RCC St Thomas. Rarified air I know, but...

[ljmiii]

...one of the most pleasant things about staying at the RCC was the absence of that feeling of a state of war between management and guests. If you wanted a beach towel you got one...or eight. There were plenty of dishwasher pods. And laundry pods. And creamers for the coffee. And I'm sure that if we needed more we would have been given them.

Over the past couple of years we've stayed at a number of nice to very nice MVC resorts. And I had been sort of annoyed at the increasing distance between the expectations and reality of service at the MVCs but I hadn't really put together how much things had changed until our stay at the RCC. Even our newly beloved Westin St John introduced towel cards this year (not that anyone at checkout cared about how many we had).

I'm beginning to think that being parsimonious with these things are the MF equivalent of 'security theater'. It has nothing to do with actual thrift - the cost of these items is insignificant compared to the rapidly rising cost of 'big ticket' line items like wages, insurance, and management fees. But if owners can see the staff doling out each and every coffee creamer like it was gold, they know MVC is 'on the case' keeping MFs down.

 

[WBP]

...one of the most pleasant things about staying at the RCC was the absence of that feeling of a state of war between management and guests. If you wanted a beach towel you got one...or eight. There were plenty of dishwasher pods. And laundry pods. And creamers for the coffee. And I'm sure that if we needed more we would have been given them.

Over the past couple of years we've stayed at a number of nice to very nice MVC resorts. And I had been sort of annoyed at the increasing distance between the expectations and reality of service at the MVCs but I hadn't really put together how much things had changed until our stay at the RCC. Even our newly beloved Westin St John introduced towel cards this year (not that anyone at checkout cared about how many we had).

I'm beginning to think that being parsimonious with these things are the MF equivalent of 'security theater'. It has nothing to do with actual thrift - the cost of these items is insignificant compared to the rapidly rising cost of 'big ticket' line items like wages, insurance, and management fees. But if owners can see the staff doling out each and every coffee creamer like it was gold, they know MVC is 'on the case' keeping MFs down.

Marriott Vacation Club made this mess. When Marriott Vacation Club factored The Ritz-Carlton Club - - a Private Residence Club - - into their portfolio of timeshare resorts, they set the stage for reflections like yours. In my opinion, you are comparing apples and oranges, the only thing that the apples and oranges have in common is the currency that you use to purchase the produce.

In my opinion, you are compaing a high quality timeshare product, with, what once WAS, a luxury tier, Private Residence Club. At that Private Residence Club, there was never an (initial) intention of opening that club to a Marriott timeshare audience; The Ritz-Carton Club was intended as a Private Residence Club, for the exclusive use by (RCC) Club Members, and their guests. Opening those floodgates caused the Members at The Ritz-Carlton Club, Aspen Highlands, to go sideways, and to sue MVC.

If The Ritz-Carlton Club existed, today, as it was initially envisioned, it would operate as a true luxury product, managed by the consummate luxury professionals, and luxury hoteliers of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company. But that does not exist. What exists, today, is a pig wearing lipstick. compliments of the Timeshare Jockeys at Marriott Vacation Club (and the Timeshare Jockeys are busy making strategic decisions about The Ritz-Carlton Club, from their timeshare perch in Orlando). If we were original purchasers of a first generation, Ritz-Carlton Club Membership, we’d be incensed to discover the deception that existed amongst the Marriott Vacation Club salesforce at The Ritz-Carlton Club, which just so happened to cost Marriott Vacation Club a MINIMUM of $25=$40 Million dollars, for alleged deception and non-disclosure of the Mello-Roos Tax, at The Ritz-Carlton Club and Residences, San Francisco.

 

[ljmiii]

Marriott Vacation Club made this mess. When Marriott Vacation Club factored The Ritz-Carlton Club - - a Private Residence Club - - into their portfolio of timeshare resorts, they set the stage for reflections like yours. In my opinion, you are comparing apples and oranges, the only thing that the apples and oranges have in common is the currency that you use to purchase the produce.

Not at all...though perhaps I should have made it clearer. I'm comparing MVC today to what it was pre-COVID (never mind when I first bought in). It's just that staying at the RCC reminded me of what MVC used to be not that long ago. No grief about towels or dishwasher pods or any of the other petty annoyances that MVC's management seems intent on inflicting on its owners.

