# Why do hotels usually offer "free" (LOL) breakfast?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [March 28, 2017, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220 "2017-03-28T14:16:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 4
### Author:  [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/61 "2017-03-29T01:02:08Z")
Also a big free breakfast will hold off hunger for a good long time, which gives us time to find a place we really want to eat instead of settling for whatever we come across first.
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### Author:  [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/62 "2017-03-29T01:21:45Z")
You know, the free breakfast I had at a boutique hotel in Paris was great - but not that much better than what I’ve had in Marriotts. The croissants were better, of course, but the drop off was minor.
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### Author:  [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/63 "2017-03-29T01:26:04Z")
Professionally speaking …
IME in the US free breakfast is a sign of a low-end business or mid-level tourist hotel. Or lower. IOW, your generic low-midmarket US chain hotel like Holiday Inn Express, Hilton Garden, Choice, Comfort Inn, Clarion, etc.
Nice hotels don’t have free breakfast. They have ~$18/person entrees and buffets. I hate paying it but I love eating it.
Anyplace they won’t cook real eggs to order is not a place I prefer to eat. Scrambled eggs need to be multicolored. Not a homogenized light yellow that was poured from a carton.
Not to say I won’t eat the occasional freebie when it’s all that’s available within the time I have to spend.
Oh yeah: “continental breakfast” is another word for “coffee”; none of the rest of that white flour-based food is edible. At least sometimes they have a bit of real fruit.
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### Author:  [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/64 "2017-03-29T01:50:52Z")
I travel for work a bit and I do love a hotel buffet breakfast in the morning. Bacon, eggs, pancakes, sausages, and unlimited coffee - what’s not to love?
It’s also quite likely that I’m covering my own meals, and since the exchange rate on the AUD isn’t generally amazing against the USD or GBP, eating a huge breakfast and skipping lunch helps keeps my costs down.
I’ve had hotel breakfasts across Australia, NZ, Malaysia, Singapore, the USA and UK and in every single occasion they’ve been miles better than something from McDonalds and about equal to something from Denny’s or IHOP. Somtimes they’re even outstanding in their own right.
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### Author:  [@jnglmassiv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jnglmassiv)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/65 "2017-03-29T01:56:40Z")
> [@Driver8](#):
>
> So the hotel breakfast is very appealing. It doesn’t hurt that the hotel is ridiculously fancy compared to anywhere I’ve stayed, and the breakfast offerings are excellent.
I’d like to request details, please. A photo or two would be really cool, too, even if not one of your own.
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/66 "2017-03-29T02:13:04Z")
Since this is about food, let’s move it to Cafe Society.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
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### Author:  [@Driver8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Driver8)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/67 "2017-03-29T08:53:17Z")
> [@jnglmassiv](#):
>
> I’d like to request details, please. A photo or two would be really cool, too, even if not one of your own.
It’s the Hyatt Regency Wuhan Optics Valley. A google image search seems pretty representative.
The breakfast buffet consists of a Western section, which seems to take its cues from Australia, so all the standard hot foods plus mushrooms and grilled tomatoes; a Chinese section including delicious BBQ pork steamed buns; and a assortment of really good pastries and fruits and sliced meats and yogurts and some other stuff at a table I didn’t even get to 🙂 All very good quality.
It’s an interesting contrast to the Zhangjiajie hotels I stayed at over the weekend, which cater to local tourists. Clean, but incredibly basic. And no free breakfast.
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### Author:  [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/68 "2017-03-29T09:57:54Z")
Are you kidding? Is there anything better than lifting that heavy metal lid to reveal dozens of bacon strips nestled together like cordwood, free for the taking? FREE, I tells ya!
mmm
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### Author:  [@kiz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kiz)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/69 "2017-03-29T11:17:38Z")
> [@stpauler](#):
>
> There are a couple reasons:
>
> 1. Traveling with children. It’s easier than finding a place out.
> 2. Traveling for work. Some people will have to shuttle to work and this might be the only place they can get breakfast.
> 3. Staying in the hotel for a conference.
> 4. General convenience.
> 5. Cost.
+1
I don’t like going through the rigamarole of finding a breakfast place if breakfast is being offered to me gratis. Yes, quality may vary, but I can always get something else later when I’m out.
