The latest trends in guestrooms mostly involve taking things away.
Wall-to-wall carpet? Too hard to keep clean. Bathtubs are going bye-bye. Desks are getting ditched (although the outcry from business travelers may bring them back.) Even nightstand Bibles are getting harder to find.
But what about the hotel alarm clock? Some chains think it’s time to remove them from guest rooms too. Walt Disney World took the alarm clocks out of its hotel rooms in 2016, replacing them with power/USB charging hubs. Guests still want their clocks, however — they just want them to work a little better.
Guests’ biggest gripes about the hotel alarm clock
Hotel guests love to complain about the humble little box with the glowing red numbers for one main reason: It interrupts their sleep. We all know how hard it is to sleep when you’re traveling, especially when you’ve just arrived at your destination. It’s not just jet lag! Scientists have documented a phenomenon called the “first night effect,” in which people remain wakeful when they’re spending the night in an unfamiliar place. Recent research suggests that “maybe our first night in a new place is disturbed because half our brain is pulling an extra shift as a night watchman,” The Atlantic reports.
For that reason, the alarm clock can feel like an enemy of sleep. One common problem: the numbers glow too brightly. “Between the digital clock's light, the red 'eye' on the TV, the glow from the smoke alarm, and the beam through the peephole, it is never dark in a hotel room, even if by some miracle the curtains close completely,” observes one commenter.
Sometimes the alarm beeps at 4 a.m., thanks to a previous guest. Sometimes the time is inaccurate, and it’s just too hard to correct. Another concern is competition for power —the clock claims a precious outlet that guests might prefer to use to charge their phones.
What do guests really want from their hotel alarm clock?
Despite their complaints, guests don’t want hotel alarm clocks to go away. While millennial travelers may prefer using the clock and alarm functions on their phones, boomers and older travelers do use the hotel clock. They just want it to answer their needs. That means they want an alarm clock with a USB charging port, to charge devices on the nightstand. They want a dimmer function, to avoid the sleep-interrupting glow. Battery backup helps avoid the wrong-time or missed-alarm problem.
Most of all, the clock should be easy for anyone to use. Innkeeper Erika Hall told The Washington Post she replaced the alarm clocks at the Abbey’s Lantern Hill Inn with “super simple” clocks she found at Ikea. “If someone can’t figure this one out,” she said, “they probably shouldn’t be traveling on their own.”
The future of alarm clocks in guest rooms
How will hotel alarm clocks continue to evolve?
- Wellness features: For hotel properties that make wellness a brand pillar, it makes sense to offer alarm clocks that promote healthy sleep — like those with white noise/sound machine features. Dr. Deepak Chopra recommends travelers use a dawn-simulating alarm clock, which gradually brightens the room until they wake up naturally.
- Multi-purpose tablets: The citizenM boutique hotel chain allows guests to set their own customized wake-up call with a tablet called a MoonPad, which also can adjust the blinds, the temperature and the color of the mood lighting.
- Wireless charging: The next level of convenience is alarm clocks that include wireless charging of devices. Just place your phone or other device on a special pad, and it recharges. Paul Golden, VP of market development for the nonprofit Wireless Power Consortium, says more than 1 billion devices that can charge wirelessly will be in use by 2020. Wireless charging alarm clocks are an easy way to add this functionality to guest rooms, he says, but they must be Qi-certified to avoid the risk of fires or injuries to guests.
What are you adding to — or taking away from — your guest rooms? ? Tell us about it and we may feature your hotel in a future post.
