I started to notice something while I was at Disney 2 years ago. More and more hotels and resorts are putting signs in their bathrooms stating they are very concerned about the environment and if you want to help out, please hang up your towels if you don't want to wash them every day. They then give statistics on how much water could be saved if hotels cut down on washing every towel every day. They urge you to hang up a towel and re-use it instead of washing them all every day. While this is a nice gesture, they're so full of shit it's not funny. Come On! I can't even believe they have the cahunas to suggest for one second that they are concerned about the environment. Their suggestion is PURELY profit driven. Are you trying to tell me that all of a sudden, within the last 2 years every major hotel chain just 'came up' with that idea? What is their net profit per day made off of that decision? Furthermore, why don't they donate that amount to some environmental charity? Please don't get me wrong - I'm not a granola eating, tree hugging liberal. Anything but. I want to drill holes in Alaska until it looks like a big slice of Swiss Cheese and I want the fairways on golf courses to be a shade of green that can only be obtained through chemical enhancement. I want BALCO juiced tee boxes. It just really bothers me when people make a decision for greed and then try to pass it off as something entirely different. The Hilton owned Double Tree just cranked up the nonsense. In a $150/night room, there was a note on my pillow explaining that unless notified otherwise - they would only change the sheets every 3rd night unless a new guest was arriving and you were leaving. That makes perfect sense to me also, as there is no need to change them daily - but again - they mention the environment. "Boooo. Boooo, I Say." Also, on the desk was a note about electricity and how much is wasted every day because people leave their rooms and leave the lights and TVs on. Again, it's an attempt to save them money. Is my room rate going to go down next year if everyone turns off the electricity in their rooms? No! I tell my wife when she travels on business to let the TV on when she leaves the room. Maybe if hotels beefed up security...I mean add security....people wouldn't feel compelled to do that. While in New York last week, the Comfort Suites I was staying in had the message in the bathroom about the environment - yet they had a gas fireplace burning in the lobby den 24/7....soley for ambiance. It was in the 50's and 60's and I never saw one person sitting in the den. I came in one night pretty late and it was still burning. Apparently it's OK to waste gas, just not water. Or, does the ambiance of the fireplace in the den allow them to charge more because it's aesthetically pleasing to their business travelers?
And while I'm on hotels....most do a good job of having a free continental breakfast. Some even add waffles to the free mix. Well, the Hilton hotels still charge for breakfast. The rub is, it's a breakast buffet for $9.95. You can get a pound of bacon, a stack of eggs, french toast and a plate of fresh fruit for your money....or you can get a tiny box of cheerios and 8 0z milk and still pay the same price. Idiotic. Well, on the third day of the trip my business companion just had cereal. When the waitress came to see if we were done I asked her if they had another price for someone who just ate cereal. She told us after stuttering around that the cereal bar was $4.00. Great. She had a box of Cheerios 1/20th the size of a box I can buy for $4 at the grocery store. I asked the waitress if there was a menu for breakfast and she said she would see if she could find one. So, only at that point did we learn we didn't have to have the buffet. Before I asked, it was implied it was the only choice. Most things were $8 anyway so the buffet was a "bargain". Charge whatever you want, but please stop insulting people's intelligence!
No comments:
Post a Comment