clinton plaza not closed

[Flashermac]

The Living Room was simply closed for the holiday, I believe. But with so much of Clinton already gone, Graham says he plans to turn TLR eventually into just a beer bar. Supposedly, he has another location picked out for his new bar. Assorted stories on what is supposed to go up at the former Clinton. It may be a hotel, may be office space. Whatever it is, it is hardly needed.

 

[CondomKing]

The four street side establishments are all open for business. That would include The Living Room, Delifrance, Family Mart and the large corner beerbar (I don't know the name).

 

Beyond the barricades is another story. Yesterday I removed the last of the condom machines from what used to be the Candy Bar and had to climb over rubble to get to it. Demolition has begun.

[Guest]

I it always very sad, when returning and seeing more and more places and bars being closed/ shut down.

 

Let's hope, the BKK nightlife will last for long on an acceptable level

[Flashermac]

The Clinton Plaza bars knew they were on borrowed time -- the construction plans for the site had long been in the works. But I don't think the bar owners expected the construction to begin as soon as it did. They thought they'd have a few more years at least.

[SingaporeSteve]

Mentors = You have hit upon a very important point is assessing how good a deal you think your buying when staying in a luxury hotel.

 

The simple fact is that an empty room generates no revenue and is a wasted commodity after say 8.00PM in hotels minds. The key driver for all the big hotel chains such as Sofitel, Sheraton, JW Marriott is that they have proven expereince of filling those rooms and hence maximise the profits for the owner of the hotel. These big companies very rarely own the hotel, or indeed have any equity involved. Its some other company or family that own the land and building. Therefore maximising occupancy and the average room rate are critical in how these management companies get paid. The higher the profit, the more they earn.

 

Big international Hotels have a system similar to airlines that assess the potential of selling all their rooms for the optimal profit level and then calulating how many rooms they can discount to achieve full or desired occupancy. Therefore if you walk into a Marriott they will charge you the 'walk in or rack rate' price in most cases. However there may be many agents that can get you a better rate as they are offered different rates, which the hotels provide only a limited allocation of rooms. The end result is that they get high occupancy with a whole host of guests paying different rates, some low, some at corporate rates and a couple at full rate.

 

To the point Peter made, Christmas is actually a good time to stay in somewhere like the Landmark, Sheraton etc because they have no business travellers, therefore they will allow their agents to book more rooms to take up the slack. They are well aware that they will have no business travellers. You will probably find these good deals on numerous web sites. After all the hotel is not going to change its service offering for a week of low occupancy, so its common sense to discount the rate to increase the occupancy - albeit not to the price levels offered by smaller less luxurious hotels. Part of this in maketing the fact that the buyer (you and I) think we are getting a great deal (e.g 40% discount) - yet would you ever pay the full rate? I certainly would not.

 

So, in terms of what does it mean to us punters - yes we can get good rates in these hotels but generally you need to book it early and not directly with the hotel but with an agent or an Internet site.

 

Cheers