Moomba

I just came back from a stay at the Westin Miyako in Kyoto. My room reservation stated Heavenly Bed. The bed in my room was far from heavenly.

It had the Heavenly duvet, pillows and linen but it was not a heavenly mattress as I have had on previous stays at Westin hotels. The mattress was quite lumpy and on inspection looked quite old and did not have the extra comfort layer over the mattress.

So is a heavenly bed the whole shooting match or just the pretty linen etc. Should I have complained as my reservation clearly stated Heavenly Bed? Is the Heavenly Bed something that can be reserved and should be honoured?

BTW the literature in the rooms suggested that 'some' of their hotel rooms have Heavenly Beds.

SecretAgent

Ahhhh..."Some rooms have the Heavenly Bed." It sounds like you got a room that clearly did not. THe Westin Heavenly Bed does indeed include good mattresses, not just the bedding. The following from Westin.com:

The all-white Heavenly Bed consists of:

A custom-designed pillowtop mattress set by Simmons with 900 individual coils;
Three sheets - ranging in thread count from 180 to 250;
A down blanket - three versions for three different climates;
A comforter and a crisp white duvet; Five goosedown/goose feather pillows.

Still, unless that property is currently undergoing renovation, I would wonder how they got by with only partial compliance.

redtop

I, too, just had a recent stay in the Westin Miyako, Kyoto. I also had issues with the beds in our room. We had booked a standard room, but since we got a gold upgrade, I've been wondering ever since if our beds were supposed to be heavenly. It was the same as you described it--the heavenly bedding, including duvet, pillows, comforter, but the mattresses were awful. They looked twenty years old, and were honestly the worst mattresses I have ever slept on in a hotel. It looked like there was no box spring--just two matresses stuck one atop the other. When I pressed down on the top mattress, the "boxspring" would compress a couple inches. I didn't complain, either, so I don't know if the Miyako has better beds out there.

What category room did you end up in? I think we ended up in a "superior grand view" room, since these are supposed to have heavenly beds, and we had a pretty good city view on the 9th floor. In any case, clearly misleading advertising, and definitely not heavenly.

Moomba

I booked Deluxe room and was given Deluxe room with (upgrade of) Executive Club access for breakfast and evening cocktails. The room was the newer style of decoration and was quite nice apart from the bed. View was of the garden courtyard on 7th floor.

After 2 nights of 4 night stay I complained I couldn't sleep as there was rumbling vibrations keeping me awake.They moved me to Junior suite on 11th floor overlooking the city. This room was decorated in older style (would have been latest of high tech room in the 70's but it did have the heavenly bed and for the next two nights I did sleep heavenly.

Hence the reason for my original post. If my booking states Heavenly bed am I supposed to get a Heavenly bed?
Mr. Lurker are you in? Can you please give the official SPG view on this subject?

Starwood Lurker

Yes, I can. SPG does not have a view on this subject. SPG is the frequent stay program for Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide. Now, the Westin brand might have a view on the subject. Perhaps the Asia Pacific Division within which the hotel resides might also have a view on the subject. But, SPG? Nah. I really don't think they care much about stuff over which they have no authority.

If I had such a question, I would direct it to the management of the hotel via Corporate Customer Service. 800-328-6242.

Best of luck.

Sincerely,


William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

[email protected]

Moomba

So are you saying that bookings made on the SPG website can have misleading room information and SPG don't care about that?

For future reference, if any feature or benefit for a room, as quoted and booked on SPG.com, is not evident during the stay are we justified in/should we be making a complaint to the hotel at that point? I am not talking about the general blurb about the hotel either I mean the room features listed with the room quote.

Starwood Lurker

I guess I am saying that the same information available on the spg.com web site is available on all the other branded web sites (starwood.com & westin.com, for example) and if you have a problem with what information a hotel chooses to put there, then your best route to resolution is to contact the hotel through customer service because SPG has no control over that.

