Confused about room rates....

I hear mention on here of different rates for rooms on the strip, new guest, rack rates, and comp value. Can someone explain the difference of the three and are their other rates?

 

Way too many variables to answer you question. I will say the biggest variables are

Past Play
and
Supply and Demand.

 

New Guest - I don't know what that means in terms of rates.

Rack Rate = the rate that shows on a hotel's website if you are just a member of the general public and not looking at a price that is discounted either under a publicly available offer code (like ones found in the Discounts thread here, or on a hotel's own website), or a player's club marketing offer. So this is the highest possible rate.

Comp Value = The hotel and casino are separate operating units. When you book a marketing offer from a casino, the casino operation pays the hotel operation for the room, typically at a discount of 30% or more to the rack rate. The amount the casino pays the hotel for the room is the comp value of the room. The casino needs to recoup that amount (and a lot more, to be profitable) from you through your play.

Example: You get an offer from a 3 night comped stay in a "Deluxe ABC" room. You go to the hotels website and without entering any discount codes, you see that the typical rate per night is $100. When you book the casino offer, the casino is probably going to pay between $60 - $70 a night for that room, and they'll be looking for you to generate between 3x - 4x that amount in theoretical win (for them) via gambling.

Other rates - Most hotels offer discounts to everybody at any given time, via offers on their websites and through third party travel sites. It's pretty hard to actually end up paying rack rate unless you are not aware there are discounts.

 

To get an idea of Supply and Demand on room rates, check out January rate pages.

Bellagio for example has some room nights as low as $145 and high of $1,020. Same room, same hotel. And that high rate is not for New Years either.

 

Actually a number of us don't play for comps so many of us don't qualify for anything other than the rack rate. But that's why I usually check the third party sites for better deals.

As for New Guest, I would assume that means people who sign up for the casino's player's card for the first time and are regarded as a "new" guest or customer. Some hotels will offer some room deals to these people to entice them to stay and play at their casino. They then use the person's stay as an indicator whether he/she will get future offers from the hotel based on their play.

 

I think you get a 15% discount just for being an MLife member for example. And their hotels usually have offers (check the individual hotel sites, or smartervegas)

CET properties have "sales" all the time.

Third party aggregators are definitely an option (airlines especially), occasionally they will have really good combo air/hotel rates.

If you're not a gambler, it definitely takes more legwork to find the best prices. You have to do a bunch of research (ie checking sites) over time, it's not a matter of this site or that site will always have the best price. On any given day you are looking, and for any given stay dates, it's going to vary.

 

Another option for rates is hotel programs from various credit cards. American Express has the Fine Hotels and Resorts program (select luxury hotels) and a recently introduced program which includes some of the moderate properties such as Mandalay Bay.
Another option is if you have frequent stay points with one of the major hotel chains, you may be able to apply hotel points to lower your room rate at a chain property in Las Vegas.

Hope this helps!
Kelly

 

Thank you everyone. I now understand.

 

Back when I was in college (years ago, DECADES ago) I worked in hotels off and on. What we THEN called the "rack rate" was the rate posted on the "rack" on the back of the door, which was the rate that was usually charged on a busy night. Nowadays, "rack rate" seems to mean more like the "suggested list price" or cold-call or walk-in rate, with the posted rate being majorly inflated to hundreds if not thousands to allow management to CYA when they jack up rates on NYE or other really busy nights.

One term we used which you seldom hear anymore is "run of the house" or ROTH room, meaning a regular hotel room or whatever is available.

One thing that I really think has changed in recent years is that desk agents don't seem to have the leeway they used to. When I worked desk at one place, the GM always told us never to "walk" anyone on price if we had rooms to sell, since the marginal cost of turning a room was really quite low and it boosted occupancy numbers. I know I told the story here of one thing I witnessed in the late 90s where a friend complained to the desk at the IP that she was being charged more than someone else and the desk guy just picked up his pen, crossed out the rate and wrote in another. I don't think that would ever fly today!