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Hotels General Discussion

Alsty said:
Come on Matt. You've just been to Europa-Park. How was their breakfast compared to the Alton Towers one?
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In fairness, Europa did have a nice breakfast. I’m not sure if they were or not, but a lot of Europa’s continental stuff (the main bit I tried) seemed freshly made; the pancakes were lovely, and tasted like they’d been freshly made that day, and some of the pastries I tried also tasted very fresh. My parents, who tried more of the savoury continental stuff and the cooked stuff, also seemed to like what they ate, and said that it seemed homemade. Europa also had very nice maple/golden syrup, and the cinnamon sugar I tried one day when there was no syrup available was also very nice, and the fruit was nice as well!

However, I remember Alton Towers’ being perfectly nice too. Granted, it is 3 years since I last stayed in ATH, and not being a huge foodie myself, my memory of food from 3 years ago is perhaps patchy at best, but I had no complaints and neither did my mum and nan. The pancakes, although I would have guessed that they weren’t fresh like Europa’s seemed to be, tasted perfectly nice, although I do remember Towers didn’t have any golden syrup, instead having some sort of sauce that you got out of a big vat, which I found interesting. I don’t have any overriding strong memory of it aside from that, although I would have said it was certainly no worse than the likes of a Premier Inn breakfast. I’m not sure comparing Towers to Europa is entirely fair, as they’re totally different scales of resort; EP is on a scale vastly beyond any theme park resort in the UK, and is probably more comparable to somewhere like Disneyland Paris than Alton Towers.

As I say, though; I’m headed to the Alton Towers Hotel next month, so I’ll report back my thoughts in here. I may be able to make a fairer comparison to Europa’s breakfast after that, as I’ll have been in Europa less than 2 months prior.
 
Matt N said:
I’m not sure comparing Towers to Europa is entirely fair, as they’re totally different scales of resort; EP is on a scale vastly beyond any theme park resort in the UK, and is probably more comparable to somewhere like Disneyland Paris than Alton Towers.
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That's somewhat the problem, though, 20 years ago the Towers hotels were entirely comparable with those at EP and even Disney. The Alton Towers Hotel was actually a high quality hotel and Splash Landing was added as a more budget-friendly option, but still highly themed and with comparable service.

In 2000, it would have been pretty laughable if you were to try and compare Alton Towers Hotel with the likes of Holiday Inn because it was simply in a totally different league. And yet here we are 20+ years later discussing which has the more budget breakfast items and which operation has sourced a better tasting vat of knock-off golden syrup.
 
Squiggs said:
That's somewhat the problem, though, 20 years ago the Towers hotels were entirely comparable with those at EP and even Disney. The Alton Towers Hotel was actually a high quality hotel and Splash Landing was added as a more budget-friendly option, but still highly themed and with comparable service.

In 2000, it would have been pretty laughable if you were to try and compare Alton Towers Hotel with the likes of Holiday Inn because it was simply in a totally different league. And yet here we are 20+ years later discussing which has the more budget breakfast items and which operation has sourced a better tasting vat of knock-off golden syrup.
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I meant in terms of the raw scale of the resort and the amount of visitor numbers/presumable money they have. In 2019, DLP got 13 million (I think?) guests and Europa Park got 5.7 million guests. Alton Towers got 2.1 million, so their operation simply isn’t on the same scale as EP or DLP.

With regard to the bolded; interestingly, Premier Inn actually had Lyle’s Golden Syrup last time I ate their breakfast, so not a knock off at all! Although we’ve admittedly eaten our own instant porridge pots rather than the hotel breakfast on our last few Premier Inn stays, so that may not be the case any more.
 
Matt N said:
I meant in terms of the raw scale of the resort and the amount of visitor numbers/presumable money they have. In 2019, DLP got 13 million (I think?) guests and Europa Park got 5.7 million guests. Alton Towers got 2.1 million, so their operation simply isn’t on the same scale as EP
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And yet when Alton was pulling 3 million in the mid 90's and seemed to have the world at it's feet, EP wasn't and DLP had not long opened. A pretty damning show of how downgraded Alton has become and how different parks have chosen to go on different journeys and in different directions.
 
