swpidgeon

I held a meeting at the newly-flagged Renaissance Waterford Oklahoma City today. This property rebranded from Marriott to Renaissance just a couple weeks ago after a major renovation, which was sorely needed. I've stayed here a few times before and as a Platinum, I usually got upgraded to one of the suites.

I had a ton of work to do in between and booked myself a room for two nights just to have a place to sequester myself for calls, etc. You guessed it...no desks. Only a strange, not-quite-right-height coffee table and a sofa/chair that weren't conducive to proper work ergonomics or posture. There's actually a huge void where the desk used to me / should be.

Just to hear it for myself, I spoke to the front desk lady in the afternoon and she sighed a little when I asked, which tells me she's heard the question a lot. Apparently only the suites have desks, and if you want one, you pay the upcharge. So, don't expect free plat suite upgrades here!

Jim31328

I'm at the Buffalo Marriott now. The hotel's website says rooms have a " well lit work desk". My room has a coffee table in the seating area. It's not well lit ( no lamp), it has no electrical outlets or USB ports and has no desk chair. I'm sitting on the couch typing this. A desk chair would be useless because of the design of the "desk". I complained to the front desk receptionist and she offered to get a portable desk sent to my room. When she described it, I realized it's already in my room. She was quite apologetic and said it's part of Marriott's plan to appeal to millennials. I sent a comment to Marriott expressing my unhappiness and letting them know that I am switching my business to a chain that caters to business travelers. I don't know why the picture is sideways!

JONEZY00

Thanks for this thread. Recently had a stay at the Chicago REN and as reported no desk. Will check this list before booking in the future. Really bad decision by Marriott.

sethb

Speak to the General Manager, not the front desk clerk. And ask for a refund because they don't have what they advertise.

RogerD408

Yes, it should be taken up with the GM, he/she had to agree to the changes and it was a bad mistake. I wonder how long it took them to come up with the line "plan to appeal to millennials"? All working travelers need/want a desk to work at and not just spread out over whatever surfaces are available. Sure sounds like an attempt to cut costs by removing the desk and maybe support building new properties with smaller rooms.

EVERY TIME you hit something like this it needs to be taken up with the highest management available and every survey whenever free text is available. Make them feel the effect of their decision and don't be complacent about bad decisions!

SkiAdcock

Agree.

Agree.

And for those who do FB/Twitter/Instagram, "name & shame".

Cheers.

Jim31328

I complained to Marriott because this is a new hotel. The rooms weren't changed during a remodel, they were built this way. Here is the important part of Marriott's reply to my complaint that they are not accommodating business travelers and my notice to them that I cancelled all of my existing Marriott revenue reservations and won't reserve any additional stays:

"Thank you for your reply.

I am sorry to hear of your disappointment.

There are a number of innovative features to the new design of the Marriott Hotels guest room. Our research on the working habits of current and future guests shows a strong desire for a room design that offers greater flexibility in where and how to work. With this in mind, our rooms are designed with work surfaces that are more versatile than a traditional desk. For example, a more streamlined work surface that can accommodate a guest's laptop, papers and other materials is designed to be mobile allowing it to easily be moved to various seating arrangements in the room. We have also built in easier access to power from various room locations. All of these innovations are designed to create a more open and versatile work environment.

Safe travels,
Teri Ann Moroney
Marriott Customer Care"

nihonto

It's so hilarious to read these things written by marketing people. "Here's a pile of dog poop, let me describe how good and tasty it is and why you should eat it." And they look you square in the eye, fully expect you to eat it, and are in fact surprised when you tell them no, you won't eat it because it's obviously dog poop.

People already had the flexibility to work on the floor on sit in the bed and use their phone. They are not "enhancing" your stay experience any more than the airlines are enhancing the flying experience by adding extra seats.

I hope these idiots don't screw up Starwood.

joshua362

Simply a matter of time before this spreads to Starwood and the rest of the industry in general!

stimpy

If a matter of time is 30+ years, then you could perhaps be right. But not in the next 10 years. There are too many of us old people who are filling up the nice hotels and want our desks.

joshua362

I'm not saying it's right or I support it as I don't. But I think the decision's been made, not going to be reversed and every room that gets refurbished going forward is going to the new style whether we like it or not.

Sort of the way the food industry unilaterally in unison decided half gallons, quarts and pints were too big so they shaved off ounces but kept the full prices.

Some one must have also told them it was demanded by consumers for our convenience...

stimpy

And I'm saying that is NOT going to happen. Hotels make decisions based on their best research of what the guests want and are willing to pay for. If this decision by Marriott was economically a good choice, it would already be replicated throughout the industry. It was clearly not well researched and that's why it will not continue across a broad base. Perhaps it will continue at certain hotels that cater to millennials, but not everywhere.

I think that once the industry gets a better handle on what millennials want and where they stay, they will implement changes at the hotels and in the regions where it makes financial sense. I think one reason I was shocked about this happening is because I generally do not travel to such places. I rarely see a millennial at a hotel I stay at unless they are with their parents. However I am currently in San Francisco at a nice old hotel and have been surprised this week to see a rather large percentage of millennials staying at this hotel. I've never seen this in my previous hotel visits in Europe, Asia or even the east coast of the US. So maybe a city like San Francisco or indeed the US West coast is a good place to cater to millennials. But you can't say the same for everywhere.

