Category Archives for Hotels.
Jeff Bezos says the biggest mistake businesses make is not focusing most on what customers want. However Marriott’s CEO – who says workers make too much money and guests need to have more sympathy for hotel ownership groups – says his chain needs to modify brand standards to “consider franchisee feedback and..focus on reducing costs.”
Two hoteliers and hospitality consultants are pushing back, making the case that the hotel industry is living a big lie.
As you can see from this chart, only Hyatt Ziva Puerto Vallarta has changed pricing, going from 20,000 points per night to 25,000 points per night. Hyatt tells me, though, that Hyatt Ziva Puerto Vallarta will be moving to Category B at 20,000 points in the next week.
I have to give Hyatt a lot of credit here. My first instinct is to wonder whether assigning existing all-inclusives to a new award chart would be an opportunity to raise the price of redemptions. Surely at most programs it would be! And they have not done this here.
There’s a lot of words in hospitality that people get wrong all the time. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard people refer to American A-Advantage, or A-Mex. But it never occurred to me that I’ve been pronouncing Marriott wrong for the last 20 years or longer.
Hyatt is introducing a new award chart for all-inclusive properties. That’s because they used to have the Ziva and Zilara brand, but are now starting to bring the 100 Apple Leisure Group properties into the World of Hyatt program that they acquired. In fact, 6 hotels are already live and 50 more will be joining the program May 9. Kudos for speed, this took about 8 months from deal announcement rather than the traditional 18 months.
Kimpton Hotels is providing free therapy to guests. They’re providing “up to 1,000 complimentary video therapy sessions with licensed counselors to any guest over the age of 18 staying at one of Kimpton’s 60+ participating properties.”
And the deal on mental health treatments extends even beyond the stay.
The hotel industry is practicing “shrinkflation.” That’s like when Doritos cost the same as before, but come in a bag with fewer chips. The price of a bag of Doritos hasn’t gone up, but you get less for your money anyway.
Fairfield Inns in Japan will offer breakfast boxes instead of hot breakfast.
Gratuity is part of the cost of breakfast so for a breakfast to be considered complimentary guests must not be expected to pay cash out of pocket when they eat it. But the Delta Hotel Daytona Beach Oceanfront has figured out a way to charge elite guests a cash co-pay for their ‘free’ breakfast.
Seagulls have become a nuisance along the Grand Canal in Venice, and hotels have adopted a variety of strategies to ward them off. Two in particular – Marriott’s excellent Gritti Palace and Preferred Hotels’ Hotel Monaco – have started issuing water pistols to guests.
IHG is running a 20% discount on hotel night redemptions, initially for co-brand cardmembers but other members should become eligible too. And they’re updating on when we’ll see new points-earning and elite benefits, too.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