Perhaps it is true that our MVC stays were also rarified air. Until very recently 90% of our MVC stays were at the various Hawaii resorts, Custom House and the Mayflower. And as I learned in the mid-week tidy thread the service at those resorts has always been better there than at the HHI resorts. But we did stay pre-COVID at Imperial/Royal Palms and Newport Coast and I don't remember towels/supplies/housekeeping grief there either.

 

[dioxide45]

Not at all...though perhaps I should have made it clearer. I'm comparing MVC today to what it was pre-COVID (never mind when I first bought in). It's just that staying at the RCC reminded me of what MVC used to be not that long ago. No grief about towels or dishwasher pods or any of the other petty annoyances that MVC's management seems intent on inflicting on its owners.

Perhaps it is true that our MVC stays were also rarified air. Until very recently 90% of our MVC stays were at the various Hawaii resorts, Custom House and the Mayflower. And as I learned in the mid-week tidy thread the service at those resorts has always been better there than at the HHI resorts. But we did stay pre-COVID at Imperial/Royal Palms and Newport Coast and I don't remember towels/supplies/housekeeping grief there either.

I remember issues related to pool towels and room towels dating back more than a decade. One of our first stays at Ocean Pointe we had a studio. We needed new towels because we didn't have in-room laundry. They wouldn't do it. No new towels. This was long before Covid. There has long been towel huts, towel exchange cards or some other scheme to track pool towels dolled out.

I seem to recall the free flow of in room supplies to be something that came about with Covid and the ease of texting the front desk to ask for stuff when no one wanted to talk to each other. They would just drop stuff outside your door. Whatever you asked for. I don't remember anything like that pre-covid.

For some reason people seem to think how things happened during covid was the norm before covid too. I've seen this when people talk about exchanges and availability. How things were so much easier. Yes, it was easier during covid but people forgot that it wasn't the same prior to covid. It's now been 5 years. That's a long time and memories run together.

 

[ocdb8r]

For some reason people seem to think how things happened during covid was the norm before covid too. I've seen this when people talk about exchanges and availability. How things were so much easier. Yes, it was easier during covid but people forgot that it wasn't the same prior to covid. It's now been 5 years. That's a long time and memories run together.

I wonder if there's also an element of some of us Vistana folks creeping in? I will say that pre-MVC acquisition and pre-COVID, I never had any issues at the Vistana/Westin/Sheraton resorts getting extra supplies when needed....and I had always understood that at a location where you don't have in-room laundry, you should have the ability to swap out bath towels as needed. Both as a result of changes at Vistana/Westin/Sheraton and dipping my toes more into the MVC world, I too have noticed more of these "friction" points.

I called the front desk at Newport Coast last year the night before we checked out to ask for an extra dishwasher tablet and I was told I could buy them at the Marketplace store. I explained we just wanted to run the dishwasher that night before we left the next morning and that they were basically saying I should just leave it full of dirty dishes....and the response was "yes, if that's what you want to do." It seemed a bit foolhardy to me...and I caught housekeeping outside one of the nearby rooms and they were happy to give me a tablet.

 

[ljmiii]

I seem to recall the free flow of in room supplies to be something that came about with Covid and the ease of texting the front desk to ask for stuff when no one wanted to talk to each other. They would just drop stuff outside your door. Whatever you asked for. I don't remember anything like that pre-covid.

We've never texted for supplies before, during, or after 2020. We always get them from housekeeping...and it's only been in the past year or three that we've gotten the 'I'm not supposed to but here you go' answer.

Towels are trickier because we never needed them at the Pulses, Palms resorts (busy at WDW) or NCV (Feb visit so brrrrr).

 

[jp10558]

IDK about MVC, but I'm always a little confused by various TSs where they no longer give you the check in / check out paper in a lot of cases. So I never know if they're expecting me to take out trash (where?) or if I'm supposed to purchase dishwasher pods, toilet paper, etc or not. Lately I've been able to ask for stuff at HGVC no issues. Same so far at Hyatt The Welk, though that was for an extra blanket and a blender. But I get the impression I can probably ask for dishwasher pods or toilet paper if necessary.

Other places like Massanutten, Smuggs or Vacation Village Weston I'm less sure what's included. But so far haven't been denied anything - though I often bring my own spares if I'm driving. It's harder when flying.