THE room at the Premier Hotel
in Times Square looked like any other. But before I stepped inside, the
hotel had gone to extraordinary lengths to purify it. In a seven-step
process to cut down on bacteria, pollen, dust, dust mites and other
possible irritants, everything in the room, from the curtains to the
carpeting to the air-conditioning units, was cleaned and treated with
an antimicrobial agent that attacks bacteria.
A cartridge containing tea tree oil, a natural antiseptic and
disinfectant, was installed in the heating and cooling unit. The room
underwent a four-hour ozone shock treatment to kill any remaining
living organisms and zap associated odors. A mist was applied to
surfaces to make it difficult for bacteria to grow. Mattresses and
pillowcases were covered with dust-mite protectors.
I had entered what Pure Solutions NA, a company hired by the Premier, calls its Pure Room.
This much cleanliness might seem a bit neurotic. But it’s not enough
anymore for hotels seeking health-conscious patrons to serve organic
cuisine and offer all-natural bath products. As more hotels try to set
themselves apart, a new amenity is emerging: the hypoallergenic hotel
room.
The concept isn’t aimed just at the allergic, but also at guests who
are concerned with what might be called the ick factor. “The whole
thing is geared toward ‘What about the guy before me?’ ” said Tom
Kammerer, a managing director at Thayer Lodging, a private hotel real
estate investment firm in
Annapolis,
Md. Thayer Lodging, like the Premier, is working with Pure Solutions,
based in Cheektowaga, N.Y. Thayer is converting about 10 percent of the
rooms at each of its 13 hotels into Pure rooms by the end of this year.
“That’s why we have encasements over our pillows and mattresses. The
natural human body sheds 150,000 cells a day. After a year or so it
gets — you know. We’re trying to cut down on breathing in other
people’s stuff.”
From the Fairmont Vancouver Airport hotel to the Mandarin Oriental in
Miami,
hotels are doing everything from replacing feather duvets to installing
air purifiers in guest rooms. Some are ripping out carpets and drapes,
which tend to harbor dust and trap odors, and replacing them with
smooth surfaces. Others are making less visible changes, outfitting
pillows and mattresses with liners that help contain dust mites and
swabbing phones, doorknobs and other surfaces with antimicrobial
agents.
Hilton and Millennium Hotels, each of which is testing the concept
in a few hotels, said they might consider expanding it to more
properties depending on demand. NYLO Hotels, a new brand scheduled to
open its first hotel in Plano, Tex., in November, plans to offer at
least one floor of allergy-friendly rooms at each of its locations.
Hotels say it’s not uncommon to get special requests from guests
with allergies. “We get a lot of requests for special blankets, special
pillows, no spray in the rooms,” said Maureen O’Brien, director of
sales at the Premier, a Millennium Hotel, which spent $30,000 to
convert three floors to Pure rooms this year. The hotel is also using a
line of natural bath products in those rooms for guests with sensitive
skin and noses.
But mostly, hotels see the creation of super-clean rooms as a way to
gain an edge now that amenities like plush beds and flat-screen TVs
have often become standard.
Thayer Lodging, unlike the Premier, is charging a 5 to 10 percent
premium for Pure rooms — at hotels including Marriotts, Hilton
Doubletrees and Wyndhams. “If all you’ve got is good service, and ‘Gee,
my room was clean’ — well, you kind of expect that today,” Mr. Kammerer
said. “We’re looking for things in our hotels that are extraordinary
and give you a wow factor.”
I found the Pure room at the Premier hard to distinguish from a
regular room until the room division director picked up the couch to
reveal a large metal air filtration unit underneath. The room did have
a distinctly fresh feeling, but it was difficult to tell whether that
was from the air quality or just the result of a room temperature that
was cooler than that of the hallway.
Some guests who battle allergies say there is a distinct difference.
“I go to hotels all the time, and I’m allergic to everything in the
whole room,” said Tim Dagit, a real estate developer from
Philadelphia
who has special air filters in his home to help manage his allergies.
On a typical trip, Mr. Dagit said, he takes medication “to deal with
excess dander and dust in the air” and spends about two hours tracking
someone down to replace any down pillows and comforters in the room
with something that doesn’t provoke his allergies. “It’s a total
nightmare,” he said. “Every hotel I go to, be it the Ritz-Carlton or
the Motel 6, same problem.”
That’s why Mr. Dagit was surprised when he checked into the
Annapolis Marriott Waterfront in Annapolis, Md., last summer and was
given a Pure room. “I slept great,” he said. “I had no problems. I was
thrilled about it.” The $20 extra he was charged for the room was well
worth it, he said. “Frankly,” he added, “I would have paid more.”
HOTELS say the demand is certainly there. In the first two months
after the Fairmont Waterfront in Vancouver introduced a “featherless
floor” in 2005, it was 87 percent full, the hotel said, compared with
70 percent occupancy in the hotel overall. The Hilton Chicago O’Hare
Airport hotel was so pleased with the demand for two Enviro-Rooms
created by Environmental Technology Solutions in Glen Ellyn, Ill., that
it opened 11 more earlier this month.
Unlike Pure Solutions, which treats the existing hotel room,
Environmental Technology Solutions renovates the space to create its
Enviro-Rooms. Rugs are ripped out and replaced with hardwood floors,
and curtains with wooden blinds, and the entire room, from the
all-cotton linens on the bed to the special porous wallpaper, is
designed with allergen-sensitive guests in mind.
There is no standard for what qualifies a room as hypoallergenic.
Neither company claims its rooms are allergen-free. Pure Solutions
advertises its Pure Room as “allergy-friendly,” while Environmental
Technology Solutions says its Enviro-Room “reduces airborne and surface
particulates.”
Allergy experts say most of the methods the hotel rooms are using,
like the special pillow covers and rug removal, are in line with what
might be recommended to parents of an asthmatic child. But some, like
removing feather pillows or using tea tree oil, said Robert G.
Hamilton, an allergy specialist and professor of medicine at
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, will have “little impact in addressing the allergen issue.”
More hotels may be creating hypoallergenic hotel rooms in the future. In
Connecticut,
Representative Claire Janowski introduced a bill in this year’s General
Assembly session to require hotels to offer allergy-friendly rooms. It
was stalled this year, but she plans to propose it again in 2008.
