NEW METHODS IN HOTELS

Evening Star, Issue 20988, 30 December 1931, Page 10

NEW METHODS IN HOTELS

In common with almost every other kind of enterprise, hotels in the United States have suffered from the business depression, and have therefore been forced to find new methods of attracting patrons. Some of these methods are not actually new, but rather a reversion to methods of earlier days before over-elaboration in selling gave patrons the sensation of being exploited at every turn through a multiplicity of charges—charges which, in the aggregate, were not always inordinate, but which, by their number and variety, conveyed the impression of excessive outlay. Among the older ideas coming into force again are the restoration of the so-called American plan—the charging of a fixed sum per diem for rooms and meals together, and in restaurants the return to the table d’hote. The newer ideas generally start with the older as a base, and upon them novel combinations are built. Thus two hotels in New York under the same management are now offering at a three-day combination rate of lOdol “ lodging for two nights in a first-class room with bath or shower, ice water and radio, six meals in the hotel dining room, admission tickets to Roxy’s Theatre (vaudeville-cinema), and the Chrysler tower and a sight-seeing bus ride.” The offer was first made jn advertisements on the cinema screen in theatres at Wilkesbarro and Scranton, Pennsylvania, whore lOdol tickets -were given as prizes, but now travel agencies in Pennsylvania and Massachusetts have the hotel tickets for sale, and the managers report that the number of their guests is constantly increasing.