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### Author:  [@GrumpyBunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrumpyBunny)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/70 "2017-03-29T11:54:33Z")
> [@Colophon](#):
>
> Because if they didn’t, where else would you ever get the chance to play with one of those strange wire-rack-conveyor-belt toasters?
The cafeteria at my former employer’s office had one of those. At least one bagel was flambeed daily. Good times.
I like “free breakfast” at a hotel, but I’m a toast and coffee breakfast person\*. And I HAVE to eat to take my morning medications, so that works for me.
\*ETA: unless there’s bacon, in which case I’m a toast, BACON, and coffee breakfast person. Because bacon.
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### Author:  [@Miss\_Mapp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Mapp)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/71 "2017-03-29T12:07:51Z")
> [@Colophon](#):
>
> Because if they didn’t, where else would you ever get the chance to play with one of those strange wire-rack-conveyor-belt toasters?
My toast caught fire in the back of one of those at a hotel in the Lake District last year. Very scary for a moment when the flaming object dropped down into the lower tray, but one of the staff put it out quickly and the hotel did not burn down.
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### Author:  [@SanVito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanVito)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/72 "2017-03-29T12:24:31Z")
> [@Nava](#):
>
> Only, that’s a legend. I’ll see your full English and raise you a farmer’s breakfast. Or just the breakfast my definitely-not-farming family ate. Apparently someone in England confused “what people whose stomach doesn’t wake until noon eat before breakfast” with “breakfast”.
>
> I favor hotels with “full breakfast buffet” specifically because “a croissant and a cuppa” doesn’t hold me up long enough to go pee. By the time I leave the bathroom I’m hungry again.
No idea what your family eats at home, but a continental breakfast reflects the experience in most European hotels - it might be cake, ham, bread, yoghurt or whatever, but it’s generally uncooked and contrasts strongly with the full hot meal traditionally expected of a British hotel/B&B.
The vast majority of Brits don’t eat a full english very often either, but it’s what we traditionally expected of our hotels. Hence the distinction.
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### Author:  [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/73 "2017-03-29T12:26:04Z")
Many organizations default to the federal per diem limits for travel reimbursement. That assumes $11-17 for breakfast, depending on where you are. A free breakfast means you can put that money toward a nicer dinner. Or pocket it if you work for a place that just gives you the full amount up front.
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### Author:  [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/74 "2017-03-29T12:55:55Z")
> [@Ruken](#):
>
> Many organizations default to the federal per diem limits for travel reimbursement. That assumes $11-17 for breakfast, depending on where you are. A free breakfast means you can put that money toward a nicer dinner. Or pocket it if you work for a place that just gives you the full amount up front.
We weren’t allowed to claim the breakfast per diem if the hotel offered breakfast. I assume every employer was aware of this.
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### Author:  [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/75 "2017-03-29T13:01:08Z")
> [@Leaffan](#):
>
> We weren’t allowed to claim the breakfast per diem if the hotel offered breakfast. I assume every employer was aware of this.
Why would my company be aware of your company’s policy?
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### Author:  [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/76 "2017-03-29T13:13:21Z")
At my company you could claim the full per down and then do whatever you wanted with it, so long as you didn’t try to double expense anything. In other words, you were entitled to claim the full breakfast allowance even if you didn’t spend all or any of it for breakfast.
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/77 "2017-03-29T13:38:22Z")
> [@Ruken](#):
>
> Why would my company be aware of your company’s policy?
I think he means every employer would be aware of which hotels had free breakfast.
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### Author:  [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/78 "2017-03-29T13:40:58Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#):
>
> I think he means every employer would be aware of which hotels had free breakfast.
Ah. I certainly don’t know which ones do. And some only offer it if you have a certain status.
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### Author:  [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/79 "2017-03-29T13:43:27Z")
Yes, but it’s easy enough for a corporation’s travel management department to find out.
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### Author:  [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)
#### Post date: [March 29, 2017, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-hotels-usually-offer-free-lol-breakfast/783220/80 "2017-03-29T13:45:10Z")
Large corporations often have their own internal travel reservation system. The employees are required to book hotels through that system to get their corporate rate. The amenities of each hotel are listed, such as free internet, breakfast, etc. So if the company has their expense system integrated with the reservation system, they’ll know if your hotel has free breakfast. You can still expense breakfast if you meet with clients or something like that, but you’ll need to justify it.
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