No room service at the inn

By N.B. | WASHINGTON, D.C.

THE New York Hilton Midtown plans to stop offering room service because it is a money-loser, Crain's New York Business reported recently. This has led to much gnashing of teeth by Americans who would prefer to gnash their teeth on overpriced room-service salads. "Combined w/death of minibars, awful for biz travelers," Dan McLaughlin, a conservative writer, tweeted last week. (Gulliver wrote about the decline on minibars in April.)

Those business travellers who can put room-service meals on expenses will no doubt regret the Hilton's move. But in general, the outcry is overblown. It's true, as John Fox, a hotel-industry consultant, told theNew York Times, that many hotels lose money on labour-intensive room service. And the New York Hilton Midtown, while a prominent, 2,000-room hotel, is just one data point. Most high-end hotels still offer room service. And of all the places to be left without room service, midtown Manhattan is possibly the best. "I rarely ever used room service myself, and certainly not in New York, where decent food is never more than a block or two away," writes Kevin Drum, celebrating the Hilton's decision.

Fifty-five people will lose their jobs when the Hilton stops its room service, and some business travellers will avoid the hotel because it doesn't offer the amenity. Scrapping room service might not make sense in a remote area where guests don't have other options. But the Hilton seems likely to get away with it. Hotel rooms in Manhattan are in high demand, and there's little evidence that the Hilton won't be able to fill its rooms, lamb chops or not.

As with minibars, another hotel amenity that loses money because of labour costs, the future of room service will be greatly influenced by progress in automation. If a robot can roll around the hallways attending school as a proxy for a homebound child, how far off can one be that delivers room service? The labour costs seem to be the central issue here. If the Hilton is willing to end room service entirely in order to cut 55 people from its payroll, we shouldn't be surprised if—a few decades from now—some of its competitors replace their delivery staff with automatons. Brave new world, indeed.