Omni La Costa Resort & Spa Carlsbad

“Disappointment”

We have been coming to Omni La Costa for over 20 years, and this trip was by far the worst. The pillows were completely flat and provided no support. The AC unit in our room was very loud, making it difficult to sleep. There was a gap in the restroom doors, allowing anyone to peer in and making it … more

We have been coming to Omni La Costa for over 20 years, and this trip was by far the worst. The pillows were completely flat and provided no support. The AC unit in our room was very loud, making it difficult to sleep. There was a gap in the restroom doors, allowing anyone to peer in and making it very difficult to be private. Upon walking into our room, I noticed a large spider hanging from the ceiling near the window. I killed it before my wife had a chance to see it; otherwise, it would have been a bigger issue. And lastly, many rooms had food plates left outside their doors that required pickup, which was not done in a timely manner. To me, it seemed like the "attention to detail" was not taken into consideration. Sad for such a nice resort.

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“The price was right, kids loved the pools, just needs to up some small service areas.”

We have been coming to Carlsbad annually for about 7 years now. Always staying at Park Hyatt Aviara as we stumbled upon them 7 years ago and really loved it there. We had always seen and heard great things about Omni La Costa, especially it being kid friendly with the pools now that we have 2 kids… more

We have been coming to Carlsbad annually for about 7 years now. Always staying at Park Hyatt Aviara as we stumbled upon them 7 years ago and really loved it there. We had always seen and heard great things about Omni La Costa, especially it being kid friendly with the pools now that we have 2 kids (age 5 and 2), with this year's trip the cost of Aviara being double Omni La Costa, we figured we would stay with them to check it out. We were gaming the new AMEX biannual hotel credits, and make 2 separate consecutive bookings for the 22nd-24th and 25th-26th. Upon arrival, the front desk offered us an upgrade from a double room to a junior suite for the second leg of our stay, which we opted not to do as we didn't want move/unpack, and we also liked the location of the double room being close to valet, restaurants, and the pools. The front desk was very flexible in making it work to where if we didn't upgrade that we wouldn't have to move rooms, so we did appreciate that. After the initial check in process, we found a litany of service issues that kind of surprised me and my wife, especially comparing Omni to our previous stays at the Aviara. Omni had a promotion going on, kids eat breakfast and lunch free, dinner 50% off, which is quite generous given the drink, entree, side and dessert the kiddos got each time. An additional AMEX perk was that we had a breakfast credit to help cover the adult breakfasts, so all of this was likely around a $125-$150 a day, which is pretty awesome. The first 5 meals we did have a service related issue, which almost got to the point of being comical. A kids chicken strips came out as macaroni and cheese. We ordered a cocktail for 2 that came out in one glass, the server was unaware that it was supposed to be for 2. The biscuits and soyrizo gravy, we asked the server if it was vegetarian, she thought it had meat, so a manager came out and said the soyrizo was vegetarian but thought it had something meat based, so the cook came out to confirm it was all vegetarian, but then told us that biscuits wouldn't be ready for another thirty minutes. Another time we ordered a side of ‘carrots and celery’ only to have carrots come out, the server was puzzled didn’t know carrots were included, only to bring out some piping hot carrots 5 minutes later, which oddly didn’t go with the cold celery and ranch. A big chip in my glass was another instance. The funniest one, both of our girls went down for a nap, so I offered to go to the lobby/Traza bar to get a beer and a cocktail for my wife. I asked the bartender which drink he liked better, The Bees Knees or the Blue Ridge Flip? He said, “I don’t like any of those drinks, I drink Coors Light.” I mean, who says that when the cocktails are $20 and $22 a piece. I asked for the other bartender to come make the drink, which he was enthusiastic to make the Flip, and it was quite good. Valet not unlocking the truck doors when a family clearly walking up to need the back doors to get the girls in. Numerous times the staff walking through the door or a hallway the same time as you and not really making room, or waiting aside. I know that sounds a little pretentious but it happened multiple times. On check out, going over the folio, I asked if the $100 AMEX credit was applied, and the way it was presented didn’t make sense to me. Instead of all of the charges happening and then seeing a $100 credit at the bottom, the $100 credit was broken up to cover 3-4 different charges. On the second leg/folio, we were charged a breakfast when that was supposed to be free which I still need to follow up on. Would I stay at Omni again, yes, if it was half the cost of Aviara again, but we were quite surprised at the gap in service as it is just a lot of little things that just added up, which I feel could just be teachable moments for staff. The property is beautiful, great pools for the kiddos, room was nice. Just need to up their service game a bit.

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