After Ryanair’s 30 minute infomercial on the BBC this week, Mr O’Leary is no doubt feeling very pleased with himself and basking in the glory of putting one up on “the establishment”. His clearly successful model of driving down costs no matter what the consequences made me think how else that could be applied to our travel experience. And so I came to imagine a future brand, fictitious of course: we’ll call it Hotel1, where each year millions of hotel rooms are given away for nothing. Here’s how it works:
Booking – online only, of course. On choosing where and when you want to stay you will then have the option of opting out of the overbooking insurance (€20 per night) – the tab for which will be sandwiched neatly between Moldova and Montenegro. You will also be able to choose from a list of room options (more of those shortly). No refund, no changes allowed. Payment for the room will be free with the Hotel1 debit card (available at an annual fee of €99), otherwise you will be charged between €5 and €10 for the transaction. Per person. Per night.
Check in. This will be done online of course, and once checked in you will receive a 16 digit code to enter into the keypad on the hotel entry door. This will then need to be entered again to access your room. To complete the online check-in you will be charged €5, and failure to have the code to hand at the hotel will require you to call the special 0905… premium rate customer courtesy line, charged at €5 a minute. You will then be charged €50 for another entry number. There is no hotel reception desk, and you will be able to select any room that is vacant, simply by tapping in the code and seeing if the door opens.
Parking. You will find that many of the Hotel1 properties will be more than 20 miles out of the town listed, often on disused industrial land. Parking in these remote locations will be available at €15 per day.
Room options. The free rooms are available in all properties and offer basic level of comfort. The following options are available:
- Bathroom access – for €5 pppn you can enjoy unlimited use of the shared facilities. For an extra €10 you can reserve one of the rooms with a private bathroom (as a courtesy please clean the bathroom before the next guests arrive)
- Window view – black-out blinds are installed to protect the furnishings. By entering €5 in coins, these can be rolled back to reveal the natural beauty of your surroundings
- Bed size – a single bed is provided as standard. If you wish to have a larger or longer bed please advise on check-in. Bed upgrades are charged at €25 a night.
- Wi-fi - all Hotel1 properties are equipped with wi-fi and access is available at €29.99 for a 24 hour period
- TV – a basic television is available – pay €10 to release this from the storage unit.
- Food – food is not permitted to be eaten in the rooms unless purchased from the vending machine in the corridor. Coffee is dispensed at €3 a cup (€8 between 7am and 9am) and a range of sandwiches are offer, starting at €10
Check-out. This is between 7am and 8am, although can be extended for an additional fee of €10 per hour. Once the check-out has passed, the room door will automatically lock, and will only be released by entering a code provided by calling the premium rate customer courtesy team.
How’s that for a winning formula? Low costs all the way. It is possible to do it for nothing (almost!) and strip down almost everything. I have to admit though, going back to the airline model, when we do start to break down all of the options in this way, how much I find the experience of flying has become so unpleasant as a result of this relentless pursuit of cost. This criticism is as valid when directed at BA and other national carriers as at the low-cost companies; more so perhaps, because our expectations of the big legacy airlines have sunk so low in the last ten years as a result of rapidly eroding standards. Are we to blame as well, for choosing our travels so much on price and so encouraging the airlines to cut down on so many basic service standards?
It will be interesting to see how this low-cost service model develops in the next 10-20 years. Will it go to the extreme lenghts as suggested above, or will there be a backlash in consumer demand, where a value is placed on being treated with courtesy and consideration and these qualities are not extras available at added cost, but basic prerequisites for a business to survive? Watch this space…
