2023-06-29 08:11:53
Opinion Knock, knock, concert
Where room service in the hotel is still an option
Room service, invented in New York a good 100 years ago, has now reached the level of a takeaway in many hotels. But there are still hotels that are resisting this decline: they are luxury hotels with some quite extravagant offers.
Status: 29.06.2023 | Reading time: 3 minutes
By Kira Hanser
responsible editor travel/style/motor
In “The Milestone Hotel” in London, musicians from the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra can play with champagne if requested
Quelle: The Milestone Hotel & Residences/The Red Carnation Hotel Collection
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Anyone who walks through the hallway of a hotel floor early in the morning gets to know the unsavory side of room service. In front of the room doors are trays with plates full of dried leftovers, crumpled serviettes, glasses with stale beer puddles waiting to be carried away. Room service, invented more than 100 years ago in the legendary New York “Waldorf Astoria” as the ultimate luxury, has reached the level of a takeaway in many hotels.
That’s why it doesn’t actually take a big survey to find out what exactly guests ordered in their room the night before for convenience. You can see and smell their eating habits the next morning: spurned onion rings from burgers, bitten sandwiches, gnawed pizza crusts.
Nevertheless, the booking portal Hotels.com in a worldwide survey of almost 500 hotels, the top three room service orders were asked. Exactly: It was burgers, sandwiches, pizza. Fast food is mainly ordered between seven and eight in the evening, and the leftovers are then left outside the door before going to bed.
This demand for room service is actually increasing, as confirmed by a good 40 percent of the hotels surveyed. This could be because many hoteliers have now reduced the room service surcharge. For a calculated reason. They want to avoid another bad habit. There are now many cost-conscious guests who prefer to order from one of the countless food delivery services on the go in order to save on the service fee. The bag is then picked up discreetly at the hotel entrance or less discreetly from the concierge.
Musicians to champagne in the hotel room
Can this mundane decline of room service be stopped at all? Some hoteliers respond by trying to accommodate special requests other than room service. And so they boil mineral water, mix mashed potatoes with ice cream (apparently a children’s experiment) or comply with the request to prepare a fish in the hotel kitchen that the guest has brought himself.
More about dining at the hotel:
To save our honour, it should be said that there is one last bastion in which room service is and remains an option: these are luxury hoteliers who offer the most extravagant menus as in-room dining. In the „Park Lane Hotel“ in New York, for example, there is caviar on demand via a caviar hotline, in „The Milestone Hotel“ in London, champagne ordered in the room can be beheaded with a sword if requested. Incidentally, a trio of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra can also be ordered to the room as musical accompaniment to meals – the famous musicians can play the guests’ favorite pieces on request. The price is negotiable.
And if it’s supposed to be a burger after all: For these guests, that’s what we offer „Post Oak Hotel“ in Houston an opulent, deliciously self-indulgent room service option. The “Black Gold Burger” for $1600. It consists of Wagyu beef, goose pie, black truffle and caviar in a 24-karat gold-plated brioche bun. There will definitely not be a crumb left over.
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