Thrifty Thursday - Selecting a Hotel

Today's bit of thriftiness doesn't have anything to do with crafting (although I did manage to craft some allergy-free body scrub in the process that led to this post). Last weekend a severe storm wiped through the area leaving my family without power. My sons were camping and thankfully missed the brunt of the storms. By the time I picked them up on Sunday morning, I was ready for air conditioning and a hot shower. And having been away from civilization for a week, they were ready for the more important things afforded by modern life -- fast food and cable television.

My husband agreed that a night in a hotel sounded blissful so we visited Hotels-dot-com and perused the available choices. And boy were there a lot of choices! My favorite way to look is by price, lowest to highest. There were some seedy, one-star hotels listed for dirt cheap prices that made our budget look like something more closely associated with surnames like Vanderbilt or Rockefeller. And then there were some -- like a B&B located in horse country for nearly $400 a night -- that made us visibly cringe.


That's when we began looking at what the different establishments offered to get the best deal. Here are the top 3 amenities we considered before making a final selection.

• The Swimming Pool
  Cable television, even with movie channels, can only entertain teens for so long. Electronic gadgets are a great time waster but having something readily available that the boys can't get at home always helps. We've stayed in hotels that had things like free Foosball, complementary family events, and guest passes that offered heavy discounted or even free admission to local area attractions. In this case, we were only staying one night so the pool was enough of an attraction in itself.
• Free WiFi
  Believe it or not, some hotels still charge for the privilege of having this service in each room. Others only offer it in the business or other public access centers, like the lobby. Whereas some don't offer it at all! Fortunately ours did, and connecting was as quick as two clicks of the mouse. Thanks to the complementary WiFi, the boys could not only connect their gadgets to the Internet for amusement after the pool closed, but more importantly I could keep working which helped pay for the room.
  
  
• The Continental Breakfast
  This was the most important factor. I'm talking about traveling with teenage boys -- which means the food budget isn't cheap! We usually have pizza delivered for dinner, a novelty we don't get in the rural area where we live, and usually the welcome package in the hotel room has restaurant fliers offering coupons with special deals and discounts for hotel guests. Any time that we can get discounted food is a major plus, but free is even better, which is why we love continental breakfasts. However, if the hotel offers little more than this:
  
  
  
  
  then it's guaranteed that we'll be stopping to get a pre-lunch snack to tide the boys over. Donuts on their own aren't really that filling. Even bagels with cream cheese are better, but still don't really do the trick on their own. Our hotel offered something more like what you see in this photo.
  
  
  In addition to two kinds of juice, milk, and coffee to drink, the food menu included yogurt, fresh fruit, cereal, sausage, eggs, and make-your-own waffles. The boys spent about an hour alone eating breakfast, and I happily watched the savings pile up with every bite they took.

Our hotel also offered the uber-cozy memory foam mattress, which was not as nice as Hampton Inn's Cloud Nine Mattress but still nicer than what we have at home. The staff was first-rate, and the lady at the front desk went on and on about what handsome, polite young men my sons are. No matter what complementary perks the hotel offers, compliments still go a really long way especially when they're to a parent about their kids.

While we spent more than what we originally budgeted for a hotel room, what we saved in food and attractions more than made up the difference. The next time your family is facing a hotel stay, don't just settle on the one with the lowest price. Sometimes a room priced in the mid-range section, especially if it has a high rating from past guests.

What are your favorite hotel amenities? What do you look for when searching for a hotel room? How important is price versus reputation? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below. Thanks for stopping by!