Originally Posted by
ffgap
I don't think this refutes my point at all. Sure, you can treat yourself to something extra in many all-inclusives, but a lot more stuff is included. Hence the name, duh! 4-6 meals a day including regular beer and wine, some sort of cocktails, etc. It allows travellers to budget more tightly which matches the preferences many people have these days.
Futhermore, all-inclusive has something which I am hereby dubbing the McDonald's effect. You're on vacation in a far-away place you may have never visiited before. But food and beverage is essentially free unless you demand top-shelf stuff. Less decisions to make. You know, this is like many FT'ers traveling to Portugal or Spain but still wanting the American breakfast/full English breakfast. You want to travel, but you don't want things to be all that different. And if in the all-inclusive resort, dinner is already included in the room rate, one less decision to make. People love that. Not having to decide.
What is the lack of decisions? The vast majority of Hyatt AIs have 4-15 dinner restaurants available, each with a full menu of options. Sounds like decisions to make to me.
Sorry, I don't follow. I'm not a native speaker, perhaps that's why I don't understand what point you're trying to make in that paragraph.
EDIT: I do admit that a big-chain's brand standard may cater to the same psychological urge to some extent. You know, sometimes you can find a non-chain hotel in Italy which costs half as much as an HR or GH but is actually better. But other times you pay nearly as much as for an HR for an inferior product. So sort of the same phenomenon qualitatively, but not quantitatively. All-inclusive is the whole thing on steroids.
It's what your edit is getting at - despite many here protesting that the all-inclusive mindset is for a "different" group of travelers who don't care about things like food quality, many here will still have endless discussions of whether a city's HR or GH has a better lounge evening reception even though both are extremely mediocre in food/drink quality compared to a dozen bars or restaurants within walking distance of the hotel.