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Break Out of Chains
The Travel Critic · June 29, 1998

It wasn't the long hotel check-in lines or the day-old danishes that used to make Ed Young dread every trip.

What really got to him was the sterile rooms. "They all looked the same, and what do you do in there? You sit there and watch television," says Young, a regional operations manager for an electronics company in Albuquerque, New Mexico. "There's nothing else to do."

But that changed earlier this year, when his employer arranged a three-day sabbatical at The Britannia & W. E. Mauger Estate, an eight-room Victorian inn near downtown Albuquerque. Young says he liked the intimate atmosphere, the home-cooked cuisine, and the friendly staff members who always called him by name. He could lounge around the living room or raid the refrigerator whenever he wanted to, and there were always plenty of people to talk with.

"Now I only stay at a chain hotel when I have to," he says.

The latest figures compiled by the Professional Association Of Innkeepers International, a Santa Barbara, Calif., trade organization for bed and breakfast owners, suggests he's not alone. In urban areas such as downtown Albuquerque, about a quarter of the guests are corporate travelers, according to the group. In rural areas, it's close to 10 percent.

And the number of business travelers like Young who are dumping their hotel in favor of a B&B is creeping up. From 1994 to 1996, the last year for which figures were available, the number of road warriors staying at an inn edged up by about one percent.

"The growth is not dramatic, but it's steady," says Pat Hardy, co-executive director for the Professional Association Of Innkeepers International.

She says travelers are tired of waking up and not knowing what city they're in. They want to stay somewhere with a personal touch.

That was the appeal for Brad Ward, a senior vice president for an Atlanta mutual fund company. The Marriott platinum member snubs the chain hotel whenever he's in Jackson, Miss., in favor the Fairview Inn, a two-and-a-half story, eight-room Colonial Revival bed and breakfast.

"I'm really down on Marriott," complains Ward. "They don't live up to my expectations as far as my platinum status goes. They give me the same room that anyone else gets who comes in off the street. It's not special anymore."

Responds Marriott spokesman Gordon Lambourne: "That's highly unlikely." How so? Platinum members are practically treated like royalty, to hear Lambourne describe it. "We go the extra mile to take care of them," he says. "They're our VIP customers."

Perks include a guaranteed reservation with a 48-hour notice, automatic upgrade to a suite, in-room amenities like bottles of wine and fruit baskets. You get the picture.

So what, says Ward. To him, The Fairview feels like coming home. "The people are nice, they've got the place decorated the way I would decorate my house, and the food is terrific," he raves.

Chuck Ross, a vice president with lodging consultants Smith Travel Research in Hendersonville, Tenn., says while frequent travelers aren't exactly abandoning their hotels in droves, the reasons for the growth in the corporate travel sector are understandable. Many guests, he says, are tired of the substandard hospitality that hotel chains are dishing out.

As a frequent traveler myself, I was dubious of small inns until I visited one several years ago. On a business trip to Aspen, Colo., one January, I found my hotel overbooked. I ended up at the Sardy House, a 20-room Victorian bed and breakfast built in 1892.

The innkeeper greeted me by name at the front door and never forgot it. That evening, I dined next to the fireplace. I learned about the fascinating history of the Sardy house, which at one point was Aspen's mortuary. In short, I was pleasantly surprised.

Now I stay at a bed and breakfast whenever it's possible. But that's not always a reasonable or sensible thing to do. You sacrifice a lot of privacy when you stay at an inn, for one. When your host gives you a cheerful and loud greeting by name every morning, it goes without saying that the atmosphere isn't exactly conducive to, say, negotiating a confidential business deal.

At a hotel you can lock your room door and shut out the world. At a bed and breakfast, no can do.

I stayed in a small inn once where the beautiful hardwood floors also creaked loudly when anyone walked across them, and where I heard every other word the honeymooning couple next door said to each other on their wedding night. I also got to know the house cat up close and personal-she stood vigil outside my door after nailing me as a generous source of food and pets.

Still, these are minor inconveniences in the overall scheme of things. Given the choice of tolerating the occasional quirkiness of a B&B and staying in a shrink-wrapped box, the inns have it.

Christopher Elliott is a travel commentator and author of A Bridge to Nowhere: A Year in the Florida Keys. All e-mailed questions may be edited, condensed or republished at the site's discretion.