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Chain Hotels Pump up the Volume

Where: United States

The big chains try to compete with the boutique hotels on lobby music, but is it just bad tunes played louder?

Yesterday, USA Today ran a story titled Hotels are alive with sound of (hip) music. We were all ears. We often mention the music playing in a certain hotel because it's an important component for the senses. There's no quicker way for a hotel to turn off discerning guests than to subject them to a barrage of Kenny G and Celine Dion at check-in or at the bar.

Unfortunately, the trend article did not make us feel any more optimistic that the big chains "get it." What they are doing is a) turning up the volume and b) standardizing the music across the chain, adjusted by time of day. In other words, you'll just hear louder Kenny G and you'll hear it every time you stay.

Traditionally, the chains let hotel managers pick their own music, creating something of a musical mishmash. Hyatt and Omni have contracted with Muzak, the music programming company, for centralized song lists. Muzak transmits songs to hotels via satellite.

At Marriott, which is also working with a music programmer, 80% of the music will be from the centralized play list, and hotels can individually select the rest."

This is why the corporate blandies will never match the feel of staying in a boutique hotel or even a cheap guesthouse overseas. In those places, a music-savvy owner or manager who is attuned to the guests will play the kind of tunes that work for that crowd, music that enhances the atmosphere. It'll include what's new and happening, not what was was popular 20 years ago and now makes you cringe.

So for now, if you're staying at a big U.S. chain hotel, keep carrying that iPod to drown out the (louder) Muzak.

Image via Siskind/Flickr

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· Hotels are alive with the sound of (hip) music [USA Today]