seawolf

Hyatt Place Frankfurt Airport offers a B&B rate so it does suggest breakfast is not complimentary.

christianj

Is that a B&B rate that shows up for people outside of Europe booking or a general B&B rate for all? Might seem like a strange question but I am asking since in Europe Breakfast is usually included with virtually all hotel rates even at higher end hotels. My European colleagues never understand how hotels get away with charging such a ridiculous amount of money for a crappy buffet when in Europe most of the rates they see and book include breakfast.

UPDATE! Just looked at it and the Standard room is less expensive than with Breakfast. Cannot believe they charge Euro 18 for a breakfast at a Hyatt Place! What a rip off!

HeadInTheClouds

MarkOK

That's very true. Though 'pocket cash' isn't exactly how I would put it. Even with free breakfast, it can be hard for me to eat within the per diem for two reasons : 1. Usually, I get pulled into business dinners with colleagues, collaborators, partners, etc, that can be a bit costly, and 2. It isn't always cheap to eat healthily on the road (like I do at home). Replacing fries with fruit even at a cheap restuarant costs an extra $5. Choosing the cobb salad with chicken entree over the burger another is 10 bucks or more. at fast casual places (etc). A free breakfast is often the difference between having my costs covered by the per diem and being out another 20+ bucks a day.

joe_miami

Indeed. People here need to be careful what they wish for. It's not like fewer breakfast customers will mean a lower room rate and/or a better breakfast for elites.

The HP I stay at for 30+ nights per year in Latin America still has a great breakfast buffet. I'd hate to see it go away, as it's one of the main drawing points for me.

escape4

I am sorry but in my humble opinion you are contradicting yourself. On one hand, you say if there is high occupancy then the hotel will lower the room rates. On the other hand you say that if the hotel has lower costs, they will keep profits to themselves rather than pass anything on to customers.

First off, higher occupancy means higher room rates, not lower rates.

Second, if the hotel cuts breakfast, some people won't care, and some people will go elsewhere. It's not all black or white; it's in the middle. If some people go elsewhere, then you have more empty rooms and the hotel will decrease rates marginally as a result. So lower costs from breakfast, lower room rates; unclear if overall the number of customers goes up or down as a result. Change in profits unknown.

CDTraveler

It's not a simple issue, but then nothing with economics is. If a hotel gets reservations at or near capacity greater than, say 2 weeks out, last minute prices rise. If at the same point, the hotel has a low percentage of reservations, prices usually drop. Business travelers are more likely to book last minute, the much maligned volleyball team books in advance and likely to be extremely price sensitive - discontinuing the free breakfast is likely to cost them the most price sensitive customers, but unless Hyatt starts disclosing a stunning amount of financial data, it's hard to analyze where they think they will gain or lose on this.

The lower costs comment was with reference strictly to the breakfasts: if the hotel lowers its cost by eliminating that, then unless they see a significant loss of the price sensitive customers what they save on breakfasts will be treated as profit, and not returned to customers in the form of lower rates. It would not be an exaggeration to consider the end of free breakfasts as a rate increase from the perspective of price sensitive customers.

Katlor

In US Hyatt Places I never eat breakfast because they are too gross. Those powdered eggs are an abomination. However, LatAm Hyatt Places (for example, Tijuana and La Paz) have fantastic, fresh-cooked breakfasts that are much higher quality than the US HPs. As a Globalist, it doesn't matter to me financially if they remove the free breakfast at American HPs. However, as a frequent traveller to Latin America, if I weren't a Globalist the removal of breakfast at HPs would be an incentive to stay at a local hotel that might provide a well-priced, tasty breakfast that would be better and cheaper than an HP's.

iahphx

"Cage free" powdered eggs, according to the Hyatt literature.

I do wonder how foreign hotels, even in the mid-range, manage to serve "real" eggs on their breakfast buffets, while I have NEVER seen real eggs on a mid-priced American motel buffet.

Eggs are neither hard to cook nor expensive. And EVERYONE knows what "processed" scrambled eggs taste like -- and no one likes them. Yet the USA motels refuse to serve them. I guess the cost/labor differential is too high to justify this improvement. Hyatt prefers to serve cage-free instant eggs over normal eggs. That doesn't make sense to me, but must make sense to their accountants.

JackE

It's a little more complicated than that. If they reduce their costs they have the freedom to reduce rates and increase room rentals. If you own a hotel, would you rather rent one room for $200 or two rooms for $180 each? When your marginal costs are too high, you have less headroom to lower your rates.

As to breakfast, they're awful, yet the regular HP menu is reasonably good IMO. I would much rather have a credit against the regular menu.

dsquared37

I was under the impression Aloft is the lowest *wood offering. shrug.

eefor jfp

Count me in the category of those who prefer the Hyatt Place breakfast to those at the Hampton Inn, HIX, Country Inn or Fairfield. And Hyatt House is usually even better. I've stayed at exactly one Courtyard in the last ten years because of their breakfast policy (and that was because our corporate rate included breakfast (albeit over on the Residence Inn side of the joint building)). And I won't book Hyatt Places in Europe, either (unless I'm at LHR where I'm just staying overnight and plan on having breakfast in the lounge at the airport). So although the breakfast isn't perfect, it's still one of the main reasons I stay at a HP, since, as noted, they are often as much or more expensive than most of the properties they compete with. I agree with MarkOK that for those of us on lower per diems, free breakfast can make the difference between an OK lunch or dinner and a decent one. It's also the hassle factor of having to go find a Denny's or a McDonalds vs. getting something in the lobby. Anyway, if this is a trend with US Hyatt Places, I for one will be looking around a lot more.