Small Hotels Rise Above the Trade Clamour.Business hotels have an undeserved reputation for blandness and standardisation. If all business travellers were fed up with big corporate hotels they would stay in little private ones. But they don't I actually like business hotels. I also enjoy small, eccentric, proprietor-run hotels in out-of-the-way places, particularly if they are as good as those in big international chains. The two categories are not mutually exclusive, merely different. To advocate the charms and advantages of the one, you do not have to bad-mouth the other. But that is what happens, with the result that business hotels are often portrayed as havens of gloom: monotonous, charmless, standardised, bland, money-grabbing. In the UK, for example, the Good Hotel Guide, which is published by the Consumers' Association, has long waged on heroic campaign on behalf of "small hotels of character". Puzzlingly, however, the Good Hotel Guide is rather fond of making its case on behalf of small hotels of character by slapping — very hard — what it calls large business-oriented city hotels. What it says is that there are no good hotels in big industrial centres. The guide takes a powerful swipe at business hotels. "There are plenty of hotels to choose from in any industrial centre. But most large business-oriented city hotels are relatively indistinguishable one from another. They may differ in their architecture and facilities: some will have air-conditioning, four-posters and mini-bars, more spacious public areas, more boutiques. "And of course their management and service may be smart and spick and span or, alternatively, slack, snooty or sullen. That can make a difference. But however good a big corporation-owned city hotel may be of its kind, it will remain the hotel equivalent of convenience food. And some of us want something else when we travel abroad." The guide continues to say that the bad — or at least the mediocre — drives out the good. "Trust house Forte," it says, "has made a huge contribution to raising the standards of hotel catering in Britain, but it is no accident that the guide lists no more than one THF hotel. "When it acquires an old hotel, THF will certainly improve its facilities, put in baths en-suite and colour televisions, and yet, again and again, its presence is a kind of half-life kiss. And the same is true about the acquisitions of all the other large chains... who are in the business of catering more for customers en masse rather than the individual." This is almost entirely unfair. It is ridiculous to claim that however good a big corporation-owned city hotel may be, it will remain the equivalent of "convenience food." A good example is the Ritz Hotel, Madrid, a THF property, which is bang in the middle of a large city and bears as much resemblance to convenience food as caviar to cat food. It is an excellent establishment in anyone's language: distinctive, distinguished and managed with great flair and sensitivity. Big is not synonymous with second rate. There are probably more good big hotels than there are good little hotels. A really good big hotel is probably a better hotel for the business traveller to stay in. Business travellers stay in big hotels — so called business hotels, though the description has more to do with marketing than with anything else — because at the end of the business day what they need, most of them, is something functional, familiar and efficient. If all business travellers were fed up with big hotels they would stay in little ones. But they do not. As a matter of fact, it has often occurred to me that good big business hotels are often a better place in which to spend a holiday than good big holiday hotels, because they are not overrun by tourists. And they are certainly miles better than poor small holiday hotels. At least in my opinion. (Adapted from the "Financial Times ")
What is the writer's viewpoint on the difference between small and big hotels? What arguments in the story seem logical to you? Why? What is the key point of the article? Why is the issue so important for hospitality industry? Is this issue so topical for Russia? Why not?
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