Apparently no one wants a hotel room that smells of smoke—and that includes smokers, according to hotel industry executives. And hotels are just as happy to not have the extra expense of cleaning and maintaining rooms that allow smoking.
More and more hotels have gone completely ‘no-smoke’ including in public areas, apparently without any great kickback from the diminishing ranks of smokers, who have gotten used to much of their world being off-limits anyway.
Among the chains that are moving in that direction are Choice Hotels, which will have its 1800 Comfort Inns and Comfort Suites non-smoking by the end of this year; Wyndham’s full-service brands (Dolce, Wyndham Grand, Wyndham Hotels) are smoke-free in North America; Hilton’s two newest brands, Canopy and Tru are no-smoking brand-wide, and nearly all of Carlson Rezidor Group’s hotels in the America are signed on.
Hotels are happy about the change for economic reasons as well. Smoking rooms take more staff time because they need more ventilation, more cleaning of linens and furniture, constant changes of filters in the ventilation system and more expense for replacing or repairing items damaged by burns and smoke. In some cases, rooms have to be taken out of inventory for an extra day for cleaning.
Incidentally, hotels are increasingly following airlines in banning so-called e-cigarettes as well. Kate Ashton of Wyndham says “We find many people’s perception of smoking, regardless of whether it’s an actual cigarette or an e-cigarette, tends to be the same. Once you smoke in a public space, other people are exposed to whatever you’re putting into the air.”
