Hotels, Part II: Now we're getting somewhere

I visited London with my mother and sisters when I was, oh, 8 or so, as I described previously. I remembered a couple basic sights, sure, but my most vivid memories are from the hotels. We had two:

First, an in-town B&B with a cheap price and a convenient location. More of a boarding house, I guess. It was horrid: dingy bare walls, lumpy mattress, and even a leaky ceiling.  We stuck it out for two days before we hied it to the Heathrow Sheraton. Compared to the B&B, this was like the Taj Mahal. Keep that in mind: you may want boutique and charm, but your kids will be thrilled with a high quality chain. So do consider using the usual internet tools to get a reasonable room in a Marriott. Big chains are likely to be forgiving when it comes to adding kid beds, too.

You’re not flying 3,000 miles just to please your kids, though, and the Hilton that’s cool to them may come off as boring to you. If you’re in Paris, perhaps you want a hotel with a Parisian flair. Or you’re in the country and you want a nice B&B, not a Ramada (err, Möwenpick) by the highway exit. In that case, you will have a harder time finding lodging through the usual tools – and certainly not discounted. Many of these hotels don’t need the volume from aggregators/bidding sites, and if they do, you need to wonder why. The day this place shows up on Hotwire (and it would be obvious), well, I’ll be there, but I’m not holding my breath.

So, you’re going to have to negotiate directly with these properties. Again, it’s OK to do so. You’re strategies will be similar to what I outlined previously – give them a reason to say yes, basically – but I’ll help formalize it. First, a little procurement lingo. You’ll want to have a ZOPA and BATNA figured out before you talk to any property.

ZOPA: Zone of Possible Agreement. This is the range in price in which a deal could be struck, which is their minimum price, and your maximum. You probably know the latter, you should try to get the former. You’ll get that if you look at what their special offers generally are. They may not want to discount 20% in the summer, but if they have Spring sales at that much off, they probably could to it high season. You can also look at comparables in different locations. In that case, you’re looking for the hotels per-room operating cost. If a 4 star hotel in one place goes for $200, and similar one runs $300 a few valleys over, then you can judge that the expensive one is marking up $100 for location, but could go to $200. They probably won’t, but they’d rather book a room at $200 than leave it open: at $200 they’re still making a profit.

BATNA: Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement. If you really want to negotiate with Hotel A, make sure you have a fall back Hotel B ready to go: that’s your BATNA. The better your BATNA, the more aggressive you’ll be with Hotel A, and the better deal you’ll probably get. So work on your plan B before reaching out to A, and fix a walk-away point, as a per-night $ (this is the other end of the ZOPA).

Not that you have that, let’s talk strategy. I like to use, if possible, the simple time-for-discount trade I outlined previously, it’s often effective. First see if they advertise a weekly rate (for ZOPA purposes), often it will be 7 nights for the cost of 6. Ask for their single night rate, then come back with 5 for 4. It helps to know if they fill up on weekdays or weekends; if you include midweek nights for a location that books weekends, you’ll do better. I find that the free night approach works better than a straight discount: hotels want to defend their room pricing, at least on paper. With the free night, they can say “we never charge less than $XXX,” and they’re not technically fibbing.

You should also, before you get into the nitty-gritty of negotiating, get the desk manager on your side. How? Ask them to do a favor for you, not too strenuous, one that might show you’re appreciative of the property. E.g.: check different availabilities; discuss room amenities and kid options; have them send restaurant menus and make recommendations.

What’s all that for? Well, some of it may be useful, but you’re playing a psychology game. I’m the reservation manager, and I’ve gotten some interested requests from you. And I’ve done them. Well, nobody wants to perform tasks for someone they don’t like, right? So, often, people (the manager, in this case) will convince themselves they like you after-the-fact, so that they feel good about having done those favors for you. At that point, they may be more amenable to just one more request, like, oh, a discount so you can enjoy their wonderful property.

There you go, you’re armed with some tools. Go out and work a deal. But before you do, you’ll still need to do a little more research on where you’re staying. Next Post.