Hotel philosophy 101 through 499: Loot, pillage, and burn #Life

Loot: Build hotels near a conference center. Bump up the room rates drastically whenever there's an event going on. Rely on your neighboring hotels to do the same, so there's no risk of actual, like, competition to drive the price down. (Common business sense. Supply and demand.)

Pillage: Now that you've started down the slippery slope of greed, make a deal with Borland to offer rooms at a "conference rate" that's actually a higher rate than if customers book directly with the hotel... but if they do try to book directly with the hotel, charge the entire stay to their credit card immediately (not even waiting until they check in). As a <voice dripping="sarcasm"> deposit </voice>. Make them read the fine print to notice that you're going to do this. If that causes problems for people who want to use check cards and then get reimbursed by their employer, well, screw 'em. (At this point, somebody is in need of reading the Cluetrain Manifesto.)

Burn: Now that you're lusting for power and wealth, decide to charge your customers an extra $14 a day for Internet service. (For that price, I could call Cox, ask them to come in and wire the hotel room for cable, pay for the setup fees and one month of service, and come out money ahead.)

What's really scary is that some damn fool, somewhere, must actually be paying $14 a day for Internet in their room.

I must find this person and stop them.