Hello everyone,

I see that everyone is having bad experiences with this hotel chain, is it really that bad?? I check their website and apparently they serve free breakfast for such a low price (I get additional 15% off), the price seems very appealing! I am currently a student, I want to safe money but I do not want to spend on something that is not worth the price. What does everybody think? Is this chain better or worst than Best Western?

Jrob

The Choice set of brands form an extremely variable chain. Different properties within a few miles of each other with similar prices are often very different experiences. My general advice is to search the area where you intend to travel for prices, then studiously compare reviews by actual travelers of the subset of properties in that area that are within your price range to determine if each merits further consideration. While there is seemingly some intent to position each sub-brand of Choice (e.g. Clarion, Comfort, Quality, Econo, etc.) to different price points or demographics, my personal experience has been that the variability with each sub-brand is so wide as to make such distinctions nearly irrelevant.

Breakfast of some form is usually available, but in some places that means a couple of yesterday's muffins, lukewarm coffee and a couple pieces of fruit that have been picked up and rejected by the last 50 people before you. In other places that free breakfast will be a set of trays with hot items, multiple kinds of fruit and juice on real china with real silverware. You can find gems with diligent research but also many truly bad properties. IHMO, "Consistently inconsistent" is the only way to describe Choice.

That said, I think I would have given a nearly identical response were you to ask me the same question about Best Westerns, save for the part about sub-brands.

I second everything jtaft has said.
You also mostly read about the bad properties on this forum rather than the good ones. There are plenty of good properties, but unfortunately the bad ones can sometimes tarnish the rest of the group.

Choice as a chain is bad because it doesn't do the one thing that chains were created to do: provide a consistent, reliable experience. In general, Choice does not do a good job of maintaining and enforcing brand standards.

Just about the only consistent brand within Choice is Cambria Suites. Those properties are all new-builds, and Choice has a dedicated division in its company for Cambria.

Quality, Clarion, EconoLodge, and Rodeway get a lot of "conversions"--that is properties that were independent or affiliated with another chain before moving to Choice. Unfortunately, these properties sometimes convert because they couldn't meet the standards of the chain they were in. I've seen a number of former Holiday Inns that didn't take update to meet the refreshed Holiday Inn standards convert to Clarion or Quality.

Agree with all said above. Additionally, when it comes to BWs, they can be very disappointing properties in the US, but great hotels in other countries. European BWs seem to overall have much higher standards, certainly higher than the average European Choice property (in my limited experience, anyway). In Australia/New Zealand, the properties I stayed at were somewhat average (mostly not horrible, but not great either). What Choice used to have was a pretty decent frequent guest program, but I'm afraid that since about 18 months that's no longer true (ridiculously high point requirements for free nights combined with not very exciting promos). Your best bet is to check tripadvisor.com for properties from either chain and go with the cheapest most decent one. I personally at this point prefer to get mileage credit to GP/BW points, but it might depend how often you stay in such hotels.

Having earned over 500K in CP points, I have stayed in a lot of CP properties. As an industrial consultant, there are a lot more of these properties located close to my work than there are Hilton's or Marriott's.

What folks have said above are all true. The inconsistencies within the brands are incredible. There are great Comfort Suites and there are bad ones. Same is true for Comfort Inns (different than CS). I have not found a good Quality, Rodeway, or Econo Lodge and I generally avoid these.

Some Clarions do not have free breakfast (Williamsburg, IA for example) and while this is supposed to be the upscale brand, they generally are only as good a Comfort Suites usually.

The MainStay and Cambria are good entry level suites style (as in extended stay suites). I can not say about the Suburban as I have not stayed there.

Because of bad experiences in a few locations, I have been looking for Hampton Inns and Hilton Garden as I find the to be more consistent and more expensive, and often less convenient.

I generally avoid Best Western as the variability within the brand is much greater than within individual brand at other chains. There are many good ones though and a little research may turn up some gems, particularly in out of the way places (Paradise, PA main building is a good example).

Travelodge is not part of Choice. It is part of WynhamRewards (Cendant), formerly TripRewards. Yet another inconsistent hotel family.

To which one could add Calrson's GoldPoints, which is yet another inconsistent hotel family.

I've not stayed at more than one La Quinta, but based on what I've read (and the bad experience with their miles-earning program) I'm not hopefully that it's much better.

So basically, I can't think of a single points/miles-earning hotel family in this space (a large portion of their brands being squarely lower-end) that is consistent. You seem to have to move up to hotel family's which "bottom out" at midscale to get that.

While I haven't seen a "jump up and down fantastic" Quality, I've stayed at several that were quite ok for the price (half the time which was points ) and small-town location. But these were always ones I prescreened through www.tripadvisor.com.

There's no "budget" hotel brand that I would consider booking "blind" based on just the brand name. I would need reviews of some sort, recommendations from travel books I trust, etc.

You are quite correct. I saw the blue trademark in my head and wrote the wrong thing. It should have been Rodeway.

Thank you everyone for sharing their experiences! My stays are going to be mostly in Canada. However after hearing all the "inconsistencies" from this chain I probably won't book there, unless it has a good reputation at tripadvisor.com. Not only that, but I do not like their rewards program that much either, especially the 2 years point expiry.. to me that is a big turn off

I was disappointed when I found out that some of them was once a Holiday Inn, but couldn't keep up with the standard and I rate most HI as adequate in terms of standards, and unfortunately this puts CI below average...

Thank you everyone again for the valuable information

I generally stay at Sleep Inns or Comfort Inns & Suites. Not as many nights as most of you folks, but so far no bad experiences.

Hello, J_rob! I have a measly 12K points which I will probably use at the Econo Lodge of London, Ont.---only 6K per night now thru June 30! Only 1 km from downtown. I just hope it hasn't gone downhill too much from when it was the National Traveller 1986--1990s!