Squiggs said:
That's somewhat the problem, though, 20 years ago the Towers hotels were entirely comparable with those at EP and even Disney. The Alton Towers Hotel was actually a high quality hotel and Splash Landing was added as a more budget-friendly option, but still highly themed and with comparable service.

In 2000, it would have been pretty laughable if you were to try and compare Alton Towers Hotel with the likes of Holiday Inn because it was simply in a totally different league. And yet here we are 20+ years later discussing which has the more budget breakfast items and which operation has sourced a better tasting vat of knock-off golden syrup.
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20 years of horrible stagnation of the park, EP, Efteling and Phantasialand is where the park should be right now but they're miles behind.

If they hadn't invested so poorly for so long they'd be smashing 5m+ visitors every year by now.
 
Premier inn breakfast I find actually very good. Last time I stayed in enchanted village the breakfast was very average. Not just in terms of the food but also the service and the chaos in the restaurant (crooked spoon). If I recall the orange juice was watered down and the coffee was undrinkable.
 
We recently had one premier inn breakfast while visiting TP. It was cooked fresh and not in warmer trays and it was actually very nice.

The ones where they bring them out to you rather than you help yourself are generally far superior.

I echo the view of the drinks at altons breakfast. Not nice at all
 
GaryH said:
Premier inn breakfast I find actually very good. Last time I stayed in enchanted village the breakfast was very average. Not just in terms of the food but also the service and the chaos in the restaurant (crooked spoon). If I recall the orange juice was watered down and the coffee was undrinkable.
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Whilst the food was as awful as usual in Crooked Spoon a couple of weeks ago, as was the coffee, it was more to do with the poor quality crap they had to work with rather than the people working there. Every staff member was lovely, polite and very attentive.

It's always the high quality of the staff that has been a consolation at Towers for me these last few years. No matter how early the park closes, no matter how many rides they remove, no matter how much purple paint is slopped over everything in an attempt to hide the underinvestment - the friendliness and dedication of the staff helps make my day.

Staff that get paid very little, have to put up with the usual crap from Karen's by working in a tertiary industry and facing a lot of uncertainty and job insecurity. 90% of the time I get a smile, a warm greeting and get asked how my day is going. That's rarer to come by at Thorpe and Chessington.
 
Matt.GC said:
Whilst the food was as awful as usual in Crooked Spoon a couple of weeks ago, as was the coffee, it was more to do with the poor quality crap they had to work with rather than the people working there. Every staff member was lovely, polite and very attentive.

It's always the high quality of the staff that has been a consolation at Towers for me these last few years. No matter how early the park closes, no matter how many rides they remove, no matter how much purple paint is slopped over everything in an attempt to hide the underinvestment - the friendliness and dedication of the staff helps make my day.

Staff that get paid very little, have to put up with the usual crap from Karen's by working in a tertiary industry and facing a lot of uncertainty and job insecurity. 90% of the time I get a smile, a warm greeting and get asked how my day is going. That's rarer to come by at Thorpe and Chessington.
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Great point Matt. The staff at AT are awesome. I remember my birthday visit in June last year - we went for a pint at the Welcome Inn and we just happened to be the last customers to be served. The barman gave us pass discounts despite not being pass holders purely because we had a chat with him.

Little things like that make a difference.
 
Towers
I had a resort breakfast at opening weekend this season, catered at Flambos. It was appalling. The food was below expectation for the price of the stay, the juice machines were appalling (standard), and it felt manic.

The day after this, I stayed at a local B&B in uttoxeter and had a good quality breakfast cooked to order (for a much lower cost overall!).

Europa
I had a resort breakfast last week. It was all fresh, with a wide variety of continental and hot foods. The juice machines dished out ACTUAL juice and the coffee machines dispensed good quality coffee. The restaurant was well presented and, whilst busy, was not chaotic.

There is absolutely no comparison in my opinion, and I’d rather save my money and skip an ATR stay to fund a trip to Europa.
 
Mediocrity has suffered a downgrade.

More tonight. For now, here's the teaser.
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The fact that this excuse for breakfast is in the same place as our lovely evening meal last night is unbelievable

Dirty cups. Watery juice.

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