Sincerely,


William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

[email protected]

Life_Platinum

I read a recent article in one of the travel mags that the bed wars were heating up, as others chains are trying to emulate Starwood's success with this product. I also read that the Starwood Heavenly Bed comes in at least two different versions, one of people, and the second for their pets (dogs). The article did not indicate that other chains had picked up on the dog version of the Heavenly Bed.

gleff

While there are likely brand standards for what constitutes a heavenly bed, there is certainly variation.

For instance, IIRC the Westin Diplomat advertises heavenly beds but has a nice mattress that isn't Simmons. (The story found somewhere her on FT was that they bought the mattresses before they signed the management contract w/ Westin, though I can't independently verify it.)

Another issue is age of mattress... what once may have been a top of the line heavenly mattress may be ready for replacement... and thus not up to heavenly comfort.

777 global mile hound

Interesting post......

The fact is that the Starwood folks were genious when those responsible came up with the "Heavenly Bed" branding concept years ago.
Other then the usual Pillow Top and linens I don't think there is a definition.
I have noticed within North America that it seems to be very similar if not exactly the same product.
But the truth is many times it is not the same product from Country to Country.The sheets may be the same or perhaps the pillows and duvets too.
But the beds are usually quite different in the International market.

For example the "Heavenly Bed" is not that similar at the Westin in Sydney when compared to the former Westin Century Plaza (now a Hyatt) or other such similar property.You are simply buying a brand name IMO with a certain quality standard that is IMO always usually satisfactory or perhaps highly satisfactory in most cases.

I would compare it in fact to a Mc Donalds "Quarter Pounder".
Order one in Sydney and one in NYC similar looking yet completely different taste.They don't fly the meat in from the US and I doubt they fly/ship the bed over to Sydney.Its all in the name or actually the perception of the brand.
The shipping would be prohibitive.
I would bet they try and get a similar product overseas to the best of their ability.There are plenty of customers that roll around in the clean linens and wouldn't probably know the difference once they are told its a "Heavenly Bed"
To the average customer it just has to be branded and recognizable as what they saw before in the advertisement or the last Westin they were in.......

Helena Handbaskets

So perhaps the OP ended up with a Heavenly dog bed? Or just a dog of a Heavenly bed?

btw, there's also a Heavenly crib.

SecretAgent

LOLOLOL Made me spit my coffee !!! LOLOLOL

Moomba

Well I took the honorable Lurker's suggestion and contacted Customer Services on this issue. They in turn contacted the Westin Myako Kyoto on my behalf.

I received an email today from the Director Of Rooms who stated that the first room I was in did not have a Heavenly Bed and that they were in the process of rolling them out across the hotel. This is due to be completed by next Spring.

I would like to give kudos to the hotel for the honesty of their reply and the bonus starpoints they awarded me for the inconvenience. ^

I responded to the email thanking them for getting back to me. I did however let them know that it is misleading if they describe their Deluxe rooms as having Heavenly Beds when in fact not all of them do.

yann

Does anyone have an update on the Heavenly bed situation (and general renovation of rooms) at Westin Miyako ?

We will be staying there in May, and wonder what to expect.

Thanks,
Yann

PackADaySmoker

I've discussed this with Starwood "CCS". This is what they told me, slightly paraphrased.

There have been a couple different 'generations' of the heavenly bed. Some of the hotels have the original version which is not as nice and comfy as the newest. And, each different region has a different standard for their beds.

Ultimately, Starwood wants all of it's Westins to have the Newest Generation hb, but when you've got 200-500 rooms on average, this is a HUGE expense. Go to www.westin-hotelsathome.com to see what the retail price of these beds are. Fully decked out you're looking at about US$3500 for a king. Sure, there's probably a discount for Starwood from the manufacturers, but it is still a huge undertaking. As such, they can not expect the hotels to immediately upgrade. Hotels are given a deadline to have it done. Usually at least a year since the change needed to be made.

And the first generation beds are now pretty old...

Bottom line, William's right. If you don't like the bed, call CCS. Let them know! Otherwise you're only having a bad night's sleep.