Notes From The Road- St. Louis

Checked into another Hampton Inn. The room looks exactly like the room in Liberty, Kansas with one small exception--the coffee pot.  The Kansas Hampton Inn had the standard, four-cup coffee pot that has become a feature of most hotel rooms.

Here in St.Louis, the Hampton Inn is featuring the CV1(TM) by Hamilton Beach.  The CV1 makes one cup of coffee at a time. The filter is packaged with a removable brew basket and you use a paper cup instead of ceramic mug.

My initial reaction was the hotel was trying to save money. However, according to their instructions, the reason why my room was equipped with the CV1 is in response to travelers' concerns.

The CV1 eliminates concerns about the cleanliness of traditional guestroom coffee pots, brew baskets, and coffee mugs. It's the most sanitary way we know to provide you with a great cup of coffee in the comfort of your room.

Who knew? I've been drinking out of coffee pots and coffee mugs for years and not once, did it occur to me to be concerned about the cleanliness of the brew basket.

Of course, I will sit on a hotel bedspread and I do walk on the carpet barefoot. I do know lots of people who would never, ever, ever walk barefoot on hotel carpet. So yes, I guess I am a somewhat reckless and dangerous traveler.

But somehow this concern over brew baskets did seem like a bit of a stretch. I simply can't imagine a focus group with travelers sitting around saying they avoid making a cup of coffee in their room because they are worried about the germs that could be living in the brew basket.

If I were to believe the instruction sheet I should be thanking Hampton Inns for making me drink out of a paper cup that doesn't even make an 8 oz cup of coffee.

Turns out when Hamilton Beach was promoting the CV1 to hotels they had a different message.

According to an article in the November 2002 issue of Lodging Hospitality the benefit of the product is cost savings  The company claims since there are no glass carafes and mugs to be cleaned, labor costs are reduced by 90%. The article also says that it uses less electricity than the standard four-cup pot.

I understand the need to reduce costs. While I would prefer to have a four-cup pot of coffee I will not think less of the Hampton Inns for using this more economical coffee maker.

I would prefer to have someone else pump my gas, but unless I'm in New Jersey I'm going to have to do that by myself too.

So, I'll live with the CV1--just don't try to tell me the reason you're doing it is to assuage my concerns over cleanliness when its real benefit is cost savings. That makes me cranky.