When traveling, many people see a hotel as a warm bed to sleep in and a cozy, quiet room to allow them to reminisce on the amazing sights they’ve seen that day. Others see a hub; the place they will return to each night will be their base, similar to our homes.
No matter which type of customer you get, they’ll be searching for an affordable room with everything they need. However, you may be able to entice more people to your business by incorporating a few extra things, otherwise known as amenities.
This article will explain what amenities are and list a few examples to help inspire you to consider which ones you’d like to incorporate. From luggage storage options to offering free surprises, there are a lot of options available to you, but let’s start with a definition.
What are Hotel Amenities?
Hotel amenities are the extra offerings some hotels provide. While every hotel must offer clean and safe rooms and bathrooms to guests, they can also offer an array of other things to attract more customers.
For example, a hotel located in a warm, sunny place may have a pool for guests to cool down in. While some extra offerings, such as a pool, would definitely attract more people, it’s likely that you can’t make such a massive change to your property, so we’ll instead focus on smaller amenities that are offered.
Some examples of these smaller amenities include high-quality or free wifi, room service, and laundry services. The more amenities you offer, the more attractive your hotel becomes to tourists, travelers, and businesses.
These offerings are obvious, however, and you may have considered a few of them already. As we continue, we’ll explore a few of the options that you may not have considered before. Case in point: luggage storage.
Why Offer Free Items?
You likely already offer small free items already like soaps or robes, so why not expand that offering a bit more? There are many reasons why offering complimentary items could improve your business, and it would be relatively easy to do, too.
When a new reservation is made, you could take the basic information you have and create a small gift basket to sit in their room. This basket could include a wide range of items depending on who’s staying and why.
For a businessperson renting a room for work purposes, you could offer items such as pens, pencils, notepads, paper, and even a small treat such as a snack or candy to help ease their trip. If a family with children books a room, the basket could contain family games, snacks, candy, or even small toys for the children to enjoy. If you allow pets in your establishment, you could do something similar for them as well—the possibilities here are numerous and exciting.
If you think personalized gifts are too much to offer, consider a basket full of local snacks, treats, pamphlets, and menus instead. Maps could help tourists navigate, and any offerings from local establishments could encourage them to visit and try the other offerings found at the local establishments. While these free items may seem trivial to you, they may excite your guests enough to entice them to book a room again.
Why Offer Luggage Storage?
For some travelers who plan to stay in or near the city they’re staying in, simply storing their luggage in their hotel room will suffice. Others who may have shorter reservations or who’d prefer to be a bit more cautious will store their belongings with a luggage storage facility.
These locations have a wide range of benefits, from being inexpensive to allowing travelers more freedom. If you have the space, you could offer this service at your hotel and charge a small fee for those who wish to take advantage of it.
A massive benefit to doing this is that you could potentially offer this service even to tourists who aren’t staying at your hotel. This would increase your business, make it easier to advertise yourself, and may even bring in new customers. If you don’t have the extra room to offer these services on-site, you could team up with a local luggage storage company.
What this arrangement may look like will vary, but it may be enticing to the luggage storage company as it would provide a wide range of benefits to both parties. At the bare minimum, knowing where the nearest luggage storage facilities are and offering your guests directions and information about them will make their trip easier. It may even encourage them to stay at your business in the future.
What About Offering Bicycles?
While some travelers may be content with traveling in vehicles from one destination to another or are more than happy to walk around, others prefer to ride on bicycles.
Traveling with them can be tedious, difficult, and risky, though, so many hotels offer rentable bicycles. Some guests won’t utilize them, but you’ll become more enticing to other people if you have some on offer. This may include regular bikes, e-bikes, or a combination of both. The only concern with e-bikes is that you’d need somewhere to charge them in between rides.
You could charge either per day or per hour and could offer extra amenities with this amenity. For example, you could charge a daily fee and offer the renter a helmet, bike lock, and water bottle. While these extra items aren’t necessary, it would make renting your bikes more alluring to your guests.
You could also offer pamphlets and recommendations to the best places to ride, like bicycle trails, and even suggest some bike-friendly places to stop and shop or grab a bite to eat. Offering maps and directions to certain locations could also improve the bike rental’s appeal and may help you create a loyal customer base.
Increasing Bookings With Great Amenities
While offering amenities is by no means necessary, it can prove beneficial to increasing your total bookings. While we discussed just a few of the things you could offer above, there are a lot more we couldn’t cover.
You may also have even more unique opportunities on what you can offer based on what businesses or tourist sites are nearby. Remember, the more you offer, the more you’ll stand out and the more business you’ll see.