Hotels and management chains very closely monitor their revenue and projected revenue. And if enough people choose to stay in a room with a desk, that will override any foolish decision made by marketing. And another force that will have an even more significant effect are large corporate contracts that mandate a desk for their traveling employees. Not just a desk, but an ergonomically correct work environment. And it won't be because they care about their employees, but rather that the HR and legal teams at these large corporations dictate such a work environment to avoid lawsuits.

SkiAdcock

stimpy, Marriott is just starting to roll it out. As new builds happen & hotels get renovated it could become more prevalent.

I toured a brand new mid-range property this week & was told they had to fight w/ Marriott for months to provide desks/office chairs in the room! I do know a GM in another city directly across from a large convention ctr that says he's keeping the desks, but that's because his property gets most of its bizness from the convention folk who do need a proper desk to work.

And while Marriott is touting it as due to the millennials (and there probably are some who don't care), it's really about saving $$. Also,

"While Marriott has taken most of the heat from road warriors for removing desks at some properties, it isn't alone. Several chains have been pushing new designs that upend the traditional room.

At Best Western's new Vib brand, bed headboards double as desks. Closets have been replaced with hooks on the wall and instead of a dresser there are drawers under the bed. Hilton's new Tru won't have closets. Instead there will be an open space with hangers and hooks on the wall. And the desk is replaced with a chair that includes a spot for a tiny laptop or tablet. Starwood's Aloft brand also skips out on the closet, instead offering some hangers behind a curtain in a built-in wall in the bathroom.

While hotels say this is what customers want, there is also a cost-savings. The big hotel chains don't own most of their properties but license out rights to them. And the owners and developers are pushing the parent companies to cut costs.

"They are more concerned about the (construction) cost, because they don't have enough time to make that up if we hit a downturn," says Best Western CEO David Kong. "People can't make the numbers work."

That's one of the reasons Hilton's Tru will cost about $84,000 a room to build, compared to $110,000 for its Hampton Inn brand. And Best Western just launched a new brand, Glo, which will cost $65,000 per room for construction.

These rooms are also easier to clean meaning hotels can pare down their housekeeping staff.

"This industry is starting to figure out what is efficient," says Scott Berman, who looks at the hotel industry for consulting and accounting firm PwC. "It begins with labor."

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/d9b4d...closet-or-desk

BTW - if you want a brand to avoid on the Hilton side, I'd start w/ the new Tru. Take a look at the pic in the article above that shows what they're providing as a chair/'desk'

FWIW - I do think that if folk decide not to stay at a property w/ a desk, a personal mtg, email or sending a folio from another chain/property to the GM makes sense. They need to know they're losing revenue because of this.

I don't buy that millennials only travel w/ their parents, given the millennial age timeline is 18-32 years of age. 22-32 means there are a lot of young biz travelers, usually in the IT field who are on the road a lot.

Cheers.

stimpy

I wasn't saying that millennials only travel with parents as a global statement. It's just what I've seen in my travels, until this week in San Francisco. However when you bring up IT professionals, those people still for the most part lug around laptops and need a desk to place their laptop on.

And I didn't know millennials went up to 32? I though technically they would be 16 and under, but that we extend that a few years to go up to early 20's, right? That's been my definition anyways.

Back to the hotels and the decision making process. This no-desk idea will never take off if the hotels that keep the desks perform better than the hotels that give up the desk. Yes these desks cost a lot of money, but they are an investment like plumbing, WiFi and everything else that is essential to most business travelers. These investments pay for themselves.

My thinking on Marriott is that senior leadership including the CEO bought into the idea and it will take a few quarters of bad financial performance at those non-desk hotels before they re-think it. Maybe they will take the data and fine tune this idea. But the other chains are watching just as closely and may not be as wedded to the idea. We will see modern brands try this out here and there and W's may be next. But before Marriott did this, several Pullman hotels did the same. I was in a non-desk a few years ago at the Pullman Brussels Midi. It was an experiment and that what this all is for now. An experiment. As I recall and we probably have a thread here on it, lots of people complained to the management of that Pullman about not having a desk. I haven't been back so I don't know if they have installed desks or not.

Once Marriott takes control of Starwood they will have a lot more power in the industry to set trends. However my point earlier about large corporate contracts and ergonomic workspaces will keep Marriott in check. After all even if they are the worlds largest, we can all still choose Hilton, Hyatt, Accor, IHG, etc.

SkiAdcock

FWIW stimpy I'm agreeing w/ you for the most part on the desk thing & it can backfire - only if people state that as the reason for staying elsewhere. The other part about the revenue bit is if someone doesn't discover there's not a desk until they actually stay there (not everyone is on FT) & doesn't move, so revenue stays up. Maybe the next time they stay elsewhere, but short of notification a GM would have no idea if the subsequent lack of stay was due to no desks or some other reason. I doubt most properties drill down that well.

Given that Marriott is basically requiring new properties & remodels to go to the no desk thing, it's not a whim (again, I just toured a property that had to fight Marriott tooth & nail to keep the desks & it took months to get the approval by Marriott). A lot of properties are going w/ the flow (buying into the kool-aid, even one of my beloved properties when I asked), some are fighting back at the outset, & some will fight back/incur a lot of extra cost when they have to switch back after enough complaints (which takes down their revenue).

Re: millennials, your definition doesn't really match what is considered millennials (pretty much everything I've read & people I've met who consider themselves millennials are 18-32, give or take a year or so on either side). There hasn't been a phrase yet defined for current teenagers (aka, 16 & under), who are the next generation in not too many years & at that point will get their own moniker.

Cheers.