from one brand to another, but within the group portfolio, if the group thinks their location or style of property would better suit a different brand. So properties my change face, but the behind the scenes stay the same.
Personally I favour independents, but finding the great ones does take an enormous amount of research. Tripadvisor is a really bad place to get a good view of a place. So the appeal of chains still stands - you know what you’re getting, the major chains will price match or beat anything booking.com will give, and you can collect loyalty points.
Someof these replies explain what I’ve seen: many Motel 6 are identical inside, but every once in a while they are totally different. probably because it was a Knight’s Inn until not long before.
@SanVito: Good to hear from a pro. Ref this:
IME as a corporate traveler, but not a hotel-selector, I’ve seen this scenario play out a number of times:
- A particular property waterfalls it's way down the quality tiers of its brand group. Usually in response to socioeconomic decline in the surrounding area, and/or some amount of underinvestment by the hotel owner / operator. After 2 or 3 boots down-market, the group brand HQ finally says "Enough is enough, the door is over there". Or maybe the owner / operator just bails on their own.
The place then re-brands associated with a more budget-oriented brand group and the cycle continues. Or they jump straight to independent.
It often seems that commercial real estate in general is a business model where sweating the assets into irreversible decline is a tried and true approach to business “success”. Or at least profits for awhile. Hotels are only partially an exception.
Does any of this ring true to you?
We drive cross country with our pets once or twice a year. We almost always stay at La Quinta since we know not only will they always accept pets (I think only two hotels in Manhattan don’t allow pets), but they have amenities like dog treats, dog walking areas, occasionally an enclosed exercise area.
Used to be that there was never a charge for pets at any location, since Wyndham took them over they allow operators to charge up to $20. Maybe half of them charge, the rest don’t. Most other chains you really need to dig into the fine print - I came close to booking a Holiday Inn Express that advertised as “pet friendly” but discovered a $50 pet fee. Not very friendly to the pet owner.
Partially. The group brand doesn’t own hardly any commercial property, so it isn’t in their interests to sweat the assets into reversible decline - they do put a lot of effort into helping struggling hotel owners, and have dedicated swat teams who go in and try to rescue failing hotels. Sometimes they will take over the actual day-to-day management of the hotel to ensure service standards are met, or they’ll come to some financial arrangement to help the owners invest in upgrades - they set time limits by which certain upgrades need to be done across their portfolio. I’ve often thought it must be a real headache for owners - they’ll regularly redesign the restaurant or reception themes and give the owners xx many years to comply.
But their patience with failing hotels isn’t limitless, and hotels which can’t or won’t maintain the strict standards they have will, eventually, get the boot.
Yeah. It’s at least sometimes an arm-wrestling match between traditional real estate “investors” wanting to sweat assets and the branding groups wanting the opposite: to maintain / upgrade their image which is a precondition to maintaining their premium pricing power.
If the owner operators are willing to pay they’ll be able to play and reap the rewards. If not, not.
Which can be both good and bad. If it’s in an undesirable part of town, obviously avoid. But sometimes you can luck out and find a hotel away from the central business district that’s in an interesting city neighborhood. In good weather, that lends itself to a decent stroll with more to look at than bank buildings and government offices, plus more dining and drinking choices than the hotel.
I meant undesirable locations, for whatever reason - next to the prison, in a high crime neighborhood, in a business district where nothing is open after 6, not even a convenience store. There are many different types of undesirable locations. I know which hotels are in those areas in my city- but a tourist won’t.
A lot of hotels have gotten badly burned by pet owners so they charge out of self-defense. We charge [service animals excepted, of course] and our rate doesn’t even come close to covering some of the deep.cleaning we’ve had to do. Like the woman who we had to kick out because she was letting her 3 dogs use the carpet as a toilet.
The problem is when they advertise as “pet friendly” and bury the amount of the charge into the fine print.
LaQuinta is well known for their pet friendly policies and is IMHO a big selling point for them.
Yeah, that irritates me as well. I see “Pet Friendly” and think $10 to $15 or possibly no extra charge. $50 is absurd. I understand that places have been burned by people letting their pets trash the room, so if you don’t want pets or want to charge a high price for them, then fine. Just don’t be misleading and say you are “Pet Friendly.” Fifty bucks isn’t very friendly and is borderline false advertising when most places that take pets charge 1/5 of that.
I know of one place that charges $75, but it is a resort so is already pricy.