DJ_Iceman

Hilton messes up lots of things, but has elite lounge access right, I think. Diamond members always have access, while gold members only have access if they get upgraded to the club level. And if they don't get that upgrade, they get a breakfast benefit in the restaurant.

SkiAdcock

Actually that was the reason I stopped staying at Hilton!

I was able to get Hilton Gold each year but not Diamond since I was also staying at Marriotts. I didn't like the 'russian roulette/guess/wonder if I'll get upgraded/have access to the lounge' game, so stopped staying at Hiltons & switched my stays all to Marriott where I didn't have to guess. I knew I'd have access, even as a Gold. I'm LTP now, so it doesn't matter.

BTW - lounges at breakfast are -1 since I rarely go to a lounge for brekkie. I primarily use the lounges in the evening, not the morning.

Anyway, back to the specific situation w/ the OP (there can always be a separate thread about overcrowding of lounges/possible solutions, etc, etc, etc - oh wait, there are ). I think the best idea is to do two separate communications vs. lumping them into one, as they really are pertaining to two separate situations.

Cheers.

Handcake

In Asia the lounges are very well serviced. I think if they didn't do that the competition would kill the top elites or those paying for executive floor / suites.

cfischer

aside from the utter nonsense of UA Gold = Marriott Gold and Starwood Gold = Marriott Gold ...

I don't care because I stay the 50 nights every year and that is A LOT for a mid tier status. Marriott better delivers on that or I'll take the free Hilton Gold from my credit card. If they promise 90 mins of goodies and there is 20 mins ... let's complain to the GM and get it fixed! Not acceptable. They want a lot of commitment to earn Gold ... they either deliver or they don't.

Oxon Flyer

Just curious : is this "dessert hour" thing particular to Marriott lounges ? Why not have the desserts out from the beginning ? Does the regular food get taken away when the desserts arrive ?

gardener

Science major here. Had you put some salt on the ice in the ice bucket, it would have worked.

A mixture of ice and water in an ice bucket is obviously at 0 degrees C / 32 degrees F since liquid and solid water form an equilibrium.

Salt depresses the freezing point of water so a ternary mixture of salt, solid water, and liquid water equilibrates at a new freezing point - temperatures of zero F are easily achievable and this will freeze your ice pack.

I have used this workaround many times when confronted with the need to freeze an ice pack so as to bring frozen crawfish tails etc. home from a trip.

joshua362

Within the Marriott chain, yes, IDK outside it.
Generally, yes but it's usually long gone and just scraps at that point.

Most lounges have (used to?) a nice engraved sign at the entrance announcing the general days and hours of operation (6a-10p) then hours for breakfast (e.g. 6-9a), appetizers (5:30-7p) and desert (7:30-9p).

These are leftover from the days when every (applicable) US hotel took great pride in their lounges and offerings - from soulless FS tucked away in an office park in the middle of Kansas, to an airport location like TPA to the swankiest downtown REN.

Food & snacks were plentiful and convenient to grab if on the run - e.g individual boxes of cereal vs. urns of loose Costco rice krispies, bags of snacks vs. a common peanut bowl, etc. Deserts were multiple cakes, not a single plate of cookies.

I earned BIB PLT and entrance to this wonderful club in 2007. It quickly deteriorated since 2008 and gets lower and lower every year. It is a pet peeve.

What the Corporation give away (easy status), the Franchisee has to (grudgingly) provide and it shows...

SkiAdcock

It should be noted that the cookies, etc, are more US-centric. My stays outside of the US the desserts are more like cake, pies, pastries, etc. And yes, they usually clear out the evening apps to make room for the dessert phase. It should be noted that usually the brekkie & evening app offerings are more robust overseas than domestically as well.

Cheers.

NoviceFT

This is my experience as well. If I insist i may get cookies but that is it.

Oxon Flyer

For those of us used to lounges doing things in a more conventional manner, 'dessert hour' seems a bit odd. Unless their timing is impeccable, a guest who wants to pop into the lounge for a quick bite before heading out won't be able to have apps + dessert, and requiring guests to hang around awaiting dessert hour only compounds the crowding problem.

SkiAdcock

It's definitely a case of YVMV. A lot of the folk who pop in before going out are more interested in the main apps (IMO) vs. dessert, & those who are popping in later more interested in desserts/are familiar w/ food being out earlier. Also, I would say that putting food out first & dessert afterwards is more conventional. At restaurants one doesn't normally have them both at the same time (unless it's a buffet meal, which in fairness, most lounges are). Some properties will list times of offerings (aka, brekkie, afternoon tea, evening apps, dessert) on their websites or in the paperwork one receives at check-in, so one can plan accordingly.

Also, in some cases it could be dependent upon the amount of space in the lounge for food offerings. If there's not a lot of space, from a logistical point of view, it might be easier to have full apps out first vs. breaking up the space to 1/2 food & 1/2 dessert. For example, before they built the (now large) lounge, Grosvenor House/JW London used to have a small lounge w/ limited space, (image of prior lounge food area), so doing apps first & then dessert made sense. Or alternatively, a property may do a more robust job on evening apps (such as AMS Marriott; view of partial offerings below) so it takes up more space, & my guess is that more would prefer the more robust evening apps


Having said all that, I think properties should plan for dessert lasting more than 20 minutes. I also think that, for the most part, properties outside of the US do a better job w/ offerings in general.

Former lounge at GH/JW:




Part of evening apps/layout at AMS Marriott:




Cheers.

Oxon Flyer

Well yes, but a hotel lounge isn't a restaurant. By the same logic, they could do a breakfast service by laying out the coffee and juice at 06:00, the cereals at 07:00, the cooked stuff at 08:00 and the pastries at 09:00 .....

I would have thought that most folk would appreciate the full spread being available whatever time they happen to call in. I certainly do.

SkiAdcock

It doesn't bother me that desserts are laid out after the larger apps. You prefer otherwise. So, as I mentioned in my post, it's a case of YMMV. And as also mentioned, sometimes it's based on logistics, especially w/ smaller areas available for food layout. I think we can all agree that 20 minutes for dessert/not replenishing isn't acceptable.

Cheers.

pinniped

My expectations of a U.S. hotel lounge have gotten so low that I never really anticipate anything from it. In fact, my recent trend has been away from the full-service hotels as I find their value diminishing over time. I had more fun playing free pinball and videogames this week at Moxy, a $125/nt property with no elite benefits at all other than bonus points, than I have at a full Marriott in a long time.

Outside the U.S., yes, I still find some value in a really good Marriott (or, even better, Renaissance).

That said, a Marriott next to MD Anderson should understand that their high percentage of medical guests might appreciate things like lounge food and working refrigerators in the rooms more than at a typical hotel.

SkiAdcock

Agree.

* For those from outside the US re: MD Anderson:

"We're one of the largest cancer centers in the world. We've been working to eliminate cancer for more than seven decades. We have ranked as one of the top two hospitals in cancer care every year since U.S. News & World Report began its annual “America’s Best Hospitals” survey in 1990. Our physicians are frequently recognized as among the best in the nation by services including Best Doctors in America."