Is the hotel room service fee expensive?

ByWill Merydith

The room service that you can bring meals to the hotel room is very appreciated when you get tired from your trip and it also makes me feel even more luxurious. However, when you look at the price after leaving the hotel, you may think that "It took so much", but if you say that this charge is reasonable it is rather cheap.

Why Is Hotel Room Service So Expensive?
http://priceonomics.com/why-is-hotel-room-service-so-expensive/

It was the first time in the world that we offered "Room Service" to arrange for hotel rooms, in New YorkWaldorf = AstoriaIt was in the late 1930s. The concept of room service that you can deliver to the room in about 30 minutes after ordering various dishes was said that it was regarded as a super luxury service at that time. Later, many luxury hotels began offering room service, and in 1969 the Westin Hotel Group began offering 24-hour room service, and even though the guests were at 4 am, caviar and lobster You can order luxurious dishes.

And now, at the four-star hotel, the provision of room service is naturally regarded as a standard service, and it is said that about half of the more than 50,000 hotels in the United States are offering room service. According to the report of the American Hotel Association, many of the users of room service are business customers.

In 2013, on a travel website,Investigate the price of "Club Sandwich" which is offered at room service of the top ten 4-star hotel for each city in the United StatesDid. The results are shown in the table below.


The average price of the club sandwiches of 150 hotels investigated was about 16 dollars (about 1650 yen), which was a bullish price setting compared with a normal restaurant. In addition, the hotel room service requires a room service fee that generally varies between $ 5 (about 520 yen) and $ 12 (about 1240 yen) in addition to the price of this dish, As a result, the price of the club sandwiches actually exceeds 25 dollars (about 2600 yen), and if it is a hotel in Honolulu it will be nearly 40 dollars (about 4,200 yen). Of course, this is not limited to club sandwiches, all the cuisines that can be ordered with room service are charged a high price, even 20 dollars (about 2100 yen) per cup of milk.

So why is the room service fee so expensive? One of the reasons is that the hotel is feeling discrimination by taking high price. If you are paying as much as 400 dollars (about 42,000 yen) to spend a luxurious night, you should not mind even if the room service is expensive. Also, if you think "I want to buy time by money", I will not spare consideration for room service which will take away the time to go out for meals.

The second reason is that there is a will to pay customers. Most guests arrive at the hotel in a state of exhausted. And such customers are usually hungry. In such a situation, there is often no remaining energy to find a place to hunt for a destination without land habit and eat, and in such a case room service is perfect.

ByCygnoir

However, it is pointed out that it is a big misunderstanding that the price setting of the room service that can be ordered 24 hours is not based on the customer's feet, but if it feels it is high, it is due to ignorance.

According to Robert Mandelbaum of PKF Hospitality Research, room service revenue in general hotel revenues is only 1%. The average revenue from the room service of one hotel room has declined to $ 866 (about 80,900 yen) in 2013, which was 1150 dollars (about 119,000 yen) in 2007, Converted to the profit of only 2.37 dollars (about 250 yen) is a bit of things. Mr. Mandelbaum says, "Room service is similar to the hotel pool, which we would like to stay at a hotel with pool, although only 10% of people use it but 90% of the others do not use it It is talking. "

ByMac Hotels

Jacob Tomskay, who works at a luxury hotel in New Orleans, says, "The cost required to keep the kitchen usable overnight, get rid of employees' drowsiness at caffeine and force them to work overnight is the cost of deep-fried food at 4 AM We can not afford to pay room service fee for drunk guests to order ", we believe that room service for 24 hours is not economically feasible for hotel.

So why does not the hotel cancel the 24 hour room service which is not economically good? The big cause is over competition. Many travel guide magazines and hotels' rating system require that they provide room services as qualifications of 4 stars and 5 stars. The hotel can not afford to stop the room service because the former is required overwhelmingly if the hotel does not have a hotel with room service and room service. It is a state of chicken race.

ByNeil Moralee

However, Hilton Midtown, the second largest hotel in New York in 2013, decided to cease providing room service in all 2000 rooms due to high labor costs and unstable orders due to unstable orders Did. And instead of stopping room service, we have introduced a refrigerator "Herb n 'Kitchen" which can be used for 24 hours self-service. Also, attempts have been made to introduce a new service called "Moving Menus" that allows hotel guests to order their favorite dishes from the abundant menu of restaurants near the hotel and deliver them to the room.

Omni hotel's CEO David Morgan said, "I think room service will go away in the future, there are signs of a clear change now, many hotels are introducing new services, switching to a new service It will not cause extra cost burden for customers. "