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Hotels General Discussion

You're unlikely to go into any heavy research (or Trip Advisor reading) prior to staying at Alton Towers as for most families it's a secondary thought to the theme park. Most people probably think of going and then think 'oh they have a hotel there, shall we stay for the night?' and go with the website marketing.

I haven't stayed on-site for a few years, but when I did go with my parents as a child/teen, even when we/they watched the product decline massively, from all the perks you got during the 90s/early 00s, to cutbacks upon cutbacks and a worsening breakfast offering, we still stayed on-site despite this. Why? Because of convenience, and I imagine that's the only reason Towers can sustain a sub-par product, it is in the middle of nowhere and some people will take convenience over anything.

Maybe the tables will turn if they continue. Simply if you don't like the product don't book a stay. Personally, I used to find it OK staying at Alton Towers, using The Sun's 50% offer, with that no long gone I just can't justify the prices for what you get.

The self-check-in desks I'm not a fan of but I don't see a huge issue with it as long as there is a manned desk available in addition. In those images from TS it looks as if there is a small desk to the side of these terminals. I recently stayed in a Premier Inn with all self-check-in terminals and no manned desk whatsoever, the machines were a nightmare, absolutely useless and when we did have an issue the only way to speak to a real human was to walk and go up to the bar to speak to a manager.
 
I have stayed for convenience, I think most of the regular “meet” attenders on the forum have basically done that for the last 6-7 years as quality has dropped and price increased exponentially, but 2022 was the year a lot of us decided to give up.

So yeah you can’t blame someone for making that call when people who know the place inside out still tolerated it until the last year.
 
I tolerated it until last year. So I probably was that clown walking in. But even since then, standards have worsened and prices have risen further.

We may never know the full extent of how much this will damage the brand. To many customers, you'll fork out thinking that, although it's made a dent in the credit card, you're going to have a good time. Imagine how ripped off you'll feel afterwards.
 
I had a quick look last night at prices across merlin hotels and a few others to see how they all compared. (This was for 2 adults and 2 kids aged 5 for Easter Saturday 8th for one night) I believe all rooms include breakfast.

Alton Towers (no tickets included)
Stargazing Sheds - £225
ATH and Splash £357
Enchanted Village - £362
CBeebies - £437
Treehouse - £1500

Thorpe Park (2 days tickets included)
Cabins - £389

Chessie (1 day ticket included)
Hotels - £354

Legoland (1 day ticket included)
Castle - £647
Lego hotel - £557

It’s interesting how the Merlin parks vary with theme park tickets, ranging from no park entry to two days park entry for Thorpe.

Elsewhere Blackpool and Efteling won’t allow 1 night to be booked that weekend, you just book minimum of 2

Drayton (1 day ticket included)
Hotel - £230

Heide Park (no tickets)
Hotel - €224
Village - €140

Gardaland (1 day ticket included)
Hotel - €545
Adventure Hotel - €719
Magic Hotel - €645

EP is actually quite booked up, with most hotels only having premium rooms available.

So from all that the best value hotel with tickets is actually Drayton. Chessie is best value merlin as it includes tickets, with the same price at towers but no tickets there. Lego is by far the dearest of the UK parks for standard rooms.
 
Apologies for not bringing much new to the conversation here but genuinely shocked by this.
A7FB97C9-E3DA-486A-8569-3D5D69CF4AD2.png
This same day last year cost me around £180 (booked in September as well!) and now it’s over double the price with seemingly no Merlin discount? It’s so ridiculous that it feels like a joke.

Unlike others from this forum I’ve had pretty positive experiences staying in recent years but this is absolutely ludicrous for a single night. Surely this is going to price large swathes of people from staying over at Scarefest? This combined with the dreadful transport links to Towers if you don’t drive may just stop people from visiting altogether. Last few rooms remaining though so guess it makes no difference lol
 
Max said:
Unlike others from this forum I’ve had pretty positive experiences staying in recent years but this is absolutely ludicrous for a single night. Surely this is going to price large swathes of people from staying over at Scarefest? This combined with the dreadful transport links to Towers if you don’t drive may just stop people from visiting altogether. Last few rooms remaining though so guess it makes no difference lol
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Me too, I enjoy whenever I am on-site (always in the Enchanted Village), but this price really seems like Merlin are pushing the boundaries of what they can get away with. This is what around £400 a night would give you in EP:
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Whilst these prices are disgusting and a lot of us know that the quality just isn’t there to justify them, you’ve got to remember that every year there’s a fresh bunch of thousands of families with young children who think, “hey, let’s have a couple of nights on resort for the first time - it’s expensive but it’ll be magical for the kids and it looks a bit like a mini Disneyland in the U.K.”.

They then turn up, realise it’s awful and don’t stay again.

Then next year there’s a new batch of families who give it a chance.

But the prices are ludicrous for what we as enthusiasts know you’re getting and everything about the hotels from the quality of F&B, the state of the rooms, the lack of amenities, the service levels and of course the price of EVERYTHING is shocking.

But with a good annual churn of first time guests, maybe Merlin just don’t care?
 
When will they run out of suckers though? Maybe not this year, maybe not the next. But if they keep doing this they will eventually. I think there's a DFS thing going on here. Maybe they've whacked in outrageous prices to see how many suckers they can con and then implement a fake "sale". Look at the "Last few rooms remaining" nonsense, put on the site to panic you into getting those credit card details tapped in. I think it's said that every time I've ever booked.
 
