TxTravelPro

Specifically hotels that exist today.
I only started staying in fine hotels in the late 90's.
How much did it cost in the 60's, 70's and 80's.
Any reflections on hotels of those eras compared to the same hotels today?

NeoPatrick

Not too much knowledge of "fine hotels", but I can tell you this. In the mid to late 50's we drove from Ohio to Florida every year -- before the interstates were built. We spent two nights on the road getting there -- in family type motels. There were five of us and we got one room with two double beds and a roll away. Usually we paid $12 or $14. I remember one year stopping at three or more places that all wanted $20 and Dad refused. I also remember when the Day's Inn chain started and all rooms were $19. Not too many years later they were all $39.

I can also tell you that in 1968 my partner and I went to NYC for Easter. We stayed at the fairly new Hilton (yes the one on 6th) and we gasped that our room (I think it was called deluxe) was $50 a night! By the way, we flew from Dayton, Ohio I think on TWA, and we splurged to fly first class which cost $10 extra per person (I don't remember what the full price was).

patg

Well, Motel 6 took that name because that's how much they originally charged for a room - $6. This was back in the late sixties.

My folks used to book the same oversized room in Las Vegas for us in the summer - it slept 8! I think it was under $40, but I doubt if the hotel is still there.

One of the historic hotels in Chicago, the Palmer House, charged $3-7 a night one hundred years ago, but that included 3 meals a day. Of course, only the wealthy could afford it. By the 1960's the charge was up to about $20 without the meals.

easytraveler

Like patg, I remember when the Motel 6s first came out and we were pretty incredulous that it only cost $6. They were all new, clean and the price couldn't be beat.

But the price kept going up and the quality kept going down.

Last time I was in a Motel 6, it was somewhere while driving cross-country. Pouring rain and this Motel 6 was the only thing I could see. Got a room, went in, undressed to crash only to find that the sheets stank and didn't look like they had been washed for weeks. Got up, got dressed, staggered back out into the rain and back into the car, kept driving, got tired, slept by the road a bit, then reached the next big town. Found a hotel for over $100 a night and just crashed. Can't even remember where this all happened, all I can remember is how bad that Motel 6 room was! LOL!

trippinkpj

I remember Motel6's being 6. Although that was one person, one bed. I think they added $2.- for each additional person person and $2.- for a 2nd bed.

John

I remember when I was a "road warrior" on the road 15 to 20 days a month. A GOOD family run motel was $20 to $25. Ah yes,the late 60's and the early 1970's

TxTravelPro

No one stayed at the Waldorf? The Essex House? The George IV? Beverly Hills Hotel? Etc...?
I figure lots of us are too young to have actually paid for an expensive hotel in the 70's.
I stayed in motels pretty much exclusively until the 90's.
I remember thinking 18.00 was steep in a resort type area during peak season.
As late as 1997 I balked at paying 55.00 in Portland.

garyt22

In 1968 for my 12th birthday, we paid $29 for a night at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York... we were a middle-class Navy family but I remember my Dad said "I wonder what the poor people are doing?" and "Don't get used to this kid, we'll never be able to afford this again". My dad, rest his soul, would turn over in his grave if he knew what I paid for the Ritz in Maui.....

NeoPatrick

Wow, garyt22, now I do see we were splurging that same year to pay $50 for the New York Hilton!

BTilke

According to an old Life Magazine guide to Paris, back in the 1930s, a night at the Paris Ritz Hotel (inc. breakfast) cost as much as a 10 minute transatlantic phone call.

Having seen some of the roaming charges on our mobile phone, sometimes I think it's not much different nowadays ;-)

I have no experience with European hotels earlier than the 1980s. I do know my foyer in Paris cost me $5 a day in 1982 and that covered a room with a direct view of the Luxembourg Gardens, bath, breakfast and use of kitchen facilities.

In 1985, a double room with bath and breakfast in a perfectly decent 2 star hotel in the 5th arrond. cost us $20 a night. The hotel was sold and has been remodeled into a more upscale boutique hotel costing about 10 times as much per night.

DH and I had planned to honeymoon in Paris in 1987 at the Grand Hotel des Principautes Unies for the double room rate of about $50 a night. The hotel has since become the much more upscale Luxembourg Parc (we had picked this hotel because it was just a few doors down from the foyer I had stayed at for $5 a day).
http://www.terresdecrivains.com/L-ho...cipautes-Unies

suze

I was too young to be staying in hotels in the 60's! My parents wouldn't let me.

Gardyloo

In 1969 I recall the federal per diem rate for Washington DC was $48, of which $12 was allocated to food. You really couldn't find a hotel room for $36, but with two sharing you could stay at someplace fairly decent.

I looked up US State Dept. maximum per diem rates for foreign cities for 1995 and for this month. For example the hotel allowance for London for 1995 was $137; it's currently $327.

For a real hoot, have a look at some restaurant menus from other times at the LA Public Library's website - http://www.lapl.org/resources/en/menu_collection.html (Put in 196* and * in the "Image" line.)

nytraveler

Have been staying in upscale hotels (due to work) since the early 80's. Naturally we usually had special corporate or group rates - but comparing rack rates to similar today, I think they've about kept up with inflation for regular rooms.

What is somewhat new - and more expensive - are the hotels that offer private butlers, suites with private pools etc. Naturally these are more.

easytraveler

Is my memory playing tricks on me or were there guidebooks that said "Europe on $5 a Day"?

pollyvw

I remember in the early to mid-60's a very spoiled friend of mine talked her mother into going to Atlanta to stay in the then new Hyatt Regency...one of the first we knew about with center atrims to the ceiling. I was appalled that her mother would pamper her enough to pay $32 per night just to stay there.

GoTravel

I remember when you could still get a hotel room in the Keys in peak season for $35 per night.

I remember thinking that there was no way I'd ever pay more than $100 per night for a hotel.

azzure

I have a notebook that my parents kept when they took a road trip from LA to Vancouver BC and back in 1947! Their accommodations ranged from $3 to $5 per night, and gasoline was about 25 cents per gallon. They also spent 75 cents to see Mission Santa Barbara, $3 at the Oregon Caves, 50 cents to cross the Golden Gate Bridge, and $1.20 to go see a movie in Vancouver. It's really a nice (and nostalgic) keepsake.

basingstoke2

On our wedding night in 1968 we stayed at the Plaza in NY for $45. We were upgraded to a suite.

MBnancy

Our Honeymoon night in Santa Barbara in 1968, at the beach, was about $14. That same room, now goes, for over $500. Motel 6 in Santa Barbara at that time was $6. It was such a splurge for us I remember. But we stayed at both places a number of times over the years and many others in-between.

ibob

A long the same line as Motel 6 = $6.00 ... I think Super 8 = $8.00 ...