I have been the manager at a local hotel for the past 5 years.
When I took the job five years ago, the hotel was filled every single night, and all of us charged top dollar to stay in our establishment.
We would always have the No Vacancy sign flashing in red. As the years have gone by, our occupancy has slowly become less and less. A big reason is due to the fact that the hotel needs a lot of upgrades. A lot of guests complain about the old equipment in our rooms. The biggest complaint has been the HVAC units. All of the HVAC units on the first and second floor are 30 years old. They look like they were installed in 1975. I’ve been telling the owner of the hotel that we need to make an upgrade. I’ve mentioned upgrades every week for the past two years, and the owner is finally listening, next week, we are going to close down for two weeks while a good deal of renovations are being made. All of the rooms are receiving new carpet, furniture, and HVAC units. The lobby is receiving new carpet and furniture as well. We are even going to remarcite the pool and add a slide. All of the new changes should help us stay competitive in the region. There are at least a dozen different hotels in the area and ours is certainly one of the oldest. The new HVAC equipment, carpet, and swimming renovations should help draw people into our lobby doors.