I think the point that @Matt.GC makes is a good one.

Pursuing first time guests is all well and good, but there’s only a finite pool of people who will ever visit Alton Towers for the first time, particularly if existing visitors do not have good things to say about the product.

If the reviews take a nosedive into oblivion, word will get around, and people will cotton on eventually, particularly in the age of social media where unofficial word spreads like wildfire. If and when that happens, Alton Towers won’t have new visitors or returning visitors to rely on, which is a complete lose lose situation.

Of course it’s important to attract new people; ultimately, attracting new guests is important for the long term growth of the business. However, I feel that making sure that these new guests turn into returning ones is equally important for two reasons:
  1. From a business standpoint, more guests equals more money. If you have a captive audience who are happy with your product and willing to return alongside a steady flow of new guests, that means greater financial returns for less effort, and surely every business wants that?
  2. If and when the pool of new guests does eventually dry up, the business still has a considerable captive audience of “regulars” and returning visitors to keep it afloat.
 
Sorry, but very blunt economics here.
The hotels are still packed in the school holidays...
The group neglect the hotels with limited resources and understaffing for, say, a decade, saving, say, a million a year.
Over ten years, that is ten million more for shareholders, with inflated room costs costing nothing in extra resources.
Then, after the years of negative reviews, and eventual reduction in hotel visitors, they do "Towers Loving Care" on the resort, and do up the hotels, with their usual "look how fantastic we are, doing the place up for you all".
 
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But did Towers Loving Care really do much to improve things? The reviews had been continually sliding down for a long time prior to that and continued to do so after.

It wouldn’t surprise me if the hotel prices have had to jump up so much because the actual additional spend by guests on resort has dropped so much thanks to the poor product offered:
  • Secret Garden 3 course meal? Well there weren’t even any starters available at one point (is that the case now?), the service was slow as hell - so just grab a main out of necessity and just be out of there. There’s potentially £50+ gone.
  • Few drinks in the bar? Said bar was filthy and queuing for 10 minutes a round means people just grab an early night instead. There’s another £50+ gone.
  • Spending a few more quid while at the theme park? Let’s not bother because I feel like I’ve had my wallet absolutely rinsed as it is.
  • Families returning for a free/discounted stay after the shambles of their last one with multiple issues. The resort are making absolutely nothing from them as a result.
Of course it’s “blunt economics”, but is it sustainable? And surely as fans of the resort we should be giving damn about this regardless? Sure the hotels are busy at peak periods out of necessity for some guests, but is it encouraging them to return? Those return trips are needed in off peak periods, which judging from my visits in recent years and the fact that some hotels are closing altogether in those periods, appear to be falling off a cliff.

Is a stay at the resort resulting in guests promoting the resort (rating their experience a 9 or a 10) to their friends and family? Or is it turning them into detractors (rating their stay a 0-6), actively encouraging them not to bother? It’s why the resort are so obsessed with those KPI kiosks, and why I always say fill them in over anything else. An increasing number of guests who are stating they’ll actively tell people not to visit has a far higher effect than any advertising campaign ever could.
 
If I was asked by someone outside of the theme park community about whether they should stay in the Alton Towers hotels, right now I would be telling them to not bother. The idea of paying nearly £400 for a room in Splash Landings is eye watering and the level of service across the hotels does not even come close to matching this extremely premium price point.

It is sad, as even when not at their best staying at the hotels can be good fun.
 
Wonder what the actual cost price is for a room at the hotel for Alton towers - £50 maybe? Factoring in heating, lighting, cleaning staff etc.
 
GaryH said:
Wonder what the actual cost price is for a room at the hotel for Alton towers - £50 maybe? Factoring in heating, lighting, cleaning staff etc.
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Probably more than that thanks to the use of agency staff at the moment. Of course I know the hospitality industry is struggling to recruit and accept there was a short term "knee jerk" need to use agencies to keep the cogs turning. But, the resort reopened post covid long ago now, yet I've seen little in terms of changes to encourage people into those roles. In the case of the now Aramark positions, the incentive to work there for young people - the very people they need to work those unsociable hours, has been reduced thanks to the drop in pay.
 
Yup agency staff is the quick fix, which in the short term was fine. The agency handled the recruitment (they’d already have staff on the books ready to go) and in general they should have already had food hygiene training and service experience , so are ready to work straight away or at least in quicker time than direct recruitment.

But we’re now so far along from both Brexit and Covid that there should’ve been some sort of long term plan to wean themselves off relying on them so much. It wouldn’t happen overnight of course, but at least there’d be a path to utilising them less. As discussed on the Aramark topic though, I don’t see anything that’s made the roles more attractive to those in the area.
 
Then couple that with the pretty inaccessible location of the park to anyone who doesn’t drive, and the limited workforce in the immediate local vicinity (E.G. Leek, Stoke or Ashbourne) and you’ve got a very tricky staffing situation.

You do have to wonder how much of a difference loosing staff accommodation like The Mills has had on this (for the resort as a whole), when you could pile 4 staff in one car with only one of them needing to drive, or run frequent bus services to a single location.

Thorpe, Chessington and Lego probably don’t experience this to the same extent, having access to plenty of young people looking for work within easy reach. Pay low but have confidence the supply will always be there. The same model just isn’t viable for Towers.
 
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