Originally Posted by
sdsearch
First of all, Marriott hasn't officially pulled all newspapers out of all hotels, it's just stopped having the requirement to have them, and thus left it up to each hotel.
Second, I don't think airline lounges and hotels are comparable on this. Newspapers in airline lounges are often taken onto the plane, and read during take-off/climbing, when onboard WiFi is not available and thus there's no other way to read a newspaper other than a physical copy (unless you managed to get the whole newspaper downloaded onto your laptop or mobile device beforehand, not just one or two articles, but AFAIK that's not possible with most online). But hotels don't have the same issue that people can't access WiFi.
I think full-service hotels are still required to have newspapers, but only in public spaces like the lobby.
Regardless, hotels can easily recoup the cost of the newspapers by adding 50 cents or whatever the discounted rate for bulk sales happens to be to the rate guests pay. For example, this is one of the amenities that a resort fee at resorts should cover.
While newspapers are complimentary at many British hotels, regardless of brand or star rating, other hotels will order any newspaper you want the night before from the local distributor (Brits call them "news agents") and then charge you for it.
I've had other hotels, like in Lisbon, Portugal, send the bellman out and buy me a weekend edition of the Financial Times on a Saturday morning.