Hotwire Hotel: Florida / Miami / Brickell - Conrad

[FFFrequentTraveler]

Upon trying this hotel in reveal zone about 4 days ago, it was not revealed.

 

Now, when I try a random date in April, it is revealed.

 

The reveal says, "Conrad Miami".  Well, that is almost correct. 

 

Firstly, Conrad was bought by the AKA group and renamed as AKA Hotel.

 

Secondly, many other websites show this hotel as merely a 4 star.  I would agree.  Having stayed both at Mandarin Oriental Brickell, and Four Seasons Brickell, I would say that those two are truly 5 star, whereas AKA hotel is more like a 4 star.

 

I think Hotwire is experiencing star inflation.

 

 

 

 

[thereuare]

Hi, and welcome to BetterBidding!

 

Thank you for letting us know the information above.

 

We typically use the same hotel names that HOTWIRE uses (so when they officially change the name that is when we do as well).

 

I tried to replicate this issue and on two searches:
BiddingHelper.com Brickell, FL for Feb 24-25 i see the 5 star hotel in the Brickell-Financial District zone listed as Hotel AKA Brickel

I then repeated at RevealHotels, searching Miami, FL (just in case the search location made a difference) for Feb 23-24  and i once again see the same hotel listed as Hotel AKA Brickel.

 

What dates are you searching so i can try to replicate with the Conrad name still appearing?

 

I do find it interesting that the hotel uses the name 'Brickel' with one 'L' while the city and hotwire zone use two L's.

 

Star inflation used to be a major issue with HOTWIRE about 5+ years ago, but at some point they did a major star re-rating though-out their portfolio and they are now much more inline with other star ratings for the same hotel.  I don't have firsthand experience with this property, but my guess is that it may have been worthy of a 5 star rating when it was a Conrad, but with the changing of name/ownership they have not yet lowered the star rating to be commensurate with the new brand... it will likely (at some point in the future) be dropped to 4/4.5 stars or the hotel will bring their services up to the 5 star level; it may take some time for HOTWIRE to get the feedback in order to make such a change.

 

Please do let us know the dates that you were searching for so we can try to replicate this hotel appearing under the previous name and make any changes on our end accordingly.

 

EDIT TO ADD: looks like Priceline also rates the AKA Hotel Brickell (with 2 L's) as 5 stars so I can't say if this will eventually be re-rated in the future or what the true rating should be.  Given the subjectivity of star ratings it could be a case where at every star rating there are those at the upper end of the boundary and those at the lower end of the boundary.  As i've commented before, the student who gets a 90 and the student who gets a 100 both get an 'A' on their report card, although they are not necessarily equal students.  Ultimately it comes down to value... if the AKA is $350 and the Mandarin or Four Seasons is $700, i don't care what they rate any of them, then question (for me) becomes whether the latter two are worth twice as much as